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The Whitetail mountains of Montana.It was a landscape consisting of barren fields blood-stained footpaths that led to nowhere. It was a beautiful but deadly terrain, foretold by the bodies of those who were left hanging on the borders. An omen of what would happen to anyone who crossed into this region.Herald to this place was Jacob Seed, the militant older brother of Joseph Seed. Joseph was the Father of the Project at Eden’s Gate, a God-chosen man with visions of the imminent collapse. He saw a world bathed in fire and smoke, the final cleansing before the true order was restored. Burdened with the mission to set humanity on the right path before the apocalypse, Joseph entrusted his big brother with the Project’s security. Jacob’s speciality was in the production of henchmen, both human and animal.Jacob’s region was unparalleled for its brutality and abundance of hostile animals, even surpassing his sadistic younger brother, John. Whereas John tortured people for his own pleasure, Jacob ruined his soldiers to set them on the right path. To filter the weak and the unworthy from the chosen few, the people who could be trusted to survive the world’s incoming wave of despair.At the heart of Jacob’s security are the Judges, animals – mostly wolves – he’d captured and improved with the use of Bliss to be bigger, stronger; to be better. These bliss-infused monstrosities were anointed with red paint on their faces as they prowled the landscape on their mission to cull the herd. Judges attacked anyone and anything that dared so much as to look up. Ever since he released the Judges into the Whitehall mountains, Jacob rested easy knowing the hard work was being done without his supervision.But one day, the Judges began to vanish.No longer could Jacob hear the howling of the herd from the distance, those deep sounds from the soul that reverberated across the mountains and made the hair on the back of his neck stand. No longer was he coming across their slightly too large paw marks imprinted in the mud. In fact, he was no longer coming across new wolves to capture. The traps were empty, the bait lying there untasted. Almost overnight, the dogs had vanished.Jacob pondered on this as he traced the outline of a snare with his hand, quickly reworking the trap with his calloused fingers. The sunlight seemed old as it filtered through the reddening leaves. The changing wind carried the first ripples of cold as autumn slowly befell Montana. Soon enough, a hardening cold would descend, and it would be harder to tend to these traps. Rising from the ground, he held his hunting rifle in position as he moved closer to a wolf trap. Intuitively, knew it’d be empty, again.This particular trap was unusual because it was set in the middle of a meadow, a rare enough occurrence in this region. Most traps were set at the bottom of hills and mountains, preying on the wolves that rested in dens and caves. Particularly, mother wolves preparing for birth. The younger he got them, the better. But the meadow trap was destined for lone wolves that strayed from the pack, oftentimes a desperate one that would enter the cage without a second thought.Jacob’s boots stepped into the meadow, a field with tall and dry grass stalks shooting up towards the sun. Clusters of late summer flowers billowed as the wind caught them. Purple shades of clematis spread their petals and bluebells with drooping heads danced slowly from side to side. Wolf’s bane bowed their heads as Jacob walked on, dragged down by an invisible weight. Despite the sounds of gunshots, screaming and explosions that frequented across the hills of Hope County, life still had its gleams of sunshine. Montana was so beautiful and wild, it almost made one forget what its inhabitants were up to. Almost.Jacob shielded his eyes from the sun as he looked onward for the trap and stopped in his tracks. His stern blue eyes narrowed with contempt as he saw the trap on its side, empty, and someone’s hurried movements making their escape.His experiences as a huntsman and soldier told him to raise his weapon and shoot the bastard. It was the easy thing to do. But something unexplainable, a sense beyond the five, bade him forward. The rifle was abandoned as he stalked the saboteur through the meadow and into the woodland. The other person seemed quite oblivious about who walked behind them. There was a spring to their step which made their head bob up and down – a stupid, airheaded way to exist in these parts. Their hands were busy carrying the stolen animal; it was almost too easy to attack them. Jacob’s hunting instinct commanded him to reach for the knife and plunge it into their throat until it hit bone. As he got closer, he saw it was a distinctly feminine figure. It changed nothing for him.It all came to a stop when the animal began writhing restlessly. It reached its paws on the woman’s shoulders and turned to look back at Jacob; it was nothing more than a little wolf pup. It barked and then, meeting Jacob’s eyes, whimpered as it pressed its snout on the woman’s neck.The woman stopped.In the natural world, some speak of the strange psychic dance between predator and prey. It is said that if a prey animal grants a subservient look, if it performs a shiver that dances over its skin, that the prey acknowledges its weakness to the predator. It communicates its servility and inferiority and thus agrees to become the predator’s victim. Some explain this as the fawn response; a flutter of the eyelashes, a lowering of the head, the twitch of a lip. A fake laugh at the bar. It was the dance of surrender and death. At that moment, as the woman turned her head, Jacob found himself following the steps to this feverish dance.She turned and he met a pair of eyes he had seen several times in his life.Jacob was not a person anybody was glad to see, especially these days. He was one of those people who had lived most moments of life as though they were punishment. Life had run him over with a truck, reversed, and hit him again, and again, and again. This gave him an indestructible look; it showed on the hard lines on his face, and the permanent scowl on his lips. It showed in the angry scars on his cheeks that travelled up to his scalp and as far down as his arms, betraying the secrets of old pain. He still wore his dog tags from his time serving in the military, along with his camo jacket. And he was old, nearing his mid-forties with a pair of eyes that seemed to dispel light despite being a shade of soft blue. It was unsurprising, then, that Daisy flinched upon seeing him.“Jacob,” was all she said in a very low voice; her eyes widening with recognition.“Daisy.” He replied. Nobody moved, nobody breathed. Even the forest held its breath for an instant of pure silence.It had been many years since he’d seen her and she hardly seemed different, thought Jacob. Aside from the faint marks on her face and a length of hair that surpassed her earlier years, she remained the same. Time had waved its ancient hand over her, too, but not in the punishing way that it’d done with Jacob. Her eyes were just as large as he’d remembered, and they silently pleaded for mercy.
“If you wanted a dog, you should’ve just asked,” he said whilst looking at her. Both knew Jacob was being very generous in this moment, perhaps for old time’s sake. It was a miracle she wasn’t dead already, and they both knew it.“I didn’t think you would mind,” she said in a distinctly Daisy-like manner; even after all this time, she still spoke softly, almost meekly. It was a manner of speaking most women overcame through years of raising their voices over men, children and other women. For whatever reason, Daisy had retained this quality.“It’s a very small one. Maybe you can have it back when it gets bigger?”“Daisy,” he said sternly. “You know better than that, don’t you?”Daisy averted her gaze to a patch of sunlight next to them. It was a strange meeting and not at all what Jacob was expecting to find when he set off on that day. From what he could see, she ventured out into the wilderness with nothing but a water flask and what he presumed to be dog treats. Her strangely long hair gave her an air of savagery, as though it proved she was wild enough to roam these parts alone.Jacob was right. She did know better; everyone knew better. Before Daisy stood the immense, overwhelming presence of a man. A man well-known for the horrible things he did to people. Locking them in cages, starving them, tormenting them, and breaking their minds with tests of endurance intended only to ruin them further. One only needed to look at the rotting corpses left hanging on his borders to understand the kind of man he was. And here he stood before her. It was hard to imagine him as someone whose soul was not intertwined with cruelty.Through all this, Daisy’s face remained motionless, a stony imprint of nothingness. But her eyes were glossed over with carefully contained tears. And her hands, he noticed, were shaking.“Hand it over to me, Daisy.” He said and outstretched his arms, beckoning her to come to him.Daisy looked at him and, hesitantly, began walking closer. The wolf pup writhed as she approached but was silent as it was transferred from one pair of arms to another. Their hands briefly touched, and the softness of her skin reminded him how hardened his was, how marked his body was by the rough tissue of scars.Something shifted at that moment. The glide of birds as they sailed through the wind, the ripples of water from the nearby stream, and the hoof of a deer sinking into the ground; they all silenced themselves. It was as if only two entities existed at that moment – the hunter, Jacob. And the prey, Daisy. The weariness in her dark eyes as she looked up at him made him think that she felt this moment too. Felt that something was being taken from both of them, the very air was thick with it.The animal lay motionless in Jacob’s grasp. To his own surprise, he made no attempt to grab Daisy and she retreated quickly.Her retreat pulled something from him, like the tug of a string from the ribs; and it hurt. It felt like his whole body was aching and burning all at once and by the time she reached her former position, it was all over.“They say the Deputy will kill John,” she said suddenly with her eyes towards the sun. Daisy’s dak eyes were illuminated by the bright light and seemed to be on fire. They glowed as though they held embers, and it gave her an illuminated fierceness. Jacob felt he was beholding something unnatural and for a moment, he felt a rare sense of fear low in his stomach. Fire encircled her irises, as though she could burn him with just one look. “Can’t you hear them over the river?”There was no mockery in her voice, he knew she was being sincere.“John can handle himself – you remember what he’s like,” he said. Jacob lay his cold eyes on her; the blaze in her eyes met the blizzard within his. “Mm,” he hummed with his lips pursed. “But you never did like him. Is that why you’re here, stealing my stuff? Too scared to return to Hope County?”The sun hid behind a cloud and whatever burnt in Daisy’s eyes disappeared. She remembered John very well, he was someone who enjoyed agitating and persecuting others from a young age. It wasn’t malicious back then; he was only a child. But his proclivity to torment for fun showed itself early. “She will kill him soon, I can feel it.” She was withdrawing with slow, backward steps. “You should hide, Jacob. The Deputy is coming for all of you.”Jacob smiled in a way that almost resembled kindness. But it was not kindness, of course. He found her ridiculous and would have been offended by these words had they been spoken by someone else. Daisy was being what Daisy always was; odd but not malicious. Speaking nonsense when you least expected it. She resembled Joseph in this way, rambling about things that didn’t always make sense. But she was no Joseph, her words were no prophecies and she was no seer. Some would call it lunacy, but he remembered what she looked like as a child and could not bring himself to punish her.“Go home, Daisy. I mean it.” Jacob’s voice gruff voice dripped with authority, and it returned something vital to him. Something he’d curiously lost around her and was glad to reconcile with.“I don’t have a home anymore,” she said quietly as if speaking to herself, though Jacob heard it. He felt the rare pang of guilt in his stomach but said nothing. He watched as Daisy withdrew into the distance with her eyes set on the ground; she did not look at him again. Hers was a silhouette with long hair that merged with the shadows and trees.Soon enough she disappeared, and motion was restored. The normal sounds of nature returned, and he could breathe with ease again. As he peeled away from the site, he had the odd feeling that something fatal had transpired.Jacob returned with the small wolf in his arms with not an ounce of triumph in his body. Instead, there lurked the memories of many years ago, threatening to spill from the abyss within his psyche. Memories from a time he’d vowed long ago to never revisit. A time of hot summers and young siblings, of shouting and things breaking. Of a version of himself restless for an escape, itching for spilled blood. And of a girl at the bottom of a lake, a girl cut by glass.When he checked on the pup the following morning, it was dead.
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Daisy added kindle to the fire and stared as the flame’s gaping mouth devoured the offering. Nightfall befell the world beyond her current home – an abandoned log cabin in a small, neglected corner of the mountains. A place so secluded that the very trees forgot to make way for the structure. Their gnarly limbs twisted outside the windows, interrupting the breathtaking view as they nudged closer towards the cabin. The roof had become thatched from the amount of leaves and pine needles that landed on it, a thick hat of greenery that was already rotting by the time Daisy had discovered the habitation. It took a lot to turn this place into a home, but it was now a small paradise between the ends of hell. The Whitetail mountains were like something from a psychedelic nightmare these days. But in this corner of the world, it was warm and safe, and the walls were decorated with prints of butterflies and flowers rather than taxidermized game. The cabin smelled like freshly brewed tea and soup and faintly of Gregor, the wolf-dog Daisy found one day and that now refused to budge from her side. Daisy placed a pot of water over the firewood stove and turned on the generator for her nightly wash.She sipped on her tea as she lay in the bathtub, gazing at the view beyond the window. Her warm breath danced in the cold air as she exhaled, and she watched as the air’s outlines swirled and turned into shapes that lulled and mesmerised her. She snapped out of this trance when Gregor pushed the door open with his large paws.“You need to wait for your turn, buddy.” She said and leaned back. The dog made a noise of disapproval and sat in front of the door, as he often did. Looking at Gregor, Daisy thought of the wolf pup she had lost that day. She came so close to saving it, she was almost at the border where she would pass it on to the animal rescue service…until he came.
Jacob Seed.Daisy struggled to count the years that’d passed since she last saw him. Had it already been a decade? It seemed hard to comprehend but she’d last seen him when she was in her twenties, and she was now in her early thirties. She scoffed to herself lightly in disbelief. All these years and what did they have to show for them?Ruins. Everything was gone. The place they’d grown up in was a desecrated site haunted by ghosts. Not only the ghosts of dead people but of those the remaining living were meant to have become. As a child growing up in Hope County, Daisy envisioned herself opening a flower shop or a tea shop, or was it a library? She never really settled on what she wanted, but it wasn’t important. What mattered was that she was at home where her roots were, living in the community she grew up in. Catching up with the people she grew up around, being someone who would remark how different the seasons were coming around each year. Someone most people found dull and boring – a local who never cared to venture outside her state. But to her, it was stability and loyalty; a natural attachment to one’s origins.
Instead, she lived now as a fugitive, always on the edge of uncertainty. Will I be here tomorrow? Will I find enough food for the two of us? Will someone bad find us? Nothing could be counted on, the road to the future had been hijacked by them.The Seed family.The four people who held the world in the palm of their hand. Well, Joseph’s hand, really. Daisy scrubbed her skin roughly as memories emerged from their tightly sealed box. She was trying not to think of them whilst surviving, there was too much dirt to face in thinking of them. Seeing Jacob today opened up a chasm within her chest. She stood so close to him, close enough to see the cruelty in those frozen blue eyes. Eyes that, she remembered, had not always been unkind. To see him as the thing he was now – a conqueror of people, a brute – unwound something that was tightly coiled in Daisy’s ribcage. She had just enough time to reach the cabin and shut the door behind her before a panic attack gripped her and made her collapse on the floor. She had breathed through the attack, but every time she closed her eyes, she saw him stand in front of her with his arms outstretched. Beckoning a surrender to death.The crescent moon glistened in the sky and Daisy thought back to many moons ago. To a time when the Seed family consisted of five people – Mr and Mrs Seed and their three sons: Jacob, Joseph and John. Back when the only marks on the son’s bodies were the subtle but definitive marks of grief. It wasn’t the grief of death but the grief a young person carries when they live in a house made of glass. A home where something (or someone) shattered every day, and this breaking would cause small pieces of sharp glass to cut through the air and enter their bodies. The wounds would eventually close, but every once in a while, they would wince as a fragment twisted from within. A memory, a scent, a sound would remind them that they still carried glass after all and would carry those lost pieces to the grave. A house like that can never really be destroyed even if you burned it.Daisy lived far enough to look the other way when the Seed parents would raise their voices (and other things). Yet close enough to notice the brothers leave in the middle of the night, vowing to never return, but finding themselves sleeping on the wet porch by sunrise. Waiting for someone to unlock the door.Did growing up in such a house mean you could ruin the entire world?She emerged from the water and shook the water droplets along with these thoughts. It was time to perform the rituals that made a woman feel normal; she would lather herself with lotions and the cheap perfume she’d found and then self-decorate her body with a house dress which made her feel like a decadent grandmother. Nobody owned pretty things anymore. It was easier to find bullets than a pair of earrings and people would sooner call a gun beautiful than a nice pair of shoes. The cult and the deprivation they created removed many things that were not considered essential. Which was everything women liked to hoard, pretty things lying in the back of their closets and underneath their beds. The kind of pretty stuff they rarely got to actually wear because people in these parts ‘don’t do that’ – wear a flashy dress or a tall pair of heels. But once in a while, when nobody was around, women would unearth these things from their resting places just to stare at them. Just to remember that they did have this after all and if the moment ever did come, they would be ready. This moment never arrived for most.Daisy liked to steal these things. She wasn’t a thief before, but times were hard now and anything left behind was up for grabs. Everyone took the first aid kits and the gun parts and maps, but nobody touched the box of bracelets, the shoes above the closet or the dress behind the bedsheets. Daisy did and was now a collector of women’s memorabilia. They meant nothing and yet were everything. To behold something beautiful was a necessity she could not go without. She now sat on the floor with her legs crossed and flipped through the pages of someone’s postcard collection. The radio lulled quietly in the background, she was warm in front of the stove and Gregor was chewing on a shoe he’d stolen from someone’s derelict garden. Despite the misery that clung to the region, life had its moments of comfort for this pair of thieves.Both were absorbed in their occupations for some time when the radio channel began transmitting static rather than the usual tunes. Daisy liked to bypass local signals to reach the channels out of state because they played real music and not bible hymns or cultist songs. She turned the handle absentmindedly – she’d reached the postcards from abroad – to restore the signal, which often failed when a raspy voice made her stop.“The weak always see themselves as heroes,” said an all-too-familiar voice. “They think they are making a difference, they see themselves as noble saboteurs for the cause. They think they have a purpose, that their actions matter. But they don’t.” The last word was said with emphasis and he let it hang in the air for a moment. Gregor’s chewing stopped and his ears perked up as though he understood Jacob’s words. And perhaps he did for he let out a low growl.“I know some of you out there are alone. And weak. And we know what happens to the weak…” Daisy turned up the volume and kneeled before the radio, casting her book to the side. She knew Jacob’s channel interfered with other local ones, but he rarely spoke. The soldiers of Eden’s Gate often used it to meddle with Eli’s signal and radio, the leader of the notorious Whitehall militia. This beef went back and forth, and Daisy thought she’d bypassed their signals. Perhaps only because nobody cared to interfere. Now, it seemed, they did.“I’m going to tell you a little story tonight. I want you to listen carefully.”“Once upon a time, there was a weak woman. She was afraid and had good reason to do so. You see, she lived near a prison and often there were reports of fugitive inmates. Criminals who would hitchhike or make the long walk to the nearest town where she lived. So, she got herself a nice big dog, a guard dog. She loved him and he loved her, they were inseparable. Every night, he would sleep beneath his owner’s bed and when she became afraid and needed comfort, she’d reach out her hand and he would lick it. ‘I am here,’ he would say. ‘You are safe.’” Jacob made a noise that sounded like a chuckle.Daisy looked at Gregor and felt cold fear expel all the warmth in her body.“One night,” he continued, “the woman thought she heard something in her house. She was afraid and, like usual, reached out for her dog. He licked her hand and assured her. So, she slept. Later that night, she swore she heard something move. Petrified, she stretched her hand and felt that loyal lick. She fell asleep again. The third time she woke up, she’d had enough and decided to investigate. The woman got up and walked to the kitchen. On the floor, she found her dog with his head had been cut off clean. Real nasty work. And on the wall, there was written in blood: ‘Men can lick too.’”A shiver travelled up Daisy’s spine.“Awful right?” He asked. “A man pounced on the woman and did all sorts of things to her. The woman and the dog were found together sometime after. You see, the woman was weak but forgot it. She thought the dog could keep her safe, that it made her stronger, safer. It gave her false hope. When the strong arrived, she finally understood her weakness. Do you understand yours?”The question reverberated in the room, threatening to choke her. Daisy’s blood pulsed with fear.“Someone out there considers themselves strong. They’re wrong. They think they can endure. But they can’t. I want you to think real hard about your place in this world. Learn your purpose. My judges are coming.” Jacon stopped and his voice drifted to static. The channel reverted to the tunes that played before. Daisy turned it off and unplugged the radio.She rose from the floor and paced the cabin. She felt the unexplainable need to touch everything, as though she needed proof she was really there. She touched the table and chairs, the water tap, she shut the blinds. Finally, Gregor caressed her leg with his large head, bringing her to the present. Daisy felt an unwavering conviction that Jacob was speaking to her, that he was close.She knew one thing for certain.Jacob was coming.
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“I heard your message on the radio, Jacob.”The night was dark with a sky of luminous stars glistening their white, red and blue colours. A night where one felt the slow steps of winter approaching. The chill cut through the skin and Montanans across the state complained about needing to wear coats again after dark. Vapour droplets clung to the roof of cars and on the stems of grass, wetting Jacob’s boots as he leaned against Joseph’s church. It was another evening of sermons from his younger brother and updated reports on the regions. Once every blue moon, Joseph would arrange for a meeting at his church under the cover of the night. Faith’s bliss farms and the Deputy’s rambles were on top of their action list, but Jacob found himself staring at the darkness beyond the window for most of the meeting. When it was all over, he took a packet of cigarettes from his back pocket with relief and watched as the smoke swirled at the lit end. Unusually, his brother John stood next to him, despite Joseph having forbidden his contact with nicotine.“I didn’t realise you were on the channel,” said Jacob and inhaled the smoke deeply. It was the kind of inhale a seasoned smoker breathed deep into their core, bringing the nicotine to every corner of their lungs.“It sounded like it was meant for someone. Did you have an audience in mind?” John stared up at the stars and then turned his head towards his older brother. The gesture reminded Jacob of when they were younger, out in the backyard and he exhaled the memory out with the smoke.“Yes, I did.” He said.After an interval, his younger brother spoke again. “I would appreciate it if you shared.”Jacob tensed his jaw in slight irritation. John was being what he always was – nosey. Jacob held a silence for some moments and spoke slowly.“Do you remember Daisy from down the street? When we lived at the old house.”“Daisy Williams. The only child?”“Yes,” said Jacob.John made a noise of surprise. “Yes, yes. I remember. Odd little thing. Don’t tell me she’s still around?”Jacob flickered ash from the end of his cigarette. “She’s been doing some damage and I wanted to send a message, that’s all.”“She’s not affiliated with any resistance, I don’t think.” Said John. “We’re using her old house as a storage unit – do you remember that old dump? Maybe she’s still upset about that,” he said with a low chuckle.Jacob chose to say nothing and just stood with his arms crossed. It was getting late and John’s trip back would be long, yet he chose to hover for some reason.“Did you tell Joseph? I noticed he was looking at you often,” said John and Jacob found himself irritated by the conversation. After spending so many years apart, Jacob found it difficult to adjust to brotherly relations. John often sought attention, as younger siblings tend to do, but Jacob couldn’t find the warmth in him to reciprocate. Duty to protect, yes. Desire to chitchat after hours, not quite. Despite being brothers, their temperaments and interests were distinctly different.“I can never tell what Joseph’s thinking,” returned Jacob and snubbed the cigarette on the wall behind him. “I think he was more concerned with the Deputy. Do you need me to come down there and sort things out?”“No, no. Everything is under control,” John said quickly. “She’s only damaged an outpost or two and some petty silos. My people are on it.”“Are you sure?” Jacob turned to look at his younger brother for the first time this evening. All three of the Seed brothers had blue eyes but John’s were the darkest – an oceanic shade like their mother’s. Jacob thought back to what Daisy had said about John and the Deputy. It made his blood run cold. “You know it’s no trouble for me. I can have her dead before you know it.”John’s gaze faltered as he turned to look at his feet. “It’s okay, Jacob. Really.”The intensity of Jacob’s eyes often unnerved John. Jacob couldn’t help but wonder if it was because John saw someone else in his features.“I’ll give you some time to deal with it. But if it doesn’t get better, I’ll have to step in.” Jacob said and offered a cigarette to his brother.“I won’t tell if you don’t,” he said but John had already pushed it away.“He’ll know,” he said quietly, not needing to clarify whom he was referring to. “And I don’t need that stuff anymore. The Lord’s compassion is all I need.” Jacob wasn’t convinced but he didn’t raise his concerns.He knew John struggled with his…urges. Only Joseph knew what that really meant but despite all the praying and repenting and fighting, Jacob knew his brother had never truly escaped the chains of addiction. For some people, ‘coming along’ was a constant process with no finishing line. John was one of them.The church’s door opened, and Faith appeared with her escort. It wasn’t often that Faith moved beyond her region’s borders and when she did, she had to be driven to and from by Joseph’s assistants. She looked at Jacob and John and waved goodbye as she walked to the vehicle. She asserted it was because she never learnt to drive, but Jacob knew it was because she was too high on bliss.Jacob waited until she was gone. “You know, I forget which one she is.” He mused expecting John to reciprocate.“There’s only one Faith, Jacob.” It was too late, the righteous mask had gone up. That’s what he gets for trying to be friendly. “I went to school with Daisy, you know.”Jacob felt his body tense up. “Oh, really?” He said disinterestedly, hoping John would drop the subject; he was in no mood for a trip down memory lane.“Yeah, middle school and we took the same bus every day. Such a skittish girl. I’d completely forgotten her until you mentioned her. I haven’t seen her once since, you know. Despite her living in Hope County and all. Does that make me a bad herald?” He laughed with a ghostly smile on his lips and his eyes glistened with that manic look he sometimes got. It made Jacob’s stomach turn.John continued. “Did she kill one of your people? I can’t imagine her doing something so serious.”Jacob shook his head. “You’ve got your hands full with the Deputy. I’m sure Daisy’s not on your list of priorities,” he said and motioned towards their vehicles.“We can never be too careful, can we?” Said John and followed him. Jacob entered his truck and waited for his brother to make a U-turn. The moon was beginning to fill again and it cast a luminous light upon everything.John pulled up to Jacob’s window as their cars faced opposite directions. The younger was heading south and the elder to the north. It would be some time till they saw each other again; it was inconvenient (and dangerous) to have all four Seeds in one place. Jacob vowed to do something about the Deputy if the issue persisted next time.“Tell you what, Jacob. You kill the Deputy and I’ll get Daisy. She’s from my region, after all. I should be putting my people in their place, shouldn’t I? I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Until next time, brother.” He said and sped off before Jacob got the chance to speak.“Always needs to have the final word,” Jacob mumbled to himself and shifted gears. He watched from his mirror as John’s car sped off into the night and the church got smaller and smaller until it was lost on the horizon.It was a long drive back through dirt roads and coming across the occasional cult member or barricade. People always made a fuss upon seeing a vehicle on the road and Jacob loved to see their faces contort with fear once they saw him behind the wheel. Other cars steered clear of his path and even animals seemed determined to avoid him. The drive back was peaceful, he drove with the windows down and felt the cool relief of the wind mixed with the faint fragrance of night flowers.Once in a while, he would gaze at the mountains in the distance and wonder if Daisy was holed up in one of them. It was very possible she lived in a cave, maybe even a prepper’s stash. When he thought of Daisy now, John came to his mind. The glistening look in his wide eyes and his final words unnerved him more than he liked. Low in his stomach lurked the odd feeling that he’d given bait to a ravenous dog.Later, when he’d reached his compound and retired for the night, Jacob thought back to his exchange with John and what he’d said about Daisy. It was discomforting, the way John’s eyes flashed with glee at the thought of finding her. He shouldn’t have been surprised that John remembered her – he was the same age as Daisy, after all. It was what lurked in his eyes that concerned Jacob, how fixated they could become on someone and how rare it was for John to let go of something he desired.As Jacob drifted to sleep, he thought of Daisy with her large eyes and long hair. She was slightly other in character and in form. With the length of her hair, a pagan air clung to her, as though she was of a slightly variant species. Something closer to the natural world than other people. It was something involuntary; Jacob remembered how unwell her presence mixed with others, and it was something she was painfully aware of. Jacob’s mind kept returning to the surrender in her eyes, the way she acquiesced her defeat to him. And how much he would hate for John to see what Daisy’s eyes looked like when they were pleading, how undeserving his brother was of seeing her beg for mercy.
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“Learn your purpose. My judges are coming.”The nightmares began after she heard Jacob’s words on the radio. Their ghoulish presence cast a shadow over her spirit, reaching their clawed hands to grab her even during her time in the waking world. She came to dread going to bed as she worried about what dreams would visit her this time. And during the day, she moved wearily, having lost energy during the night. No matter what she did – how many teas she ingested, how much she stretched and meditated, how much she tired herself during the day – nothing could abate the visions. Daisy dreamt of fire eating everything in its path, dreams of dead rivers and rotting animals, of filthy air and dead ends. They appeared to her more intensely each time, like she was leaving one world to enter another. In the day, she was trapped in a world run by religious fanatics. And in the night, she descended to a dark place, trapped in a world where evil gorged itself on all lifeforms, where the mountains were red and hot and the moon didn’t rise.And in the midst of these dreams, there was always Jacob.Sometimes he appeared as a wounded character, someone burning in fire or drowning in black water and begging for help. Other times, he appeared as a half-formed thing that crawled towards her. The creature hardly looked like him but, instinctively, she knew she was looking at Jacob, or whatever was left of him. Once, he was her friend and protector, guiding her to shelter belowground, telling her they would outlast the apocalypse together. Very often, he was her lover, as she saw herself twisting with him in hot bedsheets and tasting his tongue of fire, feeling his scars scald her skin. Sometimes, he was her killer – oftentimes, he was both her killer and lover. Someone who, whilst gratifying himself with her, would suddenly strike at her throat or reach his hand through her heart. She would wake from these passionate dreams drenched in sweat, as though the imagined act had been real.Ever since they met in the forest some time ago, it felt like her soul had become consumed by the encounter. Daisy thought of Jacon or dreamt of him or came to fear hearing him on the radio. Her soul had found a bone it refused to stop gnawing.Awaking from another one of these dreams, Daisy looked to the side. The clock read 1:00 AM. In that night's dream, she saw herself on top of Jacob and couldn't figure out if she was biting him like a lover or a cannibal. It wasn't the act that disturbed her but the passion, the thrill she felt in her body at having conquered Jacob, at having climbed on his body in triumph. In her dream, Jacob only stared at her with a faint smile and did nothing to stop her. The heat in the dream followed her in the real world as she surfaced from her psyche. She was sweaty and uncomfortable. She cast the bedsheet aside and rose to meet the window next to her bed. The night beyond was luminously lit by moonlight and the stars. She was deep enough into the countryside that she could see every constellation and spec of stardust above her. The stillness of night hovered in the air and Daisy found some respite in the night’s emptiness and the coldness of the window.Daisy looked at Gregor, who was sleeping at the foot of her bed. He was an old wolf-dog who had survived an injury. He carried himself with the grumpiness of an old male, glaring and huffing at things, monitoring from a distance with his weary eyes, half-heartedly performing his displeasure at the world. She remembered Jacob’s story from the radio, about the man licking the woman’s hand and disgust rose from her stomach. Daisy walked to the kitchen. At night, as each hour passed, she felt layers of herself shed like a lizard’s skin, feeling more alive and fresh and primal with each passing hour.
She knew Jacob was messing with her mind. People spoke of the mind games he played with people all the way from Hope County. It was like folklore in these parts. He used classic conditioning to brainwash others into doing his bidding. Unlike his brother John, who took a hands-on approach to his ‘work’, Jacob preferred to prey upon the psyche. Despite being the most physically intimidating of the Seed family, he used his body the least when dealing with enemies. It was unwise to meddle with him and even worse to respond with aggression. Aggression could have a charming influence on somebody like John, somebody who constantly craves passion and relishes in it, no matter if it is antagonistic. Jacob, on the other hand, was not to be met with fire. Daisy thought back to meeting him in the forest, how his blue eyes did not reflect light, the scars on his arms. She wondered how far into his body those marks went and if acquiring them hurt. If he had felt the way she did when their eyes met; that they were two vitally different people who should not have been in the same place at the same time. When she approached him, he smelled of sweat and pines. Perhaps this was all happening because she’d smelled of fear.Daisy poured some water from the kitchen sink and looked up at the window above it.A pair of yellow eyes stared back.Daisy was frozen in place as she realised what she was looking at.A wolf.It was sitting behind one of the hedges outside, its face was almost covered by leaves and branches. It was as if its unblinking eyes glowed in the dark, thought Daisy as she and the wolf held eye contact. She felt a sensation she often felt when she was out in extreme nature, like when she hiked a mountain, or when she saw a thunderstorm rolling in from a distance. The distinct feeling that she was facing something both beautiful and deadly. That she must tread lightly. A reminder that she could, in fact, die at any moment.Normally, Daisy would’ve rejoiced at such a close encounter with nature. But she saw the red paint smeared on its face, that crown on its temple that looked like an open gash. She noticed how unnaturally large it was. It looked wrong.
A Judge.
The Judge did not blink until she looked away, as though it sought to stare into her soul. Daisy slowly retreated from the glass as the wolf continued to take in her every movement and breath. She checked every window and, to her horror, there was a pair of yellow eyes behind each one. Having realised that there was something deeply wrong, Gregor got up and circled around Daisy. The Judges rose once they saw Gregor in there.“Oh my God,” Daisy kept whispering to herself as she pulled the curtains and closed the blinds.My Judges are coming.The cabin was surrounded, and Daisy heard the faint sound of scratching coming from behind her front door. A wolf dragged its claws on the door three times, waited, and then continued its movements. The uncanny resemblance to a person’s knocking etiquette made her skin crawl.“Only you,” sang the radio quietly, “can make the world seem right.” The world stopped at that moment. Daisy hurried to where she kept the radio. She’d kept in on at all times, unsure if she had hoped or dreaded to hear Jacob again.“Only you,” continued the song. “Can make the darkness bright.” She sunk to the floor as Gregor began growling; both knew what the song meant. Gregor stood behind her, towering as she kneeled on the floor, wishing she could just melt through the wood and enter the earth forever. “Only you and you alone can thrill me like you do…” the lyrics slurred oddly as the signal tuned in and out.Jacob’s song.The Judges began howling. Their piercing cries cut inside the cabin from all directions, it was so loud as if they wished to blow the whole cabin over with their noise. Radio static started coming through and the song was lost amidst the cacophony of wolves.“You can hear them now, can’t you?” Said a gruff, quiet voice from the radio. Daisy turned up the volume with shaky fingers.“Mm,” Jacob said and paused, letting the hum of his voice vibrate into her ears and bones. “Loud pups,” he said with a chuckle. “I can hear them too. I think I’ve got a pretty good idea where you’re holed up, Daisy.”Hearing Jacob Seed say her name sent cold shivers across her skin; it was both intimate and frightening. It made the hairs on her arms stand. His voice did something to her stomach like something cold and deadly swam in there, waiting to strike from within.“I reckon you can even see them from your location,” he continued. “They’re great hunters – they always find what I want. Wondrous creatures, aren’t they? They are well manufactured…the best idea I ever had.”Daisy turned the lights off, suddenly afraid that Jacob was looking at her home during this very moment. It was as though she could feel the coldness of his eyes carried across by the wind, carried across the mountain plains and into her home from her draughty window as he looked for her on the horizon. She could feel him close in on her like the sinking sun descends below the horizon: with inevitable finality.“I hope you’ve been thinking about what I said.”Daisy heard nothing beyond that as the window above her shattered to a hundred pieces. The next moments were a whirlwind of screaming and howling; one Judge flew through the window, and another followed, both lunging for Gregor straightaway. The animals scuffled around the room; their heavy bodies half destroyed the place as they lunged at one another, biting and tossing. They knocked over her piles of CDs and DVDs and broke one of her coffee tables. Daisy was left crouching on the floor amidst the chaos, crying out to Gregor. Each time she tried to look up, one of the animals – she couldn’t tell which one it was – would throw its body on her, trapping her on the floor. For a horrible moment, Daisy thought she would be trampled.Eventually, it was all silent.When Daisy mustered the courage to look up, they were all gone. The room was in pieces with claw marks and red smears on the walls and furniture. Light, white feathers from her cushions danced in the air where the wind caught them. With the moonlight coming in and the feathers landing on red spots, it was as though something holy had been killed. The violence of the act hovered in the air and Daisy felt it in the metallic scent she inhaled. Her home was in ruins. Daisy’s heart hammered in her ribcage.“Gregor?” She called out and heard something bellowed outside. “Oh my God,” she whimpered and looked beyond the window. There were clear signs of struggle; the flowers she’d planted outside had been trampled and she heard the faint noise of animals moving down the mountain, hearing them disrupt the stillness of the night with their shrieks and cries. It was like hearing the devil laugh.The Judges were taking Gregor down the mountain.“Don’t be upset, Daisy. They’re only doing what they know, culling the herd.” For the first time in a long time, rage burned in Daisy’s heart and she knocked out the radio. Muttering incoherently to herself, she gathered everything she needed with shaky hands and began the long trek down the mountain, not bothering to close the door behind her as she left. It was like invisible little wolf ears perked up as primal intuition guided her to her only friend. Dewy drops weighed heavily on the flower petals and stems of grass, wetting her boots as she hurried down.Many mistook night as a time of silence and solitude in the wild as if all animals were asleep and the sun had taken all activity with him when he fell below the horizon. It couldn’t be further from the truth. The mountains were filled with movement, big and small. Cougars prowled the land, owls flew silently overheard as they looked for rodents and insects, and streams of water continued trickling or thundering as they neared a waterfall. And on a smaller, subtler level, on a scale one only became aware of if they ever lay on the ground at night, one could hear the sound of plants growing. It was as true a movement and as sure a sound as anything else on this earth. The sound was that of a quiet lick, a thousand licks heard at the same time as branches stretched their green stalks, flowers grew taller and berries enlarged with juices. The kind of sound that made one realise how alive the whole world was, from the biggest land predator to the smallest shoot of grass. How all of nature vibrated with tiny lights unseen by most people. As Daisy made her way down, she felt nature extend its limbs out as branches tugged at her clothes and spiderwebs tangled in her hair, felt the gentle, protective touch of the Earth Mother. Felt her pains witnessed by something too ancient to understand yet too interwoven with all of existence to ignore. It was comforting to know that she was never truly alone.Daisy anxiously made her way through dirt paths and followed the water’s direction. She walked next to the water as it evolved from a muddy trickle to a gushing stream that would soon meet a waterfall. The sound of wolves grew stronger and she distinctly heard Gregor’s yelps. Afraid of losing any more time, Daisy was emerging from some bushes when something larger knocked into her, sending her falling down a steep path and finally landing in a small clearing with boulders. She felt a Judge hover over her fallen body before she even opened her eyes to see what had happened.“About time you came out. I thought I’d have to come get ya.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Daisy looked up to see Jacob leaning against a large boulder with his arms crossed. Half of his face was hidden by the night’s darkness whilst the other was illuminated by the clear blue moonlight. It created a discomforting effect when combined with the ghostly smile on his lips and the scars on his cheeks, as though a misshapen ghoul stared down at her. Jacob Seed was terrifying to behold; his eyes seemed black as they looked at her. Looking around, Daisy saw they were in a secluded clearing surrounded by boulders. Above them were trails that stretched up to the mountains above and steep drops leading to one’s death. She could hear the sound of water gushing in a nearby stream and the faint hum of crickets. Were it not for the current circumstances, she would have proclaimed this night to be beautiful and basked in the moonlight like one of those feverish girls in old paintings, who danced in a maddening circle alongside other women with their hands interlinked or outreached to the sky. Looking around, she realised the only tune she would dance to now was Jacob’s.“Must’ve hurt like hell,” he said. A Judge kneeled at his feet with its yellow eyes locked on her.Daisy shakily rose, feeling every ache and bruise on her body. She’d lost the piece of cloth that held her hair during the fall, so now it all fell loosely down to her hips. The tips of her hair were smeared with dirt. The Judge that hovered over her removed itself and sat by Jacob, mirroring the other one. With the Judges sitting by either side of Jacob, the image reminded Daisy of the chariot tarot card. The card with the sword-wielding rider and the two sphinxes. The card of determination and willpower.Having realised that Jacob orchestrated all of this, from the radio calls and the attack on her home to luring her out into the woods and having her thrown to the ground, Daisy trembled as she stood before him. She felt like a chastised pup even though she knew she had committed no wrong. From where she stood, she thought she could see a cold satisfaction hovering over his lips. Cruelty was etched on his skin. Deep down she knew that if he truly wanted to hurt her, there was little she could do to stop it. It all stunned her to silence. The moonlight draped over her like a veil, and she hoped it could hide the trepidation in her eyes.“You’ve nothing to say to me?” He goaded.“I didn’t like your story,” Daisy said quietly. She thought back to the urban legend he had spoken about on the radio, the one with the man who licked the woman’s hand. It was a common horror story and popular among children. She tried to forget how fearful it’d made her when she heard it. “I thought it was said in bad taste.” She continued and was careful to look at him sparingly, finding the intensity of his eyes too overwhelming.Jacob raised his eyebrows. “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said sardonically. “Should I have sung you a lullaby instead?” The unkind smile remained on his lips.Daisy shook her head. She held her hands in front of her and twisted her fingers together as she often did when she felt nervous. The situation demanded that she retorted quickly and smartly at him, but she was uncertain she could meet the challenge. Jacob Seed was not to be toyed with, and she feared provoking his wrath. A tiny voice within her said that, for whatever reason, it seemed she had provoked it already. She tried to shoo the impish voice away.“Jacob,” she said quietly. Looking at him now, half-concealed by darkness, it was hard to believe she’d ever known him as a young person. There was nothing recognisable about him. Only the blueness of his eyes, which was now lost to the darkness, could bring her back to the teenager he used to be. The angry boy next door with fiery hair and constantly red knuckles. The boy who protected his brothers with shaky fists, who was teased for his freckles. It devastated her to see how scarred the world had made him, how fate decreed that they would meet like this after all these years; as the ruiner and the ruined. It made her shiver to see the rigidity in his eyes, how unreflecting they were of the moonlight.“I know what this is about,” she continued. “I am truly sorry for taking your animals. Really, I am. I didn’t mean to bother you,” she said whilst putting her arms around her frame, trying to contain the shivers that took hold of her body. Standing before someone like him, someone with so much authority and violence inscribed on his body, someone who was clearly unhappy with her, gripped her body with fear. Daisy couldn’t stop thinking of the dead bodies left to rot on Jacob’s borders, how mangled they were with barbed wire encircling their limbs. “You won’t hear of us or come across us again. I promise-” Her last words failed to leave her mouth as she struggled to get air into her lungs. “I promise,” she repeated with more strength. “We’ll disappear.”There were people in this world who could ruin you. Truly destroy you; shatter your body and soul. Daisy knew Jacob could bring her so low as to become unrecognisable to her own self. As he had done to the countless people with the misfortune of crossing his path. Looking at his towering figure now, he seemed to gloat at her servile prostration. Daisy knew that against a personality like Jacob’s, it was best to just submit.He did not respond; an uneasy silence hovered between the two as his eyes raked over her form.“Ah, Daisy,” he said finally and shook his head like he was chiding her. It was a tone many people took with her over the years, as though they were about to bestow upon her a fundamental secret about how the world operated. As though she was silly for lacking ‘common sense,’ for having miraculously made it this far without knowing something quite basic about the natural order of things. It was patronising and filled her with dread.“It’s not about that,” he said as his eyes hovered below her neckline and then rose to meet her eyes again. “I couldn’t give less of a shit about your animal rescue work. You really think your efforts made a difference to my operation?” The sound of his scoff made her flinch.“It’s not your theft that offended me, but your weakness.” Scorn clouded his eyes as he looked into hers, and it made her burn with shame. He removed himself from the boulder he was leaning on and backed into the darkness where she could not see him. “This is about making you strong,” he called out and re-emerged with something heavy dragging behind him. When he stepped into the light again, Daisy saw a large cage. Within it lay Gregor, motionless and with faint scarlet marks staining his fur. Daisy drew a sharp breath upon seeing him.“A pet is a dangerous thing to have in this world, Daisy. A dependent,” he said. He moved stepped into the moonlight and approached her. She could now see his whole face clearly. The dog tag on his chest glittered as the light fell on it, shimmering like a relic. “A parasite.” He spat the word out with bitter contempt. The hatefulness behind his words made the knot in her stomach harden. “This is about reminding you of your purpose. Looking after the weak is what holds us back. It’s what’s wrong with the modern world, this sickly part of us that needs to be cut out.”
Jacob pulled a large needle from his pocket and circled back to stand next to the cage.
“We are all tested in this life,” Jacob said. “I was, and so were Joseph and John. It’s not something anyone wants to do. It’s something you have to do. We each have to make our sacrifice and it’s been made very clear to me that you have yet to be initiated.” He paused and looked at her in a way that reminded Daisy of a death knell. “I’m doing this for your own good.”“What are you doing?” Daisy asked and tried approaching the cage. Jacob put up his hand and she stopped. He opened the crate and pierced Gregor’s body roughly around the neck, injecting a green fluid into him. Gregor’s body spasmed as the needle entered and begun convulsing as Jacob closed the crate.“What’s in that?” Daisy asked helplessly as Jacob suddenly unsheathed a knife from his belt. An air of villainy emanated from him as he held the naked blade in his hand with familiarity. Evidently, this was second nature to him.“It’s time for your test,” he said simply and threw it at her feet. She flinched away from it instinctively. The blade shimmered beneath the moonlight like a small pool of water. The light was blinding as it shone in her eyes, making her feel like she was enveloped in an orb of holy light. She knew at that moment that there was nothing holy about Jacob, the very moon whispered it.“Pick it up,” he commanded. “Now, Daisy. Pick it up,” he said with a grave voice and a fierce look in his eyes. The ferocity of his voice reminded her that Jacob was one of the destroyers of this world. She remembered when he was sent off to fight in the First Gulf War and how, upon his return, she could see that a part of his soul had been left behind in the desert. The war had unfurled a cruelty within him, and she realised at that moment that no amount of begging and pleading could soften the blow he was about to deliver. He was one of those people with a predestined path to destruction and chaos.“Jacob, I don’t understand-” Daisy whimpered as she looked frantically between the knife and the cage, which Jacob kept his hand on. “What do you mean?”Gregor’s eyes opened at that moment. They were a sickly shade of pale green, rather than their natural shade of honey. The colour of Bliss. A green blankness shrouded his vision, and he seemed alien to Daisy. He let out a deep growl and his body heaved as though he was struggling to breathe.“Listen to me and pick up the knife.” Jacob snarled at her, looking at her shaking, incompetent hands. Daisy started to hyperventilate as Jacob opened the cage again. Gregor rose slowly, snapping his jaw like he was getting used to a new set of teeth. He looked bigger than usual and seemed to increase in size during the few moments it took him to emerge from the cage. Gregor showed no signs of recognition when he looked at her.“This is your test. It’s you or him. Pick it up and make your sacrifice.” Jacob said and kicked the empty cage to the side. The crashing sound seemed to reverberate across the mountain planes, returning a deafening echo to Daisy’s ears. Despite Jacob being closer to Gregor, the wolfdog showed no interest in him. The Judges were biologically engineered, perhaps designed to avoid him, she realised.Gregor and Daisy had spent the last several months in companionship, from morning to night. Together, they had hiked across regions and borders, fled from cultists, and made a home out of the scraps of any dump that was big enough for two. Now, he looked at her like she was nothing more than a piece of meat. Months of memories and love were lost in an instant. All it took was one needle.
“He will want to kill you. Fight him, Daisy.” Jacob said but she could hardly hear anything. All she could think about was Gregor the moment she first came across him. An elderly dog with an injured paw, lying on the ground by a stream, waiting to die. And how glad he was when somebody finally cared enough to reach out to him.
“Buddy, it’s me,” she whispered and reached out with one of her hands. Gregor barked and snarled at her. Daisy had lost a lot since the Project at Eden’s Gate had begun. Perhaps this was the straw that broke the camel’s back for she fell to her knees and was at eye-level with Gregor.“Change him back,” she pleaded to Jacob, who looked at her with an indescribable expression, something between sternness and concern. “Not him. Take anything else you want. But don’t take him.” She lost sight of her old friend as her vision blurred with hot tears.“The only thing I want is your weakness. Take the damn knife.” Jacob said and clapped his hands, which caused Gregor to leap at Daisy.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Kneeling on the ground before him with her hair spilling out and her glassy, tear-filled eyes, which sparkled like little pools of water where the moonlight fell on them, Daisy emanated an air of melancholic loveliness. It was a transfixing spectacle, something Jacob rarely saw in people. It made this ever the more gratifying; his eyes gorged upon her kneeling form and the terror in her eyes as Gregor bared his teeth at her. He felt the same satisfaction when he gazed at a lone fawn in the forest during a hunt as it stood lonesome beneath a patch of sunlit grass with its soft eyes on him. Unaware that Jacob was something it should fear because nobody had taught it so. Jacob knew the fawn’s loveliness would not protect it when the cruelty of the wilderness eventually descended upon it. And it would; it always did. Nature had no mercy, even for beautiful things. A part of Jacob knew this was a new height of cruelty, even for him. But he couldn’t help himself.Looking at her now, Jacob knew she was not the most attractive woman. Daisy’s hair was unkempt and seldom styled. It fell freely and wildly and collected leaves and dead flower petals as she passed through the woods. Evidently, she did little to prevent it from getting caught at every branch. There was something about Daisy that other people could sense but not quite describe, something isolating. She was born with a chip on her shoulder. When Jacob thought of her in the past, he could only ever picture her being alone. Despite the years that’d passed, she hadn’t ceased to be an oddity amongst others. It wasn’t like she was putting a lot of effort to blend in either, he thought. Like the way she dressed, for example, with what he reckoned were rags she’d picked up from the things people left behind. At this very moment, she wore an unsightly dress which showcased her décolletage. The dress had ripped during her descent, showing part of her leg, which glimmered from the reflectiveness of the late-night dew. She had the features to be beautiful, but they were spoiled by her lack of good sense. In short, most people found her weird and therefore a waste.It was perhaps this very unusualness that drew him in. Daisy’s evasiveness and otherworldly mannerisms, her propensity to blend in with the natural world as though she belonged with the trees and birds, to be glimpsed once in a blue moon. And it was to do with her familiarity, the fact they both knew who the other had been. This was like getting the chance to pull at a fairy’s wings and he relished in it. Perhaps he and John were not so different after all, he realised darkly.Jacob clapped his hands and Gregor lunged at Daisy with breathtaking ferocity. The animal knocked into her with its heavy, large body, causing her to fall backwards with a scream that made Jacob’s heart swell. The knife lay by her side, untouched. Gregor bit at her feet without yet piercing her skin. The cries of his old master fell on deaf ears as the wolfdog ignored her pleas to stop. The only orders he would follow now were Jacob’s. The animal retreated, growling and circling around Jacob.“Stupid girl,” he mumbled to himself. “Come on, boy!” Jacob called out and Gregor lunged at Daisy again as she stumbly rose to her shaky feet. Daisy yelped as the dog jumped and knocked her down again, and she cut her leg on a rock that protruded from the dirt. The scent of blood vexed the Judges sitting by him and he glared at them when they tried to rise. They stayed put.Daisy kicked at Gregor and the animal retreated for a moment, tensing its jaw. In that interval, Jacob saw that she was bleeding from cuts on her arms.“Pick up the knife and fight back.” Jacob repeated. Daisy gave him a wild, pleading look as her trembling hands finally approached the blade, grasping the alien handle with her fingers. She looked at the knife in her hand, then at Gregor, and the flow of her tears returned with more passion. She cried softly and looked up at the moon. Something happened when she gazed at it; her breathing paused as she looked at the luminous planet with mesmerised eyes.“I’m not a soldier,” Daisy whimpered finally as though the moon had whispered to her and placed the knife flat on her lap. For a brief moment, the image reminded Jacob of a knight laying down his sword. She then bowed her head and moved her long hair to one side of her neck, baring the other part to the cool air. She closed her eyes and stayed still, waiting for the cruelty to be over.Is she surrendering? He thought to himself in disbelief. He’d never met someone with such little desire to live. Jacob noticed Gregor preparing for the next attack. The animal crouched and walked backwards, gaining momentum for the killing blow. “Daisy!” Jacob reproached as an awful feeling started to bubble in his chest, threatening to choke him. Daisy showed no interest in defending herself and stayed still as Gregor sprung on her, readying to sink his teeth into her neck’s soft skin.Gregor drew blood when his teeth touched Daisy’s skin and Jacob suddenly pounced on the animal, throwing both of them to the ground. Gregor twisted beneath Jacob, yelping as they wrestled on the ground. They wrestled as both tried crushing the other, buckling and twisting in the dirt with grunts and bellows. Jacob placed his arms around Gregor’s neck and began strangling him with all his strength. The Judges rose from their positions and came to their master’s aid, and they attacked Gregor’s body with their teeth as Jacob squeezed harder. The wolfdog started to weaken, and Jacob grunted as he threw Gregor’s body on a boulder, hearing bones crushing as the animal fell limp on the ground.Incredulously to Jacob, Daisy cried out when Gregor fell and she crawled to the wolfdog’s side. She cradled his body and pet his fur, mumbling incoherent words of comfort to the motionless animal. She turned and looked at Jacob with a gaze so fierce it was as though she sought to kill him with it. The way she looked at him with horror and anger in her eyes gripped Jacob’s stomach with rage. He marched to her furiously and gripped her jaw with his hand, pulling her upwards to meet the indignation in his blue eyes. She spoke before he got the chance to open his mouth.“I wish you’d left me in that lake,” she spat at him with bitter sadness.Jacob was stunned to silence. “What?” he hissed.“You remember. That day on the lake. When I was swimming by myself.” Said Daisy. Jacob gripped her jaw tighter; he did remember. She winced but did not look away from his eyes.It was many summers ago, back when Jacob was in his late teens. It was evening and the sky was lit with the orange hues of the descending sun, still hot enough to burn his skin. He was already a seasoned smoker by then and was nursing a cigarette in his mouth as he gazed out into the distance. Things at home were nearing the point of no return; he’d fought with his father again and it was getting harder to keep John from telling people the truth. Jacob mindlessly inhaled the smoke, mulling over his plan to leave it all behind and join the army. He would do it in a heartbeat; he knew he’d be good at it and local army recruiters approached him every time he neared his high school’s gates. Only thing was…“Jacob,” called out a young voice and Joseph emerged from the clearing behind him. The interruption startled Jacob out of his thoughts. “What are you doing out here?” Asked the younger boy and sat next to him. Joseph was very different back then and his blue eyes looked at the cigarette in Jacob’s hand with worry.“Just thinking.” Jacob said and exhaled. He moved the cigarette to his other hand, away from his brother. In the distance, he could see the silhouette of a little girl splashing in and out of the nearby lake. The constant sound in the background filled the silence between the brothers. “Where’s John?” He asked.“Down the street, playing football,” Joseph said and looked behind them where their house stood in the distance. “They got home now.” He said quietly, not needing to clarify who ‘they’ were.“She making dinner?” Jacob asked with an air of annoyance. Joseph shook his head and pulled some dollars from his pocket.“It’s okay. I mowed the neighbour’s lawn, so we can order pizza. Only if you call, though.” Joseph said cheerfully and smiled at his brother with such warmth that the elder had to look away. Guilt tugged at his heart. No matter how hard things got, Joseph retained his natural good-heartedness, and it exasperated the bitterness in Jacob’s heart. He wished he could be happy and strong for the three of them, but it was impossible to stop nursing his hatred. Jacob nodded and his brother cheered quietly, bringing a pained smile to the elder’s lips.They sat there quietly, enjoying the sound of Montana’s summer with the cricketing insects, the warm air, and the fireflies that glistened with wondrous shades of blue and pink as the sun fell on them. After a moment, Jacob turned to his brother. “You ever thought of leaving? Like when I turn eighteen. What if I took us all and left?”Joseph smiled and had a faraway look in his eyes as he looked out at the distance towards the glittering water. The sun’s rays glimmered on the water’s surface, and he seemed to be looking at something in his imagination, as he often did. Joseph was always in his thoughts, a true dream child. “I think,” he started speaking slowly but then his brows furrowed as his eyes returned to the present moment, focusing on something in the distance. Jacob followed the line of his sight towards the lake; it was peacefully quiet and empty. Joseph’s eyes frantically scanned the lake’s banks. “I think Daisy’s drowning.”Jacob leapt to his feet, threw the cigarette on the ground, and ran to the water’s edge as fast as he could. Joseph followed closely behind as he told Jacob where he thought Daisy had jumped in from. Jacob cursed under his breath as he entered the water trying to see where the girl was. It was stupid that she was always playing by herself, where were her goddamn parents? Jacob thought of what would’ve happened if it’d been John who’d fallen in. Out here, away from everyone’s sight. Panic gripped his heart as he dived in with his arms outstretched, grasping the girl’s hand with the tips of his fingers. He swam closer and pulled her to the surface. Both brothers dragged the girl to the river’s grassy bank.Daisy coughed up water for a long time. Joseph threw a towel on her and made her sit on a sunny spot as he patted her back.“Christ, girl.” Jacob said, grabbing her ball from the water and putting it next to her stuff. “You know better than to swim by yourself.”Joseph nodded furiously at her. “You’re lucky we even saw you. You just wait till I tell your parents.” He chided, which made Daisy start crying. Jacob glared at him and his brother only shrugged as he continued patting her back.“Okay,” continued Joseph in a kinder tone. “Next time you want to play out here, you come find me and I’ll get John to play with you. Alright?”The memory fell away, and Jacob returned to the present as he stared down at Daisy’s insolent eyes. Remembering that day on the lake also reminded him of Joseph and how changed he was now. There was nothing left of that boy from back then and the memory gnawed at his heart.“Your weakness…” he hissed as he stared at her red lips, which were swollen from crying. “It disgusts me.” He swallowed hard. “You are so ungrateful, Daisy. I’m doing all this to get you stronger, damn it.”Daisy tried speaking but he silenced her as he gripped her jaw again.“You never fought back. You always let people do whatever they wanted with you,” his words dripped with contempt and he suddenly chuckled. “Never in my life have I seen such a disgusting display of weakness. What’s it going to take for you to fight back, huh?” He demanded. “You think others would be so kind if they came across you? Don’t you realise how horrible the world is?” Jacob was almost shouting his words by the end. He relaxed his grip and Daisy gasped for air.“How can you call this kindness?” She cried. “What have I ever done to you to deserve this? I never bothered anyone.” Her eyes welled with tears again and he felt their wetness on his hand. “Has your family not taken enough already? I lost the only home I ever had, do you know what that’s like? To see the people you knew turn into monsters?” She demanded and her body shook from the violence of her tears. Daisy tried moving her head to look away, but he wouldn’t let her. Eye contact made her uncomfortable and he enjoyed this small torture.“As a matter of fact, I do.” He said darkly. Jacob kneeled in front of her and brought his other hand around her neck, firmly holding her in place. He noticed the goosebumps on her skin. “This world is over, Daisy. It’s done.” Daisy let out a noise of frustration and swayed to the side, trying to remove his hands. Jacob held her in place. “You need to realise that and adapt. Or you will die. Do you understand me?”“Why do you even care?” She asked and he froze. “It’s like you said. I am weak. I could never be like you,” she said quietly in a tone akin to sadness with a distant look in her eyes. It filled Jacob with frustration. “I can’t even adapt to this world let alone the next. I accept it, isn’t that what you wanted?”“No.” Jacob said quickly, tensing his jaw. “What I want is your weakness.” He said firmly and moved closer to look deeply into her eyes. “I can make you strong. Give me your weakness, Daisy.” Jacob leaned closer and touched their foreheads together. Daisy shivered at their unexpected closeness, and he felt the shake pass through him.Daisy let out a choked scoff and shook her head in disbelief. The Judges behind them began howling and their cries echoed across the mountains, meeting the howls of other wolves in the region. They were encircled by an unseen pack. Hearing their cries filled Jacob with pride and satisfaction; things were aligning themselves to the correct order. Daisy didn’t have the vision to understand, but in time, she would. They all would.“Cut me, Daisy.” Jacob said suddenly. Daisy’s body tensed. He released her from the embrace but held on to her shoulder. Horror and confusion shone in her eyes when she saw the knife in his hands.
Daisy made a noise of protest, but he interrupted her. “Give me your weakness and I will give you strength. Here, put the knife on my arm like this,” he said and pried her hand open to place the blade inside it. He then placed his hand over her cold one and closed her first. Jacob’s hand guided hers as he brought the blade to his forearm’s skin despite her resistance.“You’re hurting me,” she whimpered quietly as his grip on her strengthened to ensure she did not let go.“Endure, Daisy.” He said gruffly and then quietened his tone, easing her into the act. The knife’s blade lay flat on the inside of his forearm. Now that they were so close, Jacob noticed Daisy look at his scars with wide eyes. She could see the harshness of the red marks on his arms, and how the roughness of the scar tissue protected his skin. It was satisfying to see her react to his ruined body like this. It was so different to her soft skin, which bore no cuts or burns. “Now cut my skin. Start small. The only thing for you to do is press.”“Jacob,” Daisy said concerningly and looked at him with pain in her eyes. This was like torture for her, and it made him laugh. Such a big reaction over a tiny thing. It was quite amusing; he’d never met someone who was so scared of hurting him. There was so much weakness to dispel. Jacob pressed down on her hand and the blade finally pierced his skin. Daisy gasped as red blood flowed from the wound, and he smiled. “See? Just like that. Not so hard, is it?” It was a rare sound to hear Jacob speak softly as he did it now, but he pushed the thought away. He watched as the red fluid trickled down his arm and he felt the softness of release, felt his body purify through this purge. A drop of water fell on his blood, and he watched as the droplet became clouded with red. He snapped out of the trance and looked up to see Daisy’s tears flowing.Jacob tutted at her. “Cruel girl, look how you’ve cut me.” He chuckled as Daisy tried to protest. “Good.” He said emphatically. “This is excellent. Now do it again without me. And if you don’t, I’ll make you cut me over and over again until you get it right. You don’t want me to bleed to death now, do you?” His face contorted with a grin, and he finally released her hand. The blade immediately shook now that her trembling hand handled it.Daisy looked at him with tightly pursed lips. “This is horrible. I don’t understand you at all, Jacob. You’re nothing like I remember.” She said barely above a whisper and Jacob released an amused exhale from his nose. Hesitantly, she moved the blade further up on his forearm and looked at him. He nodded to her. She winced as she made a small incision, barely big enough to draw blood. It didn’t flow as much as the first one, but Jacob made a noise of satisfaction. Daisy exhaled shakily with a shiver, and he patted her shoulder.“You’re a natural. I knew you had it in you.” He gloated and put his fingers in the blood. With a steady hand, he brought his stained fingers to her forehead and smeared the red colour on her temple. The crimson colour stood out as the moon shone on her dark hair, complimenting the red of her lips. The moment held the initiatory holiness of baptism as he crowned her with his blood. The fluid of pain and cruelty looked good when paired with her distraught eyes.Jacob knew she felt what he did at that moment. By cutting him, she’d finally relinquished that innocuous innocence she’d preserved all these years. Surrendered that pacifist nature that irritated him so. Tonight, she’d stepped closer to a very different world. Jacob’s world. Whether she liked it or not. Jacob remembered what he felt in the forest that day they first met again. The distinct feeling that there was something entangled between the two. Something unseen like an invisible string tightly tethered within each. Looking at Daisy, blood-stained and defeated with her eyes downcast, Jacob suddenly realised how little he wanted to lose this. Whatever ‘this’ was.“Welcome to the herd, Daisy.”