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kadian-theodosia-xanthos-blog · 6 years

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Envy is Everything Chapter 1

Tink-a-link. I stepped into Distant Encounters, the light of the setting sun illuminating the dusty thrift store. The assortment of knick knacks blankly stared at me as I walked past looking for a large calligraphy set. I got to the back of the store where a glass display case detained my objective. A noise made me drag my eyes up to the source of it. A large woman with graying eyes, a side effect of too many emotion potions, raised her also graying eyebrows at me. I gave her a sheepish smile and cleared my throat. "How much for that?" I asked pointing at the set. I glanced at the bedazzled lanyard hanging around her thick neck. Celeste it read. She continued to stare me down making me fidget until she sighed heavily getting a rusty from behind the counter to, hopefully, unlock the display case. I gave her a puzzled look since she hadn't answered my question. She removed the set from the case and handed it to me still saying nothing. Celeste walked around a shelf of cracked porcelain dolls and disappeared for a few minutes, leaving me to stand awkwardly at the display case. She returned with two spiral notebooks. My confusion grew with each passing second. "$10 please." She told me. "What?" I asked almost dropping the calligraphy set. "The notebooks are $5 each and with 2 of them your total is $10." Celeste explained. "Oh, of course." I realized that my head wasn't in the conversation. I pulled a $10 bill out of my wallet. Before I could ask about the price of the set again she started shoving me towards the front door, past the previous knick knacks. Then I was outside on the street with the door closed and locked behind me. "What just happened?" I said to the empty street. A stray cat meowed in response before staring at me like the woman did. I hissed at it before heading in the direction of my apartment. Once home a wave of exhaustion hit me like the tsunami on Japan in 2010. I settled the calligraphy set and notebooks on my cluttered desk and fell asleep just before I hit the bed. That night’s dreams were even stranger than usual. The typical terrors invaded my dreams, clawing at my sanity again with frenetic brutes from my past. A salmagundi leviathans with serpentine bodies, gnarled hands, floating severed heads with fanged yellow teeth, and many other ghastly apparitions. Amidst the onslaught of devils I saw something truly monstrous. My eyes were completely froze. It was the sliver of hope in my Pandora’s Box, with curly black hair and ice blue irises inside of black eyeballs. They were often described them as icy comets floating in deep space. He turned his head finally acknowledging that I was there. I froze, recognition flashing on his pale face. If I remembered correctly the name that he went by in that incarnation was Rook “The Raven Sword” Saxon. This incarnation was from the 1920s in New Orleans, Louisiana. It was strange that he recognized me since in the last incarnation that we were together I looked very different. I guess when you’re soulmates you just know. Pure hatred and loathing engulfed his face and he lunged for me. I bolted out of sleep covered in a gelid sweat. Leaping from my bed, I bounded to my desk and took out the calligraphy set, knowing that I wouldn’t be sleeping for awhile. The box was simple enough, just a typical cardboard box. The contents were the same as any other calligraphy set as well except for the weird rattle I heard in the plastic. Placing the contents of the set on the desk, I ripped apart the the plastic sending a cylindrical object flying across my bedroom. My eyes widened as I stared at it: I feared that it had been damaged or worse. A few beats passed before I went over and picked the object up. A light purple crystal was the mysterious object. Something told me not to mess with it anymore but of course it was just a friendly suggestion courtesy of my conscience. I shook the crystal and a sloshy sound came from inside of it. Puzzled, I put a hand on each end and twisted. To my surprise the ends moved like the way a screw does. “What the hell?” I inquired outloud. I continued to twist until half of the crystal portion came off completely. It was a pen; a calligraphy pen to be more specific. The pen looked much better than the calligraphy pens today with the rough grip and uneasy flow ink. I brought it closer to my face for further inspection. The design was 200 years old at least but the pen itself looked to be only 5 years of age. I turned it to see every angle. I glanced at the clock on my nightstand. It read 3:49 AM. I went back over to my desk and grabbed one of the notebooks. Opening the polka-dot cover, I started to write when a stream of ink started to float around my room, my level of puzzlement rising. It stayed suspended in the air for a few minutes before gravitating towards the rest of the ink. The blob had formed a large glob and started shaping itself into that of a human. “Welp, I’m dead.” I stated bluntly. The ink began to define itself, making all the nitty gritty details of the humanoid. The humanoid was the other half of my soul, Phoenixis the god of wrath. It was the incarnation from my dream. I hate prophetic dreams worse than dandelions. Nix’s (his nickname) comet eyes, full of loathing, narrowed at me but he didn’t move. “What’s the matter, your insides still liquid?” I stabbed. Then his face softened, followed a faint scratch on my hardwood floor behind me. “Great.” I said sarcastically. Turning around slowly, I tensed anticipating some kind of monster but all that was there was the cat that had meowed at me outside of Distant Encounters. “Oh it’s just…” I started before the cat jumped up in my face, scratching and biting. I could hear Nix’s familiar laughter at my predicament. Black fur clouded my vision. “Don’t just stand there, help me!” I demanded but it was rather muffled so I probably sounded like the Swedish Chef from The Muppets. His laughter finally ceased. “Temperet.” He commanded with a hint of real magic lining the word. “Let me guess not your average cat based on that locution.” I said not really caring about his answer for my rhetorical question. I started the search for my first-aid kit in case I had anything that needed tending. Sitting down at my desk and pulling my mirror closer to inspect my face, I remarked. “What’s the matter cat got your tongue?” “I am not human. I never was. Over every incarnation I tell you this. So why do you keep expecting me to act like one?” He finally spoke. “ Sorry just trying to make polite conversation. By the way, your soul may not be human but your body sure is so get off your high horse before you fall and break every single bone in that human body of yours.” I snapped. “Why you planning to finish me off, Sweetheart? Nix snapped back. “Only if you want me to.” I said sweetly. He rolled his eyes. “What stray did you pick up this time?” I said closing the first-aid kit since none of the scratches were worth worrying over. Nix ignored me. If he was going to be like this the whole time I’d end both our suffering and kill him now. A little thing you should know about the world I live in, almost everyone is born with a number somewhere on their body. This number indicates the amount of previous lives we had endured. I mean experienced because not all lives are horrific. Most people seem to have a 3 or 4 but occasionally there is a 10 or so usually they tend to disappear relatively quickly. I wonder where they go, hm? My number isn’t really a number: it’s an infinity symbol. Nix has the same sign. How about we just call it a sign to save confusion for something complicated like math. The bulb in my desk lamp when out. “Oh Satan bless it! I should throw out this fickle thing!”I said sounding like an old woman. I walked out of the room into the dark hallway and flipped on the switch. The door to the apartment opened as the light turned back on to reveal my roommate and best friend, Elisheva Ramon. She was holding a box of donuts from the bakery that she works at. The treats from Heavenly Magic were just like, if not better than, the food of the gods. Trust me I would know. I heard Nix come out of my room behind me reminded me of the onslaught of rules in the roommate agreement that I signed 72 times. She had set up a very long list of “basic” rules and regulations to make sure everything was orderly. One of them happened to be if we invited anyone over to alert the other member of the domicile, in order to prevent any unnecessary encounters. Elisheva started ranting to me about how I should have told her, how I should have this and that, blah, blah, blah. Cue insane amount of eye rolls now. Now would be a good time for that cat to start clawing my eyes out. Thankfully after 10 agonizing minutes she stopped and handed me the box that I was probably drooling over. Elisheva gestured to Nix, saying that he could have one too. “Yeah, right,” I muttered. I picked a Boston Creme donut with chocolate icing, licking all the chocolate icing off the top. A black ball of fur came soaring into the kitchen. My eyes shot daggers at it. The cat did a backflip into the air and disappeared in a flash of light. The three of us turned away so we wouldn’t be blinded by the mini sun. When we had turned back a dark haired pale slender figure was where the cat was supposed to be. “Diablo gato!” Elisheva shrieked ducking behind the kitchen island. I facepalmed saying, “Like hell I would let any kind of demon in my home.” The lights flickered again. “What kind of power source are you using? This stuff works worse than the stuff in 1922.” Nix said looking around the kitchen. The human version of the cat sat down crossed legged on the floor. “Spurious energy source!” I complained. I went outside to give the leaning lamppost a good kick. This usually gets the magic flowing again for some reason. Elisheva and Rook followed closely behind me out to the edge of the property with the the first rays of dawn peeking through the sea of buildings. A woman was walking down the sidewalk wearing a sweatshirt to keep the chill off her. I looked at the woman's face. It was the woman from Distant Encounters, Celeste. Turning to the post, I told Elisheva to go back inside to see if the magic was showing a constant flow. She did as I asked, hopping up the stairs back inside. Rook hadn’t seemed to notice her even though the clicking of her stilettos would at least spike someone’s curiosity to glance in her direction. I glanced at him then. His icy eyes were closed but they were moving under his eyelids as if they were searching for something. “The magic that you spoke of,” he paused. “It’s quite anomalous.” Rook finished opening his eyes. “That’s because it’s about as artificial as this.” I told him taking a mint out of my jacket pocket and tossing it to him. Rook caught it and popped it in his mouth, nodding. The clicking stopped. I whirled around taking a step back, almost into Rook’s booted feet. “We meet again Theodosia, goddess of envy, and Pheonixis, god of wrath.” Celeste said looking at us each in turn. A red flag started waving just behind my eyes. How could she possibly know who I really was just by a single meeting? “Thea, it’s alright.” Rook said. “ This woman is a descendant of the man that saved me from dying during our last joint incarnation.” He clarified as if that would make the fact that she knew our real identities any less of a reason to raise alarm. The door to the building opened letting out Elisheva. She bounded back down the cinder steps, “It’s good.” She said taking in the situation with her dark eyes. “Elise, stay there.” I told her. Elisheva and I locked eyes and I knew that she wouldn’t. Ya know, she listens about as well as a rock. My eyes widened and I gave her frozen jazz hands. “Elisheva can come along as well, if she would like?” Celeste interjected. I glared at her. “No, Elisheva cannot come if she would like. Now, let us be going.” I shook my head and asked. “Where are we going? And why are we going there with you?” I air jabbed my pointer finger at Celeste. “He may trust you but I sure as flapjacks don’t.” As soon as I had stopped yapping at how I distrusted Celeste all four of us were enveloped in a blue light. We had been Zipped! Once the room had been starved of the blinding light, Rook observed. “It didn’t matter if we wanted to come and take the job offer freely. Your instructions were to shepherd us hear regardless of our protests or approvals.” Celeste nodded indifferently. The room had many layers for court officials, each row a level higher than the last. Every level had colored flags hanging over the edges of the front, most likely to exhibit the difference in rank between the levels of court officials. At the opposite end of the colossal room was, quite possibly, the judge. He was in a depression in the wall that was enclosed by the same stones that made up the pews. The flag that draped off the front of his booth was pale white and outlined in blood red with the presidential crest; a golden eagle with its wings spread wide ready to could fly off the banner, emblazoned in the center. The setting of the meeting makes me uneasy due to the resemblance to that of a 16th century courtroom. I’ve been on the receiving end of their so called justice. I was able to get my own justice when their howls of pain erupted from the burning court room like the crimson flames. I shook my head dragging it out of the Dark Ages. We were herded down the room until the judge’s box was upon us, the eagle staring us down with its golden, beady eyes. The eyes of the official were much like that of the eagle, although I would take the eagle over the officials, at least I knew what to expect from the eagle. “Welcome to those that have accepted our gracious offering of employment,” came a booming voice. “This is a job that has been assigned to you because only you can do it. You have been chosen by the magical force that we have come to rely on.” The voice definitely belonged to a man, unless puberty messed up and hit a poor woman with the wrong stick. It resonated throughout the courtroom by sound magic. In the early 2000’s scientists had predicted that the world would run out of coal by the year 2050 and they were almost right. Unfortunately, we ran out halfway through 2045. The world was in the third world war for the remaining coal. (Technically the fourth, hello the War on Terror) Real magic has been around since the beginning of everything. That’s what the gods were created from and have to obey. Yes even gods have to obey rules, we can’t just do what we want willy-nilly. The alternative energy source that the world has come to rely on is artificial magic. It's much easier to use and contain but not as powerful as actual magic. “Hey, can I get the MoJo incantation?” Elisheva inquired slowly raising her hand. “You are here to get employment not to play games.” Rook snapped. MoJo is like early 21st century WiFi for our almost mid 22nd century technology. I turned around and looked at Rook. The look on his face told me that he was also remembering the 16th century. During that time he was a member of the court sometimes saving people’s lives by persuading the king that they needed to be punished justly, not simply executed. Other times his persuasions had the opposite effect. The king would condemn to death a simple farmer that had stolen some seeds for payment crops. I put my hand on his arm to silently tell him it was going to be fine. He nodded, shaking my hand off and facing the source of the voice. “What does the job entice?” Rook bellowed at the box. “It is quite simple. All you must do is go back and stop a few mass murderers.” The voice replied. ELisheva cocked her head her dark ponytail swinging to the side. “Go back where?” She bubbled. “You’re concerned where you would be going but not the whole ‘stop mass murderer’?” Celeste chuckled. “Enough, please allow me to finish with the details Miss Lyda.” A small man materialized in front of us. He had a pot belly that was emphasized by how he stood, opposite slouch. He wore a robe styled like that of priest with the colors of the presidential flag. “It is a pleasure to finally meet the last two creators of mankind. Would the rest of you come and meet them please?” 5 other people came out into the aisle, 3 were male and 2 were female. Rook stepped up next to me. The two of us surveyed them all in turn not knowing whether to embrace them or attack them. The 5 of them starred us down just as intensely. “Kadi, you don’t have to intimidate every person you meet.’ Elisheva said poking me in the ribs. “Elisheva Ramon how ya doin?” She held out her hand in hope that one of the 5 would shake it. “They aren’t much into the whole friendly greetings thing there, Elise.” I told her pulling her hand back.

I am with everyone but no one wants me

A goddess of sin in every era

I have been cast down from above with he who is forever my enemy

But also my love

A man that looked about 23 had recited part of a poem that I had written to be able to identify myself as Theodosia by any of the other gods of sin. My only response was a simple nod.

I am killed by my love in every life

Strings stronger than fate are what tether us

Sewn into everyone’s souls is that of my essence

I am also a sin

A 15 year old girl finished the rest of the poem. Nix had the same response. ‘It really is you!” A 27 year old woman with purple eyes crushed the two us into a bear hug. I would know those eyes anywhere. They belonged to the goddess of pride, Verena. Each god had some kind of physical attribute that was colored to that of our sin. I have green eyes because the color associated with envy is green. “Sid get over here and say hello to our old friends.” She told a guy about the same age as her with light blue eyes. The god of sloth, Isidor. “Well it’s certainly been awhile. The Holocaust was it?” He said. I nodded looking back at Elisheva. Her reincarnation number is 4. During the Holocaust she had experienced it through the eyes of two people. My sister was her second incarnation where she had been killed by disease in the Theresienstadt ghetto. Elisheva’s third incarnation was my daughter in that same ghetto. It was a miracle that either of us survived birth since a few of the Nazi soldiers thought it would be hysterical to tie my legs together when I went into labor. Any time the Holocaust is mentioned Elisheva would get really angry or scared as if she was remembering anything from that time. It happened 200 years ago so I had my doubts that her soul would remember it, but considering how traumatic it was even to me. Her soul will never forget anything that happened there. She didn’t even look bothered by it, thankfully. “Let me see if I can do this correctly.” Elisheva said. She pointed at each person in turn. “Verena, goddess of pride.” The woman with violet eyes. “Isidor, god of sloth.” The man with light blue eyes. “Ogden, god of gluttony.” A teenage boy with a slight pink complexion. “Keyshia, goddess of greed.” A blonde teenage girl. “Jotham, god of lust.” A man with red hair. Elisheva then looked closely at me and Rook as if she needed any additional thought to who Theodosia and Pheonixis could be. She pointed at me and said. “Theodosia, goddess of envy.” Her eyes examined Nix trying to find where his color distinction for being the god of wrath was. He pulled back his black hair to reveal his pale forehead and a small orange circle just above his brow. “Pheonixis, god of wrath.” Elisheva finished. “Do you all still have your marks?” I asked putting my hair up so it would be easier to reveal mine. They all nodded moving to show us. Verena had her infinity symbol on her left hip. Isidor had his on the right side of his abdomen. Ogden’s was on his right shoulder. Keyshia’s was on her left wrist. The symbol on Jotham was on his left ankle. Nix held out his right hand and I pulled back my left ear. All the symbols had been accounted for. “Am I supposed to reveal mine too?” Elisheva asked. I shook my head at her. “What exactly are you asking of us?” I asked. “We are asking you to go back in time and stop mass murderers from killing. The first place you would be going would be Victorian London when Jack the Ripper roamed the streets a free man until the day he died.” (fill in word for president here) informed us. I pursed my lips thinking it over. I was hesitant since I was his 5th victim out of 7. “Would all of you be joining us?” Nix asked. “Yep.” Jotham answered. “Can I have some time to think it over?” I inquired. “But, of course. We wouldn’t want you to do something against your will.” He answered. I bit back the comment about being brought here without any of our consent. “Now best be on your way. You three have a lot of thinking to do in not a lot of time. Tomorrow at 10:00 am is when I would like your decision please.” He instructed with a wave of his wrinkly hand. With that simple gesture the three of us were back in front of the apartment complex.

#Just the first of many hopefully. Please tell me if there happen to be any mistakes or confusion. Hope people like it.

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