Rococoa

by Balogun Ojetade (ed)

  I throw my arms over my face just as the explosion goes off, protecting me from the blazing wind. The Stranger’s unearthly screams fill the night, and I wish I could cover my ears too. Cautiously I lower my arms and see the Stranger sag to her knees, her cloak engulfed in flames, her face twisted in agony. Anguished moans escape her mouth as her flesh curdles and runs like melting wax. I watch as her dissolving hands claw at the earth, skin peeling off to reveal something black glistening in the firelight like mud. My stomach lurches at her grotesque destruction and even more at her pain, and the pain of my village returns to me, the pain of the people the Stranger was turning into her own. I had observed them, experimented in ways to kill them, and told myself it would be easier when I got to the Stranger.

  Her eyes peel open, blazing with hate. Something’s wrong though; her skin stops melting and slowly reverses, growing back in patches. I look down and see her hands totally restored, grave dirt moving up her arms and smothering the flames, filling in the damage. Even minor contact with earth was enough to heal grievous wounds?

  Spear in hand, I ram it into her burning breast, the tip buried as far as I can force it. The Stranger gasps, black slime falling from her mouth. The flames strengthen and her skin sloughs off in blackened chunks that crumble into the ground. She looks just like when we found her.

  “You can’t…stop us…” the Stranger wheezes, smoke curling from oozing lips. “We’ll come…kill you…make you…cattle…”

  The flames overtake her entirely with unnatural speed, as though a predator consuming favorite prey. Her body crumbles away and the flames dissipate just as quickly. All that remains is a skeleton, still kneeling, human in appearance save for its long fangs and metallic sheen. No; something else is there. Something sparkles in the abdomen.

  Wearily, I poke at the sparkling object and something round rolls out of the bloody ashes. A small jewel. Drawn to the bauble, I pick it up with my natural hand. A freezing pain shoots through it, and the Stranger’s laugh fills my head.

  I can never truly die, her spirit whispers to my soul. With my core I’ll make your body mine!

  No. Not now, not so close to finding peace. I can’t let her win after all the suffering. I can’t let my village, my Neema, be forgotten. I try to drop the jewel but she has control over my fingers, her presence sliding down my arm. In desperation I clamp my other hand around my forearm, trying to stop the spread. The rough wooden fingers squeeze my corrupted arm, the panel on the back still open. To my surprise, her presence weakens the moment I touch my arm. The wood!

  Realization strikes me, and I tip my hand strenuously toward the slot. The Stranger tries make my fingers squeeze shut over the jewel but I feel her grip on me slipping; contact with wood is disrupting the Stranger’s control. The jewel slips from my palm into the back of my wooden one, just the right size to replace the vial. Her control dissipates entirely, and I slide the panel over the jewel, the cold lessening in my arm already.

  I drop to the ground, gasping, hoping my right arm isn’t beyond healing. Warmth is slow to return to it and my hand is so numb I can’t feel it, but the fingers move when I will them to. The Stranger’s spirit is still there but now she howls and rages, simply a shroud over me. I laugh, clamping my hand over the panel. “So that’s why wood hurts you!” I point out. “It’s not just poisonous to you, it disrupts your powers!”

  You can’t keep me like this! I’ll regain my body and—

  “Be quiet or I’ll drop you into a bonfire,” I mutter. The Stranger goes silent. Looks like that would be even worse than trapping her in wood. Perhaps even a permanent death?

  Wait, the Stranger started, we can help each other. I have some wealth stashed away. I can make you rich and powerful!

  “How likely are your kind to return?” I ask. “Are there any more of you here?”

  The Stranger pauses for a moment. I don’t know. The chances of another ending up here are miniscule. Our power reaches far though; I’ve sensed something else on Earth, an ancient darkness that might call more of us here in the future. I’m not a soldier so any who come here looking for it will be far stronger than me.

  “How much stronger?”

  You can expect far more than three animated corpses and they can rot wood with a glance. You’ll need much more than some explosives and a spear.

  I pondered this. If she’s telling the truth then the world might be in terrible danger. Maybe not tomorrow or the day after, but someday…

  “Then I’ll just have to fight them when they show up,” I say. “If it takes a long time then I’ll train others, and they’ll train more if they need to. It’s not like I have a home to return to now.”

  I of course can help you! I know everything you need to know.

  “I don’t doubt it.” I know she’s just trying to save herself, but having just tried the same trick I don’t blame her.

  I lay in the dirt, closing my eyes and taking in the foul air. So I had my vengeance, just not the way I expected. I think of Neema, no longer dying but smiling. I smile too. Vengeance won’t bring my love or village back, but I like to think she’s satisfied with how this turned out. I won’t forgive the Stranger but if she can be used to save the world then maybe I can learn to tolerate her.

  I look at my wooden hand, rattling the jewel inside a little; the Stranger was foolish enough to risk me pulling a trick so she could have company. Well maybe I’m just as foolish, letting the Stranger stay with me for the same reasons. Or maybe we aren’t as different as we think. Loneliness takes a toll, and I realized how lonely I’ve been the past few years.

  Looks like we won’t be lonely anymore.

  THE CRAFTERS’ COVE

  D.L. Smith-Lee

  Their chains rattled when the cabin rocked violently as the storm encroached. Buziba couldn’t remember how many days it’d been since the Aldonians had taken him. The time he’d spent in the dark hold with the other Cayans seemed to meld together.

  It didn’t baffle him where they were being taken. This was a slave ship. They were headed for Lesthos, the major port city of Aldonia. From there they would be sold and separated from one another.

  The people of the Cayan Isles were their most frequent choice to enslave, since most Cayan Isles had weaker lines of defense. Most were too poor and backwater to afford weapons, so their villages could hardly withstand a raid. Aldonian slave owners began to think of themselves as saviors of these poor, weak people as justification for their enslavement.

  Buziba didn’t feel rescued, he felt abducted. His hand traced the scab from the scar inscribed on his cheek. The sword that had made this mark was the same one that killed his brother as he tried to defend Buziba. He tried not to think of his capture, the final night he saw his brother.

  His eyes had grown fond of the darkness. The cold chains cooled his skin, his only release from the sweltering heat in the hold. The vicious rocking hadn’t been the only thing that woke him from his bare slumber. A loud crash against the bars of his cell startled him.

  Glowing red eyes glared down at Buziba as he stared back awkwardly.

  “I’ll bet you want to be released from here,” a deep and sinister voice whispered.

  Buziba swore he’d heard it closer to him than where the red eyes glared at him. As if it was right in his ear.

  “Yes,” Buziba replied anxiously.

  “Is that really what you wish?” the voice inquired.

  He could only nod his head in response to the entity’s question. This time Buziba was sure he’d heard the voice directly in his ear. The hairs on the back of his neck rose as a sudden chill shook his body. More than a chill, more like a blizzard.

  Buziba could see his body shake but could not stop it. Regardless of the stifling heat he was cold, so cold he could barely feel his limbs as they thrashed about wildly. Buziba’s mouth opened as the black shadow forced itself down his throat.

  ####

  Buziba opened his eyes, now well-adjusted to the darkness. He star
ed at the ceiling, watching the water on the soggy wood sway back and forth. The storm was getting stronger. He stood and walked toward the iron bars of his cell only to be halted by the chains that bound his arms to the bulkhead behind him.

  Heat burned within Buziba’s chest. He’d never experienced rage like this before. Every vein in his body felt like a livewire, pumping energy through him viciously. Buziba shouted as he ripped the chains from the bulkhead, surely waking the other prisoners and alerting the guards.

  The iron bars of the cell gave way as he bent them outward. The stampede of guards stormed the passageway, halting a few feet from Buziba. The sight of this great dark skinned man that stood before them was not the only thing that held them in shock.

  The eyes in his head were not his own. They were as deeply crimson as the rivers of blood that ran through his hometown after these slave-peddling pirates attacked it. Rage consumed him again the moment he laid eyes on them. He charged forward as they brandished their muskets, diving for the first guard. He grabbed the man’s throat and rattled him wildly as another stabbed the blade of his musket into Buziba’s back. Buziba lashed out instantly, knocking the guard across the passageway, the blade of the musket still lodged in his back.

  That is enough, the voice told him. His head swiveled over the four guards (the one flailing in his grip lifelessly, the one unconscious from the blow he’d struck to his head, and two who remained with their muskets pointed, cowering before him).

  No, this voice he’d heard hadn’t come from them.

  Release the guard, the voice told him. He obeyed without a second thought. His eyes remained on the cowering guards as footsteps approached from behind. Buziba felt no fear, his resistance had waned.

  The guards backed away slowly but were halted by two other Cayan men, who’d been released from their cells. Their eyes bore the same unearthly red glow as Buziba’s.

  Hold them down, the voice commanded. The Cayan men obeyed immediately, holding the guards as they thrashed about in their grip.

  From his peripheral vision, Buziba could see multiple people walk around him, none of which were Aldonians. They stopped at his sides, nearly surrounding him as they watched a woman go ahead of them. She carried a small jar in her arms which she opened, screaming in a language which betrayed her obvious Cayan ancestry.

  The two Aldonian guards’ eyes grew large with fear as their mouths opened. They’d have screamed but the air was sucked from their lungs as the black shadows forced their way into their mouths.

  Her voice, Buziba thought. It was her. She’d been the one ordering them.

  The Cayan men dropped the guards, whose eyes had been changed almost instantly, as the woman returned the lid to the jar.

  Her dark, knee-length dreadlocks and multi-colored garment she wore gave hint to her tribal heritage. But how was she able to use this jar as she could?

  Buziba should have been horrified at the idea of being in the presence of a Crafter but he felt nothing. There were Crafters of fire, water, earth, air, spirit, ice, wood, and thunder but they had all died off. Those who didn’t were hunted and slaughtered since their magic was sacrilegious to the will of the Twin Goddesses.

  The woman turned to the men behind her, they were all under her influence. Their wills being taken away by their very spirits.

  “I have freed you all.” The woman announced proudly. “And now I have my very own ship and crew.”

  The men, Buziba included, all kneeled before this woman in a show of allegiance. They couldn’t explain why they felt this compulsion. The woman smiled upon them with purpling stormy eyes.

  ####

  The sun had finally broken through the infinite gray of the skies, beaming on the shimmering blue ocean. The sails of the Damwedo fluttered in the high winds. Kaba held the top of his tricorn hat securely to his head, counteracting the heavy winds.

  Kaba had wept for days after the attack, not because of the severe gash left in his shoulder from the keen scimitar but because of his brother. He knew he’d never see him again. The people of his village were truly close-knit but that was nothing compared to the bond he shared with his brother. Their parents had been lost years earlier, taken by illness. Kaba only had his older brother to look after him. That had been nearly fifteen years ago.

  Kaba descended below decks to see how his crew fared in the roughness of the seas. From the wooden threshold of the galley he watched as his pirates told tales by candlelight.

  “The seas tell the tale of a Cayan witch who overturned a slave ship.” Blaine, the newest addition to the Damwedo’s crew, told the men. “The high white sails turned ragged as she unleashed the spirits from a magic jar she carried with her. Using the spirits, she made slaves of her very own.

  “She freed the captives aboard the ship and forced the spirits of the jar down their throats while holding their rightful souls imprisoned. Under the influence of the spirits, the slaves obeyed her every command. She’d ordered them to kill their captors, displaying feats of inhuman strength and speed. She spared but few, making them her slaves as well. That has been the story for years.”

  “I’d be willin’ ta bet ye forty pounds o’ gold that there ain’t no witches,” Simon said, his voice thick with laughter. “All sounds like a bunch o’ spooky nonsense.”

  “That, good sir, would not be a false statement,” Blaine said to the white bearded man of pink skin, clearly burned from long hours of sunlight like most lighter skinned pirates. “If I hadn’t seen the witches myself I’d agree with you. But since my eyes have yet to betray me in my young age, I’ll have to believe them.”

  “Aw, phooey,” one of Simon’s gang chimed. This one was called Leny, a younger man of his mid to late twenties. His fiery red hair was a dead giveaway to his North Aldonian ancestry.

  “Well, my crew would’ve said otherwise, but they’re all slaughtered, thanks to the witches and their henchmen.” Blaine told them. The pirates laughed heartily at his words.

  “And we’re to believe this tall tale, why?” Simon asked, genuinely amused. The pirates stared amusedly at Blaine, a dark skinned Cayan descended man of smaller stature. They likely believed him to be an escaped slave or a convict. With his small stature, he could never have been a captain in their eyes.

  “Because,” Kaba’s familiar voice rang across the cabin.

  “Attention on deck!” One of the pirates shouted before they all shot upright, standing straighter than planks of wood.

  “Carry on!” Captain Kaba yelled back as the pirates obeyed before continuing. “The seas also tell the tale of a great sea lord who ruled the ocean and all of its inhabitants. His most loyal subjects were wrathful witches, Crafters more than likely, who protected his kingdom. The Island Kingdom he ruled was protected by massive whirlwinds of water that flung wayward ships to the rocky shores and angry lightning that struck the topmost sails of ships, killing all aboard.

  “One day the Order came and hunted down his witch servants, leaving his kingdom unprotected. Humans raided his island. Using their beasts and weapons, they destroyed the sea lord’s kingdom. They say witches live on the remains of the island, inside a dark cove where they feed souls to a massive jewel.”

  “Cap’n sir, ye believe this one?” Simon asked in disbelief.

  “If these witches are the same, then yes,” Kaba said. “But I must know,” he said to Blaine, “where did you learn this tale?”

  “Word of mouth, Cap’n sir,” Blaine responded.

  It had only been a few days since he was allowed to board the ship. Kaba found the young man floating at sea aboard a plank of wood. He’d said he barely escaped with his life since the witches took his crew.

  “Hmm, I suspect that the witches in the Sea Lord’s tale and the Cayan witch are very similar. My hypothesis: they’re the same witches, Crafters. Their jewel could mean massive fortunes for us all.” Kaba said, aiming his words to the crew whose eyes lit up with revelation.

  The cabin suddenly rocked viciously. Thro
ugh the brass speaker horn, the helmsman, Alistair, yelled through.

  “Cap’n sir, we’ve hit a massive storm out of nowhere!”

  We must be close, Kaba thought.

  “All hands on deck; that’s not a request!” Kaba ordered.

  Simon was his Bosun, in charge of all deck hands and deck operations. On the main deck, they immediately began fighting to steady the sails. The winds blew furiously as waves crashed against the ship’s hull. Kaba squinted through the pandemonium and swore he could see a typhoon form ahead of them.

  “All hands brace for shock!” He yelled over the storm.

  ####

  Kaba awoke against the threshold of his cabin, the sunlight flaring his vision. His clothes were drenched. The crew laid strewn across the deck, most unconscious and some bleeding but all moving. Kaba strained to see through the blinding sunlight as he made his way across the deck to the lifelines. Looking over the side he could see the bed of rocks lined against the Damwedo’s wooden hull.

  The ship had run aground. The faint sway of the aft end told Kaba that all it would need was a little push to get it going again. Kaba looked out to the distance as the Island came into perspective. This had to be it. The cove that was the witches’ home was surely nearby.

  Kaba awakened his crew. The medic attended the injured and stayed aboard while Kaba readied the remainder of the crew.

  “We go ashore before nightfall.” Kaba ordered.

  “Cap’n sir, I can lead the way in.” Blaine said.

  Kaba’s eyes narrowed at the small dark man.

  “Very well,” Kaba answered.

  Blaine nodded and swore Captain Kaba could trust him.

  “Sir, are ye sure we can trust ‘em?” Simon whispered to Kaba.