Serpent

"Gwynneth Kealey is on the edge of a moral precipice, till now she thought she had it all under control, despite not playing by the rules. Now, an indiscretion has her in a corner, one deviance threatening to unravel everything dear to her. Her secrets are closing in on her and her only chance is to run away with her husband, the man she loves. Adam Kealey a driven entomologist is about to embark on a pivotal, career defining research trip. His efforts to make a dinner for his wife do little to alleviate the tensions between them. He senses her unease. Gwyneth’s lover is not going to be overlooked; she needs to get away quickly. She convinces Adam to take her with him, fleeing the lover and determined to save her marriage. Adam senses the weight of it all, but the fact that he has to disrupt and threaten the success of the trip of this magnitude has him on edge. His search for a new species of stag beetle takes them off the map into a “kloof”, an unforgiving, secluded gorge of high cliffs and mountain pools. Despite the hike, the discovery of the waterfall brings tranquility to the couple; he goes against his better judgment and sets up camp. Adam falls into a deep postcoital sleep. Guilt drives Gwynn out of the tent to delete a stream of incriminating messages, nature falls into a deadly silence. A butcherbird plunges down at her, an unheeded warning; she scrambles into the tent, zipping them in. But they are no longer alone. Adam is the first to realise there is something in the tent. Straining to hear the nylon whispers of that something, he reaches for Gwynn’s phone. Lighting up the darkness, what he sees turns him cold. He wakes Gwynn with a sharp whisper, she sees her phone in his hand, shifting calculated, she weighs up her options and goes on the attack. The romantic escape to nature turns into the ultimate moment of reckoning as husband and wife are trapped in their tent, with one of the fastest most deadly snakes in the world, the Black Mamba. They could both die if they don’t work together. With restricted movement and certain death looming, the tent becomes a heated confessional to her cataclysmic truth. Gwynneth is pregnant. Held captive, the poignant beauty of what could have been and what is now broken is laid bare. Adam will die for his wife and his unborn child and she knows it. She starts to encourage it; she is too terrified to die. Let it be him. As Adam prepares to tackle the mamba with the sleeping bag, she throws herself at it. He pins her down. He sees it, the ugly truth, the baby is not his. Her face shifts as his darkness consumes him. She no longer appears to be his wife but something that should be destroyed. Something evil. Lost in a powerful delusion he tries to kill her, becoming the serpent himself. Poisoned by betrayal, the couple find themselves spiraling into a dangerous space, where the truth can do anything but set you free. Trapped, dehydrated and with no hope of help, they have to choose who deserves to live and who will take the ultimate Kiss of Death. "