by AA Lee
“Don’t mention it. You are my niece. What are families for?”
Kenda smiled in gratitude and felt a lump in her throat. She was lucky to have such a kind aunt. No more words were spoken about her mother or her father. She didn’t have any memories of them. Ever since she was young, the matter had not been discussed openly, and Kenda had grown tired of asking about her parents. The people she had asked had avoided the topic, so she just tried to forget about them. Her grandparents had been the ones to bring her up, and it felt disrespectful of her to complain, although there were times when she couldn’t help but wonder what her parents had been like.
Dinner consisted of boiled potatoes and vegetable stew. It was common for them to eat potatoes as they were easy to grow and filled their stomachs quickly. Rice was a luxury that people ran out of a few months after the harvest.
Kenda was happy, nevertheless. Her cousins were kind, and she felt happy in their company. They were her friends, and she shared a room with them. Since the death of Kenda’s grandmother, their nights were normally composed of storytelling. It was either Pilly or one of the children who told stories until they all fell asleep.
The stories were passed on from generation to generation, but the children never got tired of them. They would repeat the same stories several times, and each time, it was still exciting to them. They had heard each story so often that when the storyteller occasionally forgot a part of the story, someone else would be able to jump in to complete it.
Kenda woke up to the sound of people arguing and shouting. Her cousins also rubbed the sleep from their eyes as the voices became louder.
The sun had risen, but as they were not going anywhere today, Kenda had not bothered to ask her uncle to wake her up early. She stretched and willed her droopy eyes to open.
“We did not steal anything.” It was Goni’s voice. “You can search the house. There is nothing here.”
“Yes, you did. There were witnesses yesterday. And that wicked niece of yours used her power to get away. People saw it with their own eyes.” The second voice she heard was Datu Romu’s, and Kenda’s heart beat faster. She peeked through the gaps between the bamboo walls.
“But they did not see us stealing anything. They just saw us leaving.”
“Come here, Albe. Tell them. What did you see yesterday?”
Albe was Datu Romu’s servant. He was afraid of Datu Romu, but he was known for telling the truth. In that moment, Kenda was afraid the Datu had pressured the servant into lying for him.
“When I came back to your house, I saw some coins on the floor and you were bleeding. Goni and Kenda were running away.”
The servant had told the truth, Kenda concluded. She had not seen the coins, although she suspected that Romu must have put them there himself. As a result, it was their word against the datu’s, and it was clear that he had a way to spin stories. She came out of the room and proudly showed herself to the people gathered outside. The crowd was more than she had expected, and her bravery started to evaporate.
“Huh! Here’s the other thief! Shame on you for not even showing an ounce of guilt.”
“You should be the guilty one,” Kenda accused him. “Now that you have failed in taking advantage of me sexually, you accuse us of being thieves!”
“How dare you accuse my husband of such a despicable crime! You should be ashamed of yourself!” Pida, Datu Romu’s wife, was notorious for always taking her husband’s side.
“You weren’t there when it happened,” Kenda pointed out. “How can you take your husband’s side without knowing the truth? How sure are you that your husband is loyal? Did you know that he told me that he wanted to marry me because you were too old and not interesting anymore? Those were his exact words.”
Pida put her hands on her chest, furious and hurt at what was being said, as though it was Kenda’s fault for saying those words, even though they had come from her husband’s lips.
“Wow! Look at this kid, trying to lie her way out. Listen, people!” Datu Romu said in a loud voice. “Can you see this wound on my head?” The people looked at him. “This girl tried to seduce me, and when I got wise to her plan, she assaulted me.” People gasped. “The two of them had planned to steal my money. They were envious and angry that I had asked them to do irrigations for the villagers.”
“Liar!” Kenda shouted, but the Datu continued speaking and the people continued to listen.
“When she did not succeed in seducing me, Goni came and hit me with a branch.”
People started murmuring. Kenda couldn’t believe how foolish the villagers were. Goni made no further attempts to defend them, instead allowing Datu Romu to do all the talking, and that made Kenda even more angry. His uncle was making no effort to convince people to believe their version of events.
“Do you think that people will believe you just because you are the datu?”
“No, I’m not trying to use my position here. If you were not at fault, why did you run? Why did you hide?”
Kenda couldn’t defend herself. It was true that they had tried to steal some documents, but they had been unable to do so, and even she had to admit that running away made her and her uncle look guilty.
“We were not trying to hide. We were just scared when you started screaming.” She stammered a little and chastised herself for doing so.
“Huh! And who will believe you? A girl with magic and a man who has tricks up his sleeve versus an old man? What could I possibly do?”
Kenda couldn’t answer through fear of making the situation worse, so she kept her mouth shut.
“As the head of this village, I don’t want this to happen to anyone else.”
He faked compassion, and Kenda clenched her fists to stop herself from calling the water.
“I recommend that these two be imprisoned as criminals. They are both dangerous.”
“That is ridiculous,” Pilly protested. “My husband would never do such a thing.”
“Oh, wouldn’t he?” Datu Romu mocked. “What about what happened at the Great Fall? Didn’t he fight and injure men from the village of Nayon?”
“Yes, but that was different.”
“No, he is dangerous. There were witnesses to what happened. He is more than capable of violence.”
Pilly covered her mouth in shock as to how Datu Romu had just shot her defense. Nobody stepped in to contradict, and all Kenda could do was to allow the people to carry her to the prison when the datu ordered them to.
Chapter 29
Kenda
“I’m sorry for saying this, Uncle, but you’re kind of pathetic.”
Goni grimaced but did not contradict her. He just stayed sat cross-legged on the dirt floor. Their cell was a few meters away from Jinja’s, who had ignored them when they had been brought in.
“Why don’t you fight back? You always let Datu Romu win.”
“Well, he’s winning, but I’m not really losing.”
“What do you mean? He locked you in here to make you suffer. And, in the meantime, your family also suffers.”
“Not exactly.”
“What?” Kenda was really annoyed by her uncle’s passiveness.
“Listen,” he said in a low voice. “This place is not so bad. It is just a physical prison. No one has the magic to prevent me from using mine, so at least I can train you here.”
“But what about Aunt Pilly? Don’t you think it is too hard for her to provide food for your children when you are not home? And what about all Datu Romu’s accusations toward us?”
Goni waved her worries away. “Remember when you were a kid, I showed you shiny stones.” Kenda was all ears after having sold the gold in town. “I let my wife know the location so that she would not suffer in case something happened to me. She is fully aware of my responsibility as your protector.”
Kenda’s eyes widened. “That’s why she’s been so kind to me!”
“Well, it’s complicated, as she remembers that I have a duty to protect you, but,
like everyone else, she forgets that you are the Bringer of Equality. She is kind because she pities you. But back to the gold. How do you think she’s been managing financially when all I did for the past two months was go to work with you without bringing any money home?”
Kenda pondered and saw her uncle’s point.
“Because money was never an issue to begin with. We have been secretly exchanging gold in town for years. Anyway, let me show you a trick.” Goni reached inside his inner jacket pocket and removed a red bottle. “Fortunately, they did not search me and remove my things before they locked us in here.”
“What is that?”
“It’s—”
Goni stopped talking as they saw people approaching from the gate. It was Datu Romu, and something white was following him. Kenda strained to see the thing clearly before she realized it was Lucy. Kenda pretended not to look at the cat as the datu approached. He had a smirk on his face.
“So, how’s prison? Both of you are here for the second time. I will make sure that, this time, both of you will not be able to get out.”
Both of them were silent. They ignored him.
“It seems like I have lost some money.”
Kenda gave him a death stare.
Datu Romu was not affected by her glare. “I think that since this girl doesn’t have any money ...well, her grandmother used to have some, but she gave it all to that man’s family…” He motioned toward Jinja’s cell.
Kenda was boiling with anger. She raised her hand to call upon the water, even though the river was miles away. Goni stopped her hand and forced her to put it down.
“Pathetic.” Datu Romu spat. “Is that what you want to do? Kill me?” He laughed maniacally. “Go on, kill me. If you do, people will be afraid of you and you will be banished. Perhaps to the land of the leeches. Maybe you will refuse to go and kill us all.” He walked back and forth, like a father lecturing a child. “Or perhaps you can be my mistress and we will forget this ever happened.”
“Over my dead body, you disgusting old man!”
“Fine, then. You don’t want to marry me? The people close to you will suffer!”
Kenda trembled in anger and she struggled to control the tears which fell from her eyes. He was right. She couldn’t kill him without running the risk of upsetting the rest of the village.
“As I have said earlier, I have lost some money. You need to pay it back.” He looked at Goni.
“We don’t have any money,” Goni said weakly.
“Then give me your farm.”
“But… but that is the only thing we have. My family will starve without it.”
“Now you know the cost of your niece’s actions. It is up to you. Convince her to be my mistress, or let your family starve to death. I will be back tomorrow.” He turned to leave.
Lucy crept from behind him and jumped onto Datu Romu’s upper body. Its claws hung tightly on his clothes, and the datu thrashed loudly. Lucy climbed one more step and buried her claws into his neck. Blood oozed from the wound, and he cursed. He tried to swipe the cat away, but the cat’s claws were too strong for him to dislodge them.
This time, Kenda did not tell Lucy to stop. She was very happy that her cat was able to get revenge on her behalf. “Way to go, Lucy!”
Datu Romu finally picked up a stick and went to hit his back where Lucy was hanging. Before the stick hit the cat, Lucy jumped and the Datu hit his own back.
Kenda laughed hysterically. “Look at that crazy old man hitting himself!”
Datu Romu chased the cat, but Lucy was too fast and agile, so he gave up and left the prison, trying hard to compress the open wounds caused by the cat’s claws.
“Come here, Lucy. Oh, thank you.”
Lucy walked toward her. Its claws still had blood on them, and Kenda abhorred seeing the old man’s blood. She had never hated anyone like that in her whole life, not even Jinja.
“Lucy, wipe your claws before coming in here. I hate that man’s blood.” Lucy looked around, selected a patch of dry grass, and slowly wiped its claws.
“Give me that big leaf there. I will clean them for you.” Lucy followed her instruction, bit the leaf, and brought it to Kenda.
Goni looked at her with amazement but did not disturb her conversation with the cat. He sat back on the ground again with his legs crossed, watching her and the cat.
There was something weird about the way Lucy walked. Kenda hadn’t noticed it earlier, but it looked like it was limping and was trying not to put pressure on its right foreleg.
Kenda removed the taro leaf from the cat’s mouth and let the cat sit on her lap while she carefully wiped the blood from the cat’s claws. She poured water onto the coconut shell after she had thoroughly cleaned the cat, and the cat started to lap up water.
Kenda stroked the cat’s head and noticed that a portion of its fur was missing above its right foreleg. Kenda touched it, and the cat meowed in loud protest.
“Are you hurt?”
“What happened?” Kenda’s voice rose in alarm. She gently pushed the cat’s fur aside, and her mouth opened in shock. “Lucy! You’re hurt!” She turned to Goni. “Uncle, what should we do? Lucy is badly hurt.”
Goni leaned closer in order to examine the wound. Lucy had gone silent and let Kenda look at the wound, which looked as though it had been caused by the stab of a knife. It was a clean cut, but dried blood had made it look ugly and the fur sticking on it made it look like it was much bigger.
“This is bad. It looks deep, and it could become infected. We don’t have anything to clean it here except water, and we only have a limited supply.” Goni looked around the cell. “There is absolutely nothing here that we can use to treat it. First, let’s try and clean it.”
The cat meowed slowly as Goni poured water onto the wound. It didn’t like water, but it knew that what they were doing was for its own good. It meowed loudly but tried to stop itself when Kenda pulled the fur away from the wound.
“We need to tie this part so that it will heal.” Kenda pointed to the cat’s foreleg.
“You’re right, but, before that, we need to disinfect it.”
“We need guava leaves!” Kenda shouted in realization. She remembered that her grandmother had used guava leaves to wash her wounds when she was little. Her grandmother would boil the guava leaves and apply the brownish water after boiling it. Sim had also used it to treat her wound when she had tried to escape.
Goni stood. “Let me go and find guavas in this prison. It is a wild plant, so maybe we can find one here.”
Goni was gone for about an hour, and Kenda was too impatient to wait for him. “Lucy, are you okay?”
Liar, Kenda thought to herself. She knew that Lucy was not okay. The cat was usually talkative and liked nothing more than to bother her, but it was uncharacteristically quiet today.
“How did you get hurt?” She voiced the question that she really wanted an answer to. The cat had not voluntarily told her what had happened, and so she was forced to ask.
“And…?”
“You were watching!” Kenda couldn’t help but cut short the cat’s statement.
“You shouldn’t have risked it, Lucy. That was dangerous.”
“What?”
Kenda’s eyes widened.
“What are miners? And how did you know that?”
Kenda’s heart thumped. “But how did they know that there was gold here? Was it my fault? Did the man I sold the gold to tell them that it could be found here?”
But the cat had no more answers to her questions. It simply laid its head on the ground to sleep.
Goni returned, sweat streaming down his face. “I’m sorry. There was no guava tree here. I searched everywhere, but I haven’t found any.”
“This can’t be. Lucy was only injured because of trying to help us. It was even able to look at the evidence that we failed to see. I can’t let it suffer. I have to get out to find help.”
“No, you have to listen to me. There is too much at stake here. Datu Romu is just waiting for you to commit more mistakes so that you can be punished further. There has to be another way besides you getting out.”
“I can use my magic.” But as soon as she finished saying it, she realized that she couldn’t. Jinja was looking at them. Kenda turned to the gate. The guards were not watching. Kenda and Goni’s eyes met, and they nodded to each other. They went out of their cell and walked over to Jinja’s. Jinja looked like he didn’t care, but he suddenly went on the defensive as soon as they started to open the door.
Before Jinja could open his mouth, Goni released a blow to his forehead, knocking him to the ground. They tied his hands behind his back with vines from the nearby wall and tied him to face the prison bars away from their cell.
They returned quickly to their cell and Kenda sat down next to Lucy. She put her hand on the well that Goni had made and called forth water. “Please bring me guava leaves.”