Eden, Dawn

by Archer Swift

Chapter 45

  The royal rigmarole rambled on and on until the final Royals, quite noticeably, the Chiefs of Zika, took their seats. Wearing elaborate blue headpieces and grandiose attire—blazing purple robes, with striking green and red stripes—accompanied by an exhibitionist swagger to boot, they took up positions on each side of the royal balcony; six on one side, five on the other: Miltredic’s empty spot now glaringly conspicuous.

  While they certainly had my attention, the crowd seemed less interested and a bristling murmur rumbled over the audience. That was until the trumpeters pulverised the audience into another stiff silence. With significant effort, the herald hefted to his feet once more, threatening his legs again with his considerable bulk, for yet another imperial yakka.

  This time, the lights suspended overhead dazzled the arena in a shower of majestic radiance unparalleled yet. I knew what time it was. Though I hadn’t located Shumbalic or Miltredic in the crowd, if they were even present, one other Zikalic was yet to make his appearance. His seat was empty. And he had the most audacious seat in the house.

  It was Xakanic time.

  Every Zikalic stood to their feet. And unexpectedly, they burst into song; without any musical accompaniment. While I, of course, didn’t know the words they sung, I had to admit; it was moving. Sixty thousand voices in unison! The tone and tenor powerful, utterly overwhelming; like the sudden onslaught of a gale-force wind rushing into the sail of a ship, it snapped my shoulders back, cranked my spine stiff, and jolted every fibre of my being. They would’ve lifted the roof, if the arena had one.

  Then in he walked.

  Waltzed in … from an undisclosed entrance point on the first level.

  The monstrous, execrable Zikalic sauntered towards his throne, like a parading peacock, indulging in the praise proffered his way. Xakanic! The way he flagrantly basked in his people’s laudation made me sick, and immediately sullied the singing that had stirred me a second earlier. Only when he was about ten strides from his seat did I notice something dragged behind him … on a leash? Did he have a human pet?

  Surely not.

  As he yanked his pet along behind him and finally mounted his throne, I realised the identity of his captive.

  Her feet were still in bandages and in an unmistakable act of bravery; she tried to conceal her limp.

  Shumbalic!

  It was then that I heard a commotion break out on the first tier not thirty strides from where Xakanic roosted. Two warriors shoved a third Zikalic male, manacled with purple bands around both his wrists and ankles, to the front of the audience on level one.

  Miltredic!

  The trumpeters again battered the agitated crowd into submission and silence.

  This time, Xakanic himself spoke in the language of the Zikalic, and after a number of jarring minutes in his harsh native tongue, he continued in English.

  “Welcome, welcome, welcome … to the Great Arena,” his grandiloquent voice boomed around the arena, every ear—Zikalic and Human—arrested by his words. “This is a day like few others. Indeed, I speak in the language of the doomed. First, for their benefit. And second, because I will be the last to speak this rudimentary language in history. Today, this loathsome tongue dies, and with it, every last, puny, wretched human. Today, we rid our planet of a scourge … No! We purge the universe of a plague!”

  The multitude responded in rehearsed applause. Very different from the rousing ovation they had offered up when Racheli was returned to her mother.

  “But today,” he said, “involves a lesson too, an important reminder to all who dare to defy me. Behold the turncoat … Shumbalic!” Shoving her to the foreground, she balanced precariously near the edge of tier one. “Not only was she cowardly, failing her initiation. Not only did she lack the proud Zikalic heart to capture one of these defenceless humans, but she has fallen in love with one of them!”

  This incensed the masses into a vehement show of displeasure. Galled howls of abuse showered down upon a terrified Shumbalic. Xakanic knew how to work a crowd, and I was certain his claim that she’d fallen in love was merely to add to the macabre melodrama.

  “What is more,” he said once the hissing and heckling quietened down, “she has corrupted her entire family. Behold the treacherous, Miltredic!”

  The two stout warriors dangled Miltredic over the edge. Bound as he was, I reckoned he might hurt himself if he fell to the arena floor, but with his agility, he was surely not in any serious danger. Maybe dangling him over the edge was symbolic. Perhaps, there was a stigma attached to being on the arena floor once the ‘show’ began.

  Is the dusty ground the sole domain of the doomed?

  Xakanic’s voice thundered around the stadium. “Miltredic and his entire family have become embroiled in a mutinous plot against you, the good citizens of Zika. They have conspired with the humans to destroy our great city, and steal our jewels, robbing us of our power source. Sedition!”

  The gullible crowds, especially on the third level, gasped and groaned in injured fury. They were already worked into a dizzying frenzy, and Xakanic appeared just as pleased with his own verbosity as he was in the effect his words had on the throng. It seemed he had more than a taste for our ‘loathsome tongue.’

  “Yes, can you imagine if they had succeeded? We would be without protection from the harsh rays of the sun. Your children would die; your wives would burn.”

  As the crowds booed and hissed fervidly, I noticed that Xakanic directed his delivery almost exclusively to the third tier; very few of those on level one seemed moved by his words. Did they know his provocative and lying words were just for effect, merely for show? Perhaps they did. I guess their own status as royalty was maintained by Xakanic’s hold on the lower classes.

  “Listen to me … very carefully,” bellowed the Ruler of Zika; he was now standing upright, gesticulating wildly with his hands and arms. “Every Zikalic inside the Great Arena lives a life of privilege. The poorer classes are not allowed inside its hallowed walls…”—The third tier isn’t the poorest class?—“…the poor who live in the villages outside the great City of Zika would kill for a place at our table.”

  There are more of them?

  “If we have one fish that swims against the stream, just one, our way of life can topple, and you can lose your place in our society, your seat in the Great Arena.” He paused for dramatic effect. “For high treason against you, the citizens of Zika, and against my throne … Miltredic will be fed to Mizumba. His family, along with his corrupt daughter Shumbalic, cast out among the poor!”

  The crowd cheered clamantly, on all three levels now, an upswell of noise that took what little breath I had away. I could only guess that anyone allied to Miltredic, and sympathetic to our plight, was now dancing to Xakanic’s rhetoric just glad they weren’t exposed.

  “But now … to the main event!” said the deplorable Head Chief of the Zikalic. “I have promised you a feast of blood, a part in history. With your own eyes … you will witness the utter destruction of the disease that is called the human race!”

  The crowd’s vociferous roar swirled around the arena in response to his portentous prediction, and Xakanic clapped his hands urging his people to join him. Soon, sixty thousand pairs of mitts clapped in accord causing a deafening, ear-shattering din that threatened to blow my eardrums. Mind-numbing. Spine-chilling. Brain-jarring.

  The barrage of noise and the nearness of our end seemed to crawl over and through my resolve, poking gaping holes into it. I felt like curling up into a small ball, praying for the end to come quickly. If I felt this way, I was pretty sure many of my people would be close to capitulating, too.

  In spite of the pounding sound of synchronised clapping that seemed to shake the entire arena to its foundations; I turned around to face my people, my friends. I stood as tall as I could, head held high. Not knowing what else to do, knowing that I couldn’t say anything above the overwhelming racket, I put both hands on my heart and attempted my best smile.

&n
bsp; I tried to mirror what Gellica had done when I was publicly judged for striking her, and it seemed that most of the people recalled it instantly. Valiant smiles were returned my way, and shared around among us. While I couldn’t quite bring myself to replicate her kiss-blowing, those with less male-pride began blowing kisses to one another. In a different context, at another time, we would have undoubtedly looked rather silly. Utterly stupid, actually. In this context, at this time, it was a heroic show of love and unity. And it worked.

  The clapping abruptly stopped, and a hush fell over the Zikalic crowd. Momentary confusion. And then whispering, and murmuring, and gossiping, and pointing.

  “Enjoy yourself,” I said startled at the turn of events. Putting my pride aside, I fixed my eyes on Gels, and blew her a kiss. “Keep those kisses flowing, let them feel the love.”

  Rotting Hog’s breath! I can’t believe it!

  A few giggles erupted from among us. Partly, I guess, because we felt a little silly; partly, because it was strange that we were having such an effect on the Zikalic. And in part, as a way to blow off a crippling load of anxious steam. If nothing else, we were becoming more fascinating to the Zikalic with every passing antic. Perhaps they would soften to our need. Maybe they would open their hearts to our plight. Xakanic was trying to steer the crowd into a murderous frenzy, and we had just thrown it off course.

  “Enough!” said Xakanic, snapping his huge jaws together. “Enough! Enough!” His eyes were a blazing red, and his voice ricocheted around the arena, making my skin crawl. It was enough to silence the crowd and put us back on edge.

  “Keep it together,” I said—as much to myself as to everyone else.

  “Can you not see what this pathetic little human is trying to do?” Hissing and snarling, he thumped his right fist into his left hand. “He wants to win you over, to seduce you, to cast his spell over you … just as he did with Shumbalic and Miltredic. Remember, who you are. You are the mighty Zikalic … for after today, no one will remember the humans!”

  For a fraction of a second, he seemed unsure of what to do. I figured he probably had a few other speeches to deliver, but seemed to be uneasy with how things had turned. He was definitely frustrated. We had unquestionably rattled his cage.

  “Let us get on with the main event,” he found his voice. “Yes, this is what I promised, and this is why we have filled the Great Arena … to watch Mizumba play, and the humans pray.” Another twisted, smug smile slipped briefly onto Xakanic’s gob; again, presumably at his mastery of our language. “Let us see the humans call out to their … their puny God even as they die before me—at the will and the whim of a true god.” He beat his chest with his over-sized mitts. “Before long, they will offer up desperate cries to me.” The tone of his voice was acutely astringent, and he shuffled around on his feet. “Now! Get Mizumba ready for a feast!”

  To calm the immediate panic and perturbation that set in our ranks, and to keep my own disquietude at bay, I yelled: “Stand firm … whatever happens; hold your courage!”

  The solid wooden doors of the southern, eastern and western entrances began to slide open automatically. Only the barred portcullis now stood between us and a terrifying Sabre that darkened each entrance. I had seen more than my fair share in the wild; one was too many. But these three looked wilder—ragged and rabid. Possibly tortured and starved ahead of an arena performance; probably hyped by the attention of a full house, they tore at the bars that kept them from the copious feast served up. Their hair-raising roars and nerve-racking snarls whipped those in the audience into the expected frenzy. Pure unadulterated terror seized those on the arena floor.

  I couldn’t bring myself to offer encouragement to my people again. It just seemed so feeble now; everything, so hopeless and desolate. I fed on the memory of Judd’s father’s audacious courage. Stuffed myself on a flashback of my Dad’s self-sacrificing fortitude. “God, give me strength.” My prayer dribbled out of my mouth.

  The three Sabres would take some time to kill us all, but it would be a deliciously gory sight for an audience lusting for blood. A Sabre wouldn’t satisfy its hunger, no matter how ravenous it was, until everything alive within its reach was stripped, ripped apart, torn to shreds, dead. It was a cruel beast who liked to toy with its prey, feasting on fear as much as flesh. Very Xakanic-like.

  Out of the blue, the words of Dad’s song filled my head. I even think I got the tune back, too. I closed my eyes and allowed the words to assuage my trepidation.

  When you bundle through a squall

  Keep your head on high

  Don’t be scared of the dark

  For when the storm ends

  You’ll find a golden sky

  The sweet sound of a lark

  Walk on then in the wind

  Walk on then in the rain

  Even if your dreams are tossed and torn

  Walk on then, keep hope in your heart

  For you’ll ne’er be alone

  No, you will ne’er walk alone

  I experienced a golden moment. Walk on Dad. And I held my head up high.

  And in that moment, I knew what I needed to do.

  My eyes snapped opened; my mind clear, my heartbeat even.

  I exhaled a slow, measured breath.

  It wasn’t an answer that would guarantee our survival, certainly not mine. However, it was the only thing I could think of to keep the show going on in our favour.

  To keep the beasts at bay; to hold off our meeting with Mizumba.

  For a while longer at least.