Eden: The Eighth Day Part 1

He walked across the soft grasses beneath the starlit sky and towards the silhouette in the distance. He felt excited about something but didn’t know why. As he walked closer, each footstep soaking his tiny bare feet with the sweet dewdrops, he could smell the scent of nectar from the flowers all around him.

But as he looked up towards the moon it began to shudder and crack. He felt the panic rise in his chest and watched, unable to stop it as the beauty of the land began to slip away from him, bubbling and melting. He looked down and his feet were standing on dry rocky earth.

Each step he took caused his delicate young skin to scratch and tear. The world became suddenly bright with the red flames, which he watched lick across the sky. His flowers turned to giant orange rock faces either side of him, which seemed to close in, making him feel constricted. He looked for the silhouette but it had disappeared.

He felt something warm trickling through his fingers and raised a small hand to his face. That was when he saw the dagger, clutched in his bloody grip. His eyes followed a drop of black, sticky blood, which fell from the glistening tip and splashed onto the forehead of his brother. His young face crumpled in pain as he gulped for air.

Kayin shouted then. ‘Hevel, No. Come back.’

Kayin woke suddenly and pulled himself up in his bed. He brought his hands to his face as he felt his stomach sink with the thought of another day. If he could only rid himself of the torture she had brought back to him. He reached to his bedside, scrambling for an untouched cup of wine, hoping for the taste of sweet oblivion, when the night came crashing back to him. Her frightened face as she left him.

He knew what he must do. It was the wine that had caused him to act in such a way. It to had be. Although somewhere deep down he wondered, But I killed my brother without a drop.

Regardless, he walked to the window and pulled back the shutters, extending the cup full of red poison through to the open air. He carefully turned it over and watched as a dark swell engulfed the gleaming silver lip. He slowly tipped it further and a dark dewdrop formed. The fiery skies seemed to set it alight.

He watched that droplet as it fought its impending fall; it trembled and quivered as if trying to scramble to be back in the safety of its metal womb. From there it could continue its journey past his hungry lips, slide down inside his gut and grow, its evil desperate to spread through every inch of his body and mind.

He tipped the cup slightly further and watched that dewdrop as it became heavier and pulled further and further away from its comrades. He watched it screaming, begging for him to reconsider. They would be better in the future, they would keep their promises and never hurt him again.

He wavered, imagining the sweet taste on his tongue, but it was too late. It lost its fight and Kayin watched it in wonder as it fell, rolling through the air, defeated, until it crashed into the sandy earth below. There it lay, a tiny, inconsequential speck of discoloured sand. He felt something snap within him and for the first time in a long time he let the corners of his mouth rise to a meaningful smile as he tipped the rest of the foul liquid to its final resting place.

Vesta sat at her workstation unaware of the girl standing behind her. She could have been there for hours. Her polite coughs simply swam around the room and disappeared. She stared intently at the tea leaves floating in the water, an occasional grimace passing her aging yet beautiful face.

The girl shuffled on the spot, trying to hide the bump beneath her dress, her mind unconsciously scanning the splendour surrounding her. Large pieces of wooden furniture decorated the room: dressers, tables, even the bed was made from solid wood. The girl had seen so few trees in her existence that she couldn’t identify the dark, shining grain as cherry wood, but knew it looked rich and magnificent.

She thought what a waste it was when the wood was so desperately needed by her townspeople. The great canvasses that adorned the walls could make clothes for ten people. She brought herself back from her jealousy, remembering everything the Doluses had done for humanity.

She let out another polite cough. This time Vesta almost jumped back to reality. She inhaled a deep breath and rose elegantly from her seated position. She turned to the girl.

‘On the bed,’ she said, as she pointed towards a stone slab.

The girl hesitated. The ‘bed’ looked nothing like any bed the girl had seen. It looked cold and unforgiving, like a final resting place. The girl obeyed and headed across the tiled floor, her shoes causing an echo on every step. Nervously, she pulled herself up onto the stone slab and lay back, watching the painted stars on the high marble ceiling. They looked so peaceful and the girl wondered at a sky covered in these every night. What a sight it must be.

She turned her head as Vesta walked towards the bed, her floor-length ruby gown making it seem as though she was floating.

‘Please,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what else—’

‘Quiet,’ the empress said. ‘Life is a precious gift, but in our times, only purity should be given the chance to grow. You will be judged.’ She firmly placed her hand on the girl’s forehead, her face as lifeless as stone as she concentrated on what she needed to know.

The girl became woozy; her eyes began to flicker as her thoughts came to the surface all at once. She was there again and could see the glint of the knife and the blurred face behind it. She could feel his hands over her mouth and then darkness engulfed her as her head cracked on a rock.

She had woken, chained and bound in a room, his crater face and fiery hair staring menacingly up at her. She had cried seeing him rise, knife in hand, knowing what he would do. For days she endured his torture in that room until something occurred to her. What if she played dead? He had walked in, eagerly looking at her. He had punched her, shouting ‘wake up!’ but she hadn’t moved. She hadn’t even grimaced at the pain as he sliced off her smallest finger. He had sworn then, crudely un-cuffing her body, which fell to the ground. She felt her ankle snap with the fall and bit down on her lip to keep from screaming.

He had slammed the door as he left and Cleo had stayed stock-still, waiting until she was sure it was safe before beginning her crippling escape. She made it no further than the undergrowth outside the dwelling, her frail and broken body unable to move.

There she had stayed for two whole days, feeling her life force slipping away from her until footsteps approached. She had gazed up to see death standing there, right in front of her. A long, dark cloak with a hood covering its head. She closed her eyes, relieved it would not be at Vulcan Bilo’s hand.

But then death had scooped her up, like a mother cradling her newborn and carried her to safety in his strong arms. She noticed in her woozy state his midnight-black hands. Just an illusion, she reasoned, no one in Mendacia has skin that colour. She drifted into unconsciousness

She woke up suddenly, feeling the throb from where her little finger had been and raised it in front of her face. She examined the neat bandaging and felt a sense of calm wash over her. She turned her face towards the empress, who was mixing a concoction in a small ceramic bowl. Hearing her patient stir, the empress turned and headed towards the bed.

‘Drink this,’ she said, handing over the small bowl. Cleo took the bowl and swallowed the slimy liquid, her lips recoiling at the taste.

‘Wh-what’s happening?’ Cleo said, studying her bandaged hand. ‘Wh-where’s my finger? I-I can’t remember anything.’

Before Vesta had the chance to reply the girl sat upright on the slab pulling her knees towards her chest, a look of fear on her face. She calmed for a moment before she stiffened. Green foam began bubbling out of her mouth and she began to convulse. Her hands clutched her stomach as she screamed with pain and a pool of blood formed from between her legs.

Vesta took the girl in her arms, cradling her head until the infant inside her womb was no more. No spawn of Vulcan’s should be allowed to walk this earth.

Kayin paused momentarily as he passed a sobbing girl leaving his mother’s chambers. He turned as she passed and noticed her blood-stained dress. This could have struck him as odd had he not been so tired and deprived of his precious wine. He pushed open the great doors and headed for his mother’s clinic room.

‘Mother!’ he greeted.

‘Ah Kayin, what a pleasant surprise.’ She turned to face her son, putting down some tincture. ‘Do have a seat.’

‘I won’t be staying,’ said Kayin.

‘You look terrible.’ Vesta rose and took his face in her hands. ‘Have you been sleeping?’

‘No!’ he said. ‘But then you know that, don’t you? How could I after what I did?’

‘Stop this!’ she said. ‘It was ever so long ago, you were but a boy.’

‘But while you say this, I am being given more and more to the throws of insanity. I did a terrible thing last night.’ He sunk his eyes downward and shook his head. ‘I took my hands to a woman’s throat. I feel like the evil I possessed that day is slowly creeping over me to take my entire soul.’

Vesta looked shocked. ’That is not you, Kayin. What were you thinking?’

‘I wasn’t,’ he said. ‘I must have been a man possessed. I have no memory of it. I seemed to wake up staring into her frightened eyes and I realised what I was doing.’

‘That is strange,’ said Vesta, placing her hand on his forehead. ‘You seem warm. Perhaps it was a fever sending you delirious.’ She took in the worry etched over her son’s face. ‘Was it Vita?’

Kayin nodded.

‘Is she alright?’ Vesta asked.

‘For now,’ said Kayin, looking up. ‘But did you know Father has arranged an auction for her hand?’

Vesta nodded with sadness towards her son. ‘That man is becoming crueller by the day.’

The pair turned towards a banging sound on the balcony. An elderly woman was climbing over the walls.

Kayin shot to his feet. ‘I’ll fetch the guards.’

Vesta very slowly placed her hand on her son’s chest, her eyes fixed in wonder at the woman now standing before her.

‘That won’t be necessary.’