What he at first thought were people now filed through stone archways ahead one at a time. He stumbled forward, obeying the magnetic compulsion to follow, though he tripped and landed on the bony shoulders of the individual before him. Before he could right himself, a fist smashed his forehead, and he staggered and blinked away motes of light. After being spat on, he kept his distance and waited for the line to move.
A pair descended the stairs and fell into place behind him. They gargled unintelligible words, then chuckled. He glanced back and saw them smiling. They looked androgynous. Cain’s face flushed and he looked away. They chuckled again, and his neck crawled.
After filing through the archway, he proceeded down the tunnel until it ended with dark holes on the left and right. No light stones led the way down those paths, where the ground was hollowed out.
Wind gushed out of the hole on the right, and a metal cylinder slid into view and stopped. It was set on its side and marked with doors that slid open and allowed groups to exit before those that had waited with him entered. He followed the compulsion into the cylinder and found a seat at the end. The others took seats far from him, the doors shut, and the cylinder sped down the tunnel into darkness.
Throughout the journey, the cylinder stopped and some exited while others took their place, but he never felt the impulse to move. Three stops down, the pair that molested him with their eyes exited, and exhaustion came like an innocent caress. Indeed, he was so fatigued that he thought he wouldn’t have been able to move if commanded. After the last of them left, the hum of the cylinder lulled him to sleep for the first time in many days.
It was a deep and dreamless repose.
22
Cain awoke with a gasp, still sitting on the bench in the cylinder. He was alone, and the container was illuminated by pale light filtered through cracks in the doors. Dust flecks floated through the beams, and the scent of aluminum and sweat clung to the enclosed atmosphere. He rubbed his face with a sticky palm and stood. The machine creaked and the doors opened when he neared them. He hesitated, temporarily blinded by the light, then exited the cylinder to a well-lit corridor identical to the last, only empty.
“Hello?”
He walked a few slapping steps forward and stopped, listening to the rush of his blood, a soft but steady rhythm. He tasted the pale thirst and momentarily wished he had a red-filled cup to quench it. He ran a hand through his hair, smothered the desire, and walked on.
“Few come this way,” said the silver boy.
Cain looked at the arches. “Where are we?”
“The central Dome of the Light Bringer. Only those summoned dare come so far.”
Cain walked past the arches, pausing only to run his hand across their slimy texture. He ascended the staircase. As he reached the top, he paused. This Dome was not the same busy metropolis, filled with beings and buildings. It was a barren wasteland stretching from end to end and punctured by a singular Tower dwarfed amidst the grandeur of the Dome. He walked toward the Tower and the ground beneath him sped away strangely. It seemed to him that Time itself was rolling beneath him, and he skipped from crest to crest. Finally the undulation stilled, and the Tower loomed above him.
The door in the Tower’s side opened like that of the moving cylinder, but its shadows were repulsive, and light failed to enter its mouth. It impaled the ground, a beautiful and archaic thing, both severe and terrible, and fear held him motionless.
But what was fear but an illusion? Cain was chained to the silver boy and had set down a path he could not escape, walking the land of the Light Bringer, whose power made the silver spirit inside him quake. Every instinct screamed for him to run from this place, and yet he knew how misleading instinct could be.
The rabbit follows impulse and becomes prey. The human outwits the trapper and gains dominance.
“What are you waiting for?” the silver boy asked.
“You offered me a moment earlier. I will take that moment now.”
He knew that to walk into this Tower would be to pass into a great nexus of Time. Every detail of the future, the fate of his grandchildren, even his great-grandchildren and those beyond, ran through this singular point. It was not simply another choice, it was a defining choice.
He had realized even when planning the deed that killing his brother had set him down a path into the core of the forbidden, and now he found himself at the entrance to one of its arteries. If he turned back, Abel’s murder would become nothing more than an experiment in futility.
Cain was reminded of the incredible power of the present. Every choice crafted truth from clay, and though days earlier he would have welcomed this moment, now, with the Waters of prophetic truth rinsing him of ignorance, he saw what violence could arise from such a seemingly benign choice.
Stray but a little and the world may shatter. But if I resist …
No. I cannot choose that way.
To move forward was to embrace chaos. No man knew what possibilities lurked within that chaos, but only with movement could the pieces align. Failure was the true Sin, and as the Almighty claimed, it would consume him. Mankind had embraced chaos before, and it had brought them to a state of heightened awareness. The Almighty banished them from the Garden out of fear, for he knew that mankind in such a state could accomplish anything.
Clarity with immortality. The recipe for Godhood.
The human lays traps for the animal, but God ensnares mankind in the ambition to be as he. Power. It is what separates man from God.
This was his only chance to move forward, to embrace innovation, to seek and find what lay hidden in the dark recesses of the world and worlds, to reclaim the godhood mankind inherited in the Garden by eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
“For God knows that if you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like him.”
It was fate. Destiny. Purpose.
He looked at the vertebral marks burned into him by the Almighty, and raised his fist to the ceiling, accepting for the first time the meaning those physical manifestations contained. His throat constricted and his fist shook as he screamed past the Dome to whatever lay beyond.
“I am.” He shook his fist, “I am. And nothing and no one can stop me!”
He turned, let his fist fall, filled his lungs, allowed the fear to pass through him, and plunged into the Tower’s throat.
23
Machines growled and whirred as the sensation of movement spun Cain’s mind like a falling maple seed. Down he went into the bowels of the Tower to meet the Light Bringer. He could see nothing, for there was only darkness, and as he groped and attempted to maintain balance, his fingers waved through bone-chilling air.
He felt as he had when left in the wilderness by the silver boy. He was once again powerless, surrounded by empty nothing. The hum of grinding metal—or was it so many hammers striking anvils?—cycled with steady rhythm, and the deeper he went, the more lifeless and hollow the space became, until at last he shivered and brought his extremities in to conserve heat. Frost formed on his nose, and he closed his eyes and hugged his knees.
His insides sank as the descent slowed and everything stilled. No more gears, only the sound of Cain’s uneven breathing. His body shook.
There was the sound of sliding stone, and a sliver of light stabbed the darkness ahead. He jumped and ran toward it, shoving his hand into the ray to feel warmth. The sliver widened, became a beam, then an open doorway.
The light melted the frost from his skin as he entered an immaculate hall decorated with tapestries, lampstands, and art. The way was wide enough for perhaps twenty or so men to walk abreast, and symmetrically placed pillars held the ceiling high. Into the pillars was carved the likeness of a single face that was sensuous and drew him until he smiled unknowingly.
At the end stood golden doors into which was cast the focal point, a work of art—without equal—portraying thousands of beings with weapons raised. They marched toward a great City, and at th
eir front stood a figure lifting a brass horn from which light volleyed in widening arrows.
He brushed his fingers across it. They march to war? He traced the leader’s arm to the instrument he held. A musician.
He studied the image, then knocked thrice.
A basso voice rumbled from beyond the doors. “Enter.”
Cain obeyed.
The chamber was not as he expected. The vanity of the hallway and the overwhelming size of the City had primed him for indulgence, but the door opened to a dull gray box whose only ornamentation was one stone throne, two red lamps on the throne’s armrests, and a towering mirror on the far wall, lit by burning braziers. In the throne sat who Cain guessed was the Light Bringer, for the face was similar to the busts in the hallway and the musician in the mural.
“You are drawn to me.” His voice was sweet and smooth, yet powerful.
Cain wondered if the Light Bringer could see him shaking.
“You are free to speak in my presence.” A pause. “You have no reason to distrust me, though fear is an appropriate reaction.” The Light Bringer sipped from a goblet and set it next to the lamp that had obscured it. The drink stained his lips a dark crimson, and Cain felt the pale thirst return.
“You are a strong man.” The Light Bringer smiled with tainted teeth, then slid out of his seat and approached until close enough to touch. “You and I are cast from similar molds.”
The Light Bringer was roughly the same size as Cain, but Cain felt overwhelmed by his presence. “In what way?”
“You want freedom.” The Light Bringer’s voice lowered enough to shake the room. “And I brought you here to show you that I am.”
“You are what?”
He spread his arms. “What do you see?”
“Stone walls.”
“And what do they represent?”
“A prison?”
The Light Bringer laughed, but it was cold. “Try again. Where are you?”
The silver boy tried seizing control, but Cain suppressed it and said, “Your City.”
“My City. And how did I make this my City? Well, son of Adam, that’s precisely why you’re here, isn’t it?”
“I’m here because I was led here.”
“Liar. You’re here because you chose to come. The moment you decided to beat your brother’s brains into the dust, you put yourself on the road that led only here.”
The corner of Cain’s mouth twitched toward the floor.
“Ah, you see truth. You desire release from stupidity, and the truth will set you free, will it not? That is why you came to me. But let us speak plainly. We need each other.”
Cain gazed at his hands, then cocked his head. “Why do you call yourself the Light Bringer?”
“They call me the Light Bringer because I bring illumination. I expose what others hide. I give fruit to those who hunger. I give insight when silence reigns. I give pleasure when chastity binds. I give freedom past darkness. I am the Light Bringer, the Morning Star, the Son of the Morning, the Day Lark.” The Light Bringer’s words fell into a melodious rhythm, and Cain felt himself compelled by the Music. The notes and tension of his voice stirred the heart. “I am the Great Musician, the Voice of the Damned, the Friend of the Broken, God’s Helping Hand. I do what he needs done, though I’m despised as a rebel son. Listen!” The final word struck Cain’s ears with the force of a hammer blow. His body shook as the air itself seemed to fall silent before the Light Bringer’s eyes.
“Come,” he commanded, reverting to his rumbling bass. “Show me what’s inside you.”
Cain stepped back, but the Light Bringer approached and grabbed his chin with a soft hand, and the sensation struck him like open palms to the chest.
“Let it out.”
Cain felt his awareness recede and realized he was voluntarily giving up control. The silver boy came forward, and the Light Bringer moaned with satisfaction.
“Yes,” he whispered. “You are beautiful. Everything I ever dreamed. My beloved child …”
Tears seeped from Cain’s eyes. He felt as if the words beloved child had been directed toward him, but he was the rightful first-born of Adam, not the product of this lord of spirits. Could it be, perhaps, that this being was their Creator? His skin tingled at the mere thought of it.
He jerked from the Light Bringer’s hold and realized the Light Bringer had been speaking to the silver boy, and not he, and that it was the resonance of the silver boy’s emotions that brought the tears.
So, that is who you are. And that is why you wouldn’t tell me your name or where you came from. You were waiting to be given one by your father, the Light Bringer.
The silver boy retreated to the void, and he sensed satisfaction spilling from the darkness. He swallowed the saliva that filled his mouth, wiped the tears the thing had forced from him, and stepped back to reestablish dignity and distance between him and the Light Bringer.
But something had happened in the few moments since entering the Light Bringer’s chamber. He felt strange intimacy with this being whom he had never met. He knew they understood one another. But there was more. With a crackling sensation rippling through his mind, he realized their relationship was the nexus, the point of convergence where the fate of the world would be decided for millennia to come.
Cain, the Sinner, was in this moment the most powerful man in the world. He felt this fact resonate with the Waters. His newly awakened prophetic sight gave him the right to make this claim devoid of arrogance, for simple truth may be believed without pretense, however much of it involves one’s self.
The Light Bringer slid his fingers under the goblet resting on the arm of the throne and shifted back toward Cain. After swirling its contents, the Light Bringer offered him a drink. “Come now, you must be thirsty.”
Cain looked at the liquid and, against his better judgment, allowed the scent of blood to reach into his awareness. His heartbeat sped as he felt his muscles twitch and burn. Saliva pooled in his mouth, and his tongue longed to break the surface of the drink. His fingers chilled and shook.
“You desire. I see it in your eyes.” The Light Bringer’s voice was smiling, but Cain could not look from the ocean in the goblet. Brackish coagulates churned hypnotically, and as he stared, the Light Bringer swirled it again. “As fresh as if you sucked it from a wound.”
Sweat beaded on Cain’s face.
The silver boy said, “Take it. Accept what you have become.”
His mind burned for him to drink. No. I need not accept this curse.
The Light Bringer said, “You cannot escape what you are.”
With great restraint, Cain looked from the drink to the Light Bringer’s eyes. He thought about slapping the cup away. About beating that smiling face into a grimace and grabbing a stone, as he had in the darkness of the valley, to spill red yolk from skull to goblet.
“Feed the lust. Let it grow and mature until you must vomit it forth.”
Cain reached, gripped the goblet in a shaking hand, and brought the cool lip to his mouth. Blood poured into his mouth and filled his tongue with pleasurable flavors. His body lurched, and he tipped the goblet until it spilled down his neck and chest.
He gasped as the goblet clanged on the floor.
“Beautiful,” the Light Bringer said. “You were thirstier than I thought. Well done.” He laughed. “Well done.”
Cain ground the bitter clots between his teeth and felt them burst. Tears blurred his vision and his hands clenched at his side. Sarah, I won’t forget my promise. I will return to you, even if I must bear the ultimate shame to do so.
The Light Bringer frowned. “Young child, young gift. Is a worker embarrassed when his master says, ‘Well done’? Is a son ashamed when his father says, ‘You are my pride’? They should not be if the praise is timely. Yet you were cursed instead of applauded.” He stepped close and his voice grew tender. “Ah, I know of the injustice. Your ears were starved for affirmation. Absorbed by wanderlust, they searched for approval,
and for a time you found it in your sister, whom you loved and married. But the pain grew with you. Every time you reached for her, the movement stretched your wounds and spilled their rot on you both. Her eyes grew weary of the hardness of your pain, and more and more she sought relief in the tenderness of another.”
Cain folded his arms and shifted away, feeling the Light Bringer’s words clutch his emotions.
“Abel stole her eyes, as he stole your father’s and the eyes of all the others. He was a void absorbing everything you loved. You feared he would overtake you. That he would steal everything and you would die alone and forgotten. You and he were the Night and the Day. The very laws of nature held your faces to the grindstone. Dear child, I understand.” He stroked Cain’s cheek and whispered, “That is why I gave you the strength to do it.”
Cain closed his eyes, inwardly screaming for the Light Bringer’s arms around him.
No! He wants to use me. I can see it with my very eyes!
The Light Bringer leaned until his lips touched Cain’s ear. “I offered what you wanted, and you didn’t care what it cost then, so why care now?”
Cain felt himself nod as logic lost itself in desire.
“I love you, Cain. I am the only one who ever loved you. And I am proud of you. You have done well.” He pulled him into an embrace and kissed his head, as a father would a child.
Cain shook against the warmth of the Light Bringer’s body. A century of suppressed emotions he hadn’t known existed boiled and stung his eyes and throat.
“I am proud of who you are.”
What perversity. It’s a hoax. A fabrication.
The Light Bringer said, “Give in. Accept what you are.”
Cain whispered, “What am I? Who am I?”
“You are mine.” The Light Bringer traced the vertebral marks on Cain’s arms with sharp fingernails.
Cain could not deny the depth of the relationship between him and the Light Bringer. It felt like fate. It felt like love.
Cain: The Story of the First Murder and the Birth of an Unstoppable Evil Page 10
