"The Children of Eden" by Greg Lehman

“The Children of Eden” is a fantasy adventure novel taking a twist on the Eden myth: Eve refuses the apple, and paradise thrives, until a choice few explore beyond the boundaries that have held them from the start, discovering a world like ours, and a violent conflict with those who seek only an unchallenged life.

One.

And immediately after Eve told the serpent, no, she would take none of what the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil had to offer, the sky opened above her like a new sun, but much closer, bigger, a star as wide and far-reaching as every dimension around her. The celebration that poured out from this light outshone any brightness the world had known before this, the most fateful of moments, above the Garden of Eden. 

And in this, the Creator was more than well-pleased. 

With Eve’s denial, his promise of perpetual life could now be given to all mankind through the Tree of Life, securing immortality and utter, unending dependence on its Chatavsa fruit.

As the foundations of time and space shook with revelry over Eve and the Tree, however, on the opposite side of Eden, Adam bolted upright. He had been at one of his many naps for the day, a practice he tended to often and without guilt. But under the roar of every member of the angelic host, he was at a sprint before he could blink. 

To his mind, there was no knowing what this could be. And, though innocence and bliss were part and parcel of Eden, Adam had always known more than he let on with Eve. As unprecedented as the sound and the light were to him, dread was not.

Is this it? he thought, his lungs sucking at air all atremble. Was all of this given to me, only to be taken away? 

The sound gave no indication one way or the other. His panic added speed to each stride as all that he knew thundered around him. Great waves of noise resounded through every one of his steps, rushing up from the ground all the way up to the massive aurora in the sky. The long, ghostly flares marked where the Creator had placed a powerful, magnetic shield to defend the entire planet, holding off every bit of radiation and extra-solar monstrosities from reaching the Earth’s surface.

For now, any protection it offered was of no matter to Adam. Something had arrived. Something from outside of paradise. Something, Adam feared, of what he had seen before paradise became his. 

Still he kept running. The light and sound intensified, and once he arrived at the Tree, it was all Adam could do to keep his eyes open. All he could make out was Eve, standing just short of the tree, two figures scarcely darker than the glow that blanketed everything else. 

Her gaze was turned upward, which Adam followed to find the Creator himself, seated and hovering at a swirling entry point punched through reality itself. Rivers of amorphous celestials swam out from around the maker of this world, effecting a wellspring of elation that was impossible to deny.  

As relieved as Adam was that this was a joyous occasion, the sheer magnitude of it all sent him straight to his knees. He watched Eve through his fingers as he held up a hand, trying to make out what he could as, somehow, the scene still grew brighter. It was beyond him to know how she kept standing. 

Yet there she was, resolute and alone, hands out and open, as if she could not catch enough of this euphoria made manifest. 

From the brilliance above, the Creator spoke to the woman and the man.

“Behold the woman, Eve,” the Creator boomed. His voice was that of an announcer, declaring an upset on a previously unbeatable opponent. Indeed, Eve’s challenger was no where to be found, the serpent’s destination a footnote buried under the headline of his unqualified defeat.

“She has done as both of you were instructed,” the Creator went on, “rising above the temptation to disobey my most-holy command. 

“It was not made to be easy. I am not easily impressed. But for this, the Tree of Life shall know its fullness, and the land around Eden shall be yours.”

With these words, the Creator extended a hand through the partition between himself and reality. A chain of sparks spiraled out from the end of his arm, sending a blessing of atomic renewal to the base of the Tree of Life. 

As the roots of the Tree began to expand with a deep creak through the ground, the Creator continued to speak, his voice softening from the declarative to gentle instruction.

“Now you and your progeny will spread across this land,” he said. “And you will meet other peoples I have made, people beyond the Tree’s reach. Their journey is their own, as yours is your own, and your children will cleave to theirs, and it will be good, as I have ordained it to be. 

“The generations after you will live in good health, as you will all the days of your life, as long as you eat of the Chatavsa and obey my commandment, which is this: 

“Carry no fear in your hearts. 

“As you are mine, this world is yours. As you multiply and spread over the land and the sea, you will act in the same spirit of loving kindness that I have shown you.”

The Creator paused. This gave Adam just enough time to remember who he was, and that he was there at all. 

He straightened where he stood, and by some miracle, Eve noticed his movement. 

She looked back at her husband, and he had to keep himself from crumbling again. The Creator’s light was somehow magnified in her, flourishing through her form in a way that made existence itself seem vacant by comparison.

She smiled, a nova caught in a crescent. 

Her hand opened, reaching for him. 

Adam stepped forward, finding it easier than he had expected. 

Eve noticed and laughed, and he laughed, and when she had taken his hand in her own they laughed together, basking in the wash of the Creator’s words as he went on.

“After a time I will return,” he said, then dropped an octave, a statement on its own, “when I am needed. Until that hour, of which the specifics will elude you, no matter how much you seek them, all that you see is yours. 

“Do not worry that I have forgotten you. All things were made in my hands, and in them they are carried to where they are meant to be. 

“I am with you,” said the Creator, “before you became who you are, and after the end of this world, and in to the next.” 

And with a flick of his wrist, the Creator loosed the walls of foliage around Eden like hair freed from braids. Vast fields circled by forest revealed themselves to the first couple. The lush greenery was fed by swathes of lakes and rivers extending to the northwest where, far beyond them, colossal ranges of mountains bore ragged peaks. Between these distant slopes and Eden, life of every kind flew, leapt, wrestled, and galloped in time with the ecstasy abounding above them. 

From the corner of his eye, Adam saw Eve’s smile widen. It had been safe for her to assume that the Garden, which seemed expansive and self-sustaining enough on its own, was all that there was to existence. Adam, however, had always known there was more. And he was more than reluctant to share his memories of life outside Eden with the one who brought comfort, even meaning, to his life. Even speaking of it, he worried, could tempt a return. Dealing with its mark on his psyche was more than he wanted to think about for long, so he didn’t.

Eve turned to her husband. He returned her grin, pushing away every thought out of line with this, their new world. 

As if to confirm that this was a smart move to make, or at least what he interpreted as such, Adam felt the ground shake at his feet. He looked on with Eve as the Tree of Life’s roots sprouted new trees every which way, from the mountains to the four rivers flowing in from the southeastern coast, where the Garden was nestled at their crux. The new trees rose up and bloomed with bright Chatavsa of their own, their bioluminescence shining like blue fireworks in daylight.

Eve nuzzled Adam’s temple with her nose. Her touch made him start, and she laughed again.

“It’s all right,” she said gently, or as gently as she could in the din. She took his face in her palms. His features, which every human would inherit in some form or another, softened under her touch.

“It’s ours,” said Eve. 

Adam smiled, and together they watched as herds, swarms, packs, and families of every conceivable species continued to rejoice with the angelic throng above them. Feathered, scaled, and leather-skinned wings of every color filled the air with a cheerful beat. Wolves and dromeosaurs tackled and rolled over each other to the light braying of quagga, who were then bear-hugged by bears, and they themselves embraced in the trunks of elephants. The ground at their feet and the trees behind them were alive with slugs and spiders and all manner of arthropods, pulsing and waving their arms and eye stalks to match the jubilance in the sky. Beyond them, the rivers sparkled with the shining eyes and voices of fish, dolphins, cephalopods, and myriad other forms of marine life who did not yet discriminate between fresh and salt water.  

Wherever Adam looked, his view teemed with life. Every living thing exulted in their way, immersed in the heights of a festivity promised and now locked in permanent renewal by Eve’s triumph over temptation. 

It was a sight Adam would always remember. 

And yet, in spite of it all, Adam hid what he truly felt in that moment. He did so well, and there was no shortage of distractions at the moment. But a chill still held his heart, like ice finding just the right shadow to linger in, and freeze.

The initial horror he had felt at the other side of the Garden, however brief it was, had reminded him that life had not always been idyllic. And if things had been otherwise at one point, so too could they change. 

They could even be lost. 

Indeed, Eve could have very well given in and eaten the forbidden fruit. So too could any number of usurpers steal away the perfection they’d been given. 

He could not guess at how such a thing could happen. But amid the jubilation, a plan began to shade Adam’s eyes. Like the darkness in a candle’s flickering, he did not give this look much space, or allow it to remain for more than a moment. He hoped Eve did not see it, and she did not. No one would with everything that there was to see: giant ash-colored morning bats spun circles around eagles, scooping gusts of wind over trumpeting sauropods and megatherium. Cherubim dusted the backs of smilodons and beetles alike with shimmering bits of light, singing along with the rest of the host and the legions of species below. 

In the midst of this wondrous fulfillment of the Creator’s plan, a strategy assembled itself in Adam’s mind. Everything he needed lay in front of him, cogs and fuel for a scheme he constructed and fortified with a promise to himself where he stood beside Eve, basking in history’s first moments. 

It was at this moment that Adam, wearing delight like a mask without seams, devoted himself in secret to everything he could, and would, do to preserve this, his kingdom, forever.

Two. 

Many years later, a young man named Daniel awoke before sunrise.

To wake early was unexceptional for him. To wake up in his mind state, somber and bereft, was a private change that had come for him six weeks before. He was not used to it yet, in any capacity, but familiarity had begun to settle in. 

But what truly made this morning unlike any other, for Daniel, was what he saw upon waking. And where he was. And how much what he saw changed this place, and how it, in turn, changed everything else. 

Daniel looked up from the very same spot where Eve and Adam had stood, scarcely two paces from the trunk of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. 

The coal-colored canopy of the Tree loomed over his head, engulfing his vision like a giant, planet-sized vulture. The forbidden fruit of the Tree, red and engorged, glared down at him between razor-edged leaves, all clustered atop a trunk that ten men would be hard-pressed to embrace hand-to-hand. 

As a resident of paradise, Daniel had grown up with the story of Eve’s victory in what had been named the Fulfillment. He knew what had happened, and how it had given him a life of perpetual nourishment and bliss that would never end, in a land that had been promised to never know otherwise. 

But just why he was here, in this place in particular, was an immediate mystery. Sleepwalking was more than unusual, and almost no one visited Eden anymore. There was so much else to see and do in paradise, and the story sufficed to quench any curiosity people might have about what could be found there.

And yet, for reasons completely unknown to him, Daniel craned his neck to take in the enormous girth of the Tree. High above him, an array of branches jutted into thick storm clouds of foliage, giving the impression of a gigantic mace-head strung with bits of ruby-colored flesh. 

It was a concept with no prior relation in Daniel’s mind. Yet it came to him anyway. And, as jarring as the image and this place was to him, Daniel stayed where he was. 

As shocked as he was to find himself here, feeling out of sorts had become commonplace for Daniel. That alone set him apart from everyone he knew. And it was this that urged him to look closer, to look for more in what no one looked at anymore. 

As if anticipating as much, the Tree caught Daniel’s eye with a mark in its trunk. There, right below eye level. The unmistakable shape of fingers and a palm reached out to Daniel, dug out from dust gathered for many hundreds of years on the wood. 

The form itself was not without intrigue, either. What looked to have been a sudden movement whisked the outline down and to the right, the ends of each finger disappearing like holes dug in a hurry.

The print held Daniel like nothing else ever had before. For the second time in his life, the world matched his suspicions, as what he’d been told by his people diverged entirely from what his senses showed him now.