The Burning Princess

by Matt Larkin

  Perhaps a dozen paces inside a woman sat—a mere girl really, probably not even twenty. Legs folded beneath her and arms at her sides, clearly meditating. A spark of fresh irritation shot through Pele. Who was this child to master such an art before Pele herself? And doing it here, as if to taunt her.

  The ground rumbled beneath her, responding to her rapidly dwindling patience.

  The girl’s eyes shot open but she said nothing, though her gaze clearly took in the flame floating in Pele’s hand. Her face might have registered surprise, but not really fear. Much as she hated being so feared, somehow not getting that response from Namaka felt like an insult.

  “You have trespassed on my island, Princess.” Pele took a step forward and summoned another flame, keeping both hands lit, well aware of the intimidating figure she must pose, face illuminated by flickering flames in the darkness. She needed to make certain her message was understood.

  Finally, the girl stood, advancing with narrowed eyes and not a hint of deference. “You attacked my friends.”

  How dare this little bitch come to her island with such an attitude? Because of this girl, the Valley Isle was in chaos, her own people dying. And now she had come to bring her curses and plague here. Pele had sworn to herself, to her people, that she would make up for the wrongs her father had done on this island. And if the only way to do so was to ensure Namaka and the foreigners stayed away, well, she could do that much.

  Fire was life. But fire could also be death. And through it, protection. “Your presence violates the most ancient of tabus, and I will not have the aumakuas here turn against my people. Leave this island immediately. Or you will find out what an attack actually looks like.”

  The girl spread her arms wide, flashing a wicked grin. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Damn her. Pele roared, jerking one arm forward and flinging the flame it held at Namaka. The fires spread, thinned into a wave that would bake the Princess alive and leave her a quivering mass begging for death.

  At the same time, Namaka flung her own arms together. As she did so, all the water in the cave coalesced before her like a wall. Pele’s flame hit the wall and evaporated in a shower of steam. The vapors filled the cave, cutting off her vision.

  The Princess shoved past her, sending Pele stumbling to the ground.

  “Bitch!” Pele shouted. She slapped her palm against the ground. If the Sea girl wanted to play, she would play. Pele fed mana into the earth and immediately set it to rumbling.

  These lava tubes were old, long emptied. But far beneath them, magma still ran. Magma ran everywhere if you dug deep enough. As the steam cleared and revealed her prey, Pele screamed her rage. A crack tore through the cave floor, spreading like a bolt of lightning straight for Namaka.

  The Sea Princess dove to the side, avoiding the crack. But that was not the threat. Pele poured more mana into the Earth and a spout of lava ripped through the rupture. It blasted against the roof and rained around the cave in a shower of searing destruction.

  Namaka screamed, both in pain and satisfying fear. The girl scrambled out of the cave then leapt off the ledge, falling toward the sea twenty paces below. By the time Pele had reached the edge, the girl had crashed into the ocean. Most likely she would have died on the rocks below.

  Rage continued to boil inside Pele. So hard to let it go, once it began to erupt. She wanted to …

  A maelstrom built in the ocean, swirling faster and faster. What in Lua-O-Milu? With no further warning, the sea erupted like a volcano itself, a geyser of water shooting twenty paces into the air.

  Pele stumbled, fell on her ass just to get out of the way. A shadow rose from the geyser—the girl. She was standing atop it, staring at Pele with hateful eyes. More powerful than Pele had credited. Fine. If Namaka wanted to test her limits, Pele would oblige. Hands still on the rock, she fed more mana into it, digging deep beneath the land.

  “If I wanted to kill you, I could have done so,” Namaka said. Her voice had become almost hollow, like Pele might imagine a ghost’s. Was this Princess somehow possessed?

  If so, she’d be doing the whole world a favor by ensuring her mana was freed from her current body. “You should have.” Pele shut her eyes for an instant, releasing all her rage at once. The cliff exploded as it turned itself into a miniature volcano, spewing destruction into the air. The trembling earth threatened to collapse the cave around her, and dust and sulfur blocked her vision. She had to get out of this place.

  With a wave of her hand she summoned a jet of lava and jumped on it, letting it carry her forward like she rode a surfboard over a wave. The jet hurled her into open space, allowing her a view of the cataclysm she had wrought. The sky was blacked with toxic fumes and volcanic lightning ignited in the air as heat collided with ice high in the sky. Incandescent rocks fell into the sea, and sent up plumes of steam. Namaka’s geyser had collapsed.

  All this she took in during a single heartbeat before she started to plummet. It was dangerously far to fall. Instead, she bent the lava jet she rode backward, using it to fling her atop the cliff. The clumsy maneuver barely carried her far enough. She hit hard, rolling several times and scraping her arms over the rocks. The lava she rolled over didn’t burn her skin, but her clothes ignited in an instant.

  Coughing and panting, she pushed herself up and discarded her ruined kihei. As she stood an enormous shadow fell over her. The volcanic eruption had left her ears ringing, so she heard nothing. She turned. A wave rose over the cliff like an implacable wall.

  Her heart leapt into her throat. She tried to scream but never got the chance. The wave washed over her with the force of a falling star, knocking all wind from her lungs, all thought from her mind.

  The next she was aware something had coiled around her, crushing her arms to her side. She gasped for breath, trying to make sense of a world spinning and tumbling. Her vision cleared just enough to make out Namaka, standing on the cliff again. Upside down.

  No—Pele was upside down. Held aloft by a tendril of water rising out of the sea, forcing her to look in the face of the girl before her. Those eyes were old, powerful. She’d been wrong. This was no mere girl at all. She had become a mermaid. And Pele had to protect her people from her.

  Despite her grogginess, she summoned flames to her palms, or tried.

  The Sea Princess sneered, then waved her hand. In time with the movement, the tendril holding her aloft uncoiled like a spring, flinging Pele far out over the ocean.

  She screamed as she fell.

  Hitting the water was like hitting a mountainside. Everything went black.

  15

  Kam stumbled out of the jungle, punching a tree trunk for good measure. And now his fist hurt. Stupid Chief Tangaloa and his stupid warriors and pig shit trees. An irresistible urge to take on boar form and run had overcome him, futile though it was beneath the sunlight. His bizarre, half human form had receded within moments of getting away from the village. He had no idea what the shit that was about.

  And so he’d wandered the jungle, hardly able to shape a thought. Pasikole had been a good man—odd, but good. And Kam hadn’t done shit but watch as Pasikole got murdered.

  A short walk down the beach and the man’s crew was bringing one of the other boats ashore. No doubt wondering where their captain was. And that was what Kamapua’a had finally come back to tell them. Being the messenger of shit news was a pig shit task. Arms folded over his chest, he stood watching the boat approach. He ought to just run back into the jungle. Run and run until his legs gave out and then fall into a heap and sleep until the moon rose.

  Kam wasn’t much for praying. But he’d heard kahuna could pray to the Poison God, Kalai-Pahoa. People said an angered kahuna could pray a man to death. Kam wasn’t a kahuna, but he was pretty shitting furious.

  And that was Inemes herself on the boat. Pasikole’s first mate. Shit, that had been a shock, finding out that ‘first mate’ didn’t mean ‘first lover.’ He’d thought that an odd title for a member o
f the crew.

  The woman looked to him now, eyes questioning as the boat drew near the shore. Wondering where in Lua-O-Milu her captain had gone. Well, he probably was in Milu’s underworld now. Or maybe his ghost was sitting around watching them. Was that likely? Maybe the village kahuna would have tried to send Pasikole’s soul onward. Maybe not yet.

  And if he was here?

  Kam looked around, but he didn’t see anything invisible. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Sorry I let you down.”

  “Where’s Captain Pasikole?” Inemes shouted as she leapt from her boat.

  Yup. The shit was here. Right here, right now. Big old pile of pig shit.

  “We tried to grab Tangaloa,” Kam said.

  “I know, he told me the plan. You were supposed to be back here hours ago. Where is he?”

  Kam threw up his hands. “I tried, all right? I tried to … They attacked us right at sunrise and I couldn’t … Stupid shitters killed them. Killed them all and I was useless as a wart on the ass.”

  The foreign woman’s face went blank for a moment, like maybe she hadn’t heard him. Or hadn’t understood.

  “I … uh …”

  She clenched her teeth and turned her head away, looking at something Kam couldn’t see. She’d been close to Pasikole. Must have been, even if she wasn’t his first lover. Close like Kam was to Namaka? Kāne, what would he do if something happened to her? Tear mountains down with his bare hands, most likely. And Inemes would want to do the same. She’d go into that village and try to kill them all. And most likely, she and her whole crew would wind up dead as well. Those pistols they carried were deadly as lightning, but they only worked once. Pasikole had told him as much.

  “You can’t go there,” he blurted.

  “What?” she spun back on him, darkness like nothing he had ever seen lingering in her eyes.

  “You want revenge, right? Can’t. You might kill them, but if you go storming in there, you’ll get dead too. I don’t think Pasikole would have wanted that. He liked you. So don’t get dead.”

  Inemes took a step toward him, glaring at him with a fire that would have made a kahuna proud. “I’m just supposed to walk away?”

  “Uh, sail away. You want to punish Tangaloa? Let me do it. Quiet like a boar, middle of the night.”

  “Boar’s aren’t quiet. And—”

  Kam held up his hand. “Mighty Kamapua’a has spoken. You go get yourself and your crew to safety. Honor Pasikole’s wishes.”

  Eyes narrowed, she folded her arms over her chest and watched him for a moment. Hopefully considering what he’d said. He wasn’t so good at convincing people of shit, but he really didn’t want her dead too. So many people had died these last two weeks. Ever since the Startracer came to the Valley Isle, death had been everywhere. They should go, leave forever.

  “You swear you’ll make them pay?” she asked.

  “I’m a boar of his word.” Most of the time. When it was convenient. But this was a promise he fully intended to keep. Tangaloa would catch a rancid lump of wereboar fury.

  After a long sigh, Inemes nodded, then raised a hand to her face like her head hurt. “You’re right, I suppose. He wouldn’t want any more of the crew to fall. He was determined to get us all home. To take the blame with the he’e. He told me that last night …”

  “Yeah, I’m always sometimes right. Wait, the he’e?” What did the octopuses have to do with anything?

  At that, Inemes glanced back at the sea as if she thought one of those creepy shitters was going to jump out at any moment. “They’re more powerful than I think your people realize. Slowly but surely they’re gaining a foothold in all human lands, taking over the world both above the sea and beneath it. And some of them are …” The woman swallowed, like she was afraid to say the word.

  “Are what?”

  “Sorcerers.”

  “What’s that?”

  She cocked her head to the side. “Wielders of the Art.”

  “Oh. Like kahuna.”

  “No, Kam. Not like kahuna. They practice profane rituals designed not to send spirits on to the Ghost World, but to call them forth, bind them. Pasikole was trying to learn about them, uncover their secrets. It was his greatest mission. And now that’s lost. He thought he could use Namaka and the others to defeat their god-king.”

  Kam shrugged. “I don’t know what all that means. I mean, I was pretty sure profanity was damn good. And I don’t see why his mission is lost. You can carry on. Not here. Obviously, not here. But you can still continue his work.”

  “Me?” Inemes glanced back at her crew. They looked expectantly at her. Not even understanding a word that had been said. Poor shitters. Didn’t even know how to talk right. “You think I could? That I should?”

  He shrugged again. “Only you can decide that. Me, I got some things to set right here on the Big Isle.”

  16

  Pain was the first thing she was aware of. Pain pounding in her head, coursing through her back, neck, shoulders. Everything hurt. Everything save a welcome warmth radiating near her cheek. Pele opened her eyes and looked into the small fire before her, seeing nothing else for a time.

  At last she turned enough to catch a glimpse of her surroundings. She lay in a grove in the forest, probably not far from the shore. Late afternoon, by the look of it. Something stirred beside her, then Fire-Keeper sat near her, his back to the flame. The kahuna pressed a calloused hand to her forehead, then nodded to himself and offered her a gourd of water. She tried to sit, but the pain of it blurred her vision and left her gasping.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “Take it slow.” He lifted the back of her head, then dipped the gourd, pouring a few welcome drops into her parched throat.

  Pele coughed, half choking on it, and Fire-Keeper laid her gently back on the ground. “How did I get here?”

  “I saw the battle and swam out to find you.”

  She shut her eyes again.

  “Can you feel the energy of the flame?” he asked sometime later.

  “Mmmm.”

  “The strongest Princesses of Flame can not only control that energy, they can draw it into themselves, converting it into fuel for their bodies. Do you want to try that?”

  Oh. So this would be a lesson then. It was undoubtedly too much to ask that her nearly dying should earn her a reprieve. Rather, her failure had earned her a lecture.

  “Instead of sending your mana out to control the flame, pull mana from it. Call it into you and direct it to the places that hurt the most. I know you can do this, Pele. Just put your hand in the fire.”

  She grunted. Sure, easy enough. If she could move. She hesitated just long enough to see if he intended help her. He didn’t. Part of the lesson, she supposed. Forcing her to pick herself up, to drag herself that last half pace or so to the fire. Pele rolled onto her side, panting with effort. Then, trying her best to ignore the pain, wiggled her way along the ground until she could drop her hand into the fire.

  It didn’t burn her, of course. Its incredible warmth was relaxing, actually. For a few breaths she just lay there, trying not to think. That was not her strong point. She had challenged Namaka, certain she could defeat any foe. Because contact between Princesses was so rare, those few fights that occurred became the stuff of legend. Would her defeat at Namaka’s hands now be passed down from generation to generation, immortalized in song? Her failure a jest for old men and children?

  The flame reacted to her sudden bout of anger, flaring up.

  “Wrong direction. You have to draw energy from the flame, not feed it.”

  Damn it. Why was it so hard to control her rage? Was that a gift from her father?

  No.

  No, thinking about him would only inflame her anger. She needed calm. She needed to get as close as she could to the meditative trance Fire-Keeper always urged her to achieve. The kahuna liked to reach that state by staring into the flicker of a fire. Watching its patterns unfold, always changing, always shifting, adapting, and yet�
��somehow—always the same.

  She kept her eyes locked on the fire he had built for her. The kahuna was always watching out for her. Oh, but he would let her fail. Let her get hurt. And sometimes, mostly at night, he would remind her that one day she would have to be strong enough to live and rule without him backing her up. She liked to tell herself that day was a long way away.

  Of course, she knew she was probably lying to herself. She likely had no more than another decade, two at the most. So Fire-Keeper would have far less.

  That thought, and the secret burst of fear it carried with it, cost her her concentration, and again the fire flared. This time, the kahuna said nothing, just slunk down across the fire from her. As he faded from her sight, she pushed him from her mind. There was only the fire.

  Fire was the source of light, heat, and ultimately life. Creating and consuming. And all her fears and pain and rage, she was meant to pour those back into the flame to be transformed. Everything goes into the flame. Fire-Keeper had repeated that mantra again and again when first trying to teach her meditation. No matter how many times she repeated it in her mind, she had never quite gotten there.

  Still, she let the mantra roll through her consciousness. Everything goes into the flame.

  With a sudden start, she felt herself falling. Her balance disrupted, she jerked upward, trying to steady herself. The fire had dimmed, diminished. And with it, some of the aches of her body had begun to fade. Indeed, how had she even managed to sit up? Moments ago she could barely move. Had she done it? Somehow drawn the energy back into her body? It was as if, in pouring all her thoughts into the fire, she had emptied herself and allowed it to fill the void.

  “You’re afraid to let go,” Fire-Keeper said, his face now visible across the dimmed fire. “For a moment you teetered on the edge of eternity, ready to connect with the universe. And in fear, you pulled back.”