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The forest is quiet, despite the magnitude of what is happening. Pieces always moving, new life constantly coming into play. Sometimes Zanka thinks that growth should be louder. The branches should sing and new buds should hum along as they come into bloom.
He walks the forest floor, leaves crunching beneath his bare feet. He can barely see the blue of the sky behind the canopy. Zanka’s domain does not extend to the sun and skies, but that doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy the warmth of it. It’s all connected anyhow–the sun, the trees, the earth. There is a harmony there that must be maintained and appreciated.
Zanka leans against his staff to admire an old redwood. The dirt is cool between his toes. The sun cuts through the leaves above and its rays are warm on his arms. The tree is large enough, old enough, that if Zanka were to put his arms around it, he wouldn’t even reach halfway around. He remembers when it was just a sapling.
Incredible things come from the smallest, humblest of seeds. It takes rain and sunlight and time, but Zanka is a patient god. He must be, to see the fruit of his labor.
A twig snaps beyond the old redwood, birds scatter from the tree’s branches. Someone approaches. He steps around the tree towards Zanka, leaving a trail of dead undergrowth in his wake. He touches the tree and the bark falls away beneath his hand. A younger tree might have shriveled completely, but there is too much magic in the oldest redwoods.
“Jabber,” Zanka regards him. Death, itself.
“Zanka, my dear,” he croons. “I thought I would find you here, in this old forest.”
It was a favorite of Zanka’s, he must admit, rather predictable. Zanka’s jaw tightens, his mouth thinning into a grim line. He doesn’t like to play with Death, but unfortunately Death likes to play with him. He stands stiff as a board as Jabber approaches. The forest goes silent, without even the crunching of leaves beneath Jabber’s sandals.
Jabber circles Zanka closely. From behind him, Jabber runs his long nails down the side of Zanka’s cheek.
“If only gods could bleed,” Jabber says, his lips almost touching Zanka’s ear. “I’d dig my nails into your soft skin.”
Zanka knows this. It’s not the first time Jabber has said as much. Sometimes Zanka imagines it. He considers what the trickle of warm blood would feel like on his cheek, his throat. He imagines the thrum of a pulse beneath his fingers, beneath Jabber’s fingers.
“Death is inevitable, you know,” Jabber continues when Zanka doesn’t respond.
Like the sun and the sky, there was a necessary harmony there too–as reluctant as it was. The cycle ensured that these kinds of meetings continued to happen. As long as there was Life, Death would continue to be.
“Doesn’t mean I have to surrender to it,” Zanka snaps. There’s not enough venom in his words. There should be more. Jabber meant the end of all his hard work. He took and took and took when Zanka had put so much effort into giving life.
Jabber curls himself around the front of Zanka, his long hair falling into Zanka’s space. He wraps his fingers over where Zanka holds his staff. His rings dig into Zanka’s skin.
“There’s no need to consider it a surrender. All of your creations will experience death, my dear.” His voice is heavy and sweet as honey. “All but you. How can you walk among your creations and let them experience death when you, yourself, never will?”
Zanka had felt the quick beat of a rabbit’s heart, the exhale of a young deer. He knows each tree in his forests by name and walks among them as kin. And still, they will all die, each and every living thing will be plucked from this earth by Jabber’s claws.
“I could give it to you, you know.” A wry smile plays on the corners of Jabber’s mouth. Zanka wonders what it would taste like. Would he be able to taste the poison there?
“Give me what?”
“Death. Or at least the preamble to it. A heart, lungs. You could know what it’s like.”
Air in his lungs, blood coursing through Zanka’s veins. He would feel alive, certainly, but it would be a lie. All it ensured him was a timely death.
“You don’t want me to die,” Zanka counters. “Who would you play with? Who would create the life that you so willingly take away?”
Jabber moves impossibly close. “All you do is make things that die anyway. Think of what we could do together.”
But it’s not true. Zanka never asked for his creations to die. Jabber took them, cut the string of their lives violently short. And now he wanted Zanka. He was getting greedy.
Zanka thinks about the heart Jabber could put in his chest if only he asked. He thinks about what it would beat for, if it would still beat for this world he had worked so hard to build. Or if it would beat for Jabber.
“You know I can’t–I won’t.” His voice is a whisper between them, barely perceptible even among the quiet of the trees.
Death cocks his head and grins. “You will, my dear. One of these days.”
What if Jabber is right? What if he is too weak?
A fear like the coldest winter seizes Zanka. He had always been weak, a mere sapling among the gods. He created life, sometimes selfishly, so that Death could hold it in his hands. And now Jabber dangled life–no, death–in front of him and Zanka can feel the hollow in his chest that it would fill.
Zanka steps back and yanks his staff from Jabber’s grasp. He looks at the old redwood. It had been a sapling once too, its roots not yet established. These were Zanka’s roots–each decision, each trial. Zanka entrenched himself further into earth. He worked hard to create animals and trees and flowers from nothing. He didn’t need a heart to live, he was life.
“I don’t need you,” Zanka says. “You need me. Without me, you have nothing. Without me, there is no death.”
Jabber glares at him. “Fine. But you’ll come around. You will see how little living means without the promise of death at the end of it all.”
Maybe he would. But not today. Today he was a redwood tree and his bark may peel beneath Jabber’s touch but he would not fall.