Day 1
I found this diary floating among some of the salvage that has washed up alongside me on the beach. Along with a bottle of ink and a stray quill that remained within the captain's destroyed writing desk, I should be able to document my time here on this island. Even if I should perish on this shore there will remain a record. Perhaps those that come after, perhaps even my own countrymen, will happen upon it. Or perhaps I'll deliver it myself one day back to my homeland. I cannot say. I only know that writing this makes me feel grounded somehow, which after last night is sweet succor to my shaken nerves.
The storm was like some howling elemental demon with wind like claws that ripped at our sails and our skin. The Captain, however, had assured me that the ship would weather it fine. I took him to be a wise man of calm demeanor and calculated action and so I know the fault of the sinking likely does not lie with him. Rather it seems more likely it was some unavoidable work of fate. The vessel was a fine two masted sailing ship titled "The Queen's Mercy" which had been carrying cargo from the far east back to the frigid shores of home. A well seasoned trading vessel with yet many years of work ahead of her, I had no reason to doubt its physical integrity and must assume that some time during the night we hit a shoal or a low reef in the storm. For all I know we may have been taken under by a Kraken, a beast set my Poseidon himself to destroy our vessel. Whatever the cause I know little of the actual sinking. I was awoken in the night amid a tumultuous and ruinous scene of blind panic and desperate action. I remember men screaming, running in the darkness below decks as the ship lurched. The crew must have fought tooth and nail to keep her afloat. I wish I might have helped in that endeavor. Perhaps the aid of my hands, as inexperienced as I am at sailing, might have somehow saved the ship from her fate. I suppose fate had other plans for me as struck my head at some point in the panic and passed in to a deep unconsciousness.
I awoke, just a few hours ago now, on a desolate, lonely, rocky beach. By some chance miracle, my trousers had hooked on to a crate filled with wax sealed incense. It kept me afloat and saved me from being swallowed by the black abyss of this angry, cold sea. The strangest thing happened when I awoke, though. There was a figure there, watching me from some feet away. It was of a darker complexion and looked to be holding some kind of stick. At first I thought it was one of my crew mates. In my half drowned delirium I called out for assistance before once again fainting back in to unconsciousness. When I awoke I was again alone and have seen no other living soul. I'll make a search for survivors of the wreck and salvageable supplies along the beach before it gets dark. It's about all I think I can do with how worn and battered I feel.
Day 2
I have seen no other members of the crew... no living ones, that is. 2 men, some of the sailors that worked the lines, washed up on the beach lifeless and pale. I buried them as best I could. It was an exhausting labor but I managed to dig some pits in the sand above the high tide line. I laid the men to their final rest and piled stones above them until I was satisfied that nothing short of a bull elephant would be able to unearth them. It took most of the day, but the supplies washing up on shore have made it an easier task. I found a few crates of salted meat and a few other useful things.
It does appear that I am after all not alone here. I saw the figure again. It watched me as I buried the sailors. It... they stood over half a mile off, watching me from afar. From such a distance I could discern little of what they look like save for that they are athletically built and that they appear to be wearing some kind of fetishistic raven mask. It is some kind of carved totem, colored black and red that gives the figure a very unearthly, eerie quality. It must be some native of this land. Many peoples in this area of the seas have had little or no contact with outside nations. I have no idea how many natives call this place home but hopefully they are not of the xenophobic or bloodthirsty sort. Not that I could do much of anything to stop them if they are. I can only show that I am no threat and only seek to survive here on this strangely windswept island.
Day 7
This is a crooked place. The winds never stop here. The trees, the rocks, the sands, it is all bent and warped like an old man who has seen too many days of hard labor. It makes it hard to even walk about. The springtime cold doesn't help matters either. The nights are cold, and only my clumsily built driftwood fires keep me from shivering myself to pieces. Luckily the pitch soaked wood of my former ship makes for excellent, if hard to light fuel. Once ignited it tends to burn for hours on end.
I have seen the figure again, every day in fact. I think them to be a she judging by the evident swell of their hips. They haven't yet approached closer than two or three hundred feet. I'll spot them off on a hill top, or on a distant outcropping of rock in the surf, or hiding back in the gnarled forest that covers this island as I go about my business. They watch me seemingly at all hours. It is unsettling, especially with that odd crow mask the girl is always wearing. I think it is a crow mask, that is. The distinct artistic style of it is a bit hard for my civilized sensibilities to parse. I've decided to simply call her Crow for now. Maybe one day she'll come close enough to tell me what her given name is.
Day 14
Work on my makeshift camp is coming along nicely. I have cleared a space a bit up and away from the beach and used much of the recovered wreckage of the ship to make myself a shelter. It keeps the rain off for the most part but my recovered supplies are growing a bit scarce. I estimate that I have about 2 weeks worth of food if I ration a bit. With fewer and fewer boxes of cargo washing up on the beach each day I'll have to start fending for myself soon.
I saw Crow today. As I combed the beach I spied her climbing up a sheer sea cliff across the bay. I watched, fascinated as she free climbed the jagged rocks, ascending with a speed that hardly seemed natural. I've seen skilled climbers and bouldering enthusiasts during my time at university and none would have been able to hold a candle to the athletic prowess of this girl. Even wearing her ungainly mask, she made the summit of the 80 foot tall rock without stopping or slowing even slightly.
I watched as she stood atop that cliff. She stood naked, clad only in that same iconographic crow mask she always wears. Though I was too far away to make out much detail it is obvious she is quite fit. Her body is muscular, athletic, which I assume must be a necessity to live in such a rough environment. I watched as she dove from the top of that cliff. You should have seen it! She danced off the edge, a motion she had likely done a thousand times. Her honed body plummeted down that 80 foot cliff down in to the crushing sea below. I tell you honestly that I thought her dead then. Her body disappeared in to the sea foam at the bottom of that cliff and she remained beneath the dark glass waves for what seemed like ages. When she came back up I could see that there was a rather large trophy fish on the end of her spear! I stood and I clapped. I cheered long and hard, whooping and waving my arms in delight as she carried her well earned protein back to shore. I needed her to know that someone, some other living soul, had witnessed her incredible skill. I have never seen such an incredible display of human athleticism! Even the bravest divers on the university team would have balked at such a leap, and to do it and come back up with an award worthy trophy fish! Astounding. She is absolutely astounding.
Day 24
Food supplies are low. I'm going to have a go at fishing. I have not the skill to spear fish as Crow does, so I've used some salvaged line from the wreckage to make a net. It is an ugly thing but hopefully a functional one.
Day 25
The net is gone. Likely dislodged by a seal trying to get at some fish caught in it. The coast is rife with the barking beasts and if I had the means I would kill one in an instant. The damned beasts flee whenever I come within eyesight. I imagine my seal fur clad friend Crow has brought about this innate fear of humans in the beasts.
Day 32
I awoke today to a surprise. My food supplies ran out two days ago. I stretched them as long as I could, supplementing my diet with the many coconuts growing on the shores and what crabs I could take from the tide pools. The past days have been hungry ones. This morning however I found a bundle on the doorstep to my makeshift shelter. Inside a small bark package were four large, dried, smoked fish. I know this is Crow's doing. Though I have yet to even speak a single word with this girl I feel like I know her, at least in part. It is a gift that is well welcome, and one I shall have to repay in kind.
Day 33
I have a gift for Crow. It's a small pocket knife I lifted from one of the dead sailors. Hardly a cheap trinket back home, but pretty and functional. Metal must be a foreign thing to her and I hope she likes it. I'm going to leave it on a nearby rock when she is watching and I'm going to leave it in the same bark wrapper she used to give me those fish.
Day 36
The knife was gone in the morning. Crow must have taken it. I have not seen her for 2 days. I know she is likely off hunting or fishing or attending some other necessary duty but it feels odd now not to look up and see her staring at me, painted mask watching my every move.
Day 37
Crow came in to my camp last night! It was late. I like to watch my camp fires, make sure they smoulder to embers before snuffing them out. A loose forest fire on an island of this size could be a death sentence to me in the short or long run. It was in those long hours, the cold hours just past midnight that she appeared. The girl is stealthy, quiet as a house cat stalking a sparrow. I almost jumped out of my boots when she sat silently on a log opposite me. In the dim light I could see she wore a cloak made from some tanned fur and her wooden mask was like the visage of some vengeful spirit, menacing in the night. Her body is covered in either paint, or possibly even some kind of tattoos, but the dim light made it hard to tell. For minutes neither of us spoke. I was afraid that by shattering that silence with my voice I would scare her off. Luckily she spared me the decision and she broke the silence. She pointed with one bare foot at my fire pit. "Shen." she said and I knew it to mean fire. In retrospect it could mean "warm" or "orange" or "coals" but I took it to mean fire. "Fire" I responded, heart pounding at this much desired and human exchange. A month may seem a short time, but alone in the wilderness a month is a very long time indeed. When I heard her high, raspy, feminine voice ring out in the night my soul sang in joy. I could not say for how long we sat. I stoked the fire a bit but was reluctant to get up to get more wood. I simply stared at my companion across the fire pit as we exchanged words. Then, just as the sun was beginning to lighten the sky, she vanished. I yawned and by the time I closed my mouth she was nowhere to be seen. I hope she comes back tonight.
Day 41
Crow has been visiting me every day now. Sometimes she comes and sits on the rocks while I forage in the tide pools. Sometimes she comes to sit by my fire. I share my fire and she shares her food, usually dried fish or nuts. We can't really converse yet. Every day we simply exchange languages. She'll teach me her words for clam or cloud, and I'll teach her my words for water, or hair. Anything and everything. She has shown me some better ways to fish and forage. I'm still far from self sufficient but with her gifted food I'm alive. Also I've learned her name is Kukuna, but I think I'll just keep calling her Crow. She calls me Denna. Or maybe more accurately D'ennha? The subtleties of pronouncing her language elude me.
Day 60
Crow took me for a hike today. For my entire stay on this island I have been surviving off of salvaged rations, a rain trap I have made using spare sail cloth, and what drinkable water I can get from coconuts. I was close to running out, with only a few stored bottles of rain water left. I asked Crow for help. After some broken communication and charades I finally conveyed that I wanted her to show me where she got her water. I had never seen her foraging coconuts and knew she had to get her water from some place. Maybe some brackish pool or purified seep.
Crow led me up the mountain that dominates the southern half of the island. I was enrolled in the outdoors-man club in university. I have climbed a mountain or two, canoed exotic rivers. Nothing I have done was as hard as climbing the trail through the mountain forest that Crow showed me. The wind is relentless, the rocks rough and loose. The island is volcanic and the vegetation is thick and snags at the feet with every step.
The climb was rough, but I must admit here to giving in to a certain weakness of man. The hike, as arduous as it was, gave me a prime chance to ogle my companion from up close. Her body is like steel, every muscle trained by days of climbing cliffs, diving in the sea, and hiking the mountain trails. Her body is harder, more toned than the average woman and even most men. Her picture would be a textbook example of a peak performance athlete. Save for her rear. On that long hike up the mountain I had prime opportunity to glance at Crow's rear. I am ashamed to admit it, but I eagerly eyed her like some old lecher, and my mind swam with imagined scenarios too lewd to pen here. I have been alone on this island for over a month now and some primal part of me could not look away. Her rear, barely contained by her tight leather trousers, jiggled with every step she took. I drank in every second, despite my wheezing, labored breaths. Her shapely rear is the only part of her body with any noticeable fat and seems larger in proportion because of it. Fit form, small breasts, a large, round, supple rear. I cannot help but compare her to the nude forms of nymphs and goddesses adorning much ancient pottery. I knew her then as a creature of pure, raw, primal beauty.
We came at some length to the pool. It was a little space, maybe 20 or 30 feet across and looked to be fed by a warm spring in the rocks. Some volcanic stream fed by the supposedly dormant volcano beneath the island. The stream was slight, just a barely visible trickle, but it served to keep this pool filled. I stared at the oddly picturesque little grotto not knowing that Crow hadn't shown me her drinking pool, but rather her bathing pool. With a wild yell the masked girl leaped in, splashing me with the warm water. I cannot deny that it was an entrancing sight. Her nude form, laying back in the steaming spring. Her perky breasts were just big enough to pierce the surface of the water as she floated in utter relaxation. Though we sat in near darkness in that little half cave grotto, the details of her form will remain in my memory forever. We stayed for some hours and ate a small lunch beside the pool.
I took my supply of water, enough for a week or so, back down the mountain to my camp. It strikes me now that every drop of drinkable water I have came from that pool. My drinking water came from her bath tub.
Day 60
Crow and I have started to have conversations. It has taken weeks of work. Our languages are so different that it makes more than basic word to word translation difficult. The structure of her sentences is alien to me, and where words are in the sentence seems to matter quite a bit. "Big bird big" means a large bird that is close by, whereas "big big bird" means a bird that is very, very close by, and "bird big big" means a bird that is simply very, very large. Having even a basic conversation with her can be taxing. Still I am happy to learn. Crow comes by daily now, sometimes waking me up before dawn to talk with me. I get the idea that she has been alone on this island for a very long time. I don't have the language skills to ask her about such complex matters yet, but we are getting there.
One thing that does bother me a bit is that I have yet to see what she looks like beneath that damned crow mask. I've seen her eyes hiding beneath. They are big, almond shaped, golden brown, and lovely. But I have never seen her face. She never removes the mask, even to swim or bathe. Even when she eats she lifts it only enough to get the food in to her mouth. I have to assume it is of some great cultural importance or else she wouldn't go through such trouble. It is vexing though. I yearn to see her face. Even if she were a malformed in some way, I don't think I could adore her less for it.
Day 87
My conversations with Crow have been growing longer. She likes to chat with me, telling me little stories or teaching me new concepts as I fish and forage. I'm still not proficient at it but she helps. She's a bright thing. She's picking up my language far faster than I am picking up her language, learning words I've said but not explicitly taught her. "Damn it!" is her new favorite phrase.
I have also learned, more or less, why she is alone on this island. Apparently this island is one of many within the seafaring domain of her tribe. This particular place is known as an island of evil spirits. Only sorrow and misfortune come to those living here. This is also apparently the reason for Crow's distinctive crow shaped mask. In her words, "Spirit no hurt animal. Wear mask, spirit think Kukuna animal, give no hurt."
I have also learned, through some extensive and rather taxing conversations, the reason for her being stranded here on this supposedly evil island. Apparently her society, the Ananoto people, believe in very, VERY, strict separation between men and women. This separation extends in to all aspects of their lives, even dividing basic survival tasks in to dedicated male and female roles. Our basic exchanged language skills make working out the details difficult. "Man do woman tasks, big bad bad (important and very bad). Same if woman do man tasks. I hunt, I fish, I climb, I fight, all man things. Priestess warning give me. I hear not her. I... know Denna word not, hatuno, make me leave alone. Live here at bad place 3 summers," she said. I couldn't help but note how sad her voice was at the end and she refused to speak more on the subject. It seems her adventurous nature was unacceptable to her people and she violated some serious taboo. Though to exile a young woman, especially one so vibrant and full of life, just for being a bit boyish seems extreme to me.
Day 120
Summer is over and autumn is beginning to set in. I am not familiar with this part of the world but Crow tells me that the weather is about to become very rough. I believe her. The clouds grow thicker and more angry by the day. "Storm time! Big crash! Wave bad wind no!" She has told me similar things time and time again. She has been stockpiling food and supplies. Last night she invited me to come and live with her. In all this time I have yet to even see where she lives. I suppose it's just a part of our unique relationship. This island was her home first and I wanted to allow her to keep her living space secret if she so desired. Apparently, though, my beach side shelter is going to be inadequate for storm season and she wants me to come and stay with her. I have made preparations, secured away what things I cannot or will not take with me, and organized my belongings for transfer to this new place. It is exciting. Tonight will be my last night in my makeshift camp, and this will be my last entry in this diary. I've filled up every page, front, back, margins and all. It is just as well. My inkwell is almost dry. I think I'll use the last page to make a sketch of Crow, a portrait of that haunting mask perhaps.
***
My belongings, for what they are, are packed up. A few knives, some lamp oil, some measures of sail cloth, some scavenged rope, a few sets of clothes thanks to the two dead sailors that washed up on the shore, and some various bottles and jugs to store water. Most of the goods I scavenged were more or less useless. Things like soggy incense and fine perfumes. Things worth very much in my homeland, but less than useless here on this wind blasted island. I also have a little gift for Crow. It's just a cracked hand mirror recovered from the wreckage, but I think she'll like it all the same.
As I exit my driftwood home I see Crow standing on a nearby rise in the beach. She wears some thicker than normal clothing for the chilly weather. Thick boots, a cape of seal fur, and some cozy looking underclothes that do little to hide her rather buff body and round rear. She stands, spear in hand as she looks out over the angry sea and the darkening clouds gathering above. I walk up to her and stand a few feet away from the enigmatic girl. I can't help but admire her impressive physique even though I've seen it every day for months now. "I got my things. I'm ready whenever you are," I say to her as I adjust the heavy pack on my back.
"Storm come tonight. Big one. Is good omen. Big first storm mean good year. Help will you me do ritual? Appease storm god?" Crow answers back, eerie mask pointed up towards the foreboding clouds above. Her English still needs work but I get the gist of most of what she says these days.