The twelve Modoc origin myths · told whole
From the obsidian dark before time to the threshold of memory, Kemush walks the world into being — witness and mediator, not a deity. The complete cycle of twelve origin myths of the Maklaks, in a book, a companion guide, an illustrated app, and audio.
The illustrated edition
The complete text paired with 190 panels of painterly artwork, optional read-aloud, and a generative tool that lets you draft your own myths from the cycle's real structures. Fully offline. No ads, no accounts, no tracking — nothing leaves your device.
The complete book + companion guide
The full cycle in one volume, with a scholarly companion guide: the cosmology, the lexicon of spirits and forces, the comparative-myth grid, and the oral-tradition framework. The complete way in.
The cycle
Each spiral stands alone and turns into the next — a beginning becomes an ending becomes a beginning again. Read them whole in the book, as individual ebooks, or listen as the audiobooks release. The Spiral of Greed is on Audible now.
The work
The Spirals of Kemush gathers the twelve Modoc origin myths and tells them as one continuous cycle, narrated by Kemush, who moves through the stories as a witness and a mediator rather than a deity. Rooted in the Klamath Basin and the oral tradition of the Maklaks, it carries the old stories into print and onto the screen for the next generation.
By H.L. Delaney, an enrolled member of the Klamath Confederated Tribes, published by Basalt Sea Press, a Native-owned house.
The Last Song
The Last Song is a Modoc song whose words speak of new beginnings, as old as time immemorial. Its survival is owed to Modoc elder Celia Langell-Jefferson, who returned it to her people. This studio-mastered rendition is by H.L. Delaney, shared freely for cultural preservation.