by David Hair
Heke raised an eyebrow, seemingly interested now. ‘Still loyal even though the old man is dead?’
‘The old guy reckoned these boys were hanging tough, hiding out until a winner emerges. That day could be soon. Venn has sewn things up in the bush, pretty much. Just one rival to stomp out, I’ve heard.’
Heke licked his lips. ‘The Kyle woman,’ he murmured.
Not so ignorant of all this after all, are you, Heke? Parukau shrugged. ‘I need men to storm the place, before they throw in their lot with Venn and the opportunity is lost.’
Heke leant back and drained his can, waved a hand, and waited until another was opened and put in his hand. He was silent for a long time, stroking an old Rottweiler that lay at his feet, its throat and flanks scarred. The veteran of many a pit fight, Parukau guessed. A lot like its owner.
Finally, Heke spoke. ‘We never liked Puarata’s outfit, but they don’ cross our path, so we jus’ live and let live.’ He spat. ‘They’re a weird bunch — too much superstition and “Godfather” crap. We got their number.’
Parukau could barely keep the derisive smile off his face. ‘Got their number’? You’d have kissed Puarata’s tattooed arse if he’d come calling. Keeping from laughing out loud took an effort.
‘We don’t need no small-timer coming to us like we’re some sort of hired security firm for you to hide behind,’ Heke went on. ‘So, I’m going to give you my sort of deal, Tomoana. You can tell me where this treasure is, and then walk out of here with your balls still in your scrotum. Then, if and when we find anything, we will give you a reward for services. That’s the deal. Don’t waste your time bargaining, because I don’t bargain.’ Heke didn’t look like anyone’s kindly dad any more.
Parukau met his eye. Heke, you bag of blubber. You think you can intimidate me, who has lived for centuries and learned at the elbow of Puarata himself? He kept his voice level and his face neutral. ‘I thought you’d say that, Robert. I ain’t stupid. But when you see what I’ve got to show you, you’ll want to keep me in on the deal, and reach a better split.’
Heke belched contemptuously. ‘Will I? I told you: I don’t bargain, Tomoana.’
Parukau ostentatiously looked about them. ‘Do you have somewhere more private we can talk?’
Heke looked at him. They had been patted down and disarmed on arrival. He shrugged, and gestured to the most muscular of the patched men standing around the garden, who happened to be his son. ‘Arama, come with us.’ Arama Heke drained his beer and stalked over.
‘Looks like his father,’ observed Parukau. He did — a younger, slimmer version, bred for violence, an athlete of mayhem.
Heke slapped his son on the back. ‘Arama’s twice the size of your man “Boo-boo” or whatever you call him.’ He said it loud enough for them all to hear, and the Roadhawks boys laughed while Brutal scowled into his beer.
Heke led them through the garage to a windowless room with a stained and empty pool table in the middle, and a beer fridge in the corner. Old sofas lined the walls. Heke shut the door behind them, and locked it. Arama grinned at Parukau as he picked up a broken pool cue. Holding the narrow shaft, he slapped the heavy metal-ringed handle into his palm meatily.
Subtle, thought Parukau. He turned and looked at Heke across the table. ‘Want a game?’ he asked drily.
Heke shook his head, placed both hands on the table and leant forward, whilst Arama circled behind Parukau. ‘I’m through with games, Tomoana. Tell me where this place is or we’ll smash you into pulp.’
Parukau grinned at him, and felt the serpent within him rise. He met Heke’s eyes. The man was confident, complacently secure, and though his will was strong, he was an innocent in the way the world really was. The world he lived in had such ordinary nightmares. He raised a hand, and reached out with the shadows that dwelt within.
To Heke it seemed that Parukau’s whole form wavered, like a stone dropped in a pool, and then his eyes went black. The ceiling lights flickered, and then blew with a loud crack and the stink of burnt dust. The room was plunged into darkness.
‘Arama!’ he yelled, and he heard his son begin to reply then gasp. Something heavy smashed into the pool table, once, twice, like meat slapping the counter at a butcher’s shop. Someone slithered to the floor heavily.
The room fell silent. Impossibly, the broken light bulbs flared; for a second. Parukau was looking at him across the table. Then darkness. Then they flashed on, and Parukau was crawling across the table. Then the image was gone again, but not before it was burned on his retina. He backed away, mouth opening to scream.
Hands clamped his skull, and an unseen mouth closed over his. He shrieked into it, trying to pull away, a reflex of terror and disgust, but it was as if he were caught in a vice, and then something slithered inside his throat. He fell to the floor, choking.
The lights came on. Parukau stood over him, a tender look on his face. From his mouth a thin stream of smoky shadow seemed to run down to his own mouth. He froze, beyond panic, rigid in terror as the being above him smirked, and bent over him. ‘Hello, Robert. What are you doing down there? Aren’t you well? Have you caught something perhaps? Or perhaps something has caught you!’ He laughed vilely. ‘Do you know the old saying “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” It’s Shakespeare, you know. Asher Grieve used to like to say it — do you know that name, Robert?’
Heke shook and lost control of his bladder. The stink of hot urine filled the room. Parukau sniggered, and spoke again, but this time his mouth didn’t move and the words spoke directly into the Roadhawks’ boss’s mind.
‘The rules have changed, Robert. Parukau has returned! I’m going to take everything Puarata once had, and I am going to destroy Venn and Kyle and whoever else stands in my way. And then I’m going to turn on the gangs, and those that do not pledge to me will be flayed. Do you hear me?’
Heke nodded mutely. He glimpsed Arama, lying senseless but still breathing. He could not remember feeling such terror ever before.
‘Yes, I’m speaking into your head, Robert. I can get there whenever I want to. So you think that Puarata was all just superstition and secrecy, do you? Wrong! His power was real and I spent six hundred years at his side. I am the heir to his kingdom. Only those that are with me will be spared.’
He smiled, and offered his hand to the fallen man, palm down. He spoke naturally this time. ‘Pledge yourself to me, Heke. And believe me, I will know if you are insincere. That will not go well for you, your son or your wife. Or your pretty little daughter.’ He held out his hand, where a silver death-head ring gleamed dully. ‘Kiss it, Robert.’
The big man did so, and only then did Parukau swallow that thread of darkness. He watched the older man shudder as he was released.
‘You are mine now, Robert.’
Deano drove them home after Heke had been given his orders. He would lay hands on guns and ammunition, and the whole chapter would muster. Although before they could go to Rotorua, they needed to find Hine Horatai.
‘Heke looked like he’d seen a ghost, eh. Whitest brownie I’ve ever seen,’ chortled Brutal. ‘Can’t believe they’re gonna follow your orders, boss,’ he added. ‘I thought they’d beat the crap out of us.’
Parukau just smiled. ‘You gotta know the right strings to pull, Brutal. That’s why I am the boss, and that is why we’re going to come out of the next few days very rich.’ He had told them a little of what was going on, essentially the same story he had spun to Heke. They laughed and joked as they wound their way through town, but his mind was elsewhere. Where are you, Hine Horatai? When I find you, you’ll regret running away. I want you even more than Evan Tomoana did. How are you hiding from me?
He sat up suddenly. And slowly smiled.
Of course! I know where you are, you little bitch!
It was the only place that made sense, here in Taupo.
Aethlyn Jones’s house.
Patupaiarehe
T
uesday evening
Donna Kyle stared from her hotel balcony, swirling a cognac. The evening was chill but she scarcely felt it, or the sweet, strong spirit. She was numb. Everything seemed grey, as if she was going colour-blind. It was a sensation both physical and spiritual. Her skin didn’t register pain or pleasure the way it used to. Emotions that should have been intense were dull and distant. All that kept her going was the refusal to lose, to succumb to Venn or Bryce or the others. Doubts and fears gnawed at her like maggots.
Father … Asher Grieve, back from the graveyard of her memories. The thought of seeing him in the flesh petrified her, unless it was to drive a knife through his poisonous heart. And yet … did he really hold the key to Te Iho? Could she afford to turn her back on him?
She blinked those thoughts away. Lake Taupo was darkened now to a rusted metallic sheen as the sun set. The volcanoes were hidden in cumulus gathered in the south, brooding and ominous. It would be bleak outside tonight, and bitterly cold. She tossed off the cognac in one swallow, waited for the alcohol to hit her, but felt nothing. None of the hotel staff saw her leave in her grey Toyota 4WD. The streets were almost empty, the houses were dark hulks with curtains faintly aglow. When she left the city limits, the darkness felt like a cave.
It took her thirty minutes driving through stony back roads to reach the foot of Mount Tauhara, where she parked the Toyota in a place Puarata had shown her, between two old totara, their roots deep in both worlds. Tauhara leant over her like a watchful giant. A half-moon peered through the shredded ghosts of clouds, and half-lit the clearing. She unlocked a shrouded cage that sat on the passenger seat, and pulled out a young tabby cat. It thrashed about, but her grip never flinched as she carried it into the middle of the clearing, knife in her hand.
She could have chanted some ‘magical’ gibberish, but it would have been just ceremony and nonsense, a fancy way of saying: ‘Here I am, look at me.’ She had no stomach for that tonight, just wanted to get it over with. She raised the knife, and slashed. For an instant, she wanted to swallow the hot fluid. Blood was what she dreamt of now, ever since that life-saving fluid Puarata had fed her. But the thought turned her stomach, and worse, it would insult those she summoned.
She lowered the dying cat to the ground and backed towards her vehicle, still holding the knife. Shadows seemed to melt together and swim across the clearing. There were four of them, two male and two female. Pale-skinned, wild hair coloured like rust, eyes feral. They were clad in a motley collection of Maori and colonial attire. Their movements were feverish and jerky. The tallest male had a sword at his belt, a medieval broadsword. He looked at her warily as he lifted the cat to his mouth. He made a slurping noise as he drank, blood spilling down his chin. One of the women licked his face clean, then fed second. The other two waited hungrily, and took their turns, while the first two, their faces slowly turning ruddy, regarded Donna watchfully.
They were patupaiarehe, vampiric fairy creatures from the darkest places of Aotearoa. Tauhara was known for them. They usually lurked on the fringes of isolated settlements, content to steal babies or cattle from the denizens of Aotearoa. Many were harmless, but these ones weren’t. She knew their names, imparted by Puarata, and she named them now, secret words that bound them to her will. They hated that. She felt the names twist like rope about their souls. She held up her hand, and from it four silvery cords now extended, one each to the centre of their chests. She yanked the cords and watched them flinch, their hackles rising, eyes glittering with malice.
‘Why didn’t you drink, lady?’ the chief male called her, trying to break her composure. He had tattoos, but they were Celtic ones that writhed weirdly across his face. He spoke English, with an Irish accent. All their true names were European, oddly. ‘We know you wanted to. We could feel your hunger.’
The thin-faced lady at his feet held out the cat to her. ‘There is still a little wine left, lady. A few dregs at the bottom of the flask,’ she giggled.
‘Nearly one of us, you are,’ observed the lesser male, a scarecrow with his skinny limbs hunched like a roosting bird. ‘Your blood is tainted, like ours.’
Only the fourth didn’t taunt her. A quiet one, that looked barely into puberty. She stood on the verge of flight, but tethered by the cord wrapped around her heart. Donna drew herself up. ‘Silence! I command you now. You will not question my authority.’
‘Oh, your authority is undoubted, Princess,’ sneered the chief male wearily. ‘We are your humblest servants. You have our names, you have bound us.’ He reached up and tugged gently on the half-visible cord of light that ran like a leash from his heart to her hand. His smile was ironic. ‘All I wanted was to be free. I crossed the globe hundreds of years ago, before it was even known that it was a globe, to escape witches like you. Arcane slave-keepers, and murderous priests. But here at the end of the world, there is nowhere else to run. So I shall be a slave after all.’
He bent his knee with a haughty toss of the head. The other three mimicked his movements. The four cords in her hand felt oily and untrustworthy, like vipers, with fanged heads that could twist and lunge in her grasp. But short of binding a taniwha to her will, there were no better servants for the conflict to come. She needed them.
‘I will give you use-names, as I cannot use your true names openly. You, I will call “Stone”,’ she told the leader. He nodded disinterestedly as he fondled the hilt of his broadsword.
‘You, the hunched male, you are “Heron”.’ The scarecrow patupaiarehe nodded casually.
‘Give me a pretty name, lady,’ said the elder female, the one at Stone’s feet. ‘“Isabella”, perhaps?’
Donna studied the girl, her ribs showing beneath her tiny breasts, her teeth glittering, and her lips vivid. ‘You are “Thorn”,’ she replied spitefully. The skinny girl pouted, muttering under her breath.
The last female had hung back a little, had fed last and only briefly. Clearly she was the lowest in the nest. She looked barely fifteen, and reminded Donna suddenly of herself, before Asher came for her. ‘You, the quiet one, what is your preference?’
‘Call her “Sow Face” or “Cow Breath”,’ suggested Thorn with a cold snicker. ‘She is our servant. She licks our feet to cleanse us after we journey. She can lick yours, too, if you like,’ she added with a cold titter. ‘She has no pride left. We took it away from her.’
‘Shut up, Thorn.’ Donna stared down at the skinny being briefly and then returned her gaze to the dark-haired girl. Her hands were clasped as if in prayer, her head bowed. She still seemed to cling to some kind of innocence, despite her state. She found herself moved unexpectedly. ‘I will call you “Rose”,’ she said with a faint softness in her voice that she instantly regretted. Why that name? The other three looked at each other conspiratorially.
She reasserted control, jerking the silver heart-cords. ‘These are my commands. Stone, you will go to Rotorua, to the tipua goblins that haunt the northern shores, and tell them that Puarata’s heir commands their obedience. I will join you there in two or three days. Be discreet, and do not kill unless assailed.’
Stone bowed deeply. ‘As you command, Princess,’ he growled, his voice laden with resentment.
‘And you, Thorn, go to the tipua chief to the west of Taupo and demand a war-party be sent here to serve me. I shall expect its arrival tomorrow, ready to fight.’
Thorn spat blood. ‘The tipua are worms.’
‘Then you should get on famously. Both of you, go! And do not forget who holds your souls.’ She twisted the cords in her hand, sending a lash of pain before releasing them. ‘Go! Go and do not tarry.’
Stone and Thorn fled into the night. She turned to the remaining two patupaiarehe. ‘Heron, you will be my eyes and ears here in Taupo. I have sensed presences, people of power. Identify them for me. Move unseen. Observe their actions. Report to me before dawn. Understood?’
Heron cowered obsequiously. ‘I hear and obey, O Princess. Do not hurt me. I am your servant, loyal and tr
ue.’ He lifted, and soared away before she changed her mind.
Rose stood watching her, huddled in her cloak and shivering. When she turned towards her, the girl bowed her head, awaiting the lash. She looked like an abuse victim. Donna fought a pang of kinship. ‘Come, Rose.’ She turned and pulled her along by her silvery half-seen leash. ‘You will serve and guard me. You will do as I say, nothing more or less. Do I need to whip you also, to teach you your place?’
‘No, mistress,’ the girl breathed. ‘I already understand my place.’ She looked at Donna sideways through a curtain of tangled hair. Up close she smelt filthy, of rotting leaves and fetid mud, and her breath was foul with blood-taint.
‘Then come with me.’ She took her to the Toyota and showed her how to get in, then drove back to the hotel. Rose was terrified of the great mechanical monster in whose belly she sat. She clung to the seat initially, then she slowly sank to the floor and huddled, whimpering. Donna had chosen this hotel because she could come and go without being observed, and was glad of this as she led the girl inside. The young patupaiarehe whimpered in terror as the lift ascended.
Inside her rooms, Donna led the girl immediately to the bathroom, and showed her the shower and toilet. ‘If you are going to be of use to me, then you must be clean. You can’t be seen as you are.’ She held up a bar of soap. ‘Do you know what this is?’
Rose’s face lit up. ‘Soap,’ she said in wonderment. ‘It is soap!’ She clutched it to herself girlishly. Donna felt another strange emotion, an almost motherly pang that infuriated and frightened her. She hastily showed Rose the toothpaste and toothbrush and how to use them, and what to do with shampoo, conditioner and mouthwash. What the hairdryer was for. Rose took it all in like a child in her favourite class at school. Her mouth hung open and her eyes were wet with unshed tears. ‘I do want to be clean again,’ she whispered, her face glowing. ‘Like I used to be.’