Tree of Life Book III

Part II - Chapter 01

TREE OF LIFE BOOK III – PART II

CHAPTER 01

"…after he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life…"

Genesis 3:24

LONG AGO

Forgive me.

I only know to tell it this way. From the beginning, then.

The very, very beginning.

~~~

From the moment I awoke, to life, to everything, she was there. And she was always near me. She was the first face I saw each morning. The last face I saw every night. She was the dawn. She was the dusk. I never knew a day without her in it.

Her name was Valorien.

We were never apart, in those days. With her always close behind me, I would roam the Garden at will and every day was glorious. The world was young and so was I.

I did not know the time that she had seen before I came along. Perhaps it was much. Perhaps it was not. But it didn't matter in the beginning. For it was the beginning, the beginning of all things and all was perfect and new and shining and it seemed, for the longest time, that nothing was ever going to change. Everything was perfect.

I was a child, in those days. And as a child I would climb to the highest heights and howl with glee as I cast my gaze out over the land. I would run and fall, and then get up and run some more. My eyes would go wide when I spied the waterfall or the flight of the eagle soaring above my head.

I was filled with questions and not enough time in the day to answer them all. I was smiles and laughter and intrigue as I studied on my hands and knees a convoy of ants winding its way back into its lair, laden with food, heavy with mission.

My companion was the sombre one. In those days. Though she would smile the odd time, she was not one to let on her feelings or her thoughts. Her eyes would be on the lines of approach to our location, or the myriad number of ways I could fall and hurt myself or not fall but hurt myself anyway. She was the one to point out the things I should not be doing, though she couldn't tell me why I shouldn't be doing them.

In those days.

In those days, life was perfect. Life was good.

In those days.

And then, Corruption came. Everything changed.

The man and the woman were thrown out of the Garden.

Perfection was no longer.

Corruption came and the Garden fell into disrepair. Disease…illness was born and I did not know its name, for I had never seen anything like it before. Although my heart went out to it by instinct and where I touched it, it recoiled from me and for a while would abate and fall into slumber.

That was my true calling, then, I learned. I was to be the one to hold it at bay. I was there to stop it, so the world might not die, or at least not quickly. Not in a day.

That day, Valorien's true nature was revealed to me also. She was to be my guardian. She was to keep me safe.

For this purpose, she was given a Sword.

I remember seeing her use it for the first time.

~~~

Four men had found their way to the Garden somehow. I was alone, at the time, as Valorien had stepped away for a moment. And though the men were not well concealed by the bushes they had chosen, I was not aware of them, as I was busy tending to a fox that had a tumour growing in its belly. I was placing my hand on the creature, now resting in my lap, soothing it and waiting for the tumour to shrink in size when the group of four pounced out of hiding and surrounded me.