Eternal

Life, an interesting word isn't it? Where does life began? When your born, or when you make it count for something? When it ends...Is it when you die, or when you give up? I had traveled mountains to stand where I do now, Have witnessed birth and death, Joy and true sorrow... yet I still don’t have the answer. Maybe it isn't an answer, just ones opinion.
Still...Through only my eyes alone can such an answer ever be answered. A curse that has latched to my very essence and became me...Of which there is never escape.

Chapter 1

*

Sun shone through the canopy of leaves above us that evening,
songbirds singing the tune they were born to sing.
Life was beautiful.
We laughed as we danced in the evening sun and shade, me and my lady, kissing and laughing;
At peace. Happy.
As if things would never change...
Animals hid from our sight as we danced about, not understanding the cause of our joy.
I pulled her close...
And our lips met, as if they would never part...
My love,
My joy,
My peace,
My dream...

Yes, it was my dream. So much so that how could I bring myself to remember it was reality? Still as it carved itself into a dream in my mind it was fading as an old memory...So much so that the only time it shaped clearly was in sleep, When I would re-live that beauty. Then awake to wish I hadn't.
I used to believe my gift made me a God, mighty and unbeatable.

That was birth, before I witnessed the parting, suffering, and death.

What was really left of me now?

That was easy.

I was a shell, empty where once existed the passion, love, and life.

I wasn't dead, but I wasn't alive.

This was my rule, ever going...for eternity, never blessed to end. Every morning I awoke knowing this as I pulled myself out of bed, and went on with a life I knew would perish. And begin all over.

*

I left my house in the cold misty morning, repeating a pattern I was all too bored of. I was a noble now, better then before...But I didn't see how that mattered. Not for a destiny such as my own.
I let myself into the stables, when I noticed something shift in a corner beyond my horse, neatly hidden behind a pile of hay.

As usual, I was in no mood for hoodlums.

I crept over with perfection that can only come from endless nights and battles.

Swiftly as ever I pulled the intruder up with a fistful of hair, turning the scared face towards me.
I faced a young girl, nearing her womanhood now. She was tattered and weak, but fierce as she tried to pull from my grasp.

“Hey let me go! Ow..Please, I’ll leave! I...” Above her speech I heard a faint weeping behind her. I shoved her aside to see a small boy cowering, face streaked with tears. He was very young, probably only five years. I turned back to the young woman quickly pulling herself from the floor.

“Take him and leave”

She looked furious, but went to get him, pulling him up in her arms and heading for the exit when she turned. “You’re a noble, your supposed to be noble and care for the people. Yet we can’t even stay in a stable? We didn't do any harm.”

I looked back coldly. I seen countless people suffering, dying, and even tortured. These we’re just two more faces. There was already no hope for the world. But then...Despite my heart hardened by years of love and years of anguish, I felt the need to not be the reason for their demise. To not contribute to the very logic I hated and once ignored.

“Your not staying in a stable. Winter is nearing...” I turned and started to leave and I could feel her disappointment. “I said you couldn't stay in the stable...You can go stay in the house. Feel free to eat what you like, but I’m giving you one chance...I won’t be so kind if anything goes missing.”

Yet again I was opening myself to the misery I knew too well.

I learned later her name was Sandra, and her brother James. As I dreaded I began to look forward to seeing them, to love it. For once there was change in my life. I had something to look forward too, someone I mattered to.

For the first time in years I had a real smile that would appear all too often, I woke up not so sorrowful, even with my dreams of past days. Sometimes I even dreamt of the future, and not the one I was dreading. It began to show, the men I worked with could feel and see my change, and I even managed to have better and happier relations with them.

Life had become living again.

When I came home I watched as James played out in the field, never straying from the fence as was his sisters orders. I was relieved to see they were actually siblings, when I first seen the two pitiful people, I feared that Sandra was another outcast young mother, it was nice to know life had not become that cruel to her, as I had seen all too often.

I smiled, and continued inside, Sandra was at the table reading one of my many books. She was a smart girl, and all though she could not attend school, though I offered to pay and she declined, she still wished to learn. She smiled to greet me.

“How was your day?” She asked.

I smiled back. “ It was nice.” I was beginning to love her smile. That alone would make my day that much nicer.

One day she found my secret room, a room I allowed only myself, and asked me about it when I returned. My room was a room that consisted of drawings and paintings, nearly endless. She asked what they were for, why there were so many, why it was just for me.

I didn’t want her to know of my endless suffering, but she was a stubborn girl. She would always ask, or find a way around the question to ask. Truthfully I didn't mind her in my room, she could go wherever she wished to go. I wouldn't have stopped her. It was an answer to her questions that was hard to find. Still, she never entered my room after. Out of respect of my privacy probably, she realized in my attempt to avoid her questions the answers must be painful, and she didn't intrude. Though she never failed to ask me of it.

I never told her so, but I liked that she always asked. Maybe that’s why I never told her the answers. I didn't want her to stop giving me questions. It meant she cared, that my sorrow meant something to her.
*

“Daddy, tell us a story!” James would say when he was little. I told him many times I was no father, yet he didn't understand. Sandra would not explain it to him. She said that would be lying.
Even as they grew, on sleepless nights and quiet days they would want to hear stories. James would eventually try to grow forcefully, as all adolescents do. I understood that, but when he couldn't sleep, he would come to me in secret, and request a story, only if I swore to never tell his sister. Who still asked proudly.

“Only one, It’s getting late.” I said.

“Yay!” He said happily.

“If you keep asking Eilam for stories eventually he’s going to run out you know.” Sandra said with a smile.

"Nah-ah! Never!”

I chuckled. How right he was.

“Ok, ok...A story” I had told them many stories. This one was special. To me, I felt that it was a story I needed to tell them.

“Once upon a time, there was a bard. He had ran from his old life working, he no longer saw the point. He would spend his days playing music so beautiful it rivaled the very songbirds that inspired him. Townspeople would stare at him in confusion as he never asked for money. He had potential...they thought. Now, they saw him as little more then a lost cause. He didn't care. He had seen it all before, money would bring him nothing.

“He traveled from place to place, occasionally doing small jobs to make enough gold for food, or whatever he felt he needed. Or just to help even, more then anything he just didn't want to waste his time doing nothing.

“One day a young woman approached him, she asked him why he so rarely accepted money, and why he would spend so much time in the woods rather then with fellow people. He just smiled. She couldn't understand, not without experiencing for herself.

“‘If you really want to know, then follow me too the forest at sunset.’ He said. She was wary of his invitation, as any young woman would have been. When he went to find she had not shown, he was not disappointed. It couldn't be helped. She would come when she was ready, and if she never was, maybe she would be in another life.

“Over the years The bard watched the young woman mature, and she became curious, for she was reaching a period of her life where she was no longer dependent on others, exploring life for herself. She became good friends with the bard over the years he watched her, and she him.

“Many told her to save her time for one more ‘worthy’, that a bard certainly couldn’t be worth her time. She never listened to such nonsense, every sunset she would come to the bard and listen to him play his beautiful music. She trusted his word, and told him of her problems of her father arranging her marriage, and how she hated becoming a woman, because it meant things had to change, had to revolve around love, which was not her own, and of family. She said it was not fair she could not have more time for herself.

“Every time he would listen in silence, trying to understand her every sentence, for every sentence was a feeling all its own. He would comfort her, rather then try to solve her problems, for he couldn't do that. It was not his place.

“Then that evening as he went to leave into the forest, she stopped him, grabbing his wrist with gentleness and pleading.

“‘wait, I... want to go with you.” He took her hand and smiled, helping her up. He knew this time would come, he could see it in her eyes the first time he had asked her to go, that endless curiosity that all humans possess, though is heightened in others.

“That sunset they retreated into the woods together, he showed her the way of his life. Then on they went together every sunset, getting away from life together, yet living it more then ever. Together they watched young rabbits grow to have babies, and baby birds learn to fly and sing songs all their own. Together they would lie under the sun, and dance under the stars.

“Their life was a wild life, filled with love, passion, joy, peace, and just being. Home became within the trees, rather then within the walls. But there comes a time all life ends, and another begins.”

"Did she die!?” James interrupted.

"No, no she never. But time came she had to marry. For reasons all her own she decided to marry the man her father had picked for her. Though she forever loved the bard. Her parents were old and sickly, she felt it her duty to grant their dying wish. She raised a son and daughter with the man she married, and learned to love. Still, on days of silence she would visit the forest where she once lived. It was still her home she felt, but it was not the place of her duty, it was the place of her freedom. Freedom was a luxury that she had passed as she had matured, and she would only see again when she passed...but her duty gave her many joys and passion all its own.

“The bard never left her all that time. He still resided in the forest, and time to time he would come out and play his music, though people would usually hear his music coming from within the trees. He watched her age, and her children grow. Soon her son was ready to be wed, and she herself grew sickly as her parents once did.

“One day as he was playing music under a tree in the forest the woman came up to him, he could still see the curiosity and strength in her eyes. She told him of her sorrow of times passed, but of her joy of her children, and even her husband. She apologized for being gone so long, but he just shook his head.

“‘Duty is duty, the forest is always here to comfort, and to please...but eventually every bird leaves the nest.’ He smiled as she sat beside him.

“‘You haven’t aged a day’

“‘ ’Tis the fate of some folks.’ he smiled.

“She just nodded. ‘Truthfully I did not come to apologize...I came to say goodbye, my time is nearing an end. My days with you were some of my best days’ she said.

'"Do you regret your choice?' asked the bard.

'“Not at all...I’m happy with my life. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I married you, but that was not my fate. I’m happy to have had my children, watch them grow...I feel complete. I’ll never know if I would have with you, but things happen the way they do for a reason. I just had to do what I had to do.' He did not say he agreed with her, or that he didn't. He just nodded. He understood.

“'I will miss you." He said to her one last time.

“'I will always be here, like you were for me.' She said. They nodded in silence, no words were needed between them anymore.

“The bard continued to live in the forest and watch the woman’s children grow, seeing less and less of the woman he loved. And when the time came, attending her funeral. The woman’s daughter asked him who he was, and why he was here. He just told her:

“I’m an old friend of your mother’s... She was an amazing woman.'

“ As time passed he noticed the girl grow, and go into the forest, just as her mother had. As if her mothers spirit was calling her in, to enjoy her freedom...
And that was it.”

“What happened to the bard?” James asked.

“He just kept living on.”

“Why didn't he die, or age?”

“That wasn't his fate.”

“But-“

”That’s enough James, its time for bed.” His sister said.

“Aww...Okay. Goodnight daddy.”

“Goodnight little one." He smiled at James curiosity. He had lied, about the ending. There was never an ending, but somehow adding one always made the story so much nicer.

Sandra came down after tucking her brother into bed.

“Why is it some people are destined to never die or age?” She asked.

“I've never figured out the answer to that.”

She nodded and said goodnight, then headed up the stairs.

*

I watched as James and Sandra grew. From the two pitiful children behind the hay, beaten and bruised from the hard life of running and poverty, to strong and beautiful people, finding their way to where there was once just a wall. They had come so far. They said it was my doing, I don’t believe that.

James grew to be a young gentleman. He always insisted to do my hard work, despite my not growing weaker. He would watch out for his sister when I was gone on missions, though she never needed watching, and he even had a love interest of his own. He was still young, but shaping to be a noble man.

Sandra grew to be a young lady...Strong willed and passionate as ever. She had never abandoned her stubbornness. She only grew more intelligent with time, and I noticed now that all the gentlemen in town would turn to gaze at her when she went out in town to get groceries. I believed not one to be good enough for her. The strong girl who had kept her and her tiny brother alive, and chanced everything to keep it that way. Strong enough to break into a nobles stable, and stand against him.

The pride and love I had for these two people was unbreakable.
I ignored it would come to an end.
That’s the only way to enjoy it while I have it, I figured.
I didn’t even think of the sad lonely days to come.

I woke one day to the sound of rain outside, hitting on the windows. The morning felt strange to me, of so many years I was able to indicate little things even subconsciously just by the feelings of the air around me.

I stretched and tried to ignore the feeling, futile as it was, because it worried me. I descended the stairs to a kitchen where Sandra, a woman now, had already finished making breakfast. Her brother already eating.

“Good morning Eilam” She said happily.

“Good morning.” I sat across from James, already reaching towards becoming a young man. The
same age now as his sister had been when I had first discovered them behind the hay. Already 15...I both loved and hated to see them grow. “Good morning James” I said, finally grabbing his attention.

“Oh! Hello dad.” He said, smiling apologetically.

I began to eat from the plate in front of me.

Life felt like it is in the story books...A family...just simply living through life.

"Eilam, there's someone at the door" Sandra called, as her attention was caught through the window.

Just one flaw...

''Hello?" I answered stiffly, my voice rough from sleep, looking at the young man before me. His blond hair and rough skin tainted with the stains from living a rough life style, his brown eyes fierce with determination.

"Eilam?"

"Yes"

''I've been looking for you."

Wonderful...I thought.

That damned flaw...was me. And there was no running from it.