Esau finally managed to pry his heavy lids open.

The violent throb that scratched at his skull and the silence that wouldn't have tortured his ears if not for the continuous sound of chirping crickets, served as prompt reminders that he was not dead.

When he forced his eyes to adjust to the darkness around him, Esau found that he was sitting and staring at a person.

Their frame was slowly revealed in front of him as everything suddenly brightened and the first thing he was able to properly see after gaining consciousness was the blood trickling down Edythe's cheek.

He didn't remember what he had noticed first, the cut on her face or the fact that something felt terribly wrong, but that didn't matter for now.

In that split second of sudden awareness, he also didn't know if he had imagined the pain she must have been feeling before anything else had managed to click in his groggy mind. Or if what he felt was the stinging ache that had crawled agonisingly along the length of his own face.

One thing was for sure though, he was now in undeniable pain.

"Eddy," he called to her softly as he raised a hand to her unveiled face and watched in a sort of numbed shock as the tips of his fingers brushed away rivulets of the red liquid he had come to despise.

"What happened?" He pulled his hand away, holding it against his chest as though he had been burned.

"You fell," she answered, her voice containing a chill that sent tremors through his heart.

"I caught you." Edythe continued, like it would mean something to him. She didn't really answer his question but it didn't matter.

I did that. Esau trembled and furiously wiped the blood on his hand with his shirt, forcing his mind to seize control of the rest of his body and move. He wanted to get up and leave; a quiet voice in his head told him to run.

He had nowhere to go or any idea of where he was, but he didn't care.

I did that. He squashed the feeling of danger that rose up in his chest at the thought and tried to breath evenly, not daring to pass out again.

Esau just wanted to get away from her before he did another thing he would come to regret. I did that.

"We are on a tree," Edythe said without looking his way, as though she had read his mind, "you will fall."

"I'm sorry." His face paled the instant he heard the barely subdued anger in her voice.

Esau folded his legs to his chest and pulled away from his sister, shifting back towards the trunk of the tree.

He had just realized that they were sitting on large branch; Edythe sat closer to the edge than he did but she didn't seem to mind.

"Don't apologize, I shouldn't have forced you up that tree in the first place." she said.

"You didn't. . ." He rested his head on his knees and stared at his sister, fear suddenly gripping his heart as a small beam of moonlight fell on her face and illuminated the wound he had just touched.

Esau could see it clearly now and it terrified him, it resembled the scratch from a claw and stretched down from her forehead to the side of her left eye. Once again the sense of danger flared up in his mind and he thought back to the pain he had felt on his face.

His gaze not leaving hers, he used his fingers to trace his own wound, wincing slightly as his nails scratched at the broken skin. He tried to visualize where it was on his face and bit his lip.

What exactly happened?

The situation inevitably took him back to happier times when they still had a town filled with people, times when he was bullied and times when his bullies were afraid of Edythe.

Esau remembered how he'd end up with nicks and bruises, and somehow hours later his sister would have the exact injuries in the same spots. Of course they healed in days, nothing serious to worry about, but he had always marvelled about it and one day he asked her.

Edythe said it had something to do with the fact that they were twins, but he knew better. He knew when she was lying to him.

Before the attack on his town and until she got bitten by that wolfish monster, he and Edythe had almost the same amount of scars because she was obsessed with their 'sameness' in the same way he was obsessed with her safety.

That was when he finally realized why she did it. It was to make him feel better about himself. She wasn't untouchable or their parents' favorite child. She was his sister. The sister who hurt more than he did when he was in pain.

Most times it was an accident and maybe sometimes it wasn't but Edythe always managed to get hurt before he could stop her. Either she was protecting him or they were facing the problem together, that was how it always was.

That was why he had the habit of looking at her when he was in pain and sometimes forgetting which one of them was the one who actually got hurt. When they were together they were one person, there was no need for much differentiation and everyone who knew them was used to that.

Somehow it was comforting being a pair.

It was because of this reason that Esau was almost sure that the person in front of him right now was a stranger. He had been unconscious for a while yet his wound hadn't been treated in that time and neither had this 'Edythe' offered to help. That was the first thing that was off.

And even though she hadn't pulled the same stunt of identical injuries since their parents had found out, Edythe would still have hidden the fact that she was hurt for as long as she could manage. That was the second flaw in this imposter's charade.

With his palm closed over his wound Esau's frown deepened, the cuts weren't in the same place or similar at all, the one on his face was shallow, probably just a scratch by a twig.

"What did that?" He pointed to her face with his other hand, he knew Edythe wasn't careless enough to get injured while taking care of him.

"Some beast," he heard her laugh and watched her mouth form the words. Her lips barely moved.

Nothing is right. . . His eased up his frown and took his hand away from the cut. Edythe would have been fussing about him infecting it by now but she was just sitting there, silent and observing.

She was watching him like he was watching her, Esau realized.

"How long have I been asleep?" He asked again.

"A couple of minutes."

"How did we get up this tree?"

"I carried you."

"What is six multiplied by four?"

"Twenty-four," she said and sat up straighter. "Is there something bothering you, Esau?"

A lot, actually. Esau stiffened and clenched his fists, but in the end said nothing that was on his mind. "No, I'm just hungry."

"Well then," Edythe stood up with a jump, making the branch they sat on tremble from the sudden motion, "let's find something to eat."

"Sounds good," Esau's eyes flashed but he still managed a smile and a reply, slowly getting on his feet as his hand grazed his boot in hopes of finding his knives. Nothing.

He walked to her then looked down into the thinning fog down below.

"How are we getting down?" A plan had formed to push her to a possible death.

"Jumping of course!" She beamed at him, her enthusiasm obvious. For a while Esau was overrun with guilt, ashamed that he thought that the person in front of his was not his sister, but then he noticed her eyes. Golden eyes.

As the thought flashed through his mind, he unconsciously took a step back. "Edythe?" he called.

"Yes?" She turned to him.

"Ever thought it was strange that we have different eye colors?"

"I guess."

"You got all your looks from mom, didn't you? Including her eyes. But I wasn't that lucky." Esau looked down at his feet, begging that the Edythe in front of him was real.

It's a simple question. Simple. Simple. Simple. . .

"Yeah," she laughed, "I must have gotten it from mom."

Liar, liar. Liar!

"Who are you?" He shook his head and glared at her. "What have you done to my sister?"

"Esau," she took a small step towards him, "you look pale, sit down."

"No, no!" he shouted and backed up. "What are you?!"

"I'm your sister!" the thing laughed. Esau watched the wound on it's face close up, Edythe's bloody face still in place of it's real one.

"Lies." His back hit the tree trunk and anger knocked the fear right out of him. "You're a liar! Give me back my sister."

"I don't have her," the creature looked confused as it chuckled sinisterly, "but I will eat you and maybe one day you will be reunited."

It disgusted Esau to see such a twisted expression on his sister's face, but he couldn't look away. He had to get her back. "What did you do to her?"

"Wrong!" Suddenly, the creature's eyes narrowed into slits and a forked tongue fell out of its mouth and licked the entirety of the face it wore, covering it in sticky drool and what must have been venom. "You should be asking me what I am going to do to you, boy."

†

Oh, what is this? ;)

No question of the chapter today. Enjoy the cliff.
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