“There is no shame in feeling fear, Hevel,” Qayin tells him. “You will overcome it in your own time. But for tonight, know that you were brave to come here and witness the heavens.”
| The Third Gift Given |
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| By: |
| Published on 03 Aug 2026 21:44 |
The Third Gift Given
Author: Din-Bidor
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By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain, through which he was attested to be righteous, God testifying about his gifts, and through faith, though he is dead, he still speaks.
– Hebrews 11:4
Hevel ben Adam, second-born, digs his toes into the soft earth and wishes he could grow roots. He imagines himself settling on this very spot, legs joined into a single mighty trunk, his skin and flesh hardened and rugged, his outstretched arms covered in leaves. Trees do not feel scared, he tells himself. They do not fear the fire that sears their bark nor the termite that eats them from the inside out. Trees do not fear the ax nor the men who wield it, and they surely do not fear the dark. Hevel wishes he could be as fearless. Night is falling over the Valley, the mountains to the east fading into the shadows as the sun sinks beyond the horizon in the west. Soon, the people’s bonfires will mirror the stars above; a hundred families will gather around the last traces of light to reminisce about the past and tell stories wrought from their imaginations, sleep slowly weighing down their eyes. Then darkness will reign unopposed and the dying embers will wait for the dawn.
In his family’s hut, Hevel will lie awake despite the allure of slumber, alert to anything that breaks the stillness of the night. Every creak and crack will make him shudder, his mind weaving them together into the steps of a lurking predator watching his home with hungry eyes. Every call, hoot and chirp will herald faceless terrors, spirits and monsters waiting to haunt his dreams until he wakes up screaming. For Hevel, the night is the domain of fear and he is its favorite plaything.
Fear is primal, the first gift given by life. Hevel knows all children come into the world kicking and screaming, weeping their throats raw as the shock of being alive overwhelms them, lungs burning with their first breath, eyes brimming with tears. To them, everything is new, everything is terrifying. Only when held in the embrace of love does fear subside, a parent’s warmth melting away the first terror – at least for a moment.
“Do not think of fear as a burden, my son,” Adam once told him. “Fear is how we know we are alive, how we come to terms with the fragility of our existence and learn to cherish it. But you must also know to overcome it, to see beyond it so you may accept the second gift given: the gift of wonder.”
Tonight, sitting at the edge of his home in silence while his family sleeps, Hevel thinks back on his father’s words and is ashamed. He is ten summers old now, and still he cowers like a lamb who sees the wolf at every turn. He fears the dark and the things that live in it. He fears the desert and the beasts that roam the sands. He fears thunder and the wrath of the gods. Most of all, he fears he will never be a son deserving of his lineage. Hevel’s father Adam is chief over the people of the Valley; Hevel’s mother Hawwah is wisest amongst women; Hevel’s elder brother Qayin is already a man and a dutiful son. Who is Hevel? He is a coward, a child who dreams of being a tree so he will not fear the world.
A hand on his shoulder almost makes Hevel jump out of his skin, a scream forming and then abruptly dying in his throat when he realizes whom the hand belongs to. Qayin’s eyes glisten in the darkness, a mischievous but kind smile forming on his lips as he motions for Hevel to stay quiet and follow him.
Hesitant at first as if the nervous pounding of his heart could wake his parents, Hevel soon hurries behind his brother, careful not to scrape his bare feet against a rock or branch that could give up their nocturnal escapade to the adults. Even now he cannot stop side-eyeing all that surrounds him, dreading not only the terrors conjured by his imagination but also the stern scolding he’d surely receive for sneaking out. But Qayin strides with the confidence of someone who does not fear being caught, forcing Hevel to fashion his shame into a rope with which to pull himself forward.
“We can stop here,” Qayin says, which means they are now far enough from their village to speak without being heard. Hevel sits on the grass and lets his legs and lungs rest after the walk uphill, his ragged breath settling down as he takes in the cool night air and gazes down at the shadows that nestle his people’s houses in its embrace.
“It’s a shame there is no moon tonight,” Qayin lies on his back and stares at the night sky. “On a full moon you can see the whole Valley from here, all bathed in silver light. When it bounces off the Tree of Life, it fills the air with sparkles and it almost seems like the heavens are reaching down to us. But even now… well, I still thought you would like it.”
The sky is lit by a thousand thousand fires, their brightness overwhelming the all-encompassing void. Streaks of cosmic substance paint colors on the canvas of night, hinting at the tiny fraction of infinity that is this cluster of light and dust and shadow and so many forces no living man understands and will not understand until so many ages have passed that even the past is forgotten, this band of glistening milk droplets spilt out into the churning spheres where gods and myths dwell. Yes, even now it’s beautiful, Hevel thinks. He says nothing, yet as his eyes imbibe the stars no fear can do away with his smile.
“Nahash says that all stars are giant balls of fire floating in a void,” Qayin says after a while. “They just look small because they are very far away from us. If they were closer, it would be like having another sun in our sky and we would all burn to ash.”
“How does he know this?” Hevel asks. Although he does not lack imagination, Nahash the Serpent’s words often veer into the fantastic and outlandish, and even the adults sometimes scoff in disbelief.
“Well, he is an all-knowing god, is he not?” Qayin replies, although it seems to Hevel that even he is unsure. “Why else would the All-Mighty put him in charge of the Tree of Knowledge? Nahash says—well, he also says that some stars have worlds hovering around them, and that on some of those worlds there are plants and animals and people just like us.”
“People?”
“Yes, people,” Qayin shrugs. “People with songs and stories and dreams all of their own. It sounds strange, I know, but if we are here, why would there not be someone out there?”
“Do you think they know we are here?” Hevel asks as he pictures another child on some faraway world looking at a night sky not unlike his and asking their elder sibling that very same question. “Do you think we will meet them one day?”
“Perhaps. The Serpent did not tell me more; I’ll ask him tomorrow, but who knows if he will answer. All he wants to teach me is how to channel the energy of the asters to strengthen my magic.”
“So you can protect us all one day,” Hevel nods. “You will be a great chief, a great shaman.”
“And you will be a great man when you grow up, no matter where your path takes you,” Qayin says.
“I– I don’t…” his brother’s words choke Hevel as he recalls his cowardice, his childish dread of the dark and its dwellers. His brother must be a fool to put such faith in him, or else he weaves a lie to mock Hevel. Shame makes his eyes water, and it overflows when Qayin puts his arm around him.
“There is no shame in feeling fear, Hevel,” Qayin tells him. “You will overcome it in your own time. But for tonight, know that you were brave to come here and witness the heavens, and that is enough.”
Through his tears, Hevel meets Qayin’s eyes and thinks they are as pools of infinite wisdom that shine with reflected starlight, his smile a balm for his burning shame.
“And besides,” Qayin continues, “whenever you fall, I will always be there to help you get back up. We are brothers, Hevel; we are never alone.”
“Yes!” Hevel wipes his tears. “We are brothers!”
And with that, a silent promise binds them with threads of love – a promise to be each other’s keeper, to stand together, to stumble and fall together, to help each other rise again.
Tonight, Hevel dreams of the stars that are the second gift given to him, the wonder once hidden by the fear he’s dispelled. In his heart, Hevel gives thanks to the All-Mighty for his brother, for wise and kind Qayin who embraces and never shuns him, and swears a vow to himself: to be as brave as Qayin so that his brother’s faith in him will prove true, so that the gift he has been given will be earned. Tonight, the darkness holds no more terrors.
The line between life and death is thin, so thin that most do not notice it until they have already crossed it, and nowhere is this more true than in the desert. Here, the scorching sands crawl with dangers, each deadlier than the last for the unfortunate traveler: thirst and sunstroke, raging storms whose caress cuts the skin and poisonous animals who have made the waste their domain, mirages that conceal certain doom under the guise of hope, and – in this age of myth – monsters.
Hevel has heard the stories his father and the other elders tell, of the time before the people found the Valley. He has listened with awe to the recounting of their heroic exploits – from the felling of great beasts to the freeing of slaves from the monolith-cities – but he has also felt great dread as the terrors they encountered come alive by firelight. Of all the monstrosities that prowl the desert, the one Hevel fears most is the Shadowman: a usurper silhouette who swallows and replaces its victim’s shadow, anchoring itself to the unfortunate soul and whispering maledictions until madness drives them into the sands to die.
There is no defeating the Shadowman, no way to kill or subjugate it; Adam and his people encountered it twice, and on both occasions were forced to give its victims merciful release. Only through a great sacrifice were they finally rid of it, and even they still shudder when retelling this. So terrifying is the story that, since he was a small boy, Hevel has never been able to hear its ending, as scared of the Shadowman as of the nightmares its name may summon in his sleep.
Yet today, as Hevel and Qayin sit at the edge of the Valley watching their sheep to graze, one question burns on his lips: “Brother, how did Father get rid of the Shadowman?”
Qayin leans on his crook and arches his eyebrows.
“Ah, so you finally want to know how the story ends? Are you sure you will not go crying to Mother when you feel the Shadowman’s fingers creeping up your back at night?”
Hevel frowns, then smiles and waves him off, trying his best to keep his cheeks from flushing red. “I was a little boy back then! You know I can take it now! And besides, Father said it was gone and could not come back ever.”
Qayin’s expression grows devilish and he leans in until he and his brother are practically rubbing noses.
“Or can it?”
“Oh, stop that! Are you going to tell me or not?”
Qayin laughs, then breathes in deeply as his face turns serious. The crook makes him look like a wizened storyteller, like a keeper of elder lore.
“Do you recall the first time Father met the Shadowman? It was possessing a stranger, a poor emaciated man who could only scream and plead for death as the demon tugged at his old sins like a wound that never closes. Father granted the man a dignified end and buried him with all the appropriate funerary rites, but he earned the wrath of the Shadowman, who was not pleased at being denied its plaything.
“The second time the Shadowman came, it took over the body of one of Father’s people: his own brother, Nahor. He was but a child then, barely ten summers old. A child is sinless, so the Shadowman could not drive him mad like he had its previous victim. Instead, it drew on the people themselves and poured what darkness nested in their hearts into Nahor. Father never speaks of what his brother became, but he has this haunted, hollow look in his eyes whenever someone mentions Nahor; whatever it was, his brother was erased, replaced with what the Shadowman wove.
“It was Mother who ended the horror. Her magic may not have the tempering Nahash teaches me, but it is still powerful. She collected blood from each of the people and drenched five iron nails with it. Then she went to Nahor and drove one of the nails into his heart, freeing his soul and binding the Shadowman to the corpse. She commanded the people to dig a hole deep enough that five men standing on each other’s shoulders could not reach the bottom, and stabbed the other nails into each of the Shadowman’s limbs. Then they threw its puppet’s body into the hole and buried it. That is why it never returned: it is still out there, somewhere, entombed beneath sand yet still screaming.”
Hevel swallows hard.
“Mother… killed Nahor?”
“The Shadowman did; Mother simply freed him from his torment. Father never resented her—it was the only thing that could be done.”
They sit in silence, letting the wind carry the bleating of the herd through their hair. A weight has lifted itself from Hevel’s chest – the fear of an old horror story – yet now a heavier burden has presented itself. Mercy is the third gift given, Father tells him, and the dark truth these words carry ensnares Hevel’s heart.
“Qayin…” He says at last.
“Yes?”
“I do not think I could do that to you. Put the knife to your heart, I mean, even if it would set you free. Does… Does that make me a coward?”
“It does not,” Qayin replies. “A choice like that is never easy, Hevel. To end a life, even for the sake of mercy… No man or woman can walk away from that unscathed, and I would not blame you should you hesitate.”
Hevel remains silent, his gaze set towards the sky, battling the burning of his eyes and trying to snuff out the dark daydream of having to give his brother the gift of mercy.
“But if it helps put you at ease, I promise to kill you before you get a chance to kill me,” Qayin says and clasps his brother’s head under his arm, rubbing his knuckles on Hevel’s scalp until he protests and laughs.
“Mother would kill you then!” Hevel heaves out between bursts of laughter. “Imagine how mad she’ll be when she learns you killed her favorite son!”
“And what makes you think you’re her favorite?” Qayin responds, and again the brothers tussle.
“It’s very simple: I’m far prettier than you!”
By the time they stop, both of them panting and choking on their own laughter, it is too late for fear or sadness to possess them. It is also too late to stop the lioness, who pounces on the herd and sinks her fangs deep in tender meat.
Qayin curses and runs towards the panicking sheep and the predator in their midst, crook lifted to strike as the lioness struggles to drag away her kill. A hit between the ribs makes her release to focus on the new threat, and a second hit is met with a flash of paws that leaves Qayin splayed on his back, his crook out of reach as the lioness rushes to end him before he can crawl to safety.
A loud crack and a roar of pain let Qayin know he is still alive. The blood that stains his clothes is dripping from the lioness’ mouth and forehead, where a fist-sized rock has struck with the quickness of a blink. Another rock hits the feline on her left calf, and she bolts as Hevel aims a third time, leaving behind the breathless Qayin and the unfortunate sheep she planned on eating.
Hevel rushes towards his brother and frantically searches for any wounds. “Are you hurt?” He asks again and again even as Qayin reassures him that he’ll live.
“I…huff… thank you…” Qayin gasps. “But I think we’ll be in trouble when Father learns of this.”
“Poor thing,” Hevel says as they round up the sheep next to their fallen herdmate. “At least it ended quickly.”
“It almost ended quickly for me too,” Qayin muses. “We have to return to the village and tell Father. He’ll organize the hunt.”
“No!” Hevel protests, pulling his brother’s arm. “It’s not her fault! She’s not a monster! She’s just hungry!”
“Hevel, if we let her live, she’ll return and kill more sheep, or maybe even one of us!”
“Then we won’t come here again!” Hevel responds, his chest puffing as he defies Qayin. “This is clearly her hunting grounds. No one else needs to get hurt if we just leave her alone!”
For a moment, Qayin’s face contorts in a way that makes Hevel think he’s going to strike him, holding the crook so tightly that his knuckles are turning white, but Hevel sees no wrath beneath his brother’s face – only fear.
“You can tell Father it was my fault,” Hevel says. “You can tell him I was distracted, lost in my daydreams. I will tell him how you saved me, how you…”
A tight hug almost knocks out Hevel’s wind, and only when he protests that Qayin is now crushing his ribs does the pressure stop.
“No. I will not lie about your bravery, brother,” Qayin smiles, “nor will I deny you the right to show the lioness mercy. A life for a life: both still alive to know the third gift given.”
The pressure returns; this time, Hevel lets it stay.
“Now let’s move the herd before the lioness returns,” Qayin says and glances at the sheep’s corpse. “She can keep her kill. At least we know it won’t go to waste.”
In the distance, past the rocky hills that mark the beginning of the wasteland, two fiery eyes watch them. A fluttering of wings crackles through the wind like embers, and the fate of the Valley is sung in silence.
Each morning, Hevel rises to meet the sun as it emerges from the East. He closes his eyes with reverence, lets the warm light trickle down his body like soft summer rain, and feels the many fingers of the wind lifting his long, free-flowing hair. In these moments he is not flesh and bone, but an ancient giant covered in an armor of rugged bark, with myriad branches holding strong to their verdant crown and gnarled roots to withstand the hurricane. When he opens his eyes, they brim with quiet solemnity, his boyishness tempered into steely resolve. Then he puts on his sandals, takes up his crook, and leads his herd into the distance.
The ways of the All-Mighty are mysterious, for the fantasy of childhood has become true: the sapling that was Hevel is in full bloom, as beautiful as he is strong, dutiful and brave beyond the wildest dreams of the child that once cowered at the coming of night. Few recall now that they are one and the same, for who could look at the tall and sinewy Hevel—past his steadfast stroll and calloused fists, past the simmering fire of his eyes and the graveness of his words—and imagine he ever felt fear?
Yet Hevel has not forgotten who he is nor the promise he made in the time of fright and innocence. He remembers the night he received the gift of wonder, how his brother’s words did away with fear under the watchful stars, and how he swore to one day return the kindness he was shown. And so has Hevel honored his oath as both boy and man; today he shall once again be his brother’s keeper.
For many nights now, Qayin has not returned home after his training with Nahash. Anointed in nocturnal light, he has continued to hone his magic and perfect his spellcasting technique, growing stronger and wiser under the Serpent’s unyielding tutelage. Now, as Hevel approaches, he lies curled between the twisted roots of the Tree of Knowledge and sleeps, but his is not a peaceful slumber. His eyes dart around beneath his closed eyelids, his hands are rigid as if trying to clutch something invisible, and his brow is covered in sweat. He does not awaken as his younger brother approaches him, nor when he sits next to Qayin and caresses his head; he merely dreams dim dreams and strains under his oneiric ordeal, bound to duty even in what should be his time to rest.
“You’re pushing him too hard,” Hevel says while looking up at the Tree of Knowledge. The Serpent is nowhere in sight, yet Hevel knows his words do not go unheard. “He may be our future chief and your chosen apprentice, but he is also my brother. He is not yours to keep forever.”
Gingerly, Hevel unties the sack he carries with him and places its contents next to Qayin: a gourd filled with clear water, some bread and roasted lamb, and Qayin’s favorites—fresh figs and an apple as red as the dying sun. He takes one last look at the Tree of Knowledge, then at the Tree of Life which stands some twenty steps from it, and goes back to his sheep. Unseen, three pairs of eyes watch him leave, but only two stay behind.
Life has been mostly quiet for the last five years. Hevel is a man now, as occupied with his responsibilities as his father, mother and elder brother are with theirs. While Qayin trains and Adam tends to the people’s needs, Hawwah is busy raising little Seth, who is yet to see his sixth summer but has proven far more energetic and troublesome than either of his elder siblings ever were. Thus, the task of herding the sheep falls squarely on Hevel’s shoulders, and although he has learned to enjoy the wordless company of animals, he often misses the time when the wind was not the only voice to meet his own. Still, solitude is—at its core—a teacher of the heart, and through it Hevel has come to know his true character, who he is when he thinks no one is watching.
Alone, Hevel has faced the dangers that roam the frontiers of the Valley, the predators who stalk and prowl in search of easy prey. Alone, he has stared down the wolf and the bear and stood his ground against the lion. Alone, he has come to accept that life and death are intertwined, and that even with all his might he cannot wrestle nature into changing its ways. Alone, he has strived to avoid bloodshed whenever possible, and to never take the life of those he knows not to be evil, merely hungry. Hevel knows his fellow herders do not understand why he spares the predators, for people would sooner fear and kill the beasts than learn to coexist with them, and for this reason he has come to appreciate being alone in the wilderness—out here, there is no one to reproach him for showing mercy.
If only I could teach them as I have been taught, Hevel laments, then perhaps they would see beyond their fear.
He thinks about Seth, innocent and infinitely curious about the world he’s been born into, his first little steps out of the house turning into an unbridled frenzy as he ran towards everything that filled his eyes with wonder, disregarding Hawwah’s protests and Adam’s attempts to keep him still. In those first moments of mirth, Hevel imagined himself in the place of his brother Qayin, reaching out a hand to his younger sibling for both mischief and consolation, passing down all he knows and holds dear. Yet Seth is still too young to venture out of the village, and perhaps too brave for his own good; only age will show him why fear is the first gift given. The distance between the middle and the youngest brother seems destined to be wider than it ever was between Hevel and Qayin, for time is an unforgiving master who waits for no one. Thus Hevel ventures out alone, praying that there will still be a chance to gaze at the stars together.
An agonized scream cuts through Hevel’s musings and lodges itself in that primal part of his brain that knows fear first and foremost. His heart races as he motions around trying to pinpoint the origin, tendons tensing in anticipation of running. He knows he must act fast; Adam, Qayin and the other men are too far from here to have heard the screaming, and even if they’re warned by the all-seeing guardians of the Trees, they will not arrive in time to be of any help but picking up what bloody spoils remain. Another scream is followed by a gurgling, guttural laughter, and Hevel sprints in its direction, praying to the All-Mighty that the sheep will stay out of harm’s way while he lunges headfirst into it.
The ground is soaked with blood and gore. The thorny plants that grow from between the cracks of the sun-scorched rock voraciously drink the red spill dripping from the throats and open guts of the dead and dying sheep. Still alive, his mangled leg nearly torn off his body, a fellow shepherd who Hevel knows as Japhet cowers and pleads to his tormentor—a creature that by the All-Mighty’s own decree should not exist.
Ten cubits and a span in height, with fists whose grip could shatter a skull with the ease one crushes an eggshell, the creature’s shape—although monstrous in size—is surprisingly human, and for a moment Hevel thinks one of the legendary giants from the frozen north has somehow found its way to the desert. This impression does not last long, for unlike in the stories there is nothing regal nor dignified about the creature’s gait and visage. Its grey, ashen skin is dressed in sackcloth stained with rotting filth, its fingernails are black and sharpened by years of tearing at bone and rock, and it moves about less like a man and more like a lumbering beast. On its back, piercing through slits cut into the sackcloth, two pairs of atrophied limbs covered in coarse membranes betray its unnatural origin. The being turns its lumpy head towards Hevel and sneers through uneven fangs, blood and pieces of sinew dripping down its unkempt beard, almost as if waiting for Hevel to speak the truth of its nature. “Nephilim,” Hevel whispers with dread.
The abomination laughs and laughs, its bellows punctuated by its victim’s whimpering. It picks up one of the barely-living sheep by the neck and bites deep into its flesh; the pitiful last tremors of the animal make Hevel grind his teeth.
“Ah, another one!” The nephilim says wetly. “Do you come to rescue him? Fool! He should have let me have the sheep when he had the chance. Now he might as well be part of my meal.”
“If we have somehow offended you,” Hevel says, “I implore that you forgive us. If you were hungry and were refused, I apologize. But please, let no more blood be spilt. Let him go.”
“Mmmmm,” the nephilim muses. “Implore. Please. I like these words! He said something similar when I broke his leg. Now it is all that he can utter, and see what good it does him!”
He flings away the corpse of the sheep and grabs Japhet by the shoulders, holding him aloft for Hevel to see. Japhet’s face is a swollen bruise, his features barely distinguishable amidst the ugly purple and red. He looks at Hevel with pleading eyes, unable to do much other than moan.
“Please, release him. He meant you no harm! If you let him go, you can take the sheep and–”
“And what, little man? What can I do if I release him that I cannot do right now? Do you think you can order me around, like some master? I know no master, no Lord All-Mighty! I am Talmai of Watcher blood! See how easily I break your men! See how easily I shall rape your women and spoil your crops!”
With the swiftness of one who snaps a twig, Talmai tears and Japhet screams, his agony climaxing as the nephilim sunders him from neck to groin. The spilled intestines glimmer in the sunlight, their image etched in Hevel’s pupils with searing horror.
There is something roaring inside Hevel, a simmering noise that slowly rises to challenge the monster’s renewed laughter, unheard beneath the bleating of frightened sheep and the cawing of carrion birds. For the first time in his life, Hevel swells with a feeling much stronger than fear and harsher than bravery, a burning thing that answers the call of innocent blood. He holds up his crook, steadies his stance, and races towards the murderous nephilim. The world is but a thought, and that is death.
A well-placed blow to the jaw makes Talmai recoil and drop Japhet’s severed halves, and another one to the knee almost brings him down. Talmai cannot believe the gravity of this insult, his rage bubbling up with a blood-curdling scream and his fists trying to crush the cursed human who dares defy the seed of the Watchers.
Talmai’s left fist meets Hevel’s ribs, sending him tumbling towards the rocks, his back bloodied by their sharp kiss. Hevel doesn’t stay down more than a few seconds, the rightful wrath that fuels him quickly overpowering the pain and sending him back into the fray with no hesitation. Hevel strikes Talmai in the face with such force that the crook splinters and snaps, sharp pieces of wood embedding themselves in the nephilim’s vulnerable eyes. Mad with anguish and nearly blind, the monster is reduced from a bashful brute into a rabid animal fighting for its life, fists landing stray blows on everything within reach. Hevel waits for an opening, carefully watching the nephilim’s desperate throes before driving one half of his broken crook into Talmai’s wounded knee, crippling it and at last forcing the abomination to kneel.
“Yield,” Hevel pants over Talmai’s groans. “Yield and leave this place with your life.”
The only answer he gets is Talmai’s hands closing over his torso and lifting him up like a vulgar lump. Through pained heaves, Talmai laughs his gruesome laughter and tries to squeeze, only for one last scream to tear through the Valley as Hevel stabs his broken crook into the monster’s right eye again and again, pushing and hitting and burrowing deeper into the flesh until the blood-soaked tip reaches something soft and moist and slides into it with the ease of a knife going through cheese. Talmai stops screaming, and the desert echoes with his fall.
Drenched in blood, sore and newly-baptized as a killer, Hevel stares at the carnage and finds nothing within himself but an accusing silence. It had to be done, he tries to tell himself, but his mind does not answer. It was the only way, he tries to muster, but he cannot even bring himself to think it.
“It had to be done,” a voice not his own tells him.
“Did it?” Hevel answers without turning. Whoever the speaker is, he is too ashamed to meet their eyes. “I took a life. I was angry, and I killed him. How am I less of a murderer than he was?”
“His was a wrath born of wounded pride; yours, one born of righteousness. You took his life to save many others. You became their justice, as well as his.”
Hevel does not refute the voice. He continues looking at Japhet’s corpse, sprawled in pieces next to Talmai’s remains.
“My father and brother will be here soon; they will help me carry Japhet home and honor him in death. But him…” Hevel motions to Talmai. “He was a remorseless murderer, a breaker of men and a despoiler of cities. Still, does he not deserve at least the dignity of the grave?”
“You would honor the one who sought to destroy you and all you hold dear?”
“In another life, perhaps, it could have been different,” Hevel laments. “I will honor the life that we were all given by the All-Mighty.”
For a moment, silence, and then:
“I will help you make a pyre for him.”
At last, Hevel turns. There is One standing beside him, One who radiates with light most holy, their wings so wide they could cross the breadth of the heavens with one clap, who carries between their hands a flaming sword that is justice and mercy. A warm smile is on their lips and a single message burns within their kindly gaze; it says be not afraid.
Behold Hevel ben Adam, second-born, greatest amongst warriors, champion and protector of the Valley and its people. His feet are steadfast on treacherous ground, light and nimble as he heads into battle. His flesh bears the scars of victory and his bones keep the memory of every beaten foe. In his eyes there is no fear, only purpose, and his heart is hard but for its very core, where the kindness of childhood remains enthroned.
Behold him as he wields the Tumbling Blade, bound to his being to be both mercy and justice, for only one who loathes to unsheath his sword is worthy of its power. See how he fashions it as if it were tender clay, shaping it into forms as deadly as his imagination allows, how he makes it appear and disappear with the mastery of one who kills with a single thought. And yet, see how he spares those who recant and choose peace instead of violence, how he puts away the sword to hold out his hand in reconciliation.
Behold him as he trains day and night under Uri-El, Archangel of the All-Mighty, dodging the strikes of His flaming sword, parrying them with his own and striking back at the ethereal being in a deadly dance so fast that the mortal eye can see only its phantom. Not once has the searing kiss of the Archangel’s blade touched Hevel’s skin, for its pain is not his to endure, but neither has Hevel laid a single blow on his teacher, for Uri-El will not hold back His lessons.
“I will shed not one drop of your blood,” He said to Hevel, “but I will make you hurt. Your body will wail, but you will not heed it. Your spirit will falter, but you will not succumb. I will lay your mangled pride down at your feet. Pain will be your temperance; when you meet it in the battlefield, you will bend with it and never break. I have given you the Tumbling Blade. Only when I feel its bite shall you truly be called champion. Now get up and fight, Hevel ben Adam!”
Behold Hevel—man, brother, protector—his face grim as he watches over the frontiers of the Valley. Below him march the throngs of refugees who flee the East towards the ocean, braving the desert and its dangers to escape the horror that swallows men and gods alike: the rising tide of the Daeva Empire and its idols whose sole blessing is perdition. There are so many of them—frightened, dispossessed, lost. Their homelands have been taken and turned into killing fields, their gods humbled in their own temples and taken in chains to Daevon, their families and way of life shattered, all defiled in the name of the Scarlet King. Adam and his people have done what they could to aid them, to bring them some comfort in their loss, but there is only so much help that can be given, and to reveal the Valley to the masses would put everyone at risk.
Hevel will not speak of it, but he knows the truth in that tender, kindly part of his heart from whence his entire being sprouts. He knows what the Serpent told his mother, what she then told her husband, what is now evident even for those without the foresight of the All-Mighty: soon the shadow in the East will spread to the desert and consume the Valley and its people. And yet, that is not the greatest worry that weighs on his furrowed brow.
That night there was despair in his parents’ voices, Hevel recalls. Once they led their people through the wastelands and protected them, but Adam and Hawwah were young then. The burden now falls upon their children—wise Qayin, brave Hevel and selfless Seth—to face the black hordes and the Daevite gods. Yet even with their strengths combined it may not be enough to prevent the carnage, the defiling of the Garden.
Seth was the first to rise and speak:
“I will go to Hakhama, the Voice Who Speaks for God, and ask for her help. She has taught me the ways of healing, and now she will teach me the might of copper so that our people do not perish in the flames.”
Hawwah embraced her youngest child and Adam brimmed with pride and hope. Hevel smiled, his heart swelling as again his brother proved to be as brave and humble a man as he had once wished to be. Qayin, however, remained impassive, lost in thought. He looked pale, his visage ashen as if all blood had drained from his flesh, and his feet were restless as if he had the urge to run away. At last he spoke:
“Nahash came to me, Mother. He said you rejected his gift—the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. Why? Within it lie secrets of ancient magic, magic so powerful we could hide away the Valley forever from the eyes of the Daeva, or strike down any who wished to harm us. Why would you reject such a gift?”
“My son,” Hawwah said, “knowledge can be a gift, but also a curse. The secrets the Serpent holds are powerful indeed, but they are not meant for man to discern. The gods themselves shun such magic, for they know it could be too much even for them. I am but a woman of flesh and blood, and I know not to tempt fate.”
“The only fate that awaits us is slaughter!” Qayin rose to his feet and accusingly looked his mother in the eye. “The Serpent has shown me what will happen, what shall become of us if we do not take the Serpent’s gift! Children will be torn from their mothers’ wombs! The people will be killed or turned into livestock! The Trees will be set aflame! But that shall not be. I will not let it be!”
“Qayin, what did you do?” Hawwah gasped.
“I have eaten the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, Mother. I have taken the gift and the burden you refused.”
They all held their breaths, the weight of Qayin’s revelation crushing their windpipes. Then the stunned silence was broken by the quiet weeping of Adam and Seth’s pleas to undo what had been done, to go back to the Serpent and demand it take away its blessing. Hawwah did not speak, did not reproach her son; she simply embraced him as tears flowed down her face, caressing his back and face as if Qayin was once again a helpless babe left at the mercy of an uncaring world; he did not hug her back.
He is not himself, Hevel realized. He may never again be himself.
He wanted to scream, to grab his brother by the shoulders and shake him until whatever had hollowed out and slithered into Qayin’s form was forced to leave and give him back the brother he loved. But his mouth was empty when he opened it, and all he could do was look on mournfully as he understood the magnitude of his brother’s choice. Qayin left without another word, but his eyes revealed something had already changed forever. What light once shone inside them was broken, fractured into a myriad of shards that screamed at Hevel as the two brothers’ gazes met. In those last moments, Hevel lifted his hand as if to reach for Qayin, to hold him as he had once done for him in that ancient night under the stars, but he found only emptiness: Qayin was gone, and his steps faded into the dark. And then, nothing. What could be said or done to undo the irreversible? What use is weeping or praying to uproot fate?
Thus began the preparations for the Valley’s stand against the Daeva. Qayin would lead the men to the East against the black hordes and unleash the ancient magic revealed to him by the Serpent. Hevel would stand together with Uri-El and guard the entrance to the Valley, while Seth and the remaining people would build great copper warriors and bulwarks using Hakhama’s blessing. If the people perished, it was agreed, they would not perish in fear but in defiance.
But as time passed, Hevel could not ignore the plight of his elder brother. The shadow in the East was monstrous, yet another shadow loomed within the Valley. Qayin grew from reserved to almost mute, his gaze hollow and his gait unsteady. Night after night he failed to return home, and the food Hevel brought him went uneaten. All Qayin did, Hevel told his family, was sit at the shade of the Tree of Knowledge, mutter under his breath and stare out into the distance with tears welling up in his eyes.
“How will he lead our people against the armies of the Scarlet King?” Adam lamented. “What curse has beset my son, my pride and joy, and left him a husk filled with sorrow?”
“He is fraying under the weight of knowledge,” Hawwah said. “He is trying to comprehend it all, to understand what it means and how to use it, but it is too much. If we do not find a way to relieve him, he will be crushed, and then he will be truly lost to us.”
“The Serpent gave him this burden, and he accepted it,” Adam said somberly. “I cannot blame Qayin for his choice: from the moment of his birth he was meant to lead us one day. How could he fulfill his duty, if not by example, if not through sacrifice?”
“His sacrifice will be in vain if he cannot overcome this malaise,” Hawwah responded. “If only he would share what torments him with us so that we may lend him our shoulders to carry the weight. Oh, Hevel, will you not speak to your brother? He has always loved you most of all, and perhaps he will listen and know he is not alone.”
For the first time in his life, Hevel is unsure if he can reach his brother. Qayin does not speak to him, does not respond to Hevel’s pleadings to eat and sleep, and at times barely seems to recognize his younger sibling. Once, when they were both innocent, nothing could separate them; now, burdened with the weight of responsibility, the wedge between them seems as wide as the desert itself.
Yet how can Hevel forsake his brother in this direst of times? How can he break the oath he swore to be his keeper? Time and again he has protected Qayin from the dangers without, and now he must hold his hand to face the torment within. Perhaps Qayin will not listen, and perhaps this will not be enough to help him through the strain of forbidden knowledge, but at least he may remember the spark of joy and wonder once shared between brothers, keep it close to his heart and light with it a torch as he walks through the darkness.
“You are afraid,” Uri-El says, and Hevel frowns.
“I am not,” he retorts. “That pain is not mine, but I cannot cross my arms and let Qayin suffer alone.”
“You are afraid and you do not even know it. There is no strength nor bravery in denying it, Hevel, only foolishness.”
“Why should I be afraid of my own brother?”
“It is not Qayin that scares you,” the Archangel says. “Look inside and name your fear.”
Hevel leans on the Tumbling Blade and gazes towards the hill where the Two Trees stand. From here, he can almost hear the whispers of the wind through their leaves, the machinations of their twin guardian gods, and the muted sobbing of his own brother. He can see himself walking uphill, his breath labored not by effort but by the knot forming inside his chest and the weight creeping up his shoulders. He sees himself standing before Qayin, and he cannot bring himself to embrace his brother.
“I am afraid that it will not be enough,” he says. “I am afraid that I will fail him, that this time will be as before—futile and vain. I am not a man of words, Uri-El; I cannot speak consolation into my brother’s heart nor mend the wounds of his soul. All I can do is stand at his side and hold his hand as he once held mine.”
“Then that must suffice, Hevel ben Adam,” Uri-El smiles. “And if it does not, you will receive peace in knowing you were not idle. Go now to your brother. Remind him what it is like to be a child: afraid, trembling, but also full of wonder, protected always by those who walk on the same path.”
Qayin is unusually lucid when Hevel arrives. He is still gaunt and sullen, but he meets his brother’s gaze and speaks with a voice not unlike the one he possessed before he took the Serpent’s poisonous gift. Still, his words are full of woe and despair, and Hevel’s attempts to comfort him are water spilled on barren earth. There is a hurt piercing them both, a hurt that wounds them deeper as they try to hold each other close. Thoughts unknown even to them are spoken aloud, hidden pains and resentments laid bare; they sound so accusing, yet all they want is for things to be as before. The spark Hevel sought to reignite within his brother is now an inferno that threatens to consume them both.
Before they know it, they are screaming so loudly that their voices are carried off by the wind like a furious rumor, like an omen of doom. Ingrate. Fool. Child. How do these pieces fit in the mosaic of anguish? Who throws the first stone and why? Why can’t they stop even as they’re crying, breaking while trying to hold each other together?
It matters not. A squabble is a squabble, meaningless but for its consequences: a hard blow to the right temple, a heavy drop, and a red fountain wetting the roots of the Two Trees. The last thing Hevel experiences before the blackness takes him is not Qayin’s remorseful sobbing, nor his pleadings and apologies, nor the wet grass beneath his back nor the pain emanating from his head. Under the shade of death, all that Hevel feels is surprise: of all the enemies he has faced, of all the monsters he has challenged, not once did he think the one to lay him low would be his own brother.
Five days.
Five days it takes Hevel to return from the lands of the dead to find his family mourning over his body, his brother Qayin exiled and the people shuddering with despair.
Five days has his soul endured in the emptiness of the netherrealm, with nothing to eat but dust and nothing to drink but his own boiling tears.
Five days has he walked without resting, without looking back, without heeding the calls of the dead to give in to eternal slumber, ignoring their supplications like hands that emerge from the ashen ground to try and cling to his heels.
Five days he has held the same question between his broken lips, the only question that matters: Why?
Its taste is bitter, so bitter that Hevel’s thirst increases tenfold as he ponders it. Its weight is so heavy that he feels as if he’s about to sink into the ash, never to emerge again. It wounds him so deeply even in death, its serrated teeth lacerating his heart in that tender spot that refused to harden—the memory of innocence now lost to the pain of betrayal.
Eroded by the raging winds of the underworld, half-buried in dust, infant effigies gaze at him with sadness, their mouths tongueless orifices that gape mutely, helplessly. They crumble as he passes them, averting his gaze as if to forget what has been forever shattered; he cannot bear to recognize himself in them.
Was I not my brother’s keeper? Hevel strains uphill towards the light of the living, through the darkened gray expanse that is the underworld’s sky. Was I not good to him? Did I not uphold my oath? I loved him with every fiber of my being, for it was him who gave me the second gift, who helped me find bravery within.
Black feathers float near his head as if announcing the coming of the carrion birds, but none ever come. His feet protest as he steps on jagged stone.
I fed him, I kept him company in his darkest moments, held him close when he was overwhelmed. I was his brother, his friend, his blood. I would have given it all for him, even my own life—and yet, that is what he took from me.
The memory is etched on every inch of his being: Qayin’s face contorting with blind rage, teeth grit and eyes calling out for blood, barely a man as his primal emotions took hold of his splintered mind, one hand clutching Hevel’s throat and the other holding death. A single blow and Hevel died, his mighty form crumpling like a withered flower as his blood stained his brother’s hands. A single blow and Hevel ben Adam, champion of the people of the Valley, was no more.
I wished only to console him, to protect him from his own choice.
That was Hevel’s promise, zealously kept. Yet Qayin did not wish to be protected: he knew the risk and took it. What need was there for Hevel’s blood to be spilled? This was Qayin’s burden to bear, the price of his hubris, yet it is Hevel who has paid with his life. A hand held out lovingly is met with a poisonous sting. Ingrate. The brother who once consoled the other under the stars is now the one to put him in the ground. Betrayer. The laughter beneath the Trees is now nothing but weeping.
He struck me down. He laid me low.
And how low he has fallen! He, mightiest of warriors, felled by a simple stone! What will he be remembered for, if not for this undignified demise? Poor Hevel, treacherously slain by his own blood, his mercy wasted on the one he loved most. He will be no champion of the Valley, no brave hero—he will be a mere victim, buried and mourned with pity unbefitting of a man.
He murdered me.
Hevel screams at the empty grayness and receives no answer.
The climb is arduous, even for one as strong as Hevel ben Adam. At every step, the land of the dead seems to resist his attempts to leave, trying to claim him with sharp protrusions that bleed his feet and wailing figures that remind him there is nowhere for him to go. The weight on his back grows ever heavier, and his legs give in and bring him down into the ash.
Phantasm hands, little more than dust and sorrow, gently climb up his shoulders, inviting him to stop, to rest at last and know peace. In our mantle of ash you will sleep forever, they tell him. You will know no fear or pain, no thirst or hunger. We offer you peace. We offer you oblivion.
Waist-deep in ash, Hevel thinks one last time of those he loved and by whom he was loved. He sees his family as they lament his loss, crying for both him and the exiled Qayin. He sees his brother in the wilderness, cursed to wander without rest until the end of his days. He sees the Valley and the darkness which threatens it, the imminent arrival of the Scarlet King.
I was a champion once. What am I now? Was I ever worthy of my title? Hevel thinks. Weak. I was too weak to defend myself, too weak to stop my brother from dooming us both.
The ash is up to his chest now, the cold embrace of finality about to close.
And yet, we were both deceived. We were both fooled into believing we were blessed. A poisoned gift is no gift at all, but a curse. His curse was knowledge. And mine? Mine was mercy.
Neck-deep, the eternal slumber calls him.
These gray plains were meant to be my end, yet I shall know no rest here. I am a mere shadow of Hevel, but even shades may yet serve one last purpose: to fulfill in death what I failed to do in life.
Hevel hoists himself up from the ashes, the ground begging him to stay and drown. He sees it now, the one path he was always meant to walk even when his lungs drew no more air and his heart hardened into stillness. His grey eyes match the sky, the hole at its center weeping painful light. He drinks it all in.
Behold Hevel ben Adam, second-born, he who is returned from the dead, champion of the people of the Valley. See as he marches East on his own, leaving behind all he knows. See him face the horizon where dawn shall rise over the devastation of the Daeva, where the King’s red flag waves triumphant. He does not flinch. He does not cower. He walks onwards with the Tumbling Blade firmly clasped in his calloused hands; he does not look behind at those who have gathered to see him off. He has said his goodbyes to his family, to his teacher and to the people he has sworn to protect; there is no more left to say.
There was no celebration when he returned from among the dead. A resurrected man is still dead in his own way, and it is in Hevel’s eyes that his death resides: the spark has been snuffed out, buried in ash and dust and betrayal, a wound slowly bleeding where tenderness once stood. Gone is the uncovered spirit of youth, and all that remains is steely resolve, righteous fury to drown out the cries of an agonizing soul. The people, having wept for him when he died, again wept upon realizing the true plight of their champion. Now, as he marches to battle, he is thrice mourned.
There has been enough grieving, Hevel thinks. They cry for Hevel ben Adam, second-born, innocent and kind, victorious in battle, merciful to all. But I am no longer a child—I am not what they mourn.
With the sun setting at his back, the stars come out to prick the blackness with silver light. Hevel greets them with indifference at first, but then comes to a pause. A sliver of a memory, barely a murmur in the back of his head, makes him look up.
For tonight, know that you were brave to come here and witness the heavens, and that is enough.
Qayin’s words fade into the all-encompassing silence. He resents them like a wound opening to bleed anew. And yet, for a tiny moment, Hevel cannot help but wonder where his brother roams in his exile, and whether they will ever meet again. Perhaps they walk the same path without knowing it. Perhaps he too now gazes at the stars and remembers.