Ghosts of Parihaka

by David Hair

  Jones nodded. ‘Places like this are haunted by their past. They are never far from recreating those incidents. The normal rules don’t apply here. The land is stained and tapu, and though it has been purified by tohunga many times, the past keeps returning.’

  Mat recalled what Jones, and Bain before him, had said about the place. It had a horrifying logic. ‘Do you mean that the people caught up in the raid on Parihaka keep getting returned to life, and re-enslaved, over and over? That they can’t ever die?’

  Jones exhaled heavily. ‘I do indeed. Powerful events are like that: they transcend the normal rules of this place. Until the wounds of those events are healed by society, they recur, over and over.’

  ‘But that’s horrible!’ Mat exclaimed.

  ‘Ghosts of ghosts,’ Cassandra whispered. ‘Imagine what the Nazi concentration camps must be like in their ghost worlds. Or the killing fields in Cambodia.’

  Mat shuddered. It didn’t bear thinking about at all, as far as he was concerned.

  Jones put a finger to his lips. ‘Quiet now. We’re getting close to where they lost Riki.’

  They had reached the fourth-from-last huts in the row. Both were derelict, indistinguishable from the others, but this was the place Damien had described. ‘Come on,’ Jones said, pushing his way into the left-hand hut. He vanished inside, his lantern illuminating the interior. Cassandra went second; Mat watched from the door as the Welshman nudged the strewn blankets and broken bed within. There were ashes in the fireplace. ‘Cold,’ he said, kneeling over them.

  Mat felt a chill behind him and turned slowly.

  There was a faint sucking sound, and he felt goose bumps shiver up his arms and legs as the darkness of the night took on a deeper shade of ebony. A semi-human shape seemed to crawl along the walls of the opposite hut, with elongated arms, hunched over so that shoulders and head seemed to run together. Then lightning flashed, burning his retinas. He blinked the flash away and, when his vision cleared, the shadow-shape was gone. Thunder rolled distantly, almost masking the creaking of timbers in the opposite hut. Jones and Cassandra were bent over some papers that were half-consumed in the ashes of the fire. Without thinking, he crept to the opposite hut.

  Without the lantern light, he could barely see. Stealthy sounds emerged from the hut as he approached; he positioned his taiaha, holding it with its spear-like tongue ready to jab. A soft, frightened sigh crept from within the other hut, and he heard a grunting, slurping noise that made his blood run cold. He gathered his courage and lit a tiny light inside the paua eyes of the face carved into the hilt of his taiaha to light the way. As if it sensed him, whatever was moving inside went silent, a watchful silence that was full of menace. To counter the creeping dread, he fed more energy into the paua, so that pale blue-green light pulsed outward, and he burst into the hut.

  What met his eyes was a young Maori girl, maybe twelve, lying on her back, her eyes glassy and her brown skin unnaturally grey. He thought her dead, until she blinked in the blue-green light of the paua eyes. She convulsed, whimpered, a pleading look in her eyes.

  Crouched over her was a thing that seemed made of darkness. Almost man-sized, its skin was formed from shadows and its eyes were pale moons. Dark green moko patterns covered its naked body; its teeth were like finger bones. Its hand gripped the girl’s throat, but as Mat’s light washed over it, it flinched and screeched like a bird.

  Mat whipped his taiaha blade around, trying to smash the creature sideways and off the girl. Too soon: the goblin, if that was what it was, swayed out of his reach, but in doing so had to release the girl. It flattened itself against the wall and circled right, towards the only window. Mat bellowed a challenge as he darted in and swung again.

  The taiaha had once belonged to Ngatoro-i-rangi and had been soaked in the blood of Te Iho, Puarata’s secret lair. Mat had smashed wood and concrete with it in practice.

  The goblin caught it in one hand.

  Its other hand snaked out and caught Mat by the throat. He choked as the goblin gripped and squeezed, grinning malevolently as it pulled him towards its mouth, which widened frighteningly. Mat tried to kick at it, but his leg got tangled in the taiaha, and all he succeeded in doing was kicking his own weapon.

  It turned out to be the best thing he could have done. His shin batted the carved hilt, with the glowing paua eyes, against the thigh of the creature. As the paua-light struck the goblin’s shadowy skin, it yowled in agony and lost its grip. Mat wrenched free and lurched away. Where the light had touched the goblin, a livid patch of still-burning skin glowed. It flapped at it, mewling in horror.

  Mat gasped down air, putting the taiaha between him and his foe, jabbing with the glowing tongue. The goblin shrieked, spun, and with a shrill cry threw itself at the broken window. It broke through with a crash and vanished into the night outside.

  ‘What was that?’ Cass called, then Jones hissed and she fell silent.

  ‘In here,’ Mat called softly, spinning slowly with taiaha ready, in case there were other attackers. But apart from him and the prone Maori girl, there was no-one.

  Jones burst in, sword at the ready. He looked furious. ‘I told you to stick with me!’ he snapped, then his eyes widened as he saw the girl. ‘Watch the door,’ he ordered Mat, as Cassandra came in and gave a small squeak. She put a hand to Mat’s throat, where he could still feel the goblin’s grip. Then she went to kneel beside Jones and the girl.

  Mat watched them fuss over the girl, Cassandra reluctantly obeying Jones’s instructions to hug her close, while he kindled a fire in the fireplace. ‘What happened?’ he demanded of Mat.

  Mat described what he’d heard and seen, and Jones grimaced. ‘It was a kakarepo, a night goblin. They feed on the souls of the dying and the dead,’ Jones told him. ‘They haunt places like this, where the tapu is not easily maintained. You were lucky to escape it unscathed.’

  ‘Which of those is she?’ Mat asked. ‘Dead or dying?’

  ‘Both,’ Jones replied grimly. Cassandra threw him a nauseated look and shrank a little from the girl she cradled. ‘She must be one of the spirits locked into Parihaka’s cycle of misery.’ He bent over her again and began to speak to her in soft, lilting Maori.

  At first she wouldn’t respond, just stared at Jones with huge frightened eyes and clung desperately to Cassandra. Occasionally she glanced at Mat, with neither gratitude nor trust. Mat tried to smile reassurance, but she looked away. She’s scared of men, he realized. It was an ugly thought.

  Outside, the sky slowly began to clear. The rain stopped and the moon reappeared, and then all at once Mat saw Mount Taranaki, its peak snow-white and lit by the moonlight so that it glowed. Alone, without foothills, it filled the eastern sky with its serene majesty. Stars glittered in the void.

  Inside the hut, Jones’s patient reassurance of the girl in her own tongue began to be rewarded. She accepted chocolate from his pocket, eating it with evident relish. She sat up, pulled away from Cassandra, eyeing the doorway where Mat stood, but making no movement. Finally she began to speak, answering Jones’s enquiries in a small voice. Back and forth they went. Mat, late in picking up Maori as a subject at school in defiance of his father, found he understood a reasonable amount of what he heard. His teacher had commended his growing vocabulary, but told him that to make real progress he had to make the transition to thinking in Maori. That wasn’t proving easy.

  Jones stood watch while the girl and the two teens slept intermittently. Finally, with the skies lightening behind the mountain to the east, Jones exhaled tiredly and gripped the girl’s hands, pulling her to her feet. They went outside and headed for the open ground beside the gates. Mat and Cassandra followed at a distance.

  ‘What’s happening?’ Cass whispered.

  Mat shook his head. ‘Dunno.’

  They reached the atea, the open space within the marae, just as the sun lit the land, rising from the southeast and peeking around the southern flank of Mount Taranaki. Suddenly, the girl gave a happy
cry, turned and flung her arms around Jones’s waist. He hugged her back, then let her go as she pulled away and began to walk towards the sunlight.

  Cassandra gripped Mat’s hand as the girl’s feet left the ground. ‘Oh my …’ she breathed. Mat felt the same way.

  The girl seemed to walk up the sunbeams as if they were a path, each step giant-like as she was first yards then miles away, a speck in the golden light. Then she was gone. Mat realized he’d been holding his breath, and let it out slowly. He looked at Cassandra and blinked back tears. They let each other’s hand go and just stood there in the warm glow of the dawn.

  Jones trudged thoughtfully back towards them. He sighed heavily. ‘Her name was Huia,’ he said. ‘I opened her a way forward, to go on and seek her ancestors.’

  Mat looked at his mentor with utmost respect.

  Jones led them out of the bowl in which the village stood. As they left, it seemed that the whole of the encampment fell into the mists. The sun on the mountains was so bright it hurt their eyes. Mat guessed they were probably in the same spot that the soldiers had stood, all those years ago, as they waited for the order to march in. But as the sun rose, the mist faded, revealing nothing but an empty field.

  ‘Did you find out what happened to Riki?’

  Jones nodded with tired satisfaction. ‘I did indeed. She saw him. He was taken with about thirty others towards the coast. She only avoided them herself because of Riki’s actions. But she has been taken south many times previously. It is as we thought: this place is like a festering sore, every year recycling its cargo of slaves for Bryce’s works down south. But lately, it is as if Bryce is squeezing the boil, trying to harvest every drop of suffering from it. He has raided three times already this year.’ He shook his head. ‘The thing about evil is that it finds a way of recurring. Places where evil happened keep recreating the crime in the ghost worlds.’

  ‘What can break the cycle?’ Mat asked.

  Jones grunted. ‘Reparation. Forgiveness. And time. Mostly time.’

  ‘But that poor girl is free now?’ Cassandra asked anxiously.

  ‘Yes. I helped her to wrest her soul from the cycle. One less for Bryce to recycle and break over and again.’

  ‘And Riki is still alive?’

  ‘We must hope so,’ Jones said. ‘If they were taken to the coast, then Hayes must have them and be sailing south. He has a day on us.’

  ‘But he’s only sailing,’ Cassandra said firmly. ‘We can catch him.’

  ‘Indeed we can,’ Jones said. ‘If we hurry.’

  They returned to the modern world, where the passing storm had left clear skies. Jones was silent and nibbling at his lower lip. Distant farmhouses pumped wood smoke into the air and above them passenger jets carved icy lines in the blue. Cassandra retrieved her iPad from the car, flicked it on and began checking emails. Mat ate a muesli bar he’d stowed, yawning furiously. It was now about thirty hours since he’d had a proper sleep.

  Finally Jones spoke. ‘Mat, Cassandra, listen. I think we have to take some chances if we are to head Hayes off. He’s a day ahead of us, with a westerly wind and improving conditions. Sailing ships can make good time. He could already be off Kapiti by now, assuming he is going south. They can make about twenty knots, which is nearly forty kilometres per hour. It would need them to have sailed at night, but that’s possible if you’ve got a good navigator.’

  ‘Or magical help,’ Mat put in, remembering the shipboard chase he’d been involved in that February.

  ‘Indeed,’ Jones agreed. ‘Twelve hours means nearly four hundred kilometres if all goes smoothly. We’ve got to move fast, but we’ve also got to have someone on the Aotearoa side tracking them.’

  Cassandra frowned, looking up from her computer. ‘Where is Hayes going?’ she asked. ‘Dunedin?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘Then we’ve got to get across the Strait,’ Cassandra said. ‘I can book us tickets and get the car across too.’

  Jones nodded. ‘That’s what I’m thinking, lass. If you two drive south and take the ferry, I’ll go with Bain on the Wallaby and meet you both in Nelson.’

  Mat exhaled thoughtfully. ‘But what if Hayes doesn’t go to Nelson? What if he sails straight past and on?’

  ‘Then we’ll hook up in Nelson and drive south,’ Cassandra replied. ‘We’ll still likely beat them. We’ll be doing a hundred kays an hour to their forty.’ Her hands flew across the screen of the iPad. ‘There’s a 1:10 p.m. sailing of the Interislander, and …’ Her fingers tapped rapidly: ‘We’re now booked on it.’

  Mat blinked, then grinned. Cass was in her element when she was poking and prodding at the world with her electronic touch. ‘You’ve got your superpowers back,’ he chuckled.

  ‘Never lost them.’ Cass struck a pose. She still looked worried sick, but at least she was smiling again. ‘C’mon, we’ve got to rock if we’re going to make Wellington by twelve-thirty check-in.’

  On the prison ship

  The ship wallowed sickeningly through the storm. Riki had never been to sea before and thought it utterly terrifying. The ship was being battered sideways by waves that broke over it with thudding blows that made the timbers creak and groan alarmingly, while what little sense of direction he’d had vanished. The wooden ship leaked like a sieve and the floors were awash. He had a feeling that if they went down, no-one would come to undo their ankle chains. Sleep was impossible; all he could do was cling to the walls of the hold and try not to cry out during the worst bits. No-one else was, not even the women, and he was determined not to be the only one, but he was right on the edge.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ve drowned before,’ the ghost-man opposite him said. ‘There are worse ways to go. And we still wake up in Parihaka.’

  You might. I want to live through this. If I die here I don’t get to wake up anywhere. ‘Where are we?’ he wondered aloud, aware it was probably an inane question. How could anyone tell down here anyway?

  Nevertheless, Hemi responded in a calm, hopeless voice. ‘We sailed south several hours before the storm struck. Now they will have reefed the sails and set their nose to the wind. Unless they couldn’t get offshore far enough, they will ride it out. We’ll still be off Taranaki.’

  That at least sounded optimistic. Maybe Damien could roust out some navy guys to come and rescue them. If he even knew Riki was alive. And if he was alive himself. It seemed a long shot.

  ‘You seem to know a lot about ships,’ he said to Hemi.

  The young man shrugged. ‘Just slave ships.’

  Oh. Riki exhaled, fighting not to let the fatalistic despair of his fellow prisoners infect him. What have I got myself into? ‘How long ago since we were taken?’ he asked. ‘How long was I unconscious?’

  Hemi shrugged. ‘You were out most of the night and some of the day. We reached the coast at midday and were under way by two in the afternoon. The storm probably hit at dusk and we’ve been more or less stationary since.’

  So if Damien got out, the alarm might be raised, but that’s twelve hours or more ago. Jeez, I hope he got away. Riki tried to figure it out some more, but thinking clearly when every wave seemed to herald destruction was something he couldn’t manage. Eventually he slept.

  Dawn came with a tiny white boy clambering down among them. ‘A’yup, darkies,’ he chirruped, like a kid from a Dickens play. ‘Roust and rise! Pisspots be comin’ and brekkie’s after.’ He swung like a monkey along the ceiling struts, unlatching covers over portholes high on the flanks of the hull, letting in thin streams of light from one side, presumably the east. He didn’t really look at the prisoners, but Riki was careful to hide his face. He’d been taken at night, and no-one among his captors had looked at him carefully since, but he dreaded being exposed as not being of Parihaka. The consequences, he feared, would not be good at all.

  True to the boy’s words, slop-buckets were thrown down, and the prisoners had to endure the humiliation of pissing and shitting in front of each other. Riki forced himself
to take his turn, eyes averted from those around him. There were a few hoots of derision for him as the stranger, but it wasn’t malicious. Then the buckets were hooked up by a couple of crewmen and fresh buckets with water for drinking were lowered. A couple of loaves of bread were tossed down. Each prisoner took a turn to bite and passed them on. Riki only got two bites, but that seemed to be the norm so he didn’t complain.

  By now the ship seemed to be making good headway again, at least according to Hemi opposite him. The sound and feel of the ship was completely different now, crashing rhythmically through the waves. It still creaked and cracked and he still flinched at every sound, but he’d managed to keep what little food and fluids he had in his belly down. His head still felt awful though, throbbing as if a tiny blacksmith was hammering horseshoes inside his skull.

  Around what could be noon — judging by the way the sun gleamed vertically through the open hole in the roof — the sounds from above changed, as did the motion of the ship. It began to wallow again, but not in the helpless rubber-duck-in-a-bathtub way it had last night. This was more deliberate, it seemed. ‘Are we stopping?’ he asked Hemi.

  The young Maori cocked his head. ‘Probably. If you stand and climb to the limit of the chain, you might be able to see out the porthole — you look tall enough.’ He seemed indifferent, as Riki could guess you might become if this was all your life held.

  Riki was determined not to fall into that trap. He pulled himself painfully to his feet, then dragged himself up the side of the hull. By perching one foot on a bolt-head and hauling himself up from a beam in the roof, he managed to get his face all the way to one of the portholes. He blinked in the daylight, found himself staring out at a nearby headland, very narrow with barnacle-clad rocks that gleamed like rusted metal in the fitful light. Waves crashed over them. Far beyond, he could see the shape of the coastline, hazy and indistinct.

  ‘I think we’re near an island,’ he reported to Hemi, and anyone else who might care.