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Enoch III

Oblivion's Cage

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I cross the precipice, going from one earthly setting to another. The manor is like an untamed garden, a jungle of exceptional dusts and apparently occupied by a plentiful variety of feral arachnid. Mother is not pleased in the slightest given her silence, yet father having arrived prior to our own onset had hitherto ordered of the maidservants to clean, top to bottom, what had once been our childhood domicile. To my right is the arched entry into the modest gathering room, where we would engage our guests with musical entertainment and where the older folks liked to discuss matters of business. I recall many nights where mother would sit alone before the fireplace, father seemed permanently away on business. She would always have a book in hand, and we would play at her feet for hours.

To the left is where the ornamental dining area is, although from what I observe through the similarly arched frame, there is nothing appetizing about its current state. The white stairs spiraling toward the upper floor where our room had once been, has also been assaulted by masses of grunge.

"Spectacular," Salathiel grouses, he had taken only three steps in before dropping mothers and his own belongings tactlessly to the floor.

"Genevieve," father says timorously, coming around the corner from the gathering room, many delights sidling into his astute countenance.

"Charles-" mother replies before moving toward him in gracious strides to kiss him neatly on the cheek. Then father turns to the two of us. He walks towards us, his overbearing posture and his respectable though taciturn exterior igniting and lending an ever so faint, trembling light to the old days.

I wait for him to address me no matter how desperately I have wished to speak to him these last two years. He had not been contented by my foray into priesthood; if it had been his choice both Salathiel and I would have attended the academy. I must be nothing more to him than an embodiment of his own failure to provide.

At least, that is what I was thinking then. Trying to reason why he seemed to avoid my stare. Ignoring me to express how gratified he was over all of Salathiel's so many achievements at the academy. I remember, because all he had said to me was…

"Enoch…" a long pause where his dark eyes meet mine, unreadable, "you will have to sleep in the study for now, I hope that is acceptable until we can resolve some other arrangements?"

"Yes," I say weakly, uncertainty quelling any matter of thought so that the response was born of mere expectation.

"Good," his stare holds steady to my own but his body moves as though he desires to escape my presence. It is an uncomfortable ambiguity which seems to stretch on into perpetuity before his eyes leave my own.

"Shall we," he says to mother, "to the courtyard?"

xXx

The study is minute, although half of the bookshelves have been removed for the bed and dresser; it still smells overwhelmingly of the countless musty tomes. Within the room is a desk sitting before a round top window which overlooks the courtyard. As I stand before it now, a cup of tea enclosed between my hands, my mind slides back to the days we spent here. A vision of that time – it is a vision of a gold-plated broad sword dripping with my blood. I see us standing within the pond and listen into my memory retracting the phrase that he had spoken to me then.

I wish to protect you from a fate of indifference and to stay your soul inherently an innocent, he had said. He had also said that one day I would understand his words.

"Perhaps now, I do…"

"Do what?" his face appears, a reflection in the window of him standing within the doorway.

"Salathiel!" I wince at my own surprised voice before turning to face him, "I…"

He watches me intently but with an indifference to his stare. "I was thinking…" I cannot seem to find the words.

"No bother," he says as he walks in and pushes straight past me, going to one of the two slim book rests still present in the room. I look to the floor, then down my front where some of my tea has spilled. He pays no mind and though I feel the urge, I repress the wrath it imparts in me. I must overcome such trite emotions to become truly fulfilled.

I move toward the desk and set down the glass so that I am standing behind him as he searches the books. He sweeps a tanned finger across the dust-covered spines and it sounds like a soft, foreboding whisper against the leather-bound volumes.

"What is it that you are looking for? Perhaps it was set on one of the other lecterns?"

"Perhaps…" he mumbles grudgingly. The indulgent whisper continues as his pursuit does. I find myself glancing toward the courtyard once more.

"Salathiel," I swallow hard, it has been years since I have said that to his face so casually, "what did ever happen to that sword you brought me those many, many nights ago?"

His head turns slightly toward my voice but he does not answer. Feeling discomfited by my own question I reach for my tea again, "oh, pay it no mind, I was only-"

"I buried it."

"You… buried it?" I bring the cup back away from my mouth, "where?"

He looks away again, this time towards the window and into the garden. I can tell that he is remembering the spot. I follow his gaze as he steps toward the view, living his own recollections now. I am about to repeat my question, but then his eyes open wide and he turns back toward the bookshelf. His hand darts out and snatches down a book which he had missed but for its reflection.

I had not seen his expression then, but I am certain that half of what was to come may have been prevented if only I had been permitted that. For within that book, the truth is held.

Salathiel walks toward the door but stops at the precipice; he says then, "you still know nothing, little brother. You are still not but a hapless babe unfit for the world of men."

xXx

After that account, there were many such instances of which I could give. Despite this, we spent little time together. He and father pursued building relations with our neighbors and in relaying our status ubiquitously. Apparently, my achievements were not of great enough value. Salathiel did not shy away from reinforcing this thought either. I was beginning to feel as though the words he had spoken held a tangible element within them. As I watched my brother becoming this mimicry of my father, a mere link in the chain of our family lineage, I also felt more entitled to reach out to him. I was certain that this is not the life he would have chosen for himself. I was certain…

"May I interrupt?"

He is lying across his bed with a book in his hand. That book. He nods, indifferent to my presence and I walk to his bedside.

"Sit," he says, pointing with a finger on the hand he is resting against and eyeing a chair to the corner of the room. I debate it for a moment before listening to what had been more demand than civility.

"Thank you… What is that you are reading?"

Salathiel sighs and narrows his eyes at the book, "you distract me from my book only to inquire about it?"

At this point, I have had enough of his ill-temper. Not allowing the evil emotions to stir in me certainly does not vindicate me allowing his rude behavior.

"I believed you would be pleased to speak about it with someone, you seem only too interested in it," I keep my words short so that he will recognize my intention.

He does, and he raises both brows as he turns to look at me, the anger only thinly veiled behind his smiling eyes.

"You are correct in that, brother. Someone. Not you."

I rise from the chair and bang my fist sideways against the wall, "what have I done to deserve such disrespect?"

"What have you done?" the bitter amusement is drenched with jovial sarcasm.

"Yes, what have I done?" I restate, my displeasure showing blatantly in my severe stance and expression.

"Nothing. That's exactly the problem," he smiles callously and then rolls away from me to continue reading his book.

I hesitate, facing an abyss of indecision so deep that I fear going forward; instead I turn back to my old ways. My frustration feeds so greatly into my anger that I next find my body being propelled forwards by it until I have torn the book away from my brother's hands and retreated to the other side of the room with it.

He is to his feet within the blink of an eye and in three self-possessed steps lingers with his face before mine.

"Return that to me," the potency of insistence within his words is staggering and enough to waken me from my anger.

I look down to my hand and suddenly his is clasping over mine. My eyes widen at the familiarity of the situation before he twists my wrist and snatches the book away.

"Leave."

Having fallen to my knees I can do nothing but hold my injured wrist. I stare up at him, incapable of comprehending what had just happened. "Leave!" he yells again. I stand and rush from the room - I go back to my own. I sit that night cupping my wrist, too embarrassed by my own actions to appeal to my mother or anyone else.

xXx

His behavior after that incident became even more erratic. He would leave the house at extraordinarily questionable hours only to return invigorated. Many nights after these romps I would witness him bathing in the pond. I had not spoken a word to him after the event concerning his book. He took his meals in his room, which went unquestioned considering that he was the model of a good-son that my father was so proud of. If we passed each other in the hallway we would spare not even a glance at one another.

The corrupted feelings between us had become omnipresent. Over weeks the listless exterior with which he had entered the mansion had somehow been reformed into vivacity. He had come alive within those walls. Or perhaps out of them? My thoughts were constantly on his escapades before I had decided to take it upon myself to confront him. I waited for him by the pond where I knew he would return before the night was through, and where we could speak privately…

His form is a dark silhouette melding together with the shadows of the forest. He steps onto the stone before the pond and removes his clothing. He does it slowly, as if he is cherishing every moment. There is a perverse smile which never leaves his lips for an instant. Just before he readies to enter the water I step out from behind the fountain and walk around to its front.

"Salathiel."

He is genuinely stunned by my voice for it takes him a moment before he turns to face me. His smile fades completely and melts into fear at my approach. I am steps away from him before he holds up his hand and shouts-"stop!"

This time I am the one to be unsettled, and I restrict any movements. What could his intention be? I look him in the eyes trying to decipher his purpose but he only slowly begins to smile. Then he is laughing like those so many times when we were children. Pure, untamed joy.

"What is humorous?" I follow his eyes, they seem to stare to me then to behind me. I turn on my heels with great trepidation, I don't know what or who to expect behind me. Then I understand.

I have positioned myself directly before the statue of the angel. I turn back and forth a few more times before realizing how from Salathiel's perspective, the wings appear to be my own.

"With such prominence the world avails to see the weak survive!"

His words are uttered in a single breath, and then he turns and dives into the water. I get the impression that he is bidding to escape from me and the sensible words I wish to impart to him. I follow him to the edge and look in but see nothing.

"Brother…" I say quietly, there is a hesitance consuming my resolution unexpectedly. I stand there and wait for him to rise from the water only I wish that he will not. All of the strength and resolve I had held in my heart before has been supplanted by this fear; once more a fear of what seems a great abyss. It is a deep obscurity of overwhelming odds balanced in the favor of those only willing to jump. Those with no inhibitions, to me this is alike to no moral judgement... I cannot face this or I will perish.

A hand creeps out from the water and clasps my ankle and pulls. I feel myself falling and then I am being dragged into the murky chasm. My hands reach out, scratching at the stone and trying to find a nook or crevasse to attain a hold in. My fingers continue sliding and before I can so much as cry out I am submerged in what seems oblivion.

I open my eyes and suddenly I am brought back to reality as Salathiel's face appears in the water before me and I recognize his touch. He moves to stand and as I gather my bearings I do the same, but his hands continue clasping my shoulders. My breath is leaving me and I cannot help the enormous amounts of air which have already left my lungs from the shock of hitting the water. For a moment I do not resist, but as the urgency grows great within my breast I clasp his arms and attempt again and again to rise from the water. He does not allow it. I hear the muted noise of my arms splashing desperately at the surface.

His face contorts within the ripples my movements create on what is normally such a calm surface. My head throbs, and in a cruel twist of irony, it feels as though it is filling with air. Then he releases me and for a moment I cannot find the energy to drag myself to the surface, yet it happens very much of my body's own accord. I hear myself gasping for breath as I sway in a stupor towards dry earth. I come close, reach out and stick my fingers into the muddy lip of the pond. It takes all of my energy to stop my knees from buckling under my own weight. The disorientation only made worse by the indescribable dread in my mind. My heart races so hard I feel my body throbbing in its rhythm.

When my eyes can finally focus I turn back to see him standing in the middle of the pond. I cannot fully see the expression in his eyes, but his lips are smiling to me. I turn away before I can fully comprehend the emotion there, a powerful fear telling me to get away. This is not him, this cannot be my brother. I stop at the stairs to the house, hover there… but in the end I did not look back. I could not bring myself to do it. I feared with all my heart that look in his eyes.

xXx

No longer was he angry or hostile like an animal caged. The days following the incident in the pond gave birth to a person I little knew. A better person, but a stranger still.

More and more I feel like the outsider in my own home. At dinner he and my father discuss business ventures and my mother smiles politely along with it. The days are spent meeting with my father's associates and I am left home. Mother will frequently visit old friends and invite me out of the good nature of her heart, but we both know the proper answer. I spend most of my time partaking in menial tasks around the house; sweeping and other chores which make me feel as though I have returned to the abbey. That is until I hear the scurry of feet and moments later our housekeeper is insisting in her heavy accent that one of the maids will take over for me.

Many days I find myself standing in his doorway, caressing the door knob with my fingertips but never fully grasping it. I do not have the courage to trespass. Standing there fills me with the same fear as that night. I worry that if I am to open that door he will be there, staring at me with those eyes, expecting. Even when I know that cannot be the case.

Am I going mad? I know that it is illogical, and perhaps knowing his secret may help me to understand and allow this fear to slowly wither until we return to whatever normalcy we once had.

But I cannot do it!

And yet there he is, strolling across the precipice, smiling at the maidservant as he hands her his newly pressed coat. Father pats him on his shoulder and Salathiel turns to him, they share a smile that makes my heart sink. Then father disappears below the second floor's railing and I cannot see him any longer. Salathiel begins to follow but halts his steps for a moment, a moment long enough to look up at me with that smile. But I know it's not the same, I can read the way his face changes. The air shifts as I am suddenly breathing in his hostility. Then he passes below me and out of sight.

He is like a bird that has taken flight. Perhaps there are matters that I still must contend with in my own heart. Is this emotion simply jealousy? Had he not expected my response the other day? It is possible… he would be used to rough-housing with his friends. But those eyes – they are seared into my consciousness, my very soul – those eyes…

I saw him struggling at first to remain air bound, but now he is flying beneath a sun which coats his feathers in a golden foil of light. A luxurious image of his own revolution... Yet I remain behind. He has left the cage door open behind him but I dare not take to the air.

Watching. I can only watch him as his form slowly melts into the sun.