Son of Blood and Malice

Chapter 3

"How dare you."

His voice was dripping with contempt, so low it could barely be heard. He knew he had said he would accept whatever explanation, but this stung hard. 

Nephilim. 

The book of Enoch describes Nephilim as the children of the fallen iyrin, the former watcher angels under God's command who turned against him. After the watchers had fallen down to earth, stripped of their angelic rank, they lusted after human women. The children born from their exploits were the Nephilim, a race of evil beings who were cast away by God. 

Earlier transcripts described Nephilim as giant warriors from the old world, ancient and powerful beings that walked the earth and were said to have lived in Canaan. Even so, they were always referred to as sons of God, and their offspring were the wicked Eliouds in certain jewish beliefs. If Jason was anything, he would be an Elioud.

This was the ultimate insult. A child born with the Jewish faith, raised as a servant of Hashem, being a descendant of angels who defiled his God. The irony almost made him laugh.

"How dare you call me, a child of God, a Nephilim?"

Jonas looked taken aback, not expecting this reaction from him.

"It's just what your people used to call me", he said with a blank expression.

"My people huh ... what would make them call you such a thing?"

Jonas didn't say anything, he kept his head down as if he suddenly remembered something painful from his past. It was obvious that this was a painful conversation to him as well.

"I told you, I'm not the person to tell you about us. I said we're Nephilim because that's what the Jews of Judea called me when I resided there in the past. We have never referred to ourselves."

"What did you call yourselves if it wasn't Nephilim or elioud?" Jason asked through gritted teeth.

"Purebloods, katharos haema, pura sanguine, whatever floats your boat. The truth is that many of our kind have the nature of Nephilim described in your holy scriptures, and thus they called themselves pure bloods. To remind everyone of the pure and divine blood that flows through their veins. After all, even the Nephilim were called sons of God."

"Do you believe that it's true? That we are descendants of fallen angels?"

"I don't know Jason, there were so many of us that no one even cared where we came from. In my family we never spoke a word of Hashem, because doing so was blasphemy. I just thought it was due to prejudice, as well as me growing up in the far north and then later ending up in Rome where you honoured the gods. I actually don't know anything for certain."

Jason hated how sincere he sounded. He could not direct his anger towards him. All he could think about was who he was and where he came from. If he truly was a so called "pureblood", who were his parents and why was he raised by the heir of house of Thebes? 

In Kristos and Penny's cases, they were children of his father's cousin's mistress. The safest place for them would be in father's care, according to their father. Jason only saw him as cowardly for neglecting them.

"Does Kristos know?" he asked after a while.

"Yes, I told him recently because he was in a similar position you are now", explained Jonas, "that's the reason why he's been staying here a lot."

It was true, Kristos had spent more and more time at Melanie's and Jonas' place. He had no idea that he was struggling with the same thing, but the worst part was how he did not tell him. As if they weren't brothers who could confide in each other.