Season 1

Episode 1

Before Forever

≈ 4500 B.C.

A thick blanket of snow coated the evergreen forest as a small fur-wrapped group huddled around a fire. Blond hair, long beards, stone tools, and grim expressions. Only one man in the group of twenty seemed in good spirits. His skin was tanned and dirt-free and his hair hung loose around his clean-shaven face. The others watched him, unsettled as he seemed unbothered by the biting cold. 

“You haven’t told us your name yet, stranger,” spoke the largest man of the group. The patriarch of the family, a hulking man with a decent amount of fat and the largest pelt. The others called him Cruh, but it was an unfamiliar name to the stranger.

“Three days travelling together and you had yet to ask,” he looked up from his whittling to smile at Cruh. His deep blue eyes settled their gaze onto the older man. “My mother named me Raoul.”

“And where is your mother? Men with kin don’t need to rely on the hospitality of strangers.” Raoul shrugged and returned to his whittling.

“My kin is gone, like everyone’s is one day,”

“Raoul, play nice with you brother.” The deep melodic voice of Raoul’s mother echoed in the elegant tea room as she reprimanded her son.

“But, Mother! It’s not my fault.” Raoul stood us from behind a plush sofa, his small, round face red in anger. “Adam won’t give me back my book!” Raoul’s mother shook her head, her black curls shaking gently. Her large gown billowed as she leaned forward and set her teacup down.

“Adam,” she said. “Stop crying and give your brother back his book.”

“But Mother, he’s been reading it all day–” Adam peered over the couch as well, his wild curls threatening to spill from their haphazardly tied ribbon. 

“Shush, he’s four, Adam, and you’re two years older. Go read a different book.” Adam groaned, but held out a small paperback to his younger brother. Raoul took it eagerly, his smile wide as he ran around the couch to sit and read next to his mother.

“Next time,” she said, peering down at Raoul, “Don’t try to hit him when he won’t give it back.” Raoul frowned, but nodded as his mother leaned down to pour herself more tea. As she leaned forward her cape-like sleeves fell off of her pale arms, leaving them exposed. Raoul watched as her dainty hands clasped firmly around the tea kettle. The undersides of her arms were covered in dark stones, each one embedded in her skin in a trail of jagged protrusions usually kept thoughtfully concealed by her gowns.

She picked her cup up again and leaned back, readjusting her sleeve to cover the stones. Raoul didn’t mention them, and returned to his book.

“We can rest here for the night,” said Raoul, peering through a cluster of jagged rocks and into a small cave. “It should be big enough for a fire during the night.” The snow was as thick as a man’s forearm was long, and travel was slow for the young and the frail. Raoul was nimble and quick, seeming to float above the earth’s white blanket as he scouted ahead. Cruh followed not long behind, his spear at the ready should an animal try to pounce on the strange man.

“A good thing, too. The sky promises a storm tonight.” said Cruh. “Doli! Bring the dry wood.” 

The wood, preserved from the wet environment by a sun-tanned deer hide, burned quickly and brightly, illuminating the cramped walls of the cave as the group laid out hides for the night. Raoul stood at the entrance of the cave, soft snowflakes scattering across his tawny hair. He held his only possessions, a small knife of a strange, shiny material and the wooden figure he had been carving.

Cruh sat with his wife, a large woman he called Doli. The facial similarities between them were undeniable, but Raoul chose to look the other way. You only met so many people in your life these days. Cruh looked to be in his late twenties, he probably didn’t have much time left. A quick glance around and Raoul was certain that the tribe wouldn’t be able to survive without him. The women were too old and the men too young. Three days he had travelled with them, and they had already lost two to the cold. 

“Da, there are things on the wall.” a small child, one of Cruh’s boys, spoke up and broke the solemn silence in the cave. Raoul turned from the entrance to see what he was referring to.

“They’re paintings, son.” said Cruh, turning his head away from his wife and towards the opposite wall. “Other people have been here.” Raoul followed the boy’s gaze to the large, stony wall of the cave. His eyes widened momentarily, but his companions didn’t seem to notice.

“What is it?” asked the boy. Cruh chuckled warmly and squinted his eyes as he strained to make out the red shapes.

“It looks like some sort of scene… There’s a group of people and that,” Cruh raised a hand to point to the largest figure. “Is definitely a woman.” Raoul’s eyes scanned the scene as Cruh spoke. There were several undefined figures in the crowd of red clay smeared haphazardly on the wall, but two stood out behind the prominent woman. A figure in a large gown, with several dark shapes emerging from her arms and a man with wavy hair running towards the central figure. The central woman was pretty, with a symmetrical face and thick dark hair. However, her plump lips and high cheekbones seemed to fade into obscurity when compared to the vivid green of her eyes. Raoul lingered on them, the pigment was so bright it might as well have glowed.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Who is she?” The boy was insistent, and by this point, the entire tribe of early humans had their eyes trained on the wall.

“I don’t know, I didn’t paint her.” Cruh tried his best to explain, “It looks faded, it’s probably pretty old.” The boy seemed distraught by this, prying his father for more information.

“But it’s the best painting ever, Da! How can you not know who she is?” Best painting ever. High praise from a boy who had only ever seen one shoddy attempt. Raoul chuckled to himself as his eyes glazed over the face of the green-eyed woman.

“That’s probably one of the worst paintings I’ve ever seen,” Adam sneered over Raoul’s shoulder as they sat together in the manor’s formal dining room. Raoul sighed.

“I know,” he said. “It’s supposed to be Mother.” Adam laughed.

“I thought it was Father!” Raoul crumpled onto the table in front of him, defeated. He paused for a moment, then sat up quickly with a stern expression on his face.

“I’m going to tell Mother you said that!” Adam’s face fell and brief panic flashed across his expression.

“What! No!”

“Yes!” Raoul grabbed the piece of paper with his grubby hands and began to charge out of the room. Adam grabbed him from behind and the two fell down to the floor. Raoul laughed as Adam tried to grab the paper from him.

“Give it! Give it!” yelled the older brother.

“Nuh-uh!” Adam snorted, then let go of Raoul. The younger boy stood up and indignantly brushed off his tunic. Adam rolled his eyes.

“Let’s make another one, then. One that actually looks like her this time.” Raoul perked up, and leapt back into his chair as his brother sat down next to him.

Raoul faded back to the present. Adam was long dead, so dwelling on him served no purpose. He glanced back at the painted woman’s green eyes, but quickly returned to his whittling.

“I don’t know everyone that’s ever lived, son.” Cruh was beginning to appear frustrated with the constant questions. “Leave it, and go to sleep. We start walking again when the sun comes up.” The tribe heaved a collective sigh as they settled in for the night, furs being pulled over children and the fire being coaxed to burn hot enough to last until morning. 

“Stranger, won’t you join us by the fire. The night’s are cold this time of year,” Raoul turned his head to Doli, and politely shook it.

“No thank you, I find I don’t get cold.” She accepted his reasoning with a strange look but no complaint as she nestled next to her husband and son. Raoul turned back to the flurrying forest outside. By the light of the fire, he continued whittling his small figurine.

It was not long before the first light of the sun began to filter through the treetops, warming the forest after the snowstorm the night before. Cruh was the first of the tribesmen to arise, and he walked out of the cave and up to Raoul, who stood in a small clearing with the fresh sun on his face and his finished figurine in hand.

“Raoul, did you rest at all last night? We have a long walk ahead of us.”

“You might, friend, but I do not. We are parting ways today.” Raoul turned to Cruh with an effortless smile, and the primitive man jumped back, eliciting a chuckle. “Is something the matter?”

“N-No, it’s just.” Cruh looked at him again, his eyes squinting in straining effort. “I could’ve sworn your eyes were blue.”

“Hm? What color are they?”

“A dark green, like the evergreen trees.” Raoul’s smile widened, and he laughed softly.

“You must be mistaken, Cruh. My eyes have always been green.” The blond man shook his head.

“Weird, must be the cold.”

“Must be,” 

“Anyways, what is this you say about leaving? Where will you go?” Raoul sighed.

“I will head east–er, towards the sunrise.”

“But, we’re heading towards the sun as well.” Cruh took a step forward, his expression suspicious as he studied the strange man.

“You shouldn’t, it’ll only get colder. Head west, away from it. A large ocean lies that way, with plenty of fish and greenery to sustain you.” Cruh’s eyebrows knit together on his prominent brow.

“How can you know that?” Raoul raised his knife to show to the other man.

“Have you ever seen anything like this before?” The metal of the knife’s blade was smooth and shiny as Raoul angled it in the sun.

“No, not something so… precise. Where did you find the stone?”

“It’s not a stone, it’s a seashell. From the ocean.” The ocean was Cruh’s best bet at ensuring safety for his clan, and Raoul was happy to lie if it meant he might heed his advice. Cruh seemed to take it well, he nodded thoughtfully and turned around as his family began to climb out of the cave.

“But why won’t you come with us?” he asked.

“I can’t. I’m looking for someone, and I already checked by the ocean.” Cruh nodded again and motioned for his tribe to move westward.

“I don’t suppose we’ll ever meet again, Stranger.”

“I suppose we won’t,”

“I wish you luck finding your person,”

“I wish you luck as well, Cruh.” Raoul stood and watched as the tribe of haggard blond humans walked off into the woods, and gave Cruh a final nod as he turned back one last time before they were cut off from Raoul’s view. He shook his head, and glanced back at the cave.

He crawled through the opening, and by the dim light of the dying fire he could barely make out the painting of the green-eyed woman. He held up his figurine. He was missing the green paint for her eyes, but other than that the likeness was uncanny. He would like to think he’d improve since that painting, but it was still one of his favorite pieces of her. Raoul smiled as he placed the carving softly on the ground. He reached up and softly brushed the painted woman’s cheek, pulling his hand back to find it covered in red clay dust.

Raoul climbed back out of the cave and glanced at the sky. The sun had emerged fully from the horizon, and he began to set off towards it. Ignoring the cold, the forest was quite pleasant. The birds, or what were left of them in the long winter, chirped softly as the wind let snowflakes fly in soft, billowing sheets from their resting point on top of the tall pine trees’ branches.

With a flick of his hand, he persuaded the water from the freshly laid snow to melt and rise up in front of him in a small, gravity-defying ball. Using only his thoughts, he guided it through the air and over his hand, cleaning off the red clay. He scattered the water behind him and moved his draped furs aside to bury his hands in the pockets of his hand-tailored breeches.

Raoul whistled as he walked towards the rising sun, trying his best to match the tune of the birds. His green-eyed woman was waiting for him, and she was waiting in the East.