The Legend Ch. 1

Chapter One

         The silence of a tomb held no comparison to the ominous stillness that shrouded the dark forest.  No animal stirred or made a noise.  The dead trees stretched their bony fingers to the heavens as though praying for release.  The earth, charred black and barren of underbrush, smelled of scorched leaves and dirt.  Some great cataclysm had found this forest, devoured it, and vomited up the remains as a warning to others to keep out.
         Alexander had no choice though.  Something within this forest pulled him.  Called to him.  Beckoned for him to come closer.  To find the center and what awaited him there.
         He climbed the hills.  Soot turned his fingers black and worked its way under his nails.  Up and over he went only to find another hill to be climbed.  He crossed what used to be streams that had dried up and died.  But with every step he took, he became one step closer to reaching the inevitable.  Where it all had begun and where it must end.
         A familiarity seized him half up the next hill.  His heart thumped hard in his chest, and he felt the sweat began to form on his brow.  He knew what lay just beyond the horizon.  He’d seen this place many times before in his dreams, but then it had been lush and full of life.  Weeping willows swayed in the breeze and majestic pines stood tall and proud.  Birds chirped merrily within the braches of the giant oaks.  Running water gurgled a rhythmic tune of tranquility.  What had happened here?  The answer lay just over the horizon, and he knew it.  He swallowed hard and continued his ascent.
         His breathing became deeper and harder as he approached the top.  The sweat on his forehead had now formed rivulets and ran down into his eyes.  He wiped the stinging sweat from them, leaving a swarthy band of soot across his eyes making him resemble a raccoon.  After taking one final deep breath, he finished climbing to the top and stood, staring into the valley below in awe.  How he could have missed it from such a distance he did not know.  Something of such size could surely be seen from miles away, but he had not seen it.  He saw it now though, and he recognized it.  He’d seen it many times before. 
         The largest tree in the world stood in the center of the valley below.  Its braches blocked out the view of the sky and held the sun’s light within them.  But something was wrong with the tree.  Its truck, so massive it would take days to walk all the way around, was black from the bottom to as high as the eye could see. 
         Forgetting his exhaustion, Alex raced down the slope of the hill toward the mighty tree.  Standing at the base of the truck, he felt like an ant beside a skyscraper.  He reached out his hand and touched the tree.  It was hard as rock.  The tree had petrified.  How could this have happened? 
         He started to reach out to try to wipe the soot from the tree, but before he could two malignant, emerald green eyes appeared within the truck of the tree.  Alex took a step back and stumbled over one of the enormous roots, falling on his back.  An earth-rattling groan echoed through the forest as the giant tree’s roots pulled free of the ground and snatched Alex up by the back of his neck.  Lifting Alex high into the air, the tree leaned forward, letting out another groan, and the piercing green eyes stared into his.  I’ve been waiting for you, brother, echoed inside Alex’s mind, making his skull vibrate.
         “No!” Alex screamed at the top of his lungs flinging his covers back and sitting up in bed.  His sheets were soaked with sweat.  His breathing, shallow and fast.
         “Shut up,” the other boys in the orphanage moaned and groaned.  One tossed a pillow at him.
         The creaking of the dormitory door alerted them all but Alex to the brother’s approach.  They quickly pulled their covers up closer around their heads and pretended to be sleeping.
         “What’s the meaning of this?” the brother asked, shining his flashlight around the room momentarily and then immediately to Alex’s bunk.  “Alex,” he said, putting one hand on his robust hip, “I might have known.”
         “I, I’m sorry,” Alex mumbled.
         “Not as sorry as you are going to be,” he said as he marched across the room to his bed.  He grabbed him by the ear and dragged him off the bed.  “Come with me.”
         Alex could hear a few of the boys snickering lightly as he hauled him through the door and closed it behind him.  The sound of the heavy wooden door being slammed reverberated off the stone walls.  Alex could feel the cold of the large stones that made up the floor on his bare feet, but that cold was insignificant compared to the burning sting in his ear the brother held for dear life.
         Saint Andrew’s Orphanage for Wayward Boys had been a catholic church back in the late 1800s.  The building, comprised mostly of stone, had withstood the test of time, but had become too outdated and uncomfortable for its parish.  Almost fifty years ago, the church was converted into an orphanage and monastery of sorts.  The less fortunate and orphaned boys of the surrounding community and parishes across the country were sent here and provided with food and shelter and the education of God’s ways.
         Alex didn’t know how he ended up here.  According to Brother Thomas, the leader of the orphanage, he discovered Alex on the steps at the front door on the holiest of nights, Christmas.  The snow had begun to fall hard, and Brother Thomas had gone to the door to admire God’s handiwork, when he noticed a thatched basket on the steps with a baby inside.  He took the child inside, and Alex had been here for the past twelve years.
         “Brother Thomas is not going to be pleased to be waked at this hour to deal with your shenanigans.”  He released his hold on Alex’s ear and stopped in front of the door to Brother Thomas’ quarters.  After rapping hard on the door, he looked down at Alex.  “To think he’s the one who rescued you and gave you a home and this is how you repay him by starting trouble on an almost daily basis.”
         Alex lowered his head.  He didn’t have anything to say.  It wasn’t his intention to start trouble or be involved with it.  Trouble seemed to find him.  He didn’t fit in here, and he knew it.  Problem was he had no where else to go.
         The creaking of Brother Thomas’ door announced his presence.  He stood in the doorway looking down his long, hooked nose at Alex.  His beady dark brown eyes appeared black in the shadows of the hallway.  Alex had never seen him wearing anything other than the long, black robe he wore now.  A rosary hung around his neck, and he held a Bible in his hand, his index finger stuck between the pages marking his spot.  He was an older man, in his early fifties, but he was still physically fit.  He had short black hair with a few random grays around his temples.  His lips were thin, and Alex had never remembered seeing him smile.
         “I’m sorry to disturb you at this hour,” the Brother who had brought Alex here begun.
         “Non-sense,” Brother Thomas said.  His voice was deep and resonated along the halls.  It was a perfect voice for sermons.  “I must admit I’m disappointed at see you here this late, Alex, but not at all surprised.  What has he done this time?”
         “Screaming in the middle of the night, Brother, disturbing all the other boys’ sleep.”
         “I see,” said Brother Thomas, “well, do bring him in.  We can’t have that.”
         Brother Thomas led them through an immaculate living room with a small fire burning in the fireplace, down a hall to the right, and into a small study with a single lamp burning in the corner.  An antique, oak desk stood in the center of the floor along the back wall.  Behind it, two tall rectangular stained glass windows curved into an oval shape at the top allowed the pale glow of the moonlight outside to peek through.  The stained glass windows caused a faint glow of colors to fall across the desk and onto the couple of maroon leather chairs placed in front of the desk.  Brother Thomas sat in the high backed chair behind the desk and motioned for Alex to be seated.
         Alex sat in the chair.  It felt softer than his bed.  The Brother who had brought him here stood behind him.  Alex could feel his hand gripping the back of the chair.  He knew he was looking down on him with hateful eyes, and it made the hair on the back of his neck stand.  He locked his hands together and held them in his lap.
         “So, Alex,” said Brother Thomas, his eyes boring into Alex’s, “yesterday, you started a lunch room brawl interrupting our Christmas Eve dinner, and tonight, you keep everyone up at such ungodly hours.  What are we going to do with you?”
         Alex shrugged and started to speak, but Brother Thomas silenced him immediately by raising his hand and waving his index finger back and forth.
         “It was a rhetorical question.  I grow weary of your lies and constant trouble making, and I will not have you disrupting our most sacred dinner today.”  Brother Thomas reached down beside him and placed a yardstick on his desk.  “The good Book says, ‘Spare the rod and spoil the child’, and I’m a firm believer in this.” 
Alex could see Brother Thomas’ face growing redder despite his otherwise calm demeanor and he knew what was coming as soon as he saw the yardstick.  He was quite familiar with it.  It was one of the milder punishments he’d endeared over the years.
“The problem is,” Brother Thomas said, now rotating the yardstick on his desk and letting it smack the wood a little harder each time, “that no matter how much punishment you receive, you never learn your lesson.  But don’t worry, Alex, I have yet to give up on you.  I will break you even if it kills you.  Do you understand?”
Alex nodded his head.
Brother Thomas got up from his desk and walked around to the corner of it.  He sat down on the edge of it and held out his hand.
“Give me your hand.”
Alex slowly reached his right hand out, palm up, to Brother Thomas.  Brother Thomas grabbed him by the wrist and jerked his hand further out.  Alex winced from the grip Brother Thomas had on his wrist.  He could withstand the pain about to be inflicted on the palm of his hand as long as Brother Thomas didn’t break his wrist while doing it.
“Keep it open,” Brother Thomas said, and brought the ruler down upon it with a deafening whack.
Alex winced and instinctively tried to withdraw his hand, but he couldn’t budge it.
“No need to fight this, Alex,” Brother Thomas said and delivered another blow.
Alex could see the red whelps forming on the palm of his hand.  It grew warmer with each strike delivered.  The pain grew more intense and the more Alex winced, the faster and harder Brother Thomas let the blows fall.  The grip Brother Thomas had on his wrist had cut off the blood flow, but despite the pain in his palm, Alex could feel the pin and needle prickles caused by the blood trying to get back to his fingers.  To Alex, minutes turned to hours, and he had lost count of how many times Brother Thomas had struck him.  Everything grayed out, and he could hear Brother Thomas speaking to him the entire time he struck him, but it sounded as though his words came from a great distance.  He couldn’t understand anything he said except for something about a birthday present.  Alex closed his mind and tried to hide from the pain.  He could see the great tree, but this time it was alive with golden branches.  They glowed in the very top with the sun’s light and that glow raced down each branch toward the trunk.  Suddenly, Alex felt a surge of heat race down his arm and toward his hand.
“No!” he screamed, as his eyes flew open and he tried to pull it back.  But it was hopeless; there was no way to pull it all back.
The yardstick hit his hand just as the small amount of energy Alex couldn’t contain reached it.  Flames leaped up from the tip of the ruler, and Brother Thomas immediately let go of Alex’s wrist.
“What the devil?” Brother Thomas said, as he momentarily held the yardstick up like a torch.  He tossed it onto the stone floor and stomped out the flame.  Then he stared at Alex, his beady eyes dancing in his head.  “You are the devil’s child.”  Alex had never heard his voice so loud.  “Cursed by Satan.  Get him out of my sight.  Lock him up until I decide what to do with him once and for all.  Give him no food or water.”
The Brother who had brought Alex to Brother Thomas still stood there with his mouth hanging open, as though he hadn’t heard his orders.  He was busy gaping at the tip of the scorched yardstick.
“I said now!” Brother Thomas yelled and stomped his foot.
“Come with me, Alex,” the Brother who had brought him here said, but he didn’t grab his ear or touch him for that matter.