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The Gift, Redux

Bethany and Anapa, Introduction

copyright comidacomida 2026

Bethany had been lucky early in her life; she had a wonderful family with a mother and a father, an older brother and two younger siblings-- a boy and a girl; all of the kids were just over a year apart from one to the next. She had grandparents on both sides, all of whom lived close by. Unfortunately, the week after her graduation, her mother's dad passed away suddenly. It was her first experience with death, and it happened right after she felt like she was transitioning into adulthood. It was a painful transition. She learned very quickly that there was more to the big picture than she had ever considered.

She spent the morning of the funeral numb; she kept thining that it was all a dream and she would eventually snap out of it, wake up, and everything would be bacvk to normal. Despite the shadow that hung over her, the day was achingly, almost insultingly beautiful; the sun was shining, birds were singing-- it was summer but there was still a cool breeze to make sure it wasn't too hot. Kids in town were on the streets, running around and laughing, enjoying summer break. Bethany couldn't enjoy the summer break because her grandfather was dead... plus, she had graduated, so it wasn't 'freedom' from school for her; it was emptiness.

Pineton was one of the larger towns in eastern Oregon, but that didn't mean much. With barely 12,000 people, word tended to travel fast and everyone who saw her family walking toward the small funeral home knew exactly what had happened and what was going on. At one time, Bethany had enjoyed the fact that everyone in town knew one another but, that morning, she just wished that they'd stop staring. She didn't want their sympathy; she didn't want their pity; she didn't want their attention. If anything, she wanted to wake up and to still have her grandfather... but that was not going to happen.

Her mom had helped her grandmother with planning the ceremony; they'd picked out the casket together, addressed the schedule with the mortuary, and ensured that her grandfather would be presentable for an open casket funeral. It was Bethany's first time encountering death and she spent her time focusing on everything around her-- everything that wasn't her grandfather, but she couldn't stop thinking about him. When she couldn't hold out any longer, the young lady made her way slowly up to the dais.

As she stared down at the corpse that had been her grandfather, she couldn't help but admire how alive he seemed-- whatever the funeral home had done, they made him look so alive. He looked as though he were sleeping; he was the grandfather she knew... all except for his hair; they didn't style his hair right and that single trait made everything come crashing back down: he wasn't asleep... he was dead. For some reason, though, she still couldn't manage to believe it-- she had to know for sure and so, she raised her hand.

The mortician had told them the prior day that, no matter how good a job they could do to make him look alive, the body wouldn't feel like a living one, but, in that moment, she couldn't help herself. Back when she was little and asleep, her grandfather would often come into her room to visit, awakening her with a gentle brush of the back of his hand across her cheek-- perhaps that's why she did the same thing. Was it a sense of familiarity she sought? Was her final goodbye an homage to his often-loved hello? She didn't know but, the moment her hand touched his cheek, she felt the strangest sensation of not being alone at the dais.

A hand covered in a black furred glove touched her grandfather's left cheek at the exact time her hand touched his right. The old man's skin was cold, and felt... different-- it had too much give, but not enough elasticity... waxy? It was hard for her to tell. Before she had a chance to really consider it, her attention had already shifted to whoever was disrespectful enough to take away her private moment with my grandfather. She looked up, ready to tell them that she wasn't done, but the words got stuck in her mouth when she saw a face looking back at her-- a face that was entirely wrong.

Framed by tassels of gold, silver, and opals was a canine head of black fur; it was attached to a much more humanlike body, finely sculpted like a Roman statue, only instead of it being marble it was covered in fur the same color as a raven's wing. The man or, rather, the jackal man was wearing something that looked a little like a Roman toga, only not-- it was a strange moment, but what really struck Bethany as odd was that he was staring at her in the same way that she figured that she was staring back at him. The Jackal's eyes were the strangest part of him: framed in gold mascara, they had no whites at all to them, rather they were as jet-black as his pupils and his irises were purple-- purple like a rich lavender, or more like a vibrant amethyst.

He pulled his arm back immediately, otherworldly eyes focused on her and only her. The Jackal cocked his head to the side as if confused, and, surprisingly, he took a step back as if HE were the one seeing a monster. After a momentary pause it was the Jackal who recovered first, and he spoke. His words were in a language Bethany didn't know, but it sounded, as her grandmother would have described it, as 'ethnic'. It was, a smooth, soft tenor emerging from his muzzle with the crystal clarity of any normal human person speaking from a normal human mouth. "A-taray-ni?"

Stumbling back from the dais, Bethany would have fallen over if not for her her two younger siblings, who had been waiting respectfully at the bottom of the steps for their turn to see their grandfather. Adam, her younger brother took the brunt of her stumble, managing to keep her on her feet while her younger sister Amy steadied her. "Are you okay, Beth?"

She pulled herself free from both of them, turning around to look back at the jackal, then to her siblings; they were still looking at her and not the creature looking behind the coffin. "D-do you... do you see that?"

Both siblings looked to one another, then to her. Adam walked up the steps past her while Amy brushed Bethany's arm with her hand. "It's okay, Beth... you can cry if you want."

It was obvious to her that neither Adam nor Amy saw the Jackal in fact, as Adam approached the coffin, the Jackal walked right through it, AND HIM, as if neither were there. He held up a paw as if reaching for her despite their distance, his voice emerging from his muzzle again. "Man anti ya fataat? Kayfa ab-sarti-ni?"

Glancing around the room, she realized that she was the only person present who even seemed to realize that the Jackal was there. Looking back, she saw that he was almost right in front o f her, holding paw out to me as he approached and spoke in halting English combined with that strange language of his. "No. Kahina. Do not run..."

At that point she turned and did exactly what he told her not to do; she ran. Amy, though she was responsive to the sudden flight, did not move to stop her other than to shout. "Hey! Beth! Wait!"

She heard Adam move to follow her, but he almost tripped going down the steps. "Hey!"

Not responding to any of her family shouting after her, Bethany ran out of the funeral home, and she didn't stop. She kept running down the street, turning the corner and continuing on. It was twelve blocks from the funeral home to her home, and she was half way through the trip before she finally came to a stop. It was a hot day despite the breeze-- summers in Pinetown tended to be hot. Sinking to the concrete of the sidewalk beneath the shade of a spruce tree, she felt tears come to her eyes despite her lack of sobbing.

She lost track of the time that passed, her mind going a mile a minute as she tried to work through the shock of what she had seen. Was she losing her mind? Was it a stress figment brought on by facing the death of her grandfather head-on? Bethany honestly didn't know, but that eerie, tenor voice spoke from far-too-close, snapping her out of her mental paralysis as it said. "Hal ladi-ki al-Basirah?"

Bethany had a hard time trying to formulate a response, especially since she still didn't know what he was saying. The Jackal HAD spoken in English... but, for some reason, he still kept using the other language. Still shaking, she managed to say the words did finally come to her; they were direct and simple. "I... don't understand that."

"Al-hijaabu raqueeq, Kahina," he murmured, "The veil is thin between us. You see what they have forgotten."

Not knowing what else to do, the young woman turned, and began walking further along the road, heading back toward her home. The funeral hadn't provide her any closure and seeing her grandfather one last time hadn't resolved anything. What was worse was that she was losing her mind. Was it grief, or had things really become so bad that she was falling apart? It was nearly two blocks before she realized that she was still being followed.

She came to a stop beneath the thick needled canopy of a jack pine and turned to stare at the Jackal, who been shadowing her at what almost felt like a respectful distance, but nothing about being followed at that moment felt respectful. She did care whether anybody saw her as she demanded of him "What were you doing to my grandfather?"

He cocked his head to the side, talking a half-step closer toward her as his ears lowered; his piercing gaze somehow seemed to soften... just a little. He stood still for a few moments before a long, drawn out sigh. In the end his muzzle opened, and he carefully enuniciated "Not grandfather. No Ruh now. Just... body-- Guthah. Only Turab."

She stood still, unmoving; was she talking to a figment of her imagination? She didn't want to think that she'd gone so far into escapism that she was losing my mind. Despite her reservations, she demanded more than that from the Jackal. "What were you doing to his body, then?!"

He flicked an ear, muzzle scrunched up as if he were confused... or thinking. At length, he spoke, his heavily-accented English halting and interspersed with more foreign words. "I... take Ruh. Take Nour. It is... it is Jo'u. I take because I need."

There was something almost primal in his declaration. She still didn't fully understand but, based on the way he bared his teeth when describing his 'need', she thought she understood, and it was a reiviling conclusion. "You... were eating his soul?"

His ears went up, taking a step back before raising his paws, gesticulating defensively as he spoke. "It is Safar. I take because I need. Without, I am nothing. I am Fana."

Bethany still couldn't understand what he was tring to say, but she didn't like how it was sounding. "So... you were stealing his soul because you needed it? Like a thief?"

The Jackal growled at that, and she found herself taking a step back. The sound stopped immediately and his ears returned to neutral and his hackles lowered, quickly raising his paws placatingly again. "I am not... thief." the English word rolled off his tongue as if he were trying to spit it out. "I am Sayyad. I hunt Nour before it... fades... before it is gone to the dark."

She locked gazes with him, his eerie, amethyst eyes bestial, yet somehow... calming. Once she had a moment to think and to try and reason out what he was telling her, she tried again. "So... you weren't trying to eat my grandfather's soul?"

He slowly moved his muzzle to the left, then right, then left again, purposefully shaking it back and forth. "No. Not eat, Kahina. Not eat."

Bethany countered. "But, you JUST said that you hunt the Nore stuff."

The Jackal flicked an ear, slowly lowering his paws as he sighed, jaw tightening as he explained. "Nour. Nour is... is Light. All Humans have Light."

She shook her head. "That just... it doesn't make sense. What do you mean, 'Light'?"

The black-furred creature gestured around the street. "Some Humans dim... like old candle. Like Sham'a. Your grandfather, his Nour was heavy. Ready to fall. If I do not... Sayad, it is lost... Mubathara. It goes to the Ghaib... the Deep Dark. It is wasted."

Considering the Jackal's limited vocabulary it seemed like a complete thought but it made little-to-no sense to the teen. She had trouble following the conversation and, having far too little emotional and mental energy to bother trying, she simply turned... and kept walking. The Jackal, however, hurried after her. "Kahina. Please. No go."

She came to a stop, her emotions boiling over as she about-faced and stared up at the Jackal as she demanded. "Why are you even following me?! You got what you wanted, right?"

The Jackal shook his head, looking down at her. "Nour-uki..." he began, then stopped, seeming to try and piece together what he meant to say. "Your light... it is not like others. They are... cold. They are just 'Gasad'. But you..." he closed his eyes, tilting his head toward her, almost as if he were a lizard basking beneath a heat lamp, "You are... Daf'. Like the sun on stones of Al-Uqsur. You do not just have Light, Kahina... you make it."

She stepped back, thinking nothing good of his statement. "Eew. Creep... and my name isn't Karina."

He paused at her reaction. "Karina? No... Kahina. Ka-hi-nah. Priestess."

Bethany shook her head. "I'm not your priestess either... ugh just, stop BASKING. It's... weird."

He stepped back, a flicker of genuine confusion on his muzle. "I do not... Qabd. I do not take. But, when you are near, hunger sleeps. When I am with you I am... Shaba'an.

She sighed, reaching up to rub her forehead. "Okay... so you're shaba-whaterver. Is that more Jackal-stalker talk?"

The Jackal looked as though he'd just eaten a bad egg. "Full. It means I am not empty. For first time in... in many moons... I am not empty."

Pausing at that, Bethany glanced around; she realized that she was standing in front of a small serive station and the attendant, Buck, was staring her way. He'd graduated a year before she had and, rather than confront her on her strange behavior of apparently talking to herself, he just turned around and marched right into the mini-mart attached to the lot. She sighed, shaking her head, and continued walking.

He followed after her. "You see me, Kahina."

Rather than face him, she continued watching. "Yeah? Well apparently nobody else can see you, so they probably think I'm crazy. Besides, you're probably just a figment of my imagination, so what's the use?

The Jackal continued after her, the growl in his voice seemingly one of frustration rather than aggression. 'Not fig-ment. Not dream. Not Khayal. I am Kay'an. I am Anapa! I am Qadim. I walk sand before your grandfther's grandfather was even seed in the soil."

She sighed. "Oh... well... good for you."

His follow-up growl was a little more emotive, and he passed by her, turning to stand in front of her on the sidewalk. "You see me because you have Basirah. You see me because I am Kay'an. I am real. I am Spirit."

Rubbing the bridge of her nose, she stopped, sighing. "So what does that even mean?"

The Jackal spoke slowly. "I spirit. I am Anapa."

Taking a moment to sort herself out, she grasped the single piece of information she could even try to process, so she asked a follow up question. "Okay... and if you're a Spirit, and I haven't been able to see Spirits before today, how can I see you now?"

The Jackal spoke calmly, reaching a paw up as if plucking a fly out of the air. "You touch body. I touch body. I take Nour and you fel it. Now you have The Gift."

There was that word again. She didn't know what it meant, so she asked. "So what exactly IS Nour?"

The Jackal seemed confused by my question. "Nor is Ruh. It is part of you."

After speaking he pointed and she followed the gesture to where he pointed-- it took a moment before she realized what he was gesturing to. "A shadow?"

He sighed, obviously agitated at trying to explain something with a limited grasp of English. "Nour is... Al-Hayat... it is... Life-Fire. Not fire that burns wood. It is Fire that... makes Life. It is breath. Spark. It is 'You'. It is You that is not 'Gasad'... not Body. Yes?"

It made a little more sense and, since he had stepped out of her way, Bethany continued walking, but something about her presence kept her from putting him out of her mind. "So... you said your name is Qadim?"

He replied in a neutral tone. "Anapa. My name Anapa."

It was a start. "Oh. Okay. You look kinda Egyptian... like an Anubis or something."

The Jackal walking beside her grimaced at the name and he grunted, looking like he'd just eaten a lemon. "No. Not Anubis. I Anapa. I spirit, not god. God not spirit. Spirit not god. My name Anapa."

She was able to make sense of most of his statement. "Your name is Anapa?"

The Jackal nodded, motioning over his shoulder with a pointed gesture. "Humans... not now-- long time past... say Anapa. I Anapa."

Bethany nodded. "Okay... and not Anubis."

His head bobbed up and down in agreement. "Not Anubis."

She shrugged, turning the corner that led onto her home street. "Okay... it's just... you have the whole jackal thing going, and the history books say that Anubis was the god of the dead, and I met you gooning over a coffin..."

It was readily obvious that he didn't completely understand her point, but he seeme eager to refute it. "Books are Ghalat. Wrong. They see shadows on wall, not real thing. They make stories... just stories. I am not Al-Ma'bood. Not God. I am Anapa. Spirit. I work. I hunt. I live."

Nodding as if she understood, she ventured a statement based on what he'd already said. "And... not a god."

He glanced sideways at her, his gleaming lavendar eyes sharp. "A god has many Nour. Many people give Nour. I have what I find... until you, Kahina."

She found his statement pretty presumptive. "And what if I don't want to talk to you right now?"

The Jackal blinked. "I wait."

Bethany doubled down. "What if I don't want to talk to you ever"

Anapa looked genuinely hurt and he slowly sat down, eyes lowering to the ground as his ears drooped. Despite herself the young woman couldn't help but make the comparison between the Jackal and a whipped dog. Before she could say or do anything, he looked back up, offering her a paw. "I show you?"

The question didn't seem to be a response to her previous question and his limited words gave her the impression that he was seeking permission for-- she wasn't sure. There was a strange, unreadable sense of... SOMETHING in his eyes and, despite herself, she slid her hand into his waiting paw. He drew back right before their fingers met and she felt that same strange spark she encountered when she had touched her grandfather.

There was no great change or any mystical or magical explosion. There was no burst of light or Hollywood-style flashback, but something was different. A warmth filled her-- a sense of belonging and contentment. Memories of staying up late watching a movie with her grandfather; she recalled running into his arms after awakening from a bad nightmare; she remembered the first time her mom and dad let her sleep over at her grandparents' place on New Years Eve and falling asleep before they could celebrate at midnight.

Those feelings, all combined into one made her feel... everything. She whimpered softly as it all came crashing down around her. "He's gone... Grampa Don's gone. He's gone... oh Grampa Don..."

She fell into the grass, going to her knees as she cried. Bethany had been numb at the funeral home; she had been confused and angry on the march back from the ceremony; all of that had passed and she sobbed alone on the front yard of her home... only, she wasn't alone. Anapa knelt down beside her, resting a paw next to her hand on the grass as she bemoaned "It's... it's all... just... so much."

Anapa remained where he was beside her. "I help."

Bethany stood up and walked toward the door to her house, digging in her pocket for a key. "It... it hurts."

Apana didn't disagree. "Not all hurt is bad hurt, Kahina."

What he said made sense, in a fortune cookie kind of way, but tit didn't feel that helpful in the moment. "No... this IS bad hurt, Anapa. You wouldn't understand."

She fumbled with the keys, her vision blurred by tears. The house felt too quiet, too empty compared to her mind filled with the memories of her grandfather. Anapa stood silently behind her, no longer feeling as though he were looming, but close nevertheless. He lowered his head, amethyst colored eyes seeming to dim faintly. "The hurt is Al-Wafaa. Is proof that Nour was there. Is proof that love was there."

Bethany looked back to the Jackal as she finally got the door open, no longer seeing a monster or a dog-headed god, but, in that moment, there was something familiar to him-- a tired survivor who had also experienced loss... likely far more than she. "Does it ever stop? The feeling of him being gone?"

He followed after her, stepping up to the door as she went inside, but stopped at the threshhold. The Jackal's soft, almost tender tenor murmured gently. "La takhafi. Al-alam... ya'bur. Sabr, Kahina. Sabr."

Although she didn't understand the words themselves, the message was clear. There was a universal language she was coming to learn-- a sense of grief shared among any being capable of feeling loss and the empathy of a being who had liklely stood at the edge of the abyss so many times that the darkness no longer scared him. Closing the door separated her from the Jackal physically but, for some inexplicable reason, she could still feel his presence... and it didn't bother her as much as she thought it would.