THE REBIRTH OF THE CURSED

The Last Dawn

The Rebirth of the Cursed

Chapter 1

The Last Dawn

Early morning light crept over Shomoto Hill, stretching out long shadows in front of the assembled crowd. A soft, pale mist attached itself to the earth with supernatural delicacy, whirling and eddying about the feet of villagers gathered to watch the execution of a man once called Mwabezi. Quiet hums of whispers floated in the air, weaving between the tension which had settled over the crowd. Even the birds-those which usually sang their song for the rising of the sun-were silent on this fateful day.

Mwabezi stood at the center of the tumult, hands behind him and features composed, yet defiant. A man in his early forties, he had a pair of dark eyes that had seen it all-a lot more than most here in this village. His skin was weathered from years of hardships, but his spirit remained unbroken. Today, though, that spirit would be tested in the cruelest of ways.

Before him stood the Great Chief, a towering man as polished as mahogany, draped in deep red and gold ceremonial robes. The features on his face had hardened, yet not without compassion, it seemed, as if he did not relish what he was about to do. At his side stood Skunde, his adviser, his eyes bright with cold, calculating intensity. Skunde's thin face showed nothing, yet Mwabezi knew him well enough to know the triumph he should feel. Skunde had been waiting for this day for years - plotting in the dark, using rumors and half-truths to bring Mwabezi down.

"You stand accused," the Great Chief began, placing his voice so all could hear it across the hilltop, "of practicing the forbidden art of sorcery, an offense for which the law demands death."

The onlookers were murmuring in one voice, some fearing this magic Mwabezi had allegedly oiled while others doubted these charges yet were too afraid to speak. Those few in the back crossed their arms stoically, judgment etched on their faces; punishment well served.

Mwabezi said nothing. His eyes went out toward the crowd, scanning the faces to that one that was most dear to him: his son. And there on the outer fringes of the circle, the boy stood. Scarcely sixteen years old, with the same black eyes as his father, his face wore an anguished mask. Tears shone in his eyes, though his face was set to appear unyielding.

The chief smiled wryly. "Our custom is that your sentence shall be carried out by the hand of your own son. Have you any last words, Mwabezi?"

For a long instant, there was only silence. The wind stirred through the tall grasses on the hill, and the crowd shifted toward him, awaiting the saving word. Then slowly, clearly, and with strength, considering the weight of the moment, Mwabezi raised his voice.

"What I did," he said, "right or wrong, I did for my son. I die in peace, knowing that my son knows the price which we must pay at times to survive. I request no mercy from you, nor do I expect it." His eyes found his son, and for a moment, the world seemed to shrink, leaving only the two of them.

"Do not weep for me, son," Mwabezi continued in a soft tone now. "The curse is not upon you, for thou didst not truly take my life. I see the pain that thou carriest in thee, and I want thee to embrace it. Let it be part of thy life, for it shall make thee stronger. I love thee, my son, in this life and the next. Be strong, for it is the only way people like us manage. Do not seek justice, for that is a luxury denied to us. Just live to the dictates of what your soul knows to be right. Goodbye."

A tear escaped his son's eye, and in an instant, the boy seemed to snap. His shoulders sagged under the weight of his father's words, and his knees buckled beneath him. But there was no time for this. The Great Chief now turned to the boy and nodded. It was time.

Skunde was hiding a smirk and shoved the boy forward. Stumbling towards his father, his hands shook uncontrollably and could not settle. The boy leaned close to his father's ear, his breath shaking as he whispered, "I love you, Father… I'm sorry."

With one final heave, Mwabezi's son complied with the instruction. His father's body jerked forward, tumbling over the edge of the hill. Time stood still; the world froze as Mwabezi fell silently into the chasm below. His eyes remained open, unafraid, until the very end.

There was no cry, no scream-only the dull thud of his body striking the rocks below.

A hush fell over the crowd. Some averted their eyes, unwilling to face the brutality of the act they had just witnessed. Others watched with grim satisfaction, convinced they had just rid the village of a dangerous man. A few in the crowd began to mutter prayers for the dead.

But Skunde? He did not budge an inch, his gaze stuck at the point where Mwabezi had vanished. His lips arced into a smile-one so faint, it was almost not there. It was done. Mwabezi was gone, and with him, the only man who could stand in the way of Skunde's rise to power. As he turned to leave the scene, however, Skunde felt a strange, creeping chill up his spine-a feeling he could not explain.

The Great Chief, however, did not show signs of either being pleased nor unhappy. He nodded to the boy as some form of acknowledgment for participating in the execution and turned to the crowd. "Let this be a lesson to all," he said, "that our people's laws are never to be broken."

Some walked away silently, while others did so grumbling to themselves. The son of Mwabezi remained behind, standing quite near the cliff and staring down into the abyss where his father had fallen. He was broken with the weight of this day in ways no other could see or tell. He was empty, like a vessel that had its contents spilled, leaving nothing inside but the ache of loss. Even he turned and walked away, slowly and heavily.

It was over and done with, but far from over.

The world went black as Mwabezi's body landed with a thud on the cold rocks below. For a moment, there was silence-blackness, quiet-a void so complete it could only be rivalled by the ceasing of existence itself.

Then the voices came.

Whispers at first, indistinct and distant, like the murmuring of a great crowd just beyond the edge of hearing. The darkness stirred, and Mwabezi became conscious of his own presence within it. He was not dead. Not yet. Or at any rate, not in the way he had expected.

And with them came images-flashes of light and sound that lanced the void. The voices grew louder, sharper. Faces swirled in the darkness, faces he knew and faces he did not: the ancestors. They had come for him.

"We are not done with you," one voice said, deep and ancient, echoing in the emptiness. "Your time has not yet come."

Mwabezi's lips moved, but no sound came forth. His mind reeled, confused by this bizarre, shapeless nothingness that enveloped him. What was going on? Was he not supposed to be dead? Had he not been shoved off the edge of his death by his son?

"You are between worlds," another voice responded, as if it had read his thoughts. "This is the place where decisions are made."

The void stirred, and Mwabezi became aware of a presence embracing him, great and mighty beyond his imagining. It was the will of the world itself, the force binding all living things in one cover. And it was offering him a choice.

"You have been wronged," it said, though Mwabezi could not tell if it was a statement or a question. "But there is more for you to do. There is power within you, untapped and waiting. Will you take it?

Those words weighed upon him like a physical force. Power. Was that not what had brought him here in the first place? His need to save his son, to use the ancestors' forbidden magic, had damned him. Yet, here it was again, this offer of strength. It would be so easy to say yes, to take the power and use it for vengeance, to right the wrongs done unto him.

But he had faltered. His son's face flashed before him, tears, pain, and sorrow: he had already been through so much. Could Mwabezi truly turn away from the path of peace for the sake of power?

The void waited. The voices whispered.

"Choose," they said. "Live again, or be forgotten."

And so, there and then, Mwabezi spoke his mind.

"I will live," he whispered, almost silent. "I will live-but for him, not for me. I will do what I must to protect my son, no matter in what world I find myself."

The surrounding darkness seemed to pulse with that, and Mwabezi stirred something inside him, an energy he had never felt before. It surged through his body, filling him with a strange, electric sensation. In that instant, the void shattered, catapulting Mwabezi into light.

He awoke with a start, gasping for breath as though he had been drowning and had only just now broken the surface. His eyes shot open, and for a moment he was blinded by the brightness of the world around him.