Eve was set down on cold earth and she opened her eyes. Cave, she thought, shaping the word in her mind around the stone and the dirt that swallowed her. She curled up on the ground, feeling the grit beneath her cheek, pressing her fingers against the cool, damp rock.
And then there were more of them. Legs and feet and hushed tones of conversation. A flash of light turned everything white and a boom shook the earth. She yelped, her tongue thick in her mouth. Her heart raced and the pink and brown bodies moving past her blurred as moisture filled her eyes.
Something touched her head, soothing as it moved through her hair. “You’re safe, Eve. It’s just the storm. Breathe now.” The same firm hand pulled her arms away from her face for a second time. “And sit up.”
She was forced into a different position, her back supported against the rock. The man sat beside her. He stroked her hair again, then touched her face, her cheek.
“Who?” The word was rough and felt strange on her lips. She swallowed and tried again. “Who are you?”
“I’m Adam. First among men.”
The way he studied her made her tremble. She looked away, flinching from another flash and the crash that followed. The others huddled together, arms around one another. Adam’s arm encircled her, pulling her against his side. He was warm, almost uncomfortably so. A howling began and then a rushing even louder than what she had first heard.
“What’s happening?”
“It’s just thunder.” His hands stroked her body, her breasts, her belly. Not like before, with his hand in her hair. Her chest and cheeks flushed and she tried to shift away but he held her close. “The cave will protect us and the rain will pass.”
She pulled her legs to her chest so that his hands couldn’t reach her there, and wrapped her arms around her knees. The rain beat upon the earth with a constant rumble, thick and heavy. A gust of the storm blew into the cave, spraying everything with fine, cold droplets. Tiny bumps rose up on her skin, beneath the soft brown hairs on her arms and legs, and she smoothed them, until Adam stopped her.
He was still watching her, his lips curved slightly. His eyes were the color of the storm. The same shade of gray but hard as the stone, filled with cold heat.
“It’s confusing at first, I know,” he said, and he stroked her hair again. “Everything is so disconnected. Overwhelming. It takes time for understanding to come. But the important thing is you’re alive. I wasn’t sure you would be.”
Some of the things he didn’t say out loud echoed in her thoughts.
Elohim is dead. The words wriggled into her thoughts, Adam’s voice, though his lips didn’t move. It was almost like the voice in the void, telling her she must breathe, waking her from darkness and bringing her into light. Into the storm. But unlike the voice, there was no warmth, no love, swelling in her chest. The Garden is mine.
She shook her head, covering her ears with her hands. He pulled them away, his fingers hard on her wrists.
“You must listen to me, Eve.” There was a weight to his words, and a heat that made her stomach twist as it crept from his hand into her body, slithering its way inside her, as his voice had a moment before. “You and I, we’re more than these others. We’re meant to rule them, to lead them. I can see it in you, that same spark. His spirit is in you, like me.”
“I don’t understand.”
He made a noise that she hadn’t heard before. The sound was harsh, but she thought, for some reason, that it wasn’t supposed to be. That it could be friendly and joyful too.
“You don’t have to understand me, Eve. You have only to obey.” And sister or not, I will have you as my wife. His hand in her hair pulled, her scalp prickling, but he released her again before she felt the need to cry out. There is no God to stop me. His laws will die with Him.
He looked out into the rain, his gaze unfocused. The fruit. That must be the priority. I’ll find the fruit first. He balled his hand into a fist as she watched, wishing she could move away.
His head jerked up and he stared back into the cave, where the others were half-hidden in the dark, as far from him as the space allowed. Adam stood and moved to the group, grabbing another man by the arm and pulling him away from the others.
“Go, find me the body. Take a second man to help if you need it, but don’t come back without Him.”
The man glanced at her before he nodded. She didn’t hear what he said when he spoke, but a third man stood, glancing outside, his shoulders hunched. They left the shelter of the cave, flinching beneath the rain.
Adam sat down again beside her and she felt his satisfaction crowding against her thoughts.
“We’ll be very happy together, Eve. You and I.” He smiled. “The world will be at our feet. Every man, woman, and beast will be at my command.”
There was an edge to his voice that made her shiver and she wrapped her arms more tightly around her body. He was watching her, and when he touched her, she saw herself for a moment through his eyes. His gaze followed the swell of her breasts and the curve of her hip, flushing her skin.
My lovely Eve. God could not have really meant to give you to any of the others. You are mine. He pulled her closer to his body. You are mine.
The thoughts echoed in her head and she closed her eyes, leaning away from him against the cold stone of the cave. She wished he would let go. These words made her uncomfortable, these words he didn’t say. The feelings behind them crept up her spine and fogged her mind. She wished she were still in the darkness without the air and the noise and the light. Without this man who sat beside her and called her his own, his own, his own.
It all felt wrong, but she didn’t know why.
Chapter Three: 1280 BC
Thor stood beneath the shade of his mother’s tree and wiped the sweat from his brow. It had taken them months, but Odin’s great hall was finished. Valaskjalf was large enough to accommodate the rest of the Aesir when they arrived, though few beside Odin’s wife, Frigg, would remain longer than it took them to build their own halls. Thor’s small skáli had been built first for shelter while they hewed the larger stones needed from the earth and labored to erect the vast walls.
Odin had lifted the land and cloaked the mountain in mist, sealing it within its own pocket of time. From Asgard, they could watch the earth, but the earth would not be able to watch back, and no foreign god would be able to reach them without Odin’s permission. It was a precaution they had taken before, though this was the first time they had ever chosen to share a world with other gods. A Covenant of Peace had never been achieved in the five cycles Thor had known, but he was glad of it, and gladder, too, that Odin had seen the wisdom in agreeing.
Thor was weary of the wars and the stench of death, mortal and immortal alike. New worlds were growing harder to find when the last was drained of life. Soon there would be nowhere else to go, and no people to worship them. It would make for an empty existence; even the strongest of the gods would die trying to create life from the dust, a feat the True God of this world had accomplished, and then some.
“You’ll go to the others, Thor,” Odin said, joining him with two mugs of mead.
They sat down on the stone bench beneath the tree. Always the first thing established in any new Asgard, Thor made sure all the proper respects had been paid. The world-tree had been his mother’s last gift before she had left them.
“Bring them gifts of gold and let it be known we have settled here and sworn our vows for peace.”
Thor took a drink of the mead and stared into the amber liquid. “Baldur would be a better ambassador. They would have only to look on him to know his words were sincere.”
“But Baldur is not here, and I dare not wait to learn what I can.” Odin shook his head. “Let it be you. And let these other gods realize the might of the Aesir, in case they entertain ideas of breaking the Covenant.”
“Of course,” Thor agreed.
Baldur was good and genuine, but he lacked the necessary presence for subtle intimidation. Tha
t underestimation had served his brother well. No one expected Baldur to be a vígamaðr, and they certainly didn’t expect him to cleave a body in half, but the Aesir were all warriors and Odin had trained his sons on the battlefields of five worlds.
“You’ll leave in the morning,” Odin said, his gaze on the tree.
The red leaves fluttered. The first crop of apples had already grown and dropped, ripe and sweet to the grasses beneath. They had eaten some, until the rest had hardened and they could trade the gold for goats, sheep, pigs, cows, and chickens. Thor had been forced to go all the way to Egypt before the gold had been worth anything in barter. The smaller villages in the north could not use anything which did not feed or clothe them directly.
“You’ll give Sif my regrets, that I could not meet her myself.”
Odin smiled. “Sif will be too busy settling into her home to miss you, I think. But if there is anything she requires, I will provide it.”
As much as he missed his wife, he was curious about this world and the gods within it. He looked forward to meeting the others. Sif would understand; he had journeyed often in the old worlds. “Give her my love.”
“If she doesn’t know she has it by now, then my words will be of little consequence, but I will tell her.” Odin clapped him on the back and rose. “Take as much of the gold as you can carry. We will wait for your return.”
Thor nodded and finished his mead, counting the apples left on the ground. He would go back to Egypt and turn some of it into goods. Food and clothes, and perhaps a good horse to make the traveling easier. Egypt was full of gods. He had caught a glimpse of the old one, Ra, when he had been there last, and it was only right that he pay his respects to the vow-holder of the Covenant first.
“You and your people are most welcome to the Northlands, Thor,” Ra said. They walked the dusty streets of the capital city. Ra had given Thor a tour of the Pharaoh’s palace earlier, and the temples to the gods, all filled with gold and bright murals showing the history of Egypt. “Tell your father his claim will be known, and he can rest assured none will challenge him there. But you know the people are few in that area?”
“There were none left in the world we came from,” Thor said. “Odin is a fair god, good to those who would follow him. Word will spread, and the villages that already exist in those lands will be nurtured.”
Ra nodded, his brown face lined from the sun. “You would be surprised how many gods have not learned the value of patience.”
Thor smiled, his eye caught by a woman carrying a water jug. She was very beautiful, her eyes a striking shade of green he had never seen before. He paused to watch her, and felt Ra stop with him. There was something odd about her aura. Something not quite right about the shift of light and shadow…
“She is very unusual, isn’t she?” Ra asked, a smile in his voice.
The woman stopped at the well, setting down the jug, and for the first time, Thor saw the small swell of her stomach. But a pregnancy did not account for the golden glow, or the presence he felt from her. She was sunlight and spring rains. “She’s not mortal.”
“No,” Ra agreed. “Not at all. But she lives like one. And seems not to realize our presence in the world.”
He grunted, watching her lower a bucket into the well and struggle to raise it back up. “Do you know her?”
Ra shrugged. “Only from the time she has spent among my people. She’s rarely born here.”
“Born?” Thor frowned. Once born of their parents, gods lived eternities. Longer still, if they possessed the right magic. Like golden apples and ambrosias, or better, the belief of a people. Prayers were powerful.
“She’s the True God’s daughter, from what I can tell. He made her to age and die like a mortal, to be reborn again somewhere else, every century or so. In this life, she is known as Yocheved.” Ra began to walk again, and Thor had no choice but to move with him, though he wished he could have stayed another moment. “In the tradition of the Hebrews, she would be called Eve. There’s another, a man who would be called Adam. But he is not so benign a presence.”
“I’ve never seen anyone like her.” Thor glanced back, but she was no longer in sight. He could still feel her there, and leaving her behind made him feel colder, somehow. He straightened, and forced himself not to drag his feet.
“It’s a shame about the baby,” Ra said absently, his eyes unfocused and distant.
“What about it?”
Ra shook his head, the lines of his face smoothing. He flicked his fingers in dismissal. “The Archangel Michael began a rumor among the slaves which has reached the Pharaoh’s ears. He claims the True God has heard the cry of His people, and a male child will be born to the slaves who will deliver the Hebrews from the yoke of Egypt.”
Thor stiffened, thinking of the babe barely large enough to be noticed in Eve’s stomach. So not only was she a goddess living as a mortal, but she was a slave as well. An odd life to choose, but at least it seemed for a purpose. “And who better to bear the child than the True God’s own daughter.”
Ra frowned. “Michael does not say who will carry the child, and Pharaoh will not risk losing his slaves. He’s ordered all the children born within the year to be killed, along with every boy under the age of three.”
“How many?” Thor asked, feeling the pain of it already in his heart.
“Hundreds, if not a full thousand.”
His jaw tightened. So many, all innocent. But it was not his place to argue. “That is a great shame.”
They walked on in silence and Ra led them back to his temple, between towering obelisks, brilliant as the sun. One of the priests saw them and genuflected, bending so low his forehead touched the stone as he mumbled a prayer.
“Will you join me for refreshments?” Ra asked, waving the priest to his feet.
Thor shook his head. “I have some business in the markets, and much else to do for my father yet. My thanks for your hospitality. I hope one day I will be able to return the favor.” He bowed.
Ra smiled and returned the gesture, causing the priest to stare, wide-eyed at the sight of his god humbled. “It is my pleasure, Thor of the Aesir. I wish you a successful journey.”
He stood outside the small hut, shifting to catch a glimpse of the interior. It was all shadow and brick, a half-filled loom the only furnishing he could see beyond the bed, itself not much more than a mattress of straw. But from the soft, fretful cries, it seemed Eve had finally given birth to her baby.
Thor had watched over her for months, hiding himself from the Egyptian gods and gleaning what information he could from Eve’s daughter, Miriam. It had been an easy thing to cultivate a friendship with the young girl as her mother became heavy with child and Miriam had been sent to the well in Eve’s place. He had stopped her from being whipped at least half a dozen times, disgusted that anyone would raise a hand against a girl of seven simply for struggling to raise water from a well.
“A little brother!” Miriam whispered into the dark where he had cloaked himself outside the window.
“A great blessing,” he murmured back. Neither the midwife nor Eve noticed. Their heads were bent together over the baby, and Eve wept as the child nursed. The sound of her suffering had been like needles in his heart until it was broken by the babe’s wail, healthy and strong.
“It will be impossible to hide him, Yocheved. If you wish him to live, he must be sent away. Smuggled from the city,” the midwife said.
“We’ll be stopped if we try. The Pharaoh’s soldiers will find him.”
Thor didn’t dare try to manipulate Eve—such a thing would violate every law of conduct between the gods—but it took only the merest thought to influence the midwife. The river, he told her.
“Let Miriam take him to the river,” the midwife said. “The soldiers will not stop a little girl, and if you lay him in a basket, it will float long enough to take him out of the city. If it is God’s will that the baby live, he will be saved.”
God’s will or not
, this child would live. Thor had already seen too many die in this world. Too many lives wasted for nothing but the pleasure of their king. He would not allow the child of a goddess to suffer the same fate. Eve hesitated, seeming to stare straight at him through the window of the hut. He held his breath and emptied his mind of all thought but the baby’s safety. If she felt him, let her feel his reassurance, nothing more.
She dropped her eyes to the baby at her breast, and then kissed the small round head. “My boy,” she said. “Know my love.”
Eve hummed softly while she wrapped the boy in his blanket, laying him in a basket of reeds. The tune stirred memories of milk and warmth in Thor’s mind, and he shook his head to clear it. He had no time for distraction. If it was to be done, it must be done quickly. He urged them on silently until Miriam slipped out the door, the basket an awkward burden in her arms.
“I’ll carry him,” Thor said, stepping out from the shadows. Miriam was strong for a girl her age but the basket was a third as big as she was. He took her hand, cradling the basket in his other arm. “Quickly now. The fastest way to the river.”
She tugged him to the right down an alley, and he let her lead. If he used his power to travel through lightning to the water, it would give his presence away, and he could not risk being found by Ra or any of the others. They slipped through the dark streets and Thor did what he could to ensure that they were empty. When they did cross the path of one of Pharaoh’s guard by the water, he caused the man to think he had heard his wife’s voice, and they passed behind his back down the bank and out of sight.
“Did God send you to save my brother?” Miriam asked.
He looked down at her small face, lit by the moon, and squeezed her hand once before letting go. “Yes,” he lied. “But you mustn’t speak of it to anyone. Not even your mother.”
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