From the Beginning: The Old World (20 page)

“Jack? You’re back!” I opened a pair of blurry frightened eyes, rising heavily from my slumber, with Jack supporting me gently and his gaze longing and yearning for my touch.

“Come here,” he pulled me to him, feeling my unrest, knowing to give me the hug I so desperately needed at that very moment.

“Jack, it is so good you are back now. I was so worried you wouldn’t make it in time!” I mumbled as I was exploring his face with my hand, caressing him in response to his strengthening love, kissing him out of my intense need for protection and a desperate need to forget all the hours of the last few days, which were packed with a great deal of stress and not enough sleep.

“To where I will not be on time?” he repeated my words with a question. “Grace? Is everything alright?” He examined my face with a loving touch, moving my hair aside, kissing me again and again while speaking warm welcome words.

“Yes! Sure!” I hurried to undo the hints I blurted without noticing. “I am so tired I don’t even know what I am saying,” I forced a smile attempting to distract him from the matter. “I haven’t slept much in the last few days, too many menstruations…” I continued talking nonsense, feeling my head getting heavy and my thoughts slightly foggy.

“Menstruations? Grace—I’m not following you. What exactly happened in the past few days and why do you have dark circles under your beautiful turquoise eyes?” he sounded troubled now as he was kissing my tired eyes.

“You left for your journey just before the full moon. You don’t even know that I finally got my period which I waited so long for! A day before ascending for the moon cycle ceremony I started bleeding, and a week later Jezebel started too, so we went up again…” I updated him carefully as I didn’t know how he would react, but his excited response took me completely by surprise.

“Grace! That’s wonderful! I am so happy! You waited for this for so long! Ayee… how nice!” he sighed a deep sigh of relief and hugged me tight. “I am sure that Connor is bursting with joy…” he said quietly, the happiness fading quickly when he realized the meaning of it all. “Now you can have the children that you wanted so badly…” he swallowed a choking lump in his throat and pulled slightly away, lowering his eyes to the ground.

“Jack… Wait a minute…” I stopped him, the lump in his throat was choking me too. “I can have children with you too. Don’t you think for a minute that I don’t want to—it’s quite the opposite! I really want to! I will be more than happy if we have a beautiful blue-eyed child together, but there are things I know that are supposed to happen, and I saw that Connor and I will have a baby girl—I had seen it already in the old world!” I shared what I knew for a long time. “Besides,” I got closer to him again, sliding my hands sensually around his neck, nearing my face to his, “Connor isn’t here now…” I implied with an enticing whisper. “He went up to the sacred cave by himself yesterday to remember his past, and there’s a big chance he will remember the reason we broke up which might disconnect us for a while, therefore, I have no intention of giving up your presence by my side!” I clarified his importance in my life, sealing it with a deep kiss. “Come! Our waterfall cave awaits, and you have a few things to show me,” I pulled him in the direction of the pool and the waterfall.

“Yes… I have a few things to show you—especially how much I missed you!” He smiled, and the fear of losing me in his eyes disappeared once he realized he would not lose his place near me, or the possibility of having children with me. He tightened his grip on my hand, and now that the passion had reawakened in him, he dragged me running to our cave.

Unlike other times when we used to make love wildly and with force, this time, he made love to me slowly and sensually, lifted me and changed positions many times, copulating me from every possible angle. I knew he was also trying to impregnate me. I smiled with pleasure at every new position and each climax that trembled us both, laughing with a happy heart as I knew I was already pregnant, a fact he wasn’t aware.

This way, they would think, both Jack and Connor, that they were the fathers of my daughter.

Afterward, I fell asleep in his arms. Spent and satisfied, I fell into a deep sweet sleep, forgetting all the troubles and prophecies, as the sun set and the night was slowly rising, lifting the dark starry veil on the most horrific night of all… 

At that time, in the holy cave, Connor had finished another soak in the cleansing waters, remembering another piece of his past—that same piece that had slammed the door in my face, making him think that I had lied to him in the past. He saw the great love that I wanted to give him, which he had refused to accept, and how he had found that pathetic excuse—that I wasn’t officially divorced—to pull away from me. He remembered how he had claimed that I withheld the information that I had just broken up with my husband from him and that I wasn’t yet ready for a new relationship. He remembered and saw it all, the entire past and present. Suddenly a shadow crept into his vision—the shadow of a black wing, silent and ominous.

Connor leaped with a fright from the dip that just ended. Darkness engulfed the sacred cave, and only his heavy breathing echoed in the dark.

He probed his way carefully as he stepped down from the altar, and searched a long hour for his clothes and things, losing precious time until he found the torch he had brought with him, and lit it.

Now, that he could see his way, he hastened his actions. He dressed quickly and collected what little provisions he had taken with him. He stepped out into the darkness, starting his long steep way down, with only one thought in his mind: How fast should he arrive and protect me before it will be too late, before the black bird reaches me.

In the meantime, a little boat was nearing the beach. Sitting in it was a man with black eyes and a black-skinned woman. The woman’s dark skin blended in the darkness of the night when she made her way from the beach to the big cave. She snuck in silently on her toes between the people who were sleeping peacefully, dusted them with a fine powder to make them sleep more soundly. Gently she extracted the sweet baby from Jamila’s protecting arms, who fell too into a deep heavy sleep induced by the long grueling hours of tension and anticipation for the worst of all.

Embraced in Jack’s love, I moved in my sleep. A sweet smile on my face as I saw in my dream a little girl with golden curls and green eyes skipping in a spring meadow, wearing a white dress, smiling at me and her voice giggling and echoing to me—“Mom! I’m back!” Her eyes gleaming as she turned her head back and called again—“Look what I brought you, Mom!” She reached out for something I couldn’t see, but at the same moment, I became dizzy again with the same feeling I had the day before in my garden plot. I could swear I saw cells dividing in me—one cell dividing into two, two become four and so on and so forth.

I hummed with pleasure at the sight of all the clear clues as to the existence of a new baby girl in my womb. The wonderful spin flowed in me twice as powerful and woke me up from my sweet dream.

I stretched like a lazy cat, feeling Jack next to me, still curled up sleeping. The sound of the waterfall blocked any other sound from coming through, and the sensation of being cut off from the rest of the world started entering my consciousness, creating an unexplained sense of suffocation.

I rose up from my spot, approaching the narrow passage, trying to see the sky through it, but it was too dark outside.

“Grace?” The sound of Jack’s awakening voice was heard behind me, looking for me at his side. “Come here pretty woman, come back here at once!” he commanded me with a loving sleepy voice. “There is no reason for you to go out. You will not see a thing in this pitch black. Did you forget it is a moonless night?” he justified our stay in the cave—and brought back all at once my consciousness and memory of what might happen even tonight. For a minute there I thought I saw a shadow of a black wing silently passing through the dark skies.

“Jonathan!!” I cried out in panic. “Jack! Quickly! We have to go back to the big cave! If we don’t make it in time, Cole will manage to slip away from us, and we will not be able to find him!” I called out to him distressed, rushing him to join me.

“Grace?! What are you talking about? How exactly will Cole come here? And take Jonathan on top of it—what the hell are you talking about?” he was as upset as I was.

“He isn’t dead Jack. Nor you or God managed to kill him. He survived and reached another island. That is what I saw in my visions, and Jamila saw it too when she read my palm. He will come tonight to take baby Jonathan, in order to rob us of the hope for a new world. If he hasn’t taken him already…” My eyes were flooded with worry we might already be too late.

“Why didn’t you tell me anything, Grace? How can I help you if I don’t know anything?” His worry was fused with anger for not including him in the prophecy. “Never mind. I understand. Come, let’s go. I really hope that we will make it there in time.” He stepped out before me into the dark, leading the way. Since we had no light, the short road to the big cave was lengthened by nerve wracking probing.

When we approached the cave, I could already hear the commotion in there.

Jamila’s cries were heard in the distance, breaking and shattering the silence of the night, tearing my heart with pain, sending shivers and terror down my spine.

“He’s here!” I whispered in fear, realizing the worst was about to begin…

* * *

One by one people woke up to the sound of Jamila’s screams. Terrified, they ran around, bumping into each other, tripping over stones and rocks in the pitch black that hung over the cave and the entire island.

“Fire! Fire! Let’s light the fire!” someone called in the dark, sending everyone looking for kindling. The remains of the camp fire were extinguished and damp, and it was clear to all that someone had intentionally poured water on them. The wood cuttings that were on the side ready for use were wet by the same vicious mean hand.

“We need to bring wood from outside!” Roan’s voice was sounded, giving out orders in the dark.

“Roan?!” I called out to him, trying to make out his image amongst all the dark outlined figures of the tribe members, running back and forth inside and out of the cave like scared mice.

“Grace?!” His voice searched for me in the dark.

“Roan, where’s Violet?” I approached carefully, probing my way to him.

“She was with me in our niche, I left her there. She doesn’t need all this commotion right now,” he spoke out loud when he felt I was near.

“Grace?” Jack’s voice was sounded looking for me too. “Where are you going? Stay next to me!” he tried to keep us close, sensing the danger in the air.

“Jack, I will be alright, but you have to help light the fire so we can go out searching as quickly as possible!” I urged him to join the rest of the tribe so I could be free of his close guard, and I continued approaching towards Roan and Violet’s joint niche.

“Grace!?!?!” Jamila’s outcry was heard, shocking me into changing the direction I was forwarding to at once. “Grace!! Where are you? Come here! ‘Wen Intee ya ouchtee? Ta’ali Hon, min fadlak!!’ (Where are you my sister? Come Here, please)” Her distressed calls echoed around the cave, and the turmoil she was in sent her straight back to speaking in her mother tongue.

“Jamila!! I am here! Don’t move! I am getting to you!” I hastened my steps in the cave. I was no longer aware of the possibility of bumping into something or tripping—I had to reach her quickly. She needed me.

When I found her all shook up, in spasms and crying hysterically, I led her outside into the dark night’s air. Only when we stood outside, in the light of the stars that seemed paler than ever, she managed to calm down in my embrace and tell me what happened.

“I be too tired, because we not sleep in night before and all the day too, and when dark night come, I fall sleep,” she started crying again, this time with tears of awareness and guilt.

“I sleep so strong, I not hear black woman come to cave and close fire. She put powder on people so they sleep more, just like you see in vision—because I wake up, with sand on face and also Ibrahim face and more people too—nobody to feel when she take my Attalla…” Her sobbing grew more intense for a minute, but then she breathed again, pulled herself together and continued describing to me what had happened. “She take him like this, from my hands! I was sleep with him, hold him strong-strong so I feel when black bird come take Attalla—but black bird wait in boat. Black woman with white eyes take Attalla. I open my eyes little, little and see her before she put powder on me, but I was so ‘Ta’abane’ (tired) and powder make me sleep more…”

“This is exactly how I saw her, Jamila. She is also a witch like you and me,” I shared with Jamila what I had seen in my last dreams.

“She bad witch! How she take my Attalla? She not good woman taking baby of other woman. Every woman know, take baby from mother is like knife in stomach!” She sounded enraged when she described the essence of motherhood and femininity according to her worldview.

“I don’t know if she’s bad Jamila. I saw her standing above me while I was bound to the stone altar, and she was whispering words of enchantment trying to place her hand on my stomach. She then bent over and whispered something in a language I couldn’t understand as if she wanted to let me know something,” I described my dreams about the black witch to her.

“Grace! Maybe this why she come with Cole?” Jamila turned to me, her eyes widened as if the solution to solving this whole mystery just flashed through her mind. “Maybe it is not good you go there!  You only got Connor baby now—you not let them take girl!” She placed a loving hand on my shoulder.

“Jamila, if I don’t go, who will bring back Jonathan? You saw that this is the way it has to be as did I. We can’t change our plans now. I need to get there and deal with Cole once and for all. I have to end what I should have finished then in the sacred cave when he tried to attack and rape me,” I suddenly realized the reason I should go to the black island.

“Grace, you be very much careful—if something happen to you, I kill you! ‘Mazbut’ (o.k.?)?!” The corners of her mouth tried to curl up for a little smile. She embraced me with a hug so tight it nearly broke my bones. At the same time exactly we heard Violet’s searching voice, calling us quietly as to avoid attracting Roan and Jack’s attention.

“Violet! We’re here! Come, we have to leave now!” I directed her, rushing her to join us.

“Did you take out the raft from hiding?” Violet reminded me of this night’s most important mission.

“Oh my god!!” I remembered in panic where I spent the last few carefree hours and why I didn’t perform my task. “We don’t have time! We can’t go now to take it out. We will lose precious time. Also, I don’t have the map on me, but I remember the way, and I can navigate with my eyes blindfolded!” I weighed the possibilities of what we could do.

I could hear Jack calling my name from a distance, searching for me and suddenly I had an idea!

“Jack’s boat! We can take Jack’s boat. It is docked right here on the beach. Jamila, you go back to the cave now and keep Jack and Roan busy so they don’t look for us. Watch my Jezebel and Connor. Tell him, Jamila…” I whispered with tears choking me, “tell him how much I love him, that I have never loved before like I love him, and that I will always love him—no matter what happens, my love will forever be with him!” I embraced her warmly at length, after which we held hands for another brief moment of encouragement. I wiped my tears, held my head high, stretched my shoulders, and turned towards the beach with Violet following me and Jamila mumbling behind us, words of prayer and blessings, wishing us the grace and protection of heaven’s angels.

We pushed the boat silently into the still waters. Even the great big sea was smooth, its surface reflecting the darkness of the sky, and even though there was no light to show us the way, I could see with my mind’s eye all the markings and arrows from my vision, glowing underneath the water, navigating my way to the inevitable meeting with my destiny…

Connor came to the big cave, holding the only flaming torch, searching and calling my name with worry.

“Connor! It is so good that you came! All the wood is wet, we have to start a fire! Something strange is going on here!” Roan welcomed him and took the torch to light the new dry twigs they had managed to find and drag into the cave in the heavy darkness.

“Where is Grace, Roan? Have you seen her?” Connor asked in a panic, his gaze sweeping the cave quickly, which was slowly lighting up by the flames of the renewed fire.

“She was here a minute ago. She went looking for Violet and then Jamila called her. You should have heard her Connor! Jamila was screaming like a mad woman, shouting that they took Jonathan from her hands, something about a black woman or a black bird, I couldn’t quite understand. My Arabic isn’t that good,” he updated Connor distractedly while lighting the fire, adding more and more branches.

“So where are they? Where are Grace and Jamila, Roan?! You have to tell me where they went!” Connor realized that maybe he was too late.

“What happened, Connor? You look stressed as if it’s Grace’s life that is in danger—” Roan turned to look at his troubled heavily panting friend.

“Grace is in danger!” Connor interrupted Roan’s speech, “and if we don’t find her soon, your Violet will be in no less danger!” He threw the burning information in Roan’s stunned face. “Now tell me, please, where did you last see them?!”

Connor’s famous patience was about to expire.

“I think I saw them leaving the cave,” Jack’s worried voice was sounded behind them since he had heard the word exchange when he returned to the cave with a bunch of twigs to light the fire.

“You don’t think…” Jack guessed Connor’s train of thought correctly.

“I am afraid so!” Connor called. “We have to stop them!” It was like they were in sync as they both turned to run out of the cave, with baffled Roan joining them, trying to keep up with them and to extract more information about what they both knew and he was to learn now out of the blue.

“Connor!! Jack!! What is happening here?? What do you know that you are not telling me?” Roan was furious that he wasn’t included in the secret. “If Violet is in danger, I demand that you tell me, what in the hell are she, Grace and Jamila up to—because I noticed that in the past few days they were hanging a lot together, whispering secrets, but I didn’t think for a minute that there is danger lurking. Connor! Stop right now and tell me where they are off to!” Roan caught up with Connor and grabbed his arm pulling him forcibly.

“There is no time to explain right now. Let’s take Jack’s boat and the three of us will follow them. I will tell you everything on the way!”

Connor pulled out his arm from Roan’s grip of steal and continued towards the beach, hastening his stride after Jack’s image that was quickly moving forward to the same spot. Roan realized there was no point in stalling, and quickly joined his friends.

“My boat! It was here! I can swear I tied it to this tree! Where? What the hell…?” Jack raised his hands putting them desperately on his head when he understood what happened.

“They took your boat…” Connor mumbled, despaired, also understanding the frustrating situation the three of them found themselves in.

“We missed them,” Roan put his hand on his waist that tightened up from lack of breath and the increasing anxiety for his loved one’s safety. “If something happens to her…” He fell to the sand, his knees burrowed into the wetness of the silent waves, his face and voice cracked, and even without knowing all the details—he knew in his giant heart the crucial meaning of our disappearance.

A feminine figure came out of the dark, breaking the quiet beach’s still of the night, where the three desperate men had gathered.

“They will come back…” Jamila whispered to them, her face wet with tears, but her eyes were glowing with a mysterious glow as if she had just witnessed the future. “They will be back!” she repeated her words, with a more determined whisper, holding both a secret and a promise. She approached Connor, laid a comforting soft hand on his shoulder, and gave a reassuring look in Jack’s direction.

“Grace go meet her fate. Only she can win black bird, so we have good life and future!” she implied of what was about to happen on the black island’s soil. “If Grace lose—we not have new world. She need all good in her heart to fight war with bad demons. We now pray she win,” her words didn’t reassure any of them, but something in her gleaming eyes planted hope in the men on the beach that they would see their loved ones again.

At the same time, on the other side of the island, the little raft we had built slid into the water, steered by the map that one man found on it, as he was rowing vigorously and with determination following us…             

* * *