Islands of Fire

by Eldritch, Brian

  Stepping out of the canoe, Kina pushes it until it drifts free once more, then she jumps in and begins poling along with the paddle until the water becomes deep enough to row once more. The sail is still up but the wind is not strong enough to do much more than idly flap it.

  For a long time, Kina paddles across water no deeper than her waist. It seems to stretch to the horizon in all directions. A desert, truly. The presence of ocean water changes nothing, as it isn’t potable.

  From Nakali’s prone body comes a sound, then Kina can hear her speaking.

  “Kidnapping me was a mistake. My kupuna and elite guards will chase you all the way across Mokukai.”

  “I didn’t kidnap you,” Kina replies, a little surprised to see the high priestess awake. “I’m letting you survive. Look around you. There’s nothing out here. If you prefer, I could let you off at one of these sandbars. You can wait there for your people to find you.”

  Nakali rises to see over the gunwale but drops back down with a moan, pressing her palm to her wounded head. She pulls it away and looks at the blood.

  As if just now noticing the light, Nakali peers up at the sky. “How long was I unconscious? How many days has it been?”

  “I don’t know,” Kina replies. “I was unconscious, too.”

  “You’re lucky I didn’t wake before you. I would have slit your throat and dropped you over the side.”

  Kina says, “Good thing you didn’t, then.”

  Nakali covers her eyes with her hands. After a few minutes, Kina thinks the high priestess has slipped out of consciousness again, but then she asks, “Why didn’t you kill me?”

  Kina is too surprised to answer. After thinking about it, she says, “I was weak. Perhaps I should have.”

  “Yes, you should have. I’ll kill you the moment you let down your guard.”

  “Then I guess I better not let down my guard.”

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Frankly,” Kina says, “I don’t know. The sea all looks the same. I don’t know which way we drifted, and there’s no sign of the Teeth, or of the canoes, or any survivors. We could be anywhere.”

  With a groan, Nakali sits back up, this time managing to slide into a sitting position. Kina can’t help but notice the high priestess eyeing the pahi, where it rests propped up against the gunwale behind Kina.

  “And the flame? It’s gone?”

  Kina nods. “I saw it burning underwater. But I couldn’t do anything about it. It’s gone, now.”

  “Burning underwater?” Nakali asks, in a tone of disbelief. “You mean it had fallen into the water, but the fire wasn’t doused?”

  “It didn’t make sense to me, either.”

  “I see you kept the pahi.”

  “Of course,” Kina says. “I prefer not to be weaponless in the presence of my enemy.”

  They sail into an area where the water grows deeper, and they begin to pass over an expanse of coral. Reef fish dart around the outcroppings below. Kina peers into the water, then unfolds a fishing net and line. She hands it to Nakali.

  “You fish.”

  “I don’t fish, slave,” the woman says, pushing the materials back. “I’m High Priestess Nakali. Others fish for me. In fact, you’re breaking at least four different kapu laws just sitting near me at this moment. I command you to fish for me!”

  Kina eyes Nakali for a second, then reaches around and lifts the pahi.

  “Once again,” Kina says, and hands the net and line back. “You fish.”

  “And now you’re threatening me? The gods will strike you dead for that.”

  Kina makes a show of looking around. “I don’t see your gods here,” she says. “I see only Mother Ocean and Father Sky. Whatever corrupt gods you bow to have no power out here. You should know that. Their dominion extends only as far as their shores.”

  “Father Sky!” Nakali calls. “Father sky! I, your daughter, beseech you for aid in my darkest hour. I am threatened with death and enslavement. I call upon you to strike down this kaua for her temerity to give orders to an ali`i!”

  Kina watches, her hackles raising in anticipation of a bolt of lightning or sudden gust of wind, but nothing happens.

  “Father Sky has abandoned you,” Kina says.

  With a shriek of rage, Nakali launches at Kina, trying to knock the pahi away, despite her hands still being bound behind her back. Kina is thrown aside and the pahi drops from her grip. The canoe tips with their shifting weight and both of them drop into the water.

  Kina rights herself, legs kicking. She barks her shin against a coral spur, but pays it little mind. Nakali thrashes beside her, fighting to keep her head above water despite her hands being bound.

  “Stop moving!” Kina yells. She manages to grab Nakali’s hair with one hand and begins swimming back toward the canoe. Once she takes hold of the gunwale, she lets go of Nakali long enough to pull herself back up into the canoe, then she turns and reaches back down, plunging her arm into the water to get hold of the high priestess, who has begun to sink.

  Something flicks by near the canoe, a large gray body undulating beneath the waves. A shark.

  “Hold still!” Kina yells again, then puts her entire weight into heaving Nakali back up out of the water and over the lip of the canoe. Both woman fall to the floor of the canoe, panting.

  “That was close,” Nakali says. “I saw sharks!” For a moment, the veneer of her office seems to disappear and she is just another scared woman lost at sea.

  “The pahi,” Kina says. It is gone. She gazes down into the water. At some point in their thrashing it must have fallen out, though she can’t see it. “You knocked it into the water!”

  Nakali joins her. “Where is it?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “We can’t lose it!”

  “I know,” Kina says. “One of us will have to swim down there and get it.”

  But Kina already realizes it will have to be her.

  She slips over the side in a smooth dive. The reef sits in water so shallow a tall man could stand on the bottom and just reach the surface. Briefly looking around, Kina can see three sharks sliding through the water like darts.

  She plunges deeper, winnowing through the narrow channels between reef heads. Her eyes burn with the salt water. Tiny fish bolt away from her and take refuge in the fans and wedges of coral.

  One of the sharks passes overhead, just an arm’s length above Kina, though she is sheltered from it in the channel. Once it is gone, she kicks up to the surface for a gasp of air and drops back down. Another shark comes in from the side, dashing toward her and then away, as if sizing her up, unsure of her as a potential meal.

  Kina makes it back down to the open floor between coral heads, and there, resting half-buried by sand, is the pahi. It stands out black and straight against the white coral grit. Kina brushes away the sand covering it and takes it up by the handle.

  As she turns, she sees the third shark veering toward her. Weaving back and forth with each whisk of its tail, it propels itself at her with astonishing speed, its jaw creaking open and lips peeling back from the gums.

  She has no time to react, other than to raise the pahi. It plunges into the shark’s open mouth and through its head, slicing a V-shaped wedge into its brain. It bucks and thrashes, jerking the pahi away and flinging it back to the ocean floor.

  Kina can feel her breath fading, her lungs burning for more air, but she swims down to the pahi and picks it back up before rising to the surface.

  She bursts out of the water, sucking in a breath. She needs to keep moving, get away from the shark before its brethren move in for her. Avoiding the coral not far below, Kina flails forward. The pahi makes it hard to swim, so she relies on her kicking legs for propulsion. The other sharks race by, drawn by the death throes and blood of their brethren.

  Not far off, Kina can see the canoe. She heads for it, but can’t catch it. The pahi is dragging her down. />
  She sees Nakali drop down to take up the paddle, clearly figuring out the problem. She tries to paddle, but with her hands tied behind her back, there is little she can do.

  Nakali shouts, “Throw in the pahi! Quick!”

  Struggling against the water and mindful of the sharks frenzying behind her, Kina takes quick stock of her options. She can drop the heavy blade and leave it forever, or hurl it into the canoe. She must do one of these things in order to be able to swim fast enough to catch the drifting vessel. But once she has the pahi, Nakali could easily kill her.

  Something is keeping Kina from committing the pahi to the deep. She sees, now, that it has been that way from the start. Ever since she escaped with it from Keli`anu, she has had the sense that it is important, and when she saw the same symbols in that old, long-abandoned temple in the Teeth, she has realized it is at the center of a growing mystery, one that even seems to have Nakali baffled.

  “Get back!” Kina shouts. She has made her decision. She flings the pahi into the air toward the canoe.

  For a moment, flying end-over-end, Kina is afraid she has overshot and it will fall into the sea on the other side. But then it comes down hard on the canoe, burying itself like an axe into the gunwale.

  Without waiting to see what happens, Kina redoubles her effort, swimming as fast as possible to the side of the canoe. She surfaces, fingers gripping the edge.

  And looks up into Nakali’s eyes.

  The high priestess has cut her cords and is now holding the pahi. She lifts it over her head as if to bring it down on Kina.

  But then, slowly, she lowers it and reaches out a hand to help Kina into the canoe.

  Kina collapses, wet, cold, and shaking from adrenalin. After a moment she looks at Nakali, who is still holding the pahi.

  “I don’t understand,” Kina gasps.

  “You’re too useful to me,” Nakali says. “I need a navigator. You think I’m going to row this thing by myself?”

  “Oh,” Kina says, rolling over to close her eyes. “I thought maybe you have started to like me.”

  “You’re a slave,” Nakali says. “Don’t forget your place.”

  Kina pants, taking deep breaths until she feels the strength returning to her. She sits back up.

  “Feeling better?” Nakali asks.

  Kina nods. “I could use some rest. And some food.”

  “That’s fine,” Nakali says. She is still holding the pahi, though now she has taken a seat near the prow. The pahi is straight across her knees. Her hand still rests on the grip. The other hand slowly strokes the length of the blade, tracing the glowing symbols there. “Eat and catch your breath.”

  “Then what?”

  “You row.”

  Kina pulls some food from the storage area and nibbles at it, sizing up Nakali. The woman is far enough away, and alert enough, that Kina is sure she could bring the pahi to bear with ease. Clearly the high priestess was trained in fighting—she is quick and agile and hardy. And she managed to turn the tables in short order.

  In fact, Kina thinks as she numbly eats some dried fish, it’s quite possible Nakali planned all along to have the pahi drop into the water, knowing it would have to be Kina that gets it. If so, she was far more clever than Kina imagined.

  “You finished? Good. Pick up the oar.”

  Kina takes up the oar and slips the blade into the water. “Where are we going? Do you even know where we are?”

  “That is west,” Nakali says, pointing behind the prow, in the direction the canoe is headed. “We’re going that way.”

  “What for? To return to Keli`anu? I thought that was northwest from the Teeth.”

  “We aren’t going to Keli`anu, at least not yet.”

  “Oh?” Kina asks, perplexed. “Where, then?”

  Nakali runs her finger along the symbols on the pahi, lost in thought. “We’re going to find some answers.”

  Kina paddles across the lonely shoal, angling the canoe toward the west and the empty ocean. The sun climbs overhead then arcs toward the far horizon to lead the way.

  END OF PART ONE

  The Empty Shore

  PART TWO: GOD IN THE STONE

  Makoahiva first appears to Kina as a muted shape on the horizon, almost the same color as the morning sky. There is something dreadful about its shape. From here, in this small canoe far out at sea, it looks like the fin of a shark so large it could swallow whole islands.

  It is a cool morning, with a stark wind that beats at the single sail. High Priestess Nakali is sleeping, one hand on the pahi as though ready to spring from deep sleep into the thick of battle. But Kina knows the high priestess is just as tired, just as hungry, and just as thirsty as she is. It has been a long journey, with Kina forced under the threat of instant death to guide the canoe across open ocean. Though this is the second time in a week she has done so, being at sea is not something she has ever enjoyed, and other than the rudiments of sailing a canoe, she knows little about seamanship.

  Since finding themselves trying to escape in the same canoe from the rampaging devil `Imu`imu, High Priestess Nakali has been a devious and cruel taskmistress. But despite her harsh demeanor and constant threats, at least the high priestess knew a little more about ocean voyaging than Kina. So far she had been able to guide them successfully to the archipelago of Kilakila, a long string of volcanic islands separated by short straits of windy sea. Without the high priestess, Kina could have done no better than simply maintain a westerly course, with no way of knowing where she was heading.

  Kina looks at the pahi. About the length of a man’s forearm, it is made of chipped obsidian and bears a sharp cutting edge along most of its length. Kina suspects there is a dark magic about it; This suspicion had been strengthened when she saw how well it had cut into the devil `Imu`imu when it was rampaging through the fleet. If Kina could reach the pahi, she is sure she could overtake Nakali and regain the upper hand. But she is lashed to the stern, sennit ropes tied around her arms connecting her to the canoe itself. Nakali had made Kina tie these herself, the ultimate insult.

  Looking back at the distant island, Kina pulls the boom to catch the ever-shifting wind in the sail. Villagers of the tiny island of Lohotaki had warned them against coming this way. The island was guarded, they said, but a powerful devil that could kill even the most powerful warriors. It was best to avoid it.

  But Nakali had been insistent. At first she had attempted to command the hapless villagers to take her there, but even one as arrogant as the high priestess can recognize when she is outnumbered and in danger. The villagers of Lohotaki had first been happy to see the two women, though a little puzzled at why they were voyaging across the ocean in so small a canoe and with such paltry provisions. They wanted to trade. Nakali had wisely kept the pahi hidden, telling them she had nothing they might want. Her cloak and headdress had been so badly damaged in the chaos of `Imu`imu’s attack that it became nearly worthless. Over the last week of travel, Kina had stripped all the feathers off to use as fishing lures. With no food to spare, they had nothing to offer the Lohotakians. In order to win their trust, Nakali had told them Kina was her slave and forced her to dance for the ali`i. Kina was no dancer, but the ali`i had enjoyed the show enough to offer some strong advice.

  “Turn away and shun Makoahiva,” he had said. “Only death awaits you there.”

  “I am the beloved of the goddess Tiumata and command armies. I fear no devil.”

  The village leaders had been confused, thinking she was claiming to be a kupuna when she had also told them she was ali`i. Then slowly they had realized just who she was—the leader of the Cult of the Ebon Flame, both ruler and holy woman. To most in Mokukai this was an insult and went against everything they knew to be proper, but the reputation of her brutal warriors had spread even this far and none dared challenge her. Kina could see a fire in the eyes of some of the brash young warriors upon hearing this, no doubt imagining the glory that could be the
irs if they could be responsible for killing such a person, but none moved from the assemblage. Nakali had led Kina back to the canoe and they had set off once again for Makoahiva, and the entire village of Lohotaki stood on the shore and silently watched them go.

  Kina had secretly hoped a squad of warriors would break rank and charge the canoe, maybe rain arrows down on Nakali as she sat, vulnerable, at the prow of the canoe. But none dared.

  Now, seeing Makoahiva rising before her, Kina finds herself once more planning a daring escape. If she jumped out here, would she be able to swim out of sight and head for shore before Nakali awoke? Or could she drive the canoe up on a reef and escape in the confusion?

  “You’re planning an escape,” Nakali says, without even appearing to have awakened. “Just remember, you are still alive only because I desire it. That inclination might vanish at any time.”

  “I’ve delivered you to Makoahiva, so you can seek the God in the Stone. What more do you want from me?”

  High Priestess Nakali slowly sits up, fingers still wrapped around the pahi’s handle. “I told you before, you are my slave. Your service ends only when I am ready. Someone with a spirit as powerful as yours will make an excellent drum, though, so your life is mine until we return to Keli`anu.”

  Kina doesn’t reply, so Nakali turns and looks at the island. For a long time she studies the shoreline, which is growing more distinct by the minute.

  Curtain-like cliffs drop nearly straight down from the high peaks of the island’s central range, though at least on this side of the island, there is a broad lowland at the base that looks heavily forested. A white line of sandy beach, unbroken except for a few rocky escarpments, faces the sea.

  “Put in there,” Nakali says, pointing to a strip of beach near a line of windblown palms. “It looks like the safest landing.”

  “This island is huge,” Kina says, adjusting the boom. “How do you know where to find this God in the Stone? We could search for weeks.”