The Man in Search of Color

Beginning in 2014 Vol, a story began circulating among freesailors of a strange encounter at sea. A ship was approached by a man wading waist-deep through the ocean. Assuming him to have come from the Eddy, the crew welcomed him aboard. Up close, he had an otherworldly appearance--the shape of his face, the set of his hair, the cast to his skin were all just a little odd. He gave his name as Uduza, speaking Oceantongue with an unfamiliar accent. Immediately they brought out some food for him, just in case he was the ocean itself taking on a human shape (which they didn't really believe, since ocean worship faded out more than a thousand years ago, but you never know). "In return," said Uduza, "I must tell you a story you have not heard.

"My home is a place far from here, where there is land from one end to the other, and water only in small places. There, as a child, I waited for the vision that would tell me my purpose as an adult. It came to me while I slept. In this vision, I was in a place of endless water, with the sun falling into it before me. Where the sun fell, a woman appeared with her back to me. Wherever she moved her hands, colors appeared in the sky, becoming pieces of land that went into the water.

"When I told this to the elders, for the first time they did not know what a vision meant--so I told them. I would leave my land, walking always toward the setting sun. I would go until I reached a place that was water from one end to the other, and land only in small places. There I must find the woman who makes the islands.

"That was all very long ago. I carried a small boat across my land, until I came to the end of the land and the beginning of water. I put down my boat and went out in it, thinking I had found the endless water. I did not know I was wrong for many years. I followed the setting sun, and although I found many islands, and went around and across them many times, I found no people at all. Instead I came to the end of the water. The sun set behind mountains on land that was not small, and the water would not go around it.

"I thought I had failed. Angry and ashamed, I decided to return to my home. But the vision came to me again, and I knew the mistake I had made. In the vision I was without a boat. So I left it where it was, crossed the mountains, and on the other side was the endless water. I stood in it, and it welcomed me. Since then I have walked, and found the small places of land at last.

"I ask you now, where is the woman whose hands make color?"

Although no one could answer his question, they suggested he find the Eddy and ask the Water Seekers. Uduza left wading as he came, and the message went from ship to ship to keep an eye out for him, hoping to find out if he succeeded in his quest.