Rhexin: Shackles of Eden

Chapter 1

ACT 1: Glenthe House

Glenthé, Eden

Lilith couldn't breathe. She was suffocating. Clay surrounded her, dragging her down into its clutches.

Panic filled her and she kicked wildly, clawing at the soil in the direction she could only hope was up. It wormed its way under her fingernails. Her muscles screamed and she saw white.

Finally, she felt one of her outstretched hands break free with vengeance, only fuelling her desperate need to leave this prison of clay. She pushed and scraped with all her might, burrowing upwards, until she fully emerged from the ground. Not a single patch of skin was visible under the streaks of mud and dirt that coated her. It plastered her long hair to her scalp, wetly slicking it back.

She inhaled deeply, taking in her first ever breath. The air was sweet - a little too sweet. But after spending gods know how long in the earth, it was bliss. That was, until she coughed, clutching at her pain-wracked chest, and what felt like small stones pushed their way out of her throat. She shook her head in disgust, eager to find out what the hell was going on. Her eyes felt like they were soldered together, probably with soil, as she realised that she couldn't see.

She stood with legs as weak as a newborn foal, and blindly took a few wobbly steps forward, not knowing where she was going. Suddenly, she felt water up to her ankles. It felt incredible, and she pushed forward until she was waist-deep.

Lilith took a deep breath and submerged herself fully. The oceanic waters felt cool and crisp, but she didn't give herself time to appreciate the senses bombarding her mind, and instead started scrubbing her face and arms. There was so much mud that it started to cloud the water surrounding her. She pushed upwards to take another deep breath before plunging herself underwater again to remove the remaining dirt clinging to every inch of her skin and hair.

A moment later she came back up, and she felt a lot better. She wiped the water clear from her eyes and took in her surroundings.

She was stood in a sea which seemingly had no end, and the skies were a burnt orange melting into pink, scattered with fluffy white clouds. She turned to look back towards the land, and she shuddered on vaguely seeing the hole where she had burrowed her way out of the earth.

The soil-coated shore seemed to be on the outskirts of a garden. Trees stood well over thirty feet high, bearing all sorts of coloured fruits. They looked like jewels and precious stones, and they sparkled richly in the sunlight in a kaleidoscope of hundreds of different shades of sapphire and jade and colours Lilith didn't even know the name of yet.

A breeze caressed her face, bringing their irresistible aroma of citrus and jasmine over to her, only highlighted by the mossy tones of the trees and sharp flickers of sea salt in the air.

She noticed movement on the shore, and quickly snapped out of the sensory high she had been experiencing. The ground seemed to be shifting, and she froze as, a few seconds later, a dirt-coated hand shot up out of it.

Without hesitation, Lilith waded through the waters and headed for the shore as quickly as she could. She didn't know if the person coming out of the ground would be friendly or not, but she knew that she wouldn't be able to move so quickly while in the ocean if she needed to run.

The person stood, and she somehow knew he was a man. He stumbled forwards blindly with his hands outstretched the same way she had done not minutes before.

Still stood in the water, she froze as he entered the sea, watching cautiously as he began to wash himself free of the dirt.

She was so fixated on the stranger that she didn't notice the towering presence behind her until a subtle scent clouded her senses, one of smoke and cedar. A firm hand wrapped around her waist, pulling her gently back, and a deep, sensual male voice whispered something in her ear that she didn't quite catch. But the second she spun around, the presence was gone.