by A D Seeley
“Your son has been diligent in tending to them,” she told him with a smile. “You should be proud.”
He nodded before going to meet his eldest son in the large fields they sowed. They mostly ate fruits, vegetables, and grains, with meat being a treat for them to look forward to. It wasn’t that there wasn’t plenty of meat, but with Ka-in being the only truly skilled hunter in a family of mediocre ones, and with his job in the fields because he was best at that too, he just didn’t have the time to keep meat in their diet. Sometimes they would slay their sheep, but not often enough to really feed them all.
“Enoch!” he called. His son was tall and large like his father, his bare chest not as powerful and defined as Ka-in’s, but getting there because he was still entering manhood. When he was fully grown, he would then marry whomever God commanded him to before having as many children as he could before death. This was God’s commandment.
Ka-in didn’t quite understand the concept of death, but God told them that, once they had procreated the Earth enough for humans to flourish, that only then would they age and die.
He also didn’t understand age. He knew his most recent child was smaller than his first, but nobody grew larger after a certain point—even his mother and father appeared the same as Ka-in and the first of his siblings. God had explained it by saying that He had stopped their aging at their most fertile points so they could fulfill His commandment swiftly and with ease.
“Father,” Enoch said, hugging him.
Once they parted, Ka-in looked around. The crops indeed looked well.
“I see you took good care of things while I was gone,” he said, clapping Enoch on the back. He, unlike his parents, gave praise when it was warranted, no matter which child of his it was. He didn’t pick favorites.
“Thank you, Father. I did just as you said.” Enoch was obviously pleased as he wiped the filthy sweat from his brow with the back of one thickly-calloused hand.
Life went on like this for many more days and nights. Enoch married and now had small children of his own. Ka-in and Awan themselves had seventeen children. That was when things changed.
“I plan to sacrifice our most beautiful lamb to our Almighty God,” Ab-l told him one day as they walked out together away from their village toward their sheep and crops, pushing his sand-colored hair out of his eyes in much the same way that their mother always did to hers.
Ka-in had forgotten about their annual sacrifices being due. It really wasn’t smart if everyone was to eat. God wanted them healthy to fulfill His commandment, but asked for their food so they would go hungry. Ka-in didn’t see the point in it.
It was as he was thinking of how he was to feed everyone after sacrificing their food source that he got the brilliant idea to sacrifice barley from the soil not doing well this planting. God didn’t say the sacrifice had to be edible crops.
“Ka-in,” God said, appearing to him a few days later in all His glory; His white robes brighter than the sun billowing in a wind that wasn’t really there. Ka-in had always wondered if it was really the bright light that came with Him that stirred the air around them. “Why dost thou offer me such sickly crops? Dost thou not think more highly of thy Father?” God spoke the same language as them, though He did so with a flourish they didn’t emulate. It was, as his father told him, God’s way of showing them that they did not know as much as He, and they should not question His wisdom.
“I just…our families are growing larger every day, per your word. How can I make them go hungry?”
“Because it is as I commanded.” Ka-in stayed silent, waiting for God to finish. “Because thou hast sacrificed unto me thine poorest crops, I will not accept thy scant offering.” With that, God disappeared.
Ka-in was angry. He knew that was of Satan, but it didn’t matter right now. Just when he thought he’d calmed down, Ab-l—perfect little Ab-l—walked up. Upon seeing Ka-in’s refused offering on the altar, he said, “Why is that still there? God came to me before the sun was even above us.”
Ka-in couldn’t take it anymore. Ab-l had gotten on his last nerve. Without thinking, he grabbed one of the large rocks that made up the altar and hit Ab-l alongside his cheek with it. It felt so wonderful that, when Ab-l fell to the ground, Ka-in hit him in the head over and over and over again until his brother no longer moved or made a sound.
“Ab-l?” he asked through quick breaths once his body no longer felt hot with rage. But somehow, Ka-in knew his brother wouldn’t answer. He looked like an animal slain for food. Nothing showed in his eyes the color of moss. Not even a glimmer like starshine.
Ka-in grabbed Ab-l’s bloodied and gashed cheeks and started shaking his little brother’s head, calling his name over and over again. Nothing changed other than managing to get Ab-l’s sticky blood all over his own hands.
Once he realized that the blank eyes would stay that way, he dropped his brother’s head back into the dirt with a sickening thud. Somehow, he knew nobody would understand what he had done, so he stood and grabbed his brother under his armpits. Because he didn’t want more of his brother’s warm blood on him, he dragged him for a while through the dirt, leaving a bloody trail behind them. He didn’t know where he was going, he only knew that he had to get rid of the carcass. Nobody need know that Ka-in had slain him. They could think that animals had killed him for their own food.
Now, at least having a plan—and noticing that his brother was no longer bleeding—he picked Ab-l up and threw him over his shoulders like he would a large buck. He then ran until he was far enough away from their village for the animals to reign the land, but close enough to the sheep Ab-l tended so that it wouldn’t be a surprise to find him there.
Once done with that, he went and took a few of the weaker sheep and slaughtered them with his knife of flint before setting them near Ab-l so the animals would eat him. Now, nobody would question it. Ab-l went looking for some missing sheep, only to become food for the animals that had slain them. That was what had occurred….
After cleaning himself up in a small pool of water near their flocks, as well as turning up the dirt with his foot wherever Ab-l’s blood had spilled, he went back to work in the fields. He was going to pretend like he knew nothing about Ab-l.
The sun was making its descent when God came to him. “Ka-in? Hast thou seen thine brother, Ab-l?” He asked.
Ka-in couldn’t help but sneer as he continued digging up the dirt so that he could plant new crops here. He was glad that he would never see Ab-l again.
“No.”
“And thou dost not know where he is?”
“Am I my brother’s keeper?”
God’s mouth formed a tight line. Ka-in knew, in that moment, that God knew the truth.
“Thou hast committed an unpardonable sin by slaying thy brother, Ka-in.”
Feigning innocence, he said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
God seemed to swell in size, the light around Him becoming so bright that Ka-in fell to his knees and then his back, covering his burning eyes.
“I can hear his very blood crying out from the earth! In this very earth thou toils over!” He said. He didn’t yell it, but that didn’t matter. The sound still reverberated throughout all of Ka-in’s bones with a painful force.
The light dimmed and God’s voice softened. It was still stern, but it no longer physically hurt him.
“Ka-in, for thy crimes against thy brother, thou are hereby banished forthwith.”
“Banished?” Ka-in asked from his place on the ground, a little bit scared. “Where am I to go?”
“I know not. But thou cannot stay to taint the righteous. Wherever thou goest, thou will not find rest. Nowhere will feel home to thee. Thou will be a vagabond upon the Earth.”
So he was to go who knows where and it wouldn’t feel like home? Nowhere would ever be home? His fear swelled much like God had.
“Also, because this very earth screams with thy brethren’s blood, thou will be unable to produce
any crop from her henceforth.”
“But how am I to survive if I can’t grow crops?” he asked, trying to keep the emotions roiling his gut from being too obvious. “I can’t live off meat alone.”
“Go back to thine family. Thou will learn thine answer there.” With that, God disappeared.
As he’d been told, Ka-in made his way back to his home, the home he was about to leave. Ab-l had once again ruined Ka-in’s life. He truly hated his brother and would gladly smash his head like a melon all over again if he could.
When he arrived home, it was to find God there, obviously already having told everyone of his deed by their reactions. Not one person was missing. At least, other than Ab-l….
Ka-in’s mother was crying in his father’s arms. Ka-in’s own twin Aclima, who had married Ab-l, was holding Ab-l’s own twin Jumella in her arms as they cried on one another’s shoulders. Ka-in looked around. Other than his own wife, Awan, and their family—who all seemed to be in shock—each and every person seemed saddened that Ab-l would never again come home. At least now everyone understood the meaning of the word “death.”
“Thy family is gathered. Let it be known, and written in the stars, that Ka-in hast committed murder,” God announced.
Intakes of breath and squeals of shock resonated across the otherwise silent village. They had heard that word in God’s law, but had never understood its meaning. Now that they did, they looked at him in horror. The punishment for this crime was death. And now they understood death, or at least better than they had before.
“Ka-in has been banished, as well as cursed to wander the Earth until the end of his days, unable to make any living thing of the earth grow,” God said, inciting reactions and frenzied conversations between all his siblings and their seed.
“But the penalty for murder is death?” Ka-in’s father questioned, his eyes hard. It was as though he was asking God to kill Ka-in—yet even more evidence of his father’s loathing of him.
“Not in this case, my son,” God said, seeming a bit sad. Was this sadness for Ab-l, or at Adamu’s obvious distaste for Ka-in? “Ka-in did not fully understand the consequences of his actions, so his life is not forfeit.”
“But,” Ka-in stated quietly, even the smallest of babes ceasing any sound or movement as they turned to hear what he had to say, “as more and more humans are born, people who are not here to hear your word, they will take the law into their own hands. They will kill me.” He wasn’t going to fight his punishment, he just wanted God to see what would undoubtedly occur; to see that eventually someone would kill him for his fratricide—another word that he hadn’t understood until now.
God looked him over for a moment before He said, “They will not. I will make it so each man, woman, and child shall know thee upon sight, and know that thou art not to be slain.”
“But how?”
“I will give thee four marks so that they will know thee. First, as thou once towered over thy brother, so shall thee tower over men for most of thy years, Ka-in. Second, thine eyes will become as black as thine hate. Third, as thou art no longer the right hand of the one and only Almighty God, as well as thou hast defiled and marred the perfection of God when thou smote thy brother with that hand, thy right side will be marred and hidden by marks of the serpent.” Then, God added, “And finally, as thou hast not remorse for thy wicked acts, thou will not age until the end of thy days. Now begone from the eyes of the righteous.” Again, God disappeared.
Ka-in felt a vague burning sensation along the entire right side of his torso as well as his hunting arm. As it moved along him, black marks showed up in various spirals and lines on his tanned skin. Though he could still see his skin beneath it, he was marked from his right wrist, up his arm, then around to the entire right side of his chest and abdomen down to his hip. From the sounds of his family’s intake of breaths behind him, he knew that where it burned along the entire right side of his back and neck, he was receiving the same marks.
When it was done, his whole right side, other than his leg, was Marked. He did not know what the markings meant, only that they hid the side that had once belonged to God.
Now that his Mark was complete so his family could see it and pass it down among the generations, it was up to the patriarch of the family to finish his sentence. Without any emotion to show that this hurt him to do so, his father said, “All of your seed will accompany you. You must leave now and wait for them to come to you. They will pack what they can before meeting you in a few days.”
“Father?” Ka-in began, taking a tentative step toward the smaller, leaner man.
“No. You are dead to me.” He then turned and walked away. Everyone but Ka-in’s wife, their children, and their children’s spouses and young ones, turned and followed him.
Ka-in then turned to Awan. “I’ll meet you in the south caves. Tell everyone else that they are welcome to join us.” Without waiting for her response, he turned and stormed out of the village. If his parents wanted nothing to do with him, then to Hell with them. He was sure Satan would welcome them. They were the evil ones, the ones who had been kicked out of the Garden. They were the ones who had made his life miserable. And yet they were the ones judging him for his crime? And really, it was more like a favor so they would never again have to endure Ab-l’s childish antics….
Then fine. He’d leave. He’d start his own village where everyone would do things his way. Now he was the patriarch. There would be no room for God where they were going. Where they were going, he would rule forever. And God was going to regret it….
…Inac brought his hand away from the redheaded woman who was supposed to be his mother, known to the modern world as Eve, or Chavah. She hadn’t even said goodbye. She hadn’t even looked at him. He was certain her tears had been shed over losing Ab-l, maybe even Awan and their children, but not for him. His parents just hadn’t known what to do with him from day one. Sure, they had eaten the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, but that hadn’t taught them how to deal with a rambunctious child. He’d been more than they could handle from the day he was born.
At the time he’d wondered why his wife and children were to be punished as well. It was only sometime during the twentieth century that he’d realized that it was what had to happen for humanity to survive. If humanity hadn’t begun to spread across the land, then disease or starvation would have obliterated them. It had already destroyed the un-evolved cavemen of the Middle Stone Age who had died out long before Adam and his seed had taken over.
Scientists considered the cavemen “people,” but Inac didn’t. Having come across their long since abandoned caves and huts every so often in his travels—even before leaving the place of his father—Inac knew that cavemen had been far from human, which was one of the reasons they’d been destroyed. But no matter, God could have stopped Cain from killing Abel, but he hadn’t. Therefore, there was a purpose. And the only purpose Inac could think of was that he and his family needed to be banished. And when he was, the several of his siblings and their families who had taken his side and followed him as well—probably because he had been the one taking care of all of them for years, and they weren’t sure they’d be taken care of without him—well, they had needed to go with him as well, again, spreading humanity out across the globe.
He slammed the side of his fist over the drawing of his mother. Why couldn’t he just forget it all? Why couldn’t he only remember his current life? Immortality seemed like such a good thing to everyone. What they didn’t realize was how life was beautiful only because it ceased. Things get taken for granted when you get too much of them or are just given them.
His glance turned to his heavily tattooed right arm. The Mark. He still had it. Everyone else just assumed he’d done it to himself. But it was the Mark that he had made sure no longer appeared in the ancient texts as it once had. People nowadays had such crazy theories about what his Mark was, his favorite of which was that he was large and extremely hairy, perhaps even Sasquatch
. Reality was that he had never had much body hair at all. He’d passed that gene on to some of his children until it became a dominant characteristic among the slanted-eyed people who lived in a small corner of the world.
Nowadays, people saw his lack of body hair and believed that he must wax—something so normal with the womanly men of today—but he’d never needed to. Sometimes he had pondered why he hadn’t had thick body hair to act like a fur in the cold nights he’d wandered alone. At least the hair grew thick on his face and head, not allowing heat to leave through one of the most vulnerable parts of his body.
A part of him thought that maybe being hairless was God’s way of making sure that his Mark wasn’t hidden by a pelt of hair as thick as the jungles he’d traveled through back when they’d ruled over men. Like maybe God knew when He made Cain that he would one day be Marked, and had made him accordingly. It was ironic, really, seeing as how back in the burning times, the body hair had been shaved off “witches” before execution because the people believed it was the devil’s protection.
Also, when his Mark had first appeared, he hadn’t understood why it was on his entire right side except where it ended near his hip or face. But, over the years, he’d figured it out. Any of the muscles that were a large part of his right arm’s movement were Marked. The Marks didn’t consist of any language known to the devil as he’d first thought, but they were spiraled like the serpent as they moved with the curves of his perfect muscles, the perfection that God wanted hidden to show that he was no longer His instrument.
Now looking up at his aloof mother, the emotions this painting evoked causing his eyes to burn in both hatred and sadness, Inac realized that he needed comfort right now. He needed Hara. Turning toward her room, he could almost sense the light she would infuse him with. She wouldn’t know what she was comforting him from, but that was the good thing about Hara. No matter what, she would always let him hold her until he felt better. Always.