Journal of Captain Ryckert van Renssalaer#
March#
Father and Johannes [1] watched from the crowds as the procession boarded the ferry for Texel today. Amidst the cheering, they alone bore the solemn faces of the grieving. As the bands played and the ale was poured, we exchanged our final, silent words. Mother, true to her promise, was not present.
Beyond my perfunctory appearance, I could not bring myself to participate in the pagentry and festivities that accompany the inauguration of this voyage. The recruits enjoyed the attention their new positions afforded them well enough, while even the officers were given to excess. Truly, never before have I seen Pieter smile. He and Nicolas led the beer hall in song just last night, though I do not think he will admit to the display this morning.
The maiden voyage of father’s new empire, sanctioned by the Prince of Orange. These men believe in a year’s time they will return to this land as lords, rich beyond their imagination. That may be, but not in the fashion they expect. Let them enjoy their ignorance with what little leisure time remains before our godly duties are to be dispensed.
Our true cargo arrives under the cover of darkness tonight. Hendrick will receive her and help her board the Eden before the crew wakes.
—March 14th, 1637
The Eden set sail from Rede van Texel before dawn, bearing the sigil of the Lord, Jesus Christ. A finer vessel has never been produced by Dutch shipyards. Much has already been written about her in the papers, but a larger portion has been hidden from all but my family and the Stadtholders. Most of the talk has been deliberately centered around her innovative hull. With a razor-sharp bow, she cuts an imposing figure for onlookers. Father saved the headline from one of local corantos, Her Sides Are Steep and Her Draft is Deep, well before the press start scandalizing his deal with the Prince of Orange.
Less is said of her sheathe, except among the other captains. Coated in copper panels, she shimmers in the sun like an angel from God. She flies like one as well, clocked at 15 knots with a favorable wind behind her. When the elements turn against us, as they inevitably will the closer we get to our goal, her Bermuda sloop will let her glide as though she were a ghost, unanswerable to anyone except the Almighty.
Within her hull she bears enough salted beef, hardtack, beer, water and dried peas for 18 months. Hendrick reports some questions have arisen among the crew regarding the size and extent of supplies. Already there are rumors spreading our voyage is not what it appears. It is to be expected. The Eden has not been fitted with cannons, under the pretense of maximizing our profits with heavier cargos. A sailor without a cannon is rightfully nervous, but Jeremias is correct to assure them. The Eden can outrun any English privateer or Spanish dog upon which she might chance. We have no need for weapons of war.
Hendrick suggested having one of the gossip-mongers caned, but it is far too early for those sorts of measures. Though he serves his purpose, I often forget the number of Spaniards who have suffered under Hendrick’s hand. He betrays his common stock with his barbarism. His first instinct is always violence. Were he not my milk brother and utterly loyal to a fault, I might reconsider his presence on this voyage. However, whatever his disposition, his presence is necessary, being the only other soul aboard that knows the scope of the Eden’s mission. For years, we have studied together. For years, we haved waited for this moment. The day is finally near when we will finish of the work of the Lord Savior Jesus Christ.
—March 15th, 1637
That we do the Great Work is apparent. For three days straight we have enjoyed the wind at our backs. The Eden sails at breathtaking speed, faster even than the Dunkirkers’ frigates. Already Jeremias calculates that we will reach the open ocean tomorrow. None of us would believe it except that we see its proof with our own eyes every waking moment. We move with the fleetness of Gabriel. The Word of God carries our sails to the furthest reaches of the globe.
—March 18th, 1637
We picked up a tail as we left the channel. She is one of the new English raiders, built to chase down the pirates off the Moroccan coast. I admit, the seamen in me is impressed with her construction, but even with her oars, she is no match for the Eden. Jeremias says she will disappear into the horizon before sundown. She flings her cannonballs at us, but her gunners were not trained to offset their targets enough to catch us. The crew gathers round the deck now to watch the geysers sprout behind us as the fools throw their artillery into the sea. Each time they miss, a cheer rises from the crew on deck. By the time we reach Ushuant, Jeremias estimates the English will have spent three years worth of a sailor’s wages in wasted munitions. A more fitting farewell to Europe I could scarcely imagine for the Eden.
—March 19th, 1637
These eyes, which have seen clippers beach Spanish galleons off the coast of Cuba, still scarcely believe how swiftly the Eden cuts through the ocean. She made a journey calculated for ordinary vessel to take two months in mere weeks. The Eden disembarked from Sierra Leone just today after resupplying.
During the brief, Hendrick tallied our numbers. At port, we lost two men, deserters gone without a trace. None of the officers could produce a reason as to why. Their names were noted and left at port. If the authorities find them, I have left instructions to have their bodies shipped back to Amsterdam. Cowards they may be, yet no Dutchman deserves to be buried in this foreign land.
Nicolas raised concerns about unrest simmering among the crew. They wanted to know why we had not taken on any stock from the slave yards, nor loaded any gems from the mines. Instead, the hull was restocked with provisions and filled to the brim with lemons.
Once we lost sight of land, I had Nicolas gather the other officers of the crew in my cabin. I could no longer bear the deception, although I may have erred by showing them the map of Macrobius. [2] Knowledge of the Terra Incognita is no easy burden for the mortal mind to bear. Hendrick said as much with his glaring eyes, but I bade him retrieve it.
Jeremias scoffed, as expected. Pieter, always the soldier, took the news without flinching. The rest of their reactions I do not possess the skill to decipher. Suffice to say, they believed themselves set for Patagonia, only to be told at the final hour this subterfuge was a calculated manuever and our true path lie in the direction of the Austral Zone. The voyage of the Eden shall be written in no manifests.
Heaven help me if they discover what’s in the hull.
—March 29th, 1637
April#
Hendrick came to me with troubling news. The French boy, Francis, is a Jesuit. His proof? The boy pointed out the Medicean Stars to him while they were on watch last night. I confess it hard to believe a sheep farmer’s son would be schooled in the astronomical arts. Considering our goal, the sheer coincidence is too improbable to believe. Under normal circumstances, this would warrant nothing more than careful observation, but Hendrick is right. These are no normal circumstances. The risk is too great. The boy must go.
—April 2nd, 1637
Dear Lord, grant me the strength to see Thy Will be done. I am a weak and miserable mortal, condemned to wallow in sin. Mold my heart in Thy Image and make me worthy to behold the glory of Thy Throne. Speak Thy Words into my heart. Lord, I am weary of my own deadness. I wish to quit this world of sin and wash these stains from my palms. Quicken me according to Thy Word. Let me not be deluded by a false peace, but grant me that true assurance that comes only from Faith in Christ’s finished work. I surrender my will to Thine; do with me as seem good in Thy sight, only cast me not away from Thy presence.
—April 3rd, 1637
The winds have died. Whispers say our expedition has been cursed, though none will claim the superstition as their own. The heathens need not speak to be identified; their eyes tell me all that I need know. When I am on deck, I cannot help but notice the looks I receive from those bold enough to gaze upon their captain.
The vastness of the ocean often plays tricks on the mind. More than a few I have seen picked apart by her enchantments. No doubt the boy’s disappearance contributes to the air. The men idle and in their sloth, they invent idols to keep their weak minds occupied.
Once the wind returns and the Work resumes, their thoughts will turn again to the task at hand, leaving no room to fill with fanciful notions. Man is only truly at peace in his work. In idleness lay the source of all the world’s evil. This festering sin can only be rooted out with honest work and a stern hand. Fortunately, Hendrick and I are of a mind on these matters.
—April 6th, 1637
The ship languishes in calm water while the crew seethes and boils. The boy was a mistake. How was I to know he was kin to Nicolas? What madness drives a Dutchman into the bed of a French whore? I should have listened to Hendrick from the start. It was pure folly to take on an Frenchmen, no matter how well he knew the yardarm.
Lord, take pity on your poor servant. The sin is too much for me to bear. I fear it only just begins.
—April 7th, 1637
I woke to a pounding on my cabin door mere moments ago. The night still lingers in the sky and weariness beggars my senses, but sleep is no longer a possibility. Hendrick came bearing reports made by the crew. Those on duty heard chanting during the midnight watch. One of them swears he heard a woman singing.
Hendrick assures me the rumors will not be allowed to take spread.
—April 8th, 1637
Reports multiply, growing more disturbed and deranged. Every morning, Hendrick details another lurid account. Yesterday, the cook claimed to have seen swirling lights in the night sky, following the Eden. Today, a deck hand lay unconscious in the infirmary after drinking a stomach full of sea water for reasons unbeknownst to anyone. Add to these strains, the steady whispers of the midnight chant, now all but general knowledge.
Moreover, tales have spread that Francis, the boy, was keelhauled during the night watch. Hendrick assures me this is preposterous and nothing of the sort happened. I swear the man, whom I have trusted for decades with my life, smirked at me when I asked him.
—April 10th, 1637
The crew rallies around Nicolas. He spins fantasies about my father and the Prince of Orange. It is true my father secured amnesty from the Sounds Toll to build this vessel, but his accusations go too far. This has gone on long ehough. I must take matters into my own hands.
—April 11th, 1637
After speaking with Nicolas, he has seen the error of his ways. Hendrick can be most persuasive.
—April 11th, 1637
The morning began with a cry: the wind has returned! I led a devotion on deck to restore the morale of the crew. Speaking the words from memory, I transcribe them now again for the comfort they give,
They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters;These see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep.For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble.The Lord Christ spoke truly when he said to Matthew that seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear. The secrets are easily found for anyone that searches for them. They need look no further than His Word.
When the service dispersed, the crew was visibly lifted in spirit. All talk of my father and the Prince of Orange has ceased. Murmurs of Francis can still be heard, but the men are far too exhausted to give countenance anything else, especially what we might actually be transporting.
—April 12th, 1637
I could hardly believe the news. Recife has been sighted ten days ahead of schedule. Even at the Eden’s speed, this should not be possible. Jeremias’ calculations confirm it. Our current position is a mathematical impossibility. Pieter suggests the Eden is pushed by a magnetic current, but Jeremias is adamant that too is impossible since we are moving away from the Rupes Nigra. According to our esteemed navigator, there is no explanation for our early arrival, yet we are here nonetheless. Whatever the reason, the crew will be pleased to rest for a fortnight.
Tonight, after they are sufficiently in their cups, Hendrick and I will unlock the hold within the hull and take our guest to see the Potiguarra.
—April 20th, 1637
My family acquired Coaraci when our claim to Recife amounted to nothing more than the slaves we could run through the Portuguese blockades. I still remember when they unloaded her upon the dock in Amsterdam, untouched by the voyage back across the Atlantic, a defiant vision among the pitiful, broken specimens. I had no notion then, gazing upon her alien form, how intimately she would become woven into my life.
The ways of God are unknown to mere men, but looking upon her, I often what wonder great mysteries the Lord reveals to the feminine soul. She commanded the heathens last night as though the heavens had ordained it. They fell under her spell within moments of laying eyes upon her. Their tongue does not yield to the European mind despite my best attempts, but she tells me she simply explained to them that we possess the map to the Land Without Evil.
Hendrick and I watched from the edge of the village as the heathens set fire to their own homestead. The hillside burned for hours. Coaraci explained the Potiguarra honor Monan by giving their belongings to the flame. They believe the current world we inhabit is made from fire and water, that they are remnants of a sinful race that was scourged from paradise by the purifying flame of the Almighty. He took pity upon the lone survivor and sent a flood to put out the fire.
The Word of the Lord precedes us in this land and prepares our way. Hendrick agrees these pagan myths align precisely with the accounts in Genesis. Monan, Elohim, Yahweh. All names attached to the source of creation by the feeble human mind that fails to comprehend its nameless form.
If that is true, then by year’s end we will be the first humans to return to the garden stolen from us by our original sin.
We return to Recife tomorrow followed by a retinue of Potiguarra shamans. I shall tell the men our true purpose and rally their spirits.
—April 21st, 1637
Hendrick put the losses at a dozen, Nicolas and Jeremias among them. According to Pieter, they left yesterday morning after plundering the hold for supplies. He could not say where, but no doubt they made for Olinda. A party of men might be able to track them, but we would lose another week, maybe more, and to compound matters, it is not certain they would even be found. It is ironic I must now, without Jeremias, calculate the ends upon which we gamble. If the rotations are lengthened, fifty sailors is more than enough to man the Eden at all hours, but the loss of Jeremias will be felt.
The prospect of reembarking without a navigator bothers me, but the betrayal stings even worse. Jeremias has sailed with me since Matzanas. I cannot fathom why he would abandon me now. He left without explanation or clue. I am certain Nicolas got into his head with his conspiracies and convinced him of some fantasy.
If I cannot even trust the men who are closest to me with the Terra Incognita, what folly would it be to tell the others? No, this burden is mine to bear, my duty to carry out, as it is their duty to follow me. I shall prepare a sermon to remind them of their place.
—April 22nd, 1637
Another five are gone this morning. Pieter says when they learned of Coaraci, the crew dissolved into argument. Of course, in their ignorance, they could not understand why I might conceal her presence. I have seen the depths of carnal sin into which men alone at sea will fall.
Hendrick and I both agree that we disembark by the week’s end before we lack the crew to man the Eden, which leaves only a few days to make the adhoc modifications. Maurits has given us a handful of slaves to aid the task and I have given Hendrick leave to do what is necessary to ensure the Eden is outfitted with the Ipe panels on time. If what the Potiguarra say is true, then we cannot leave Recife without reinforcing her hull.
—April 23rd, 1637
Yet another deserter, Frederick, made an attempt last night. Hendrick currently exacts the penalty of his transgression for all to see. The screams are awful, but the Work must be done. He will forget the momentary pain and fall to his knees in gratitude when the Eden runs ashore of her namesake.
The heresy started when Frederick learned what we mean to do with the Ipe panels. Since yesterday, the Potiguarra venture into the “Anguera” and return hourly, bearing on their backs the hardwood from the forest interior. It grows in piles before the Eden. The Africans have been set to work melding this raw material into panels for her. Frederick called it madness. Without Jeremias to assure him with his indisputable calculations, I could not convince Frederick the weight was insufficient to endanger our voyage. He persisted in his folly and now bears the consequences.
To tell the truth, I myself am uncertain of the calculations, though I would never tell the crew, not even Hendrick. I have gone through them several times, unable to find a mistake, but I cannot say with confidence I have accounted for every eventuality. The ways of the Lord are infinite and I would be arrogant to presume I possessed the ability to enumerate them. The only assurance I have is the knowledge the Lord wrote the Eden’s fate before the wind ever touched her sail.
—April 24th, 1637
This morning, Coaraci brought before me the leader of the Potiguarra, though she says that title is not stricly speaking accurate. He is called Ubiuna, which Coaraci translates as The Black Spear. His Dutch is passable, though diminished. I nodded along as the heathen spoke of what lay before us, but waited for Coaraci to translate his pidgin into something more pliable to my ears.
He says the Land Without Evil is surrounded by endless fields of ice that are only navigable by the pure of heart. Long have the Potiguarra awaited the return of the Irin-Mage, the one born of fire, whose heart has been smelted and purified by the wrath of Monan, to show them the way. I told him the one whom he describes has a name, Jesus Christ, and it was He who sent me.
Ubiuna scoffed and spat, but pledged a dozen able-bodied Potiguarra to our endeavor. Moreover, he has told me, aged and feeble though he may be, he will accompany us himself.
When he left, Coaraci drew close and entangled herself in my arms. She explained that Ubiuna does not believe in the Lord, but rather, he seeks to use me. She spoke as if this were not apparent to me from the very beginning. It makes no matter to me what the heathen believes, I told her. The Lord does not require His instruments to hear His music.
—April 25th, 1637
Coaraci sang a lovely verse from her tongue this morning while we ate pineapple. I will miss her voice, but the terms were always clear. Her home for mine.
Down below, Hendrick drives the slaves in their tasks. We have been watching for several hours from the window of the Maurits estate, Coaraci and I. The Eden armors herself in hardwood panels, layer by layer. Tiny specks of men repel down her hull and bolt each one into place.
She tells me it is right for man to dominate other men, for all men are dominated themselves by the Almighty and are therefore made for it by nature. I find myself dwelling on her words, as I often do. The way her heathen mind yielded to the graces of God so easily and allowed His Divine Insights to penetrate has always been a source of confusion.
Father also spoke in riddles. When I was young, he would tell me, “That which is above is from that which is below, and that which is below is from that which is above.”
Looking below me now, I see nothing but slaves at work.
—April 28th, 1637
Ubiuna accompanied Hendrick and I as we surveyed the results of the refitting. True to Drebbel’s promise, the copper sheathe of his design prevented the buildup of barnacles, making the modifications substantially easier to accomplish. Where before the Eden was a shimmering cherub clothed in the vestments of luxury, now she bares the armaments of Michael, a proud warrior in the Lord’s army, ready to battle the elements.
The Shaman spoke to us of our journey ahead. The Potiguarra continue to refer to the garden as the Land Without Evil, though I have made it clear to them the true nature of what we seek. Their stories tell them it lay across the sea, guarded by walls of ice. Beyond these walls lay an oasis of green, where the fruit flowers year long and the sun never sets. The map of Macrobius, the reports of Schouten and Le Maire, these heathen myths. The confluence of evidence is too great to ignore.
He says we must possess aguyjé, the purest of spirits, to pierce the veil that separates paradise from this world. I told him there is no purer spirit than the Holy Spirit.
We depart tomorrow on the final leg of our voyage. Ubiuna and ten Potiguarra will accompany us of their own accord, as planned.
—April 30th, 1637
May#
With the addition of Ubiuna and his Potiguarra, the Eden is almost back to fighting strength. They are green and heathen, but the sea makes men of us all or in failing, casts us to its depths. They shall be sailors by the week’s end or they shall be food for the fish.
The Eden hugs the coast until Puerto Deseado and then from that point on, the angles of Macrobius will be our bearing.
—May 2nd, 1637
The Potiguarra are a queer sort of people. I have come across many languages in my travels, and while each one has its own distinct register, none compare to the primal music produced by their tongue. One cannot shake the feeling their words are more than mere signs, that they speak with a voice whose concepts precede grammar. Their words work upon them as spells or incantations. Ubiuna stands amongst them when they do their chores, reciting verse from his language, and they move as though driven by his words, as if his voice were their thoughts. Though they have been assigned the menial tasks left by the deserters, such as scrubbing the decks and cranking the bilge, they set to their work with fervor, chattering among themselves in indecipherable grunts. Listening to them converse, one is swept away to a distant past, when man stumbled from the garden and fell into iniquity.
To make matters worse, Ubiuna, when he does speak Dutch, speaks nonsense. Yesterday, while surveying the coast, Ubiuna remarked in broken sentences that it would be a great honor to drink Hendrick’s blood. Had Pieter not been there, I do not believe I would have been able to guarantee Ubiuna’s life.
—May 5th, 1637
The sky has begun to redden each evening, and the crew grows nervous. Despite my efforts, this is the one superstition I have been unable to cull from their heads. However, today these false omens speak truly. We are entering the most treacherous water in all of creation.
The Potiguarra have been training on hempen cables, tossing them behind the ship and pulling them back aboard a hundred times an hour. While I would surely prefer the full complement of Dutchmen with which I left Amsterdam, these heathens will serve the Eden just as well. A body is a body. The rest of the crew scrambles to secure every opening and bar every port in preparation. Pieter is the only one, besides Hendrick and myself, who has seen the waters of Costa Patagonum, but he has sufficiently instilled the fear into the rest of the crew.
My calculations were never as precise as Jeremias, but by my reckoning, we should enter the stormy abode of Patagonia within the next few days. All of the trials that have beset us these past months were but prologue to what follows. No foe is more unforgiving than the raw, untamed ocean. It is for this reason the sailor is nearer to God than any other individual. A mortal mind will come no closer to grasping the Lord’s Divine Nature than when it stares down a 100 foot wave that spans the horizon.
The Eden sets closer to sea level with her new armor. If our luck holds out, her new center of gravity should keep us from capsizing when the worst of it comes. If not, I have given Hendrick explicit orders to keep the masts at all costs. Strike the tops and shake off the bonnets, but anyone that tries to take an axe to the mast itself will no longer have hands to swing an axe. We will heave-to what we can, but the men must be ready at moment’s notice to deploy the drogues and begin scudding. The masts must remain.
—May 10th, 1637
As expected, the world goes gray and the water to chop. A somber air from the pink sky above descends upon the crew this evening. We all see the clouds gathering over the course the Eden charts, drawn up from the sea in sprays of fog. A curtain of roiling storm cloaks the ocean from us. Ubiuna spoke to us of the pampero, the storms which bellow from the south and west. I have given the men leave to open the winter provisions. Wrapped in fur and their beards full of tallow, they look as their forebearers looked when our Batavian blood spilled from the Rhine and flooded the upper reaches of the North Sea.
I spoke the final Psalm some of them shall ever hear as the howling gales rose in chorus,
He causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth;he maketh lightnings for the rain;he bringeth the wind out of his treasuries.May these words commend their soul to heaven.
—May 12th, 1637
The Eden is crippled. The Mizzen Yard was lost the instant the squall hit us. It exploded in a spray of splinters as if vaporized by cannonfire. Pieter caught a face of debris and now lay below deck, his chest rising slower each time I check. They have replaced his bandages three times already. I said a prayer over his unconscious body, but I fear the Lord has already taken him.
As we skimmed along the largest of the waves, the bow dipped into the sea twice. Each time, the men were swept against the railing. In total, eleven went overboard, three Potiguarra and eight Dutchmen, swallowed by the violent waters without trace.
With the loss of the rear mast, we no longer steer the ship, but fight with all of our strength to keep it on course. I’ve ordered the remaining crew to man the whipstaff in rotations of three. Everyone is a helmsman now, even the Potiguarra. The exhaustion of the work will quickly take its toll, but if we lose control, we risk spinning out and being left to the mercy of the unforgiving wind. We make for Port Desire for repairs.
—May 13th, 1637
It is as the Potiguarra say. There are but two ends in this life: fire or ice.
As the men started the makeshift repairs on the Eden, I walked along the untouched coast of this land, so different from my own. I see now that we grow complacement in our stone houses and forget the flames of the forge that shaped the Batavian soul in its cradle. Here, in desolate wilderness, where I thought no mortal had glimpsed since the Lord conjured it from the deep, I stumbled in my path upon the charred remains of those who preceded me. Here, where Schouten gave the Hoorn to the flame before devoting himself to the completion of his voyage, the very man whose journey foretold mine, whose reports informed my plan, whose essence lives now in this hallowed ground. I take no shame in the tears I shed.
—May 14th, 1637
The Eden is as seaworthy as we can make her without a full shipyard to make the repairs. Her Mizzen Yard is crooked and raw, still bearing the unpolished knots of the branches the crew hacked from her length, but it will do. We have no other choice.
Pieter still clings to life by the Grace of God. He has not opened his eyes for a week, but he yet breathes. I debated his fate with Hendrick. Hendrick’s argument has a cold logic to it, but I will not concede. He suggested leaving him, arguing it would be kinder to let him chance the elements ashore than at sea. We shall not see the end of Costa Patagonum until the next moon. The waves will be the death of him for certain, he says. I told him I would hear no more on the matter. Pieter will see the garden, above or below ground, for I owe him that much.
—May 17th, 1637
Frederick’s body swings from a tree. He would not see reason and refused to set foot back onto the Eden until I relinquished my command. I bade him reconsider, but his decision is plain for all to see. We delay another day to bury our dead. The Lord is firm in these matters.
—May 18st, 1637
A mist descended this morning as the sun rose. We saw the rays for but a moment before the fog engulfed us. The Potiguarra wailed as the light disappeared. We steer now by dead reckoning alone. I’ve angled us into deeper waters, to avoid blindly running aground, but the waves grow more fierce in the open ocean.
I had Hendrick uncork the brandy and distribute it amongst the crew. The temperature drops and we are not like to see these climes again.
—May 20th, 1637
A cry from the Crow’s Nest roused me from my cabins not moments ago. I stumbled through the thick fog and found the source of alarm. A stranger sight my eyes have surely never seen. Through the dense clouds that cover everything, I heard their bellows and titanic movements before I saw them. They emerged from the haze like otherworldly apparitions. The Eden now sails in the company of mammoth beasts, atleast a dozen, though the fog makes it hard to count them.
The crew has gathered along the port side railing to marvel at the convoy that has formed around us. Hendrick says they are whales, but they look as no whales I’ve ever seen swimming the North Sea. They dwarf the Eden by five times atleast. If one opened its mouth, the Eden could almost sail right into its stomach. These are surely the creatures that swallowed Job.
One surfaced directly beside the ship before releasing a guttural blast into the air. The water heaved aside and set us rocking, as if a mountain had risen from nowhere to cast aside the ocean. It disappeared just as fast back into the depths.
I found Ubiuna in the hull with the other Potiguarra. He told me their presence is a good omen, for they follow the same path we do. He bade me press my ear to the planks. On the other side, I heard the heart beat of the ocean, its thundering pulse. Within the booming chorus, I listened to the echoes of their words, the ancient language of the deep spoken only by the creatures who remember the days when Man still possessed its tongue and built towers to the sky in his arrogant aspirations.
I explained all this to Pieter, but my words fell on deaf ears. He remains unchanged. I wish he could have seen it.
—May 21st, 1637
Three days ago, we lost sight of the coast. Today, the sea turns to slosh. A layer of broken glass floats atop the water. If this is the ice wall Ubiuna spoke of, then the Eden will make short work of it.
As she plows along her course, the ice sheers and sings in high pitched squeals against her hull, swept in her wake through swirling vortices. It is though an angelic chorus heralds the Eden’s arrival into the Austral Zone.
—May 30th, 1637
June#
The crackle of glass becomes the endless grind of ice. I awoke to its thunderclap before the sun had risen. As I left the confines of my cabin to do my rounds, I discovered the sea had become a solid pane of ice. The Eden no longer sails, but drives herself like a nail bludgeoned by the blunt force of the wind into the solid ocean. The sound cannot be described, shrill and piercing, like needles burrowing into your ears.
—June 2nd, 1637
The whales were a harbinger from the Lord of the things to come. Everything in place is scaled to absurd heights. Icebergs lurk in the water like sunken cities, poking their towers above the surface. The Eden now navigates the frozen valleys of the mountain range that has grown from sea. The sails have been drawn to prevent speeding through this labyrinth. We cannot risk the Eden’s integrity, so she now moves at a snail’s pace, carefully skirting the icy doom that threatens her on all sides.
—June 4th, 1637
Hendrick believes he has discovered the secret to navigating this barren maze. He has noticed on his night watch the moonlight is reflected by the ice upon the clouds. According to his theory, the Eden should angle into the darkness, where there is no ice to reflect the light. I have heard no better options from anyone else, so I have given orders to make it official. Contrary to every instinct a sailor might have, we now use the darkness as our guide.
—June 6th, 1637
Hendrick’s idea has born tremendous fruit. Indeed, the ice reflects moonlight! The sails are now full of wind as we cut a course through a cleft in the ice wall.
—June 7th, 1637
Two of the Potiguarra, whose names I never learned, froze in their sleep. They could not be roused and upon investigation, it was discovered their furs had fused to their skin. The wool was soaked by a leak overnight and then turned to ice upon their sleeping bodies. Hendrick believes they died in their dreams, never knowing the cold had claimed them.
—June 9th, 1637
The temperature continues to drop as though it will never stop. Each morning, a few more levels have disappeared from the thermoscope. I no longer trust it readings. At the current rate, by the day’s end, the instrument will cease to be of use; it cannot read below its lowest marking.
The men shiver beneath mounds of fur on deck, for the wood has started to weep with condensation to point where the hold has become a frigid swamp. The stove pit went out several nights ago and everyone has long since given up trying to relight it. Instead they huddle and lean on one another near the rudders in the vain hope of stoking their collected body heat.
The hold is an issue I had not foreseen. Even with the men running the bilge pump day and night, the provisions fester. I see no other option but to appropriate my cabin and transfer the store before it goes to rot.
—June 10th, 1637
Two of the men I sent down into the store have fallen to the chill. The icy water soaked them to the bone and set them with a violent shake. Hendrick says he has seen it before, off the coasts of Norway. The cold now lives inside of them. He says they will be dead soon.
—June 11th, 1637
Man was made to suffer. It is no matter. Let the ropes and mast freeze. The men claw at the canvas sails with their knives, like scavenging animals. The Word of God is all the warmth we require.
Out of whose womb came the ice?And the hoary frost of heaven, who hath gendered it?The waters are hid as with a stone, and the face of the deep is frozen.All obstacles are conquered by his Word.
—June 12th, 1637
The Eden shuddered as she scraped her hull across a sunken spire hidden beneath the surface. On deck, we heard a scream and then an awful smack. Thomas slipped from the Crow’s Nest. His body lay mangled on the ice as the crew gathered to call out. Some of them say he replied before he disappeared from view, though I heard nothing.
—June 13th, 1637
This place announces itself every moment a world no man should enter of his own God-given will. We tread through profane waters, where the rational mind can find no purchase. I have seen its profanity with my own eyes. This world has no night. The very sky dissolves into the flames of Hell. Streaks of unnatural colors blaze and ripple across the blackness, obscuring our view of the stars.
To confound the matter, the shelves of ice below continue to batter our hull, as though an inferno did not rage above us. The hardwood has served its purpose, shielding the Eden’s hull from the ceaseless assault, but the creaking and splintering takes its toll. Some of the panels still hang only by the grace of God.
The Lord continues to test us, but we shall not cease.
—June 15th, 1637
At all hours of the night, the sound is deafening. It never ceases. High-pitched and shrill, it digs into your ears, even when you cover them. The endless rupture of glass. It is enough to drive a man mad.
But that is not even the worst of it. I can hardly write my hands shake so. Hendrick says you needn’t worry until the shivering stops. That is when you know death is near.
—June 16th, 1637
He was my brother in all but name. It is fitting that the tears which mark his end should burn my face in icy veins and crack the skin beneath.
Hendrick is gone and no one can say what has happened to him. He is simply gone, as though he never existed. This place feasts on the souls of the damned, snatching us from the deck of Eden in the dead of night. It picks at us, peeling away the crew sailor by sailor. There are less than thirty of us left. I have lost track they fall so quickly. I do not believe any of the Potiguarra remain except Ubiuna, though he will surely die soon. What have I done? To what chamber of Hell have I brought us?
Lord, I have been your ever faithful servant. This burden is too much to bear. Please, though I have no right, I beg of you, have mercy.
—June 18th, 1637
The wind spews ice as sharp as daggers. We trade the fetid tomb of the hold for the maelstrom above deck. It is simply a matter of which death one chooses. There is no place left to hide from the Lord’s Wrath. Cramped between the dwindling stacks of supplies, the men pile into my cabin for what little relief it provides, but even my walls weep and freeze. The Eden’s helm has been abandoned as the cold’s dominion becomes total. The rudders are stone and the sails are as slabs that hang in solid sheets. She drifts and lists with the whims of God, battered on all sides by the wages of sin.
—June 19th, 1637
We wait to die.
—June 20th, 1637
The Eden, buffeted by tidal winds that would level cities were they bottled and unleashed, whipped beyond our control within the roiling fog and guided by the primordial forces of Earth, she turned to splinters beneath our feet, yet clung defiantly to her remainings mast, tattered though they were in frozen strips, more ice than canvas. The deafening roar of thunderclaps and shrieking nails, plunged into raw thoughts, reduced the crew and I to whimpering wretches, what few remained. We huddled beneath the wreckage to seek whatever shelter could be found from the vengeful gusts of wind and watched the jutting fingers of ice claw the Eden’s patchwork armor from her shoulders. We watched her shudder and reel, her death throes twisting through the labyrinth of sea ice that spanned the horizon, the infinite abode of Hell that awaits the damned in eternity.
Then all at once, the razor mists and grinding mountains of white fell away, as if the Eden had passed through some threshold. The rays of the sun fell upon us and left us in daze. Ubiuna, the last of the Potiguarra not claimed by this icy hell, shed his furs and stood up in nakedness to proclaim, “Ma’e! Y Marã E’ỹ-pe!”, before he collapsed. The reeling deck sent him overboard before anyone could muster the energy to pull him back towards the jagged ruins of my cabin.
—June 21st, 1637
In the ice, a heart beats. God’s essence mingles in the elements and rises to the surface. His breath is vital warmth that turns the sea to emerald green, that fogs the glassy sheen with blooms of algae. Here, where creatures from the deep peek their alien eyes from the liquid womb and release their cries of life to the heavens, they receive in exchange for their faith a respite from the cold, a baptism of holy heat that coils in steam as incense burned in sacred ritual. Here, beneath the Eden’s ruined hull, the men shed their rags and dive headfirst into an oasis that has materialized in this wasteland.
The ground we tread is blessed by the divine, radiating with the source of creation. I can feel its heat in the soles of my feet as I walk. I took Pieter’s body to its resting place and pondered whether tomorrow he would rise as Lazarus. As I dug his grave beneath the orphic rock and soil, I found within the proof of the Lord’s Providence, a solid sphere, perfectly formed and smooth as glass. As I held it in my hands, its ink black surface began to shimmer and glow, nearly blinding me with a sudden flash of brilliant white light. In that instant, I saw the shape of things to come. I still grasp for the words to describe what was shown to me by the Almighty. I did not realize until that moment this journal would be my epistle.
I did not realize these words were addressed to you, Mesmeria. I have much to tell you before I die tomorrow.
—June 22nd, 1637
Note
All entries past this point have been torn from the book’s spine.