The Mark of Cain (51 page)

“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.