Earth - About 2 years ago
Anna
A little way from the house that Kane had just told his mother of all that had befallen him, was parked a car, a limousine, all shiny black with black tinted windows.
The driver, all kitted out in chauffeur's livery, sat still as the four litre engine idle silently.
In the back, I sat, my head pressed against the darkly tinted one-way glass. ‘Circles within circles, man of many names. Soon, very soon we will meet again.’
As I spoke, quiet as my voice was, the driver smiled, and as if by some unspoken command, he stepped out of the car to open the passenger’s door.
###
‘Can I help you?’ The woman asked, as the door opened.
Then, as her eyes opened in surprise, I said, ‘Hello, Rachel… it has been a long time, a very long time. May I come in. I have yet to complete your foretelling.’
Shock was plain on Rachel's face. ‘You! How?’ Her face lost all colour as she leaned heavily against the door frame for support.
‘A cup of tea would be nice, Rachel. It might do us both good. Come, let me get you sat comfortably, and then I'll make tea.’
Taking her arm gently, I closed the door behind me, and led her back into her living room.
Five minutes later, I had made the tea and we were sat opposite each other, Rachel in the chair that she had insisted I put her, and I on the settee, presumably where her son had so recently sat.
She still hadn't spoken a word, but she was slowly gathering herself - questions were forming on her face. It wouldn't be long now, I knew, and it was best to let her get her questions out of the way first and let her adjust to the situation before I spoke.
‘Am I going mad?’ Rachel asked, her voice a whisper, not at all what I'd expected.
What had her son told her? Not too much, I prayed.
I smiled and shook my head. ‘No, you are not mad… or at least if you are, then so am I… and so too is your son, David, or would you now prefer to name him Kane? He has told you that he has taken that name, hasn't he?’
‘Yes,’ Rachel answered, her voice stronger now, tinged with anger and perhaps frustration.
‘Who are you? What is going on? First, David, and now you!’ The tea spilt as Rachel surged to her feet and knocked the coffee table that lay between us.
‘Look what you've made me do now!’ she said, her face red with anger and not a little embarrassment, as the tea flowed out over the tabletop.
‘Still using tea leaves, Rachel, just like your mother did. I'm so glad that some things do not change. Please sit, Rachel, while I get a cloth and make us fresh cups.’ My voice was calming and yet also commanding.
Rachel sat, although I could see puzzlement on her face as she did so.
‘Do not worry, my dear, a little compulsion, that is all… a little like what you call hypnotism. Don't worry.’
Another few minutes, and the mess was cleared up, and new cups sat before us. ‘Would you like it if we were to start over? I could begin by answering your earlier questions… as best I can, that is.’
Rachel slowly lifted her cup, and sipped at her tea, her eyes filled with suspicion as she peered at me over the top of her brew.
‘Are you doing it now?’ she asked. ‘Are you using that… that compulsion on me? That's what my David, my Kane, said the Demon used to control people. And he is evil, so that makes this thing that you just did evil, too. So tell me, are you?’
So Kane told her of Dar'cen, and she believes… she truly does. Good! ‘Evil is evil, Rachel. Compulsion is a magic, a tool. It is not evil in itself. It can be used for good or evil. Dar'cen is evil… I am not. But to answer your question. No, I am not using compulsion now. I only used it to calm you, and to put you in a receptive mood for what I must tell you… and for what I must ask of you.’
‘Who are you? I did not remember you; I could not see your face, and yet now, I remember it all…’
Rachel's hand went to her mouth as the colour again drain from her face. ‘You're the same,’ she said, her voice muted by her hand. ‘You haven't changed… you haven't aged. How…’ her voice trailed off and she stared at me silently, her eyes wide.
Slowly, she lowered her hand, and hesitantly, her voice choked and no more than a whisper, she said, ‘You are Anna. You are my Kane's Anna,’ and then more firmly, ‘Don't deny it, you are her, aren't you? And yet, he believes that you died… or that’s what my David thinks, and Kane believes that you went away… left to go to the world Dar’cen came from.’ Her eyes widened as she said the last. ‘Here. You came here?’
‘Yes, I am Anna. Your Kane's Anna, as you say. And I came here, to your world, when I left Kane.’
I could not help but smile as I continued, ‘I had thought to talk an hour before I could convince you of who I was, my dear Rachel. Over the years that I have watched you, you have always impressed me with your strength and wisdom, but today —’
‘Wait! You have watched me? Over the years, you have watched me! Why? Why would you watch me? Oh, I just don't understand any of this. David… Kane, stretched my trust to breaking point… I could not understand why such a thing should happen to my son. And now you say that you have been watching me… long before my son was born, long before he could have ever met you. How? Why?
’Wheels within wheels, Rachel. Some hand guides my life, has guided my life… and that of your son. All of our lives… you too. Your son has a destiny. He has saved my world once —’
‘Al'kar? When he was this Al'kar?’
‘Yes, a very long time ago. And that he was here with you today, means that Dar’cen has again fled before him…’
‘What? Why do you hesitate,’ Rachel asked, worry now written on her face.
‘I said that he has a destiny, Rachel. A destiny that he has yet to fulfil. The Demon has fled before him, but has not been destroyed. Kane came here today to see you, his mother… something that he thought to never again do. But he has returned to this world to destroy Dar'cen… he is here, Dar'cen is here.
'He fled to your world, this Earth, a world that long, long ago was his plaything. And he thinks to take it as his again… and only one destiny stands between what he desires and the lives of all that live upon your world. That destiny belongs to your son, Kane.’
As I spoke I knew that tears filled my eyes. It was not my words, it was not for what I knew must come. It was for the tears that fell from the woman before me, for the young girl that so long ago I had marked as the one who would birth this destiny.
Oh, Kane, how my prophecies and my dreams have used you. How I have used you. Will you ever forgive me?
‘Why my son? Why does it have to be him? Hasn't he done enough?’ Rachel asked, her voice once again tinged with anger.
‘Calm, Rachel,’ I said, my words soothing, but now with no compulsion. ‘Please, be calm.’
Rachel glared at me a moment, but then sat back in her chair, her face now composed, but full of suppressed anger.
‘Why any of us?’ I asked. ‘I did not ask for the life that I have lived. Never have I done that which was for me alone. Always I have been driven by the prophecies… and my cursed dreams. But I am not alone in this struggle… and Kane is not alone.
'There are others who now dedicate their very lives to rid the world, both our world, of this evil. And you, too, are one such. Yes, I watched you, Rachel. I watched and waited, the whole universe waited for your son to be born… and I watched him, too, as he grew into the man he is.
'There are no whys, dear Rachel. There is only what is. You, today, have accepted as true more than any could have expected of you… and yet there is more, much more that you must hear.’ And I can only pray that you believe what I say… and act upon my words.
‘But why? What is all of this to do with me? And what more is David to do? He spoke of defeating this Demon thing when he was Al'kar, and of chasing it from Ellas. But he spoke of nothing else. What is going on, Anna? Tell me, please.’
‘Be at ease, Rachel. In time you will learn the whole of it… perhaps, if the gods are willing, we both will. But for now let me tell you what I have learnt since I came to your world. The story I will tell, for story I shall make of the fragments of distant histories, legends and the folklore that I have pieced together this last hundred years or so.’
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‘Hundred years?’ Rachel gasped. ‘You haven't aged since I saw you when I was a child, but a hundred years… that's impossible.’
‘Oh, I am far, far older than that, my dear. But let us not discuss that now. For now, let me tell you what I have learned.
‘On my world, Ellas, there exists the Great Prophecies that foretell of Dar'cen's coming, the destruction that follows, his first defeat, and then his return. Six tomes there are, and although I was not of the Citadel, my adoptive father ensured that I knew all that they told. Word-of-mouth, to be sure, but as true as that of the Citadel's inner sanctum… sorry, I digress.
'Six tomes, I said, and also the legend of a lost seventh that tells of this time now, the time that has just passed… what your son, Kane, has just lived through on Ellas. For, you see, no reference to that time occurs in any of the six tomes.
'But that legendary lost tome is not what I wish to tell of. The first tome tells of Dar'cen's coming, and of the evil that he is. But nothing tells of what he is, how he came to be, or from where he came. And that has always puzzled me.
'It was almost as if the first tome, the true first tome, was missing, or was never recorded. But now, on your world, together with what a friend, Grall, told me of, I believe that I have found at least some of that story, the story of Dar’cen.’
‘You found it here? But how?’
‘Please be patient, Rachel. The story itself will be explanation enough, I assure you,’ I said, holding up my hand in a silencing gesture.
Rachel sat back in her chair, as she said, ‘Please, go on.’
I smiled patiently. ‘So on with this sorry tale that I have unearthed… On this world, this Earth of yours, hundreds of thousands of years ago, there existed a race of beings that lived in utopia.
'Their world was perfect… disease and ageing had long since been eradicated, there were no wars, and everything was in abundance; they wanted for nothing. You see, all were good, creatures of the light… long since all evil had been banished from their race, banished and contained in a blackness, that legend named the Dark Light; and so long had they lived in perfection, that but few knew that such a thing existed. Few knew even of what the thing called evil was.
'But utopia had a price, and that price was that without need, there could be no challenge, and without challenge, all things stagnate.
'Over the millennia, fewer children were born, and many, long-lived though they were, succumbed to the deaths that their forefathers had striven so hard to eradicate.
Few noticed what was that happening, for after all, they were perfect, and only saw of the good that was in their lives.
‘But one man fought to reverse the stagnation, and again, make their race great. His name is lost in the annals of time, but I will name him Karas, for it is a name that is spoken of with fondness in the first tome of the prophecies. And his wife, I shall name Erithain, for it was Erithain the Dreamer it was who is wrote the first tome, and she who began the prophecies that we have held so dear.
'Of her, and her role in this tale, I am sure… as sure as I can be. For it was her who set me on this quest for knowledge of Dar’cen’s beginnings… long ago she came to me, her spirit, her ghost, if you like. She did not tell me this tale, mind. But what she did say, what she alluded to, set me on this path.
‘Forgive me, for I digress. Karas was a scholar, one who still held a spark of desire for knowledge. He knew of the blackness, the Dark Light, and the essence of all the peoples’ evil that it contained. And he had a plan.
‘Karas convinced Erithain that they should do all they could to conceive a child. But unbeknown to Erithain, Karas intended to expose himself to the darkness, the Black Light, so that their child would bear a small seed of that darkness – very small, for Karas only intended that his exposure to the darkness to be very slight. He did not want his child to be evil, only that he be not all goodness.
'He believed that the bad would be more than tempered by the good. And in that way, slowly, with the generations to come, his child’s seed would return the race to that which it was – a race that strove to be better. A great race.
‘Again, as I said, much of what I tell you is embroidery, Rachel. I know only fleeting fragments of the true story. But much may be inferred, and that inference leads to an understanding of what occurred, and why such a thing came to be.
‘Erithain was overjoyed to find herself with child almost immediately – most tried for years before succeeding, if at all, such was the decline in their race.
They agreed to give the child a name that in their tongue meant ‘Child of hope’.
'Erithain's joy was doubly so when she was told that she bore not one, but two children. Both sons.
‘Up to the day of the delivery, both children were fit and healthy, and yet one child died soon after its birth – the child seemed to have been strangled by its own umbilical cord. Despite that the child had died, Erithain insisted that he be named ‘Child of Hope’. The other, perfectly formed son, they named Darganu, which meant ‘The one who comes after’ or ‘Second son’, a name that had not been bestowed in over a millennium as none had since been blessed with a second child, let alone a second son.
‘The child, Darganu, excelled in all things, and by his tenth summer was an adult grown. His father and his tutors were amazed at both his intellectual prowess and his growth. But still Erithain mourned the loss of their first son, wearing her loss openly, and never being able to completely give her love to Darganu.
‘Details are vague over these first years of the child's life, but there are hints of strange happenings, and even unexplained accidents to any that crossed paths with the child.
'Erithain hid herself in her grief, but Karas began to suspect that his plan had gone badly, and that his second son had taken more than a small amount of the darkness as he had hoped – so many incidents could not be explained as coincidence, not in the near perfect world.
‘Then one day, a child died, a young girl. Remember, very few children were born but each and every one was loved by all. All were horrified at the mutilation that had been done to her; they could not comprehend such evil. Little was left whole, and it was thought to be some wild beast, though all knew that no such creatures existed in their world.
'Karas, horrified at his suspicions of his own son, confessed to Erithain of what he had done. And she, not truly understanding, not truly believing her husband's words, argued with him and said that it could not be true. She would not lose another son.
‘None knew what truly happened next. Some believed that Darganu listened as they argued, and then killed his father because only he truly knew what his son was. For it was only hours later that Karas was found with his tongue torn from his mouth and his eyes sitting on his cheeks after they had been torn from their sockets.
'Erithain knew then that her husband had spoken true, and that darkness had been unleashed upon their world.
'She accused her own son in the Senate, before all those present. But she had not known of her sons guile and his compulsion, for already his supporters were many. She was shouted down as a woman driven mad by the death of her husband and the grief she still carried for her first sons loss. A mad woman who spurned the love of the child who still lived.
'Erithain cursed Darganu then, and these words I speak next were as I myself read them, preserved by Erithain’s magic on the very walls that were once the Senate, all those millennia ago… the record of that fateful day in the Senate.
‘You are evil, second son. You took your own father's life, and I believe that you took that of your own brother’s whilst he was still in my womb. He was to be my Child of Hope, and you even as an unborn knew that was to be, and so you strangled him, your own brother. But his soul still lives. He will be reborn… he will claim his name, and he will come for you. He will avenge all that you have done, all of that you are. One day my son, Ka’in, will be reborn.’
‘And with that Erithain fled, and was never heard of again… in your world.’
‘Kane! You said Kane would be reborn. Are you trying to say that my Kane, my David, is the one you are talking about? That is nonsense, pure nonsense,’ Rachel said, angrily.
‘It may well be nonsense, Rachel, but I suspect that it is not. So please let me continue… we will talk when I am finished. Then, you will have the whole story to question.
‘The records say that then Darganu searched for his mother, but all his efforts and of those of those that followed him – for more rallied to him every day – found nothing of her. I believe that she came to my world, Ellas. For it was she who began the prophecies that have driven my life. Erithain the Dreamer she was named, and I believe that they are one and the same woman.’
Rachel's mouth formed a question, but she stayed silent.
‘How could she come to my world, you wish to ask. As to the how, I do not know. But it is my belief, and that of at least one other, that our two worlds are almost as one.’
‘I don't understand. What —’
‘Nor do I understand this thing, but it explains much. For the Demon has been to your world… he came from your world to ours. There was one amongst our people, Jalholm was his name, he —’
‘That name, Jalholm. David said that name. Only hours ago, he spoke of Jalholm and… Alex.’
So the Unwitting One has returned, as prophecy said he would. Yet again, wheels within wheels.
‘This Jalholm, it was he who brought Dar'cen to our world. It was he who first found him and came under his sway. He did so by turning his instrument inward towards our world, and somehow he found yours.
'Then, with this instrument and another tool, he travelled to your world, this world in the very distant past, millennia ago, after Dar'cen had conquered all and held sway.
‘Yes, I believe that our two worlds are linked somehow. Your science predicts such things as wormholes that connect distant places and of multiple dimensions where a space is occupied by more than one object. Some such thing happens here with our world's… they touch each other and lives may pass between.
'Magic was strong in Erithain's race, they were as gods compared to the strongest of my people. It is my belief that it was she who brought magic to our world, and peace and beauty came with her, even as her words spoke of a doom it yet to come.
‘Perhaps now this tale I have told gives some answer to your questions of why me, and why my son? Because, yes, I do believe that in your son lives the soul of the unborn one, the Child of Hope, Ka’in.’
Rachel's face was a mix of anger and confusion. ‘No! He is my son. My son, I tell you!’
‘That he is, Rachel. He is your son. Fear not on that… but I believe that he is also the child of Erithain, the pure child, the antithesis of the demon, Darganu, the one who names himself Dar'cen… his brother. And he is our Child of Hope… the hope of both our worlds. Our only hope for the end of days that comes.’
Rachel's face was flushed, and anger filled her eyes, and yet all she said was, ‘Another tea, Anna? Perhaps you can again read my future… or was that, too, are deception?’
I laughed. ‘The foretelling was true, dear Rachel… but it was a dreaming. Of your tea leaf reading, I must confess, I have not a clue. So deception in part only.
'I am afraid that when I saw how you doted on that young school friend of yours, Kane, I could not leave the rest to chance. And so for that I apologise to you. I hope that after all this time you can forgive the poor gypsy woman that you were so very kind to as a young child?’
‘I will consider forgiving you when you tell me why it is that you have told me all of this, and what it is you want of me?’
‘Ever straight and to the point, Rachel. I want… no I need you to convince your son, David, of who he is, who he truly is… Ka’in. Not the Kane that you wished him to be, and not simply the Kane of the name he has taken to himself, but the Ka’in who is the brother of the demon, Darganu.
‘Without that belief he will fail, and then the worlds, our worlds, will be Daganu’s forevermore. He must know his heritage, and who it is he stands against.’
‘But I am not sure that I believe all that you have said, myself. You tricked me, and terrified my mother… for weeks we fought over his name. Only my mother's pain forced the day. So how can I possibly convince him? Besides, why can't you tell him? Why can't you convince him yourself?’
I didn't answer immediately, instead I looked away. When I finally turned back I knew that there were tears in my eyes.
‘I have caused him so much pain,’ I said, my voice a whisper. I love him as a brother, and yet to do what had to be done, I have used him as a tool. He will rejoice that I still live, and yet then I must give him pain beyond comprehension.
'Fear has ever been a part of my life, something that I have endured, sometimes without thought even, but in this matter, I am a coward. I cannot tell him… please, will you do as I have asked? Will you tell your son all that I have told you this day?’