by Matt Larkin
While legends and theories persist about prior inhabitants (e.g. the menehune), scholars generally accept that the Hawaiian Islands were originally colonized by Polynesians in two waves. The first wave arrived in the 5th century CE.
When the Roman Empire was collapsing, Polynesians sailed thousands of miles across the open Pacific to found new colonies on the islands.
A second wave arrived in the 11th century CE and becomes the inspiration behind this story. While the new dynasty came from a common ancestor, their arrival created major turmoil, especially for the ali‘i caste. The two dynasties fought numerous battles before eventually being amalgamated into a unified ali‘i through centuries of intermarriage.
Similarly, the Pele ‘ohana (family) were said to have migrated from Tahiti (Kahiki), traveling across the Hawaiian group before finally settling on Hawaii (the Big Island, here Vai‘i, an older name). These people were sometimes treated as human, often as akua (gods), and sometimes as somewhere in between. They were powerful, rich in mana, and not bound by the ways or laws of Kāne. More on that in a bit.
Many believe a Spanish explorer was the first European to find the Hawaiian archipelago, but as he never revealed the discovery, he receives no credit for it. Some centuries later, Captain James Cook found the archipelago (probably by accident though one theory holds he had heard of it from a Spanish source), making first contact in 1778.
The Hawaiians initially welcomed him warmly and believed him a second coming of their god Lono. Relations later soured and Cook was killed in an altercation. Nevertheless, from that time on, frequent contact with Westerners forever changed the archipelago.
At the time of the arrival of Cook, events that would lead to a unified Hawaiian kingdom had already begun. In 1795, Kamehameha I united the Hawaiian archipelago as the Kingdom of Hawaii. He reigned until his death in 1819 and was succeeded by his son Liholiho. Under the pressure of of his father’s widow (not his mother), Liholiho abolished the traditional Hawaiian system of kapu and destroyed many of the temples and idols. Speculation holds he did so after realizing the gods did not punish Westerners for violation of tabus, and thus held no real power.
Less than a year later, Christian missionaries arrived and found a people with only vestiges of native religion remaining. They began the process of converting the islands. At the same time, foreign businessmen gained increasing wealth and power through holdings in the islands. Both groups actively worked to suppress traditional Hawaiian culture.
Within forty years of contact with Westerners, 80% of the native Hawaiian population had died.
The last king of Hawaii was David Kalākaua, who became king in 1874. Having seen the traditional ways of his people being eradicated by Westerners, he undertook to collect many of the Hawaiian tales, which he published in The Legends and Myths of Hawaii, a book that served as a primary inspiration for this series.
Kalākaua died in 1891 and was succeeded by Lili‘uokalani, the last monarch of Hawaii. Her reign was overthrown by U.S. businessmen who seized control of the country in 1893 and forced the annexation by the U.S. in 1898 (for better trade deals). The annexation was opposed by the vast majority of native Hawaiians, but Queen Lili‘uokalani consented, under duress and with objections made to the Senate, in order to avoid violence. Despite her protests, power was never restored to the Hawaiian monarchy.
On the 100th anniversary of the overthrow, the U.S. government issued an apology and admitted the act was illegal. However, in 1959, Hawaii had already been given a vote to either remain a territory or become a state and voted for statehood. Nevertheless, a Hawaiian nationalist movement remains and works to preserve Hawaiian language, history, and culture, as well as to advance the cause of an independent Hawaiian state.
Back to the Pele ‘ohana. Pele is the nominal head of the family, and possibly the eldest sibling with the exception of Namaka, who, in some stories, drove Pele from Kahiki after Pele seduced her husband. All the members of the Pele ‘ohana were children of Haumea, blessed by their mother with powerful mana.
A primary conceit within the series comes from the Polynesian concept of mana. While popularized by fantasy fiction and gaming as a kind of magic points, mana actually represents a more subtle and complex concept. One that incorporates personal power, charisma, and a connection to the spiritual that can lead to support from the spirit world. This concept I took as roughly analogous to prana (qi, ki, pneuma, etc.) found elsewhere in the Eschaton Cycle cosmology, and assumed thus that those with sufficient mana could accomplish superhuman feats.
Furthermore, in Hawaiian thought there exists mana wahine (literally “female power”) a recognition of a certain kind of mana unique to females and prevalent within the Pele ‘ohana. This power, within the story, serves as the ability to reshape others and the world around themselves. To push forward and accomplish wonders.
Pele, Namaka, Hi‘iaka, and Kapo were all women with extraordinary mana, and thus forces to be reckoned with, more than a match for men and supernatural dangers. Their tribulations form the foundation of this series.
Poli‘ahu, another of Pele’s traditional rivals, was not of the same ‘ohana (she’s generally a daughter of Kāne) and thus presented a different type of queen, but still one with great mana wahine. One that could serve as a representative of the original Polynesian immigrants before the current wave.
A final note here on linguistics. Within the Polynesian languages, “t” and “k” are generally interchangeable. Consequently, “Tahiti” and “Kahiki” are essentially the same linguistically.
Additionally, many Polynesian words use an ‘okina (a reverse apostrophe) as a means of indicating glottal stop in words. I opted to use these spellings in deference to proper transcription of Polynesian words.
Special thanks to the artists for my beautiful cover, to my editor Regina, to my wife and daughter, and to my Arch Skalds: Al, Dale, Rachel, Bill, Jackie, and Dawn for feedback.
Thank you for reading,
Matt Larkin
Flames of Mana
Prologue
Days Gone
On the slopes of Haleakalā the early morning sun stung Maui’s eyes. Up here, above the clouds, it was brightest. Brilliant and beautiful enough he could have almost forgotten his purpose and the reality behind it.
Save for the gasping of La lying before him, legs broken and lassoed with an orichalcum chain—probably the only one of its kind on these isles—that stripped the spirit’s powers and prevented him from Sun Striding away. Once, in another era, the so-called sun god had called himself Ra and ruled a land as a god-king. And here, on this island Maui’s people had named after him, he had tried to repeat his temerity.
Maybe Maui should have let him. He’d had no desire to climb this mountain nor fight this spirit, but Hina had begged him, claimed already La’s demands grew oppressive, made their new home intolerable.
And so now, he and La were on this mountain slope, flesh burnt, exhausted, and come face to face once more after so many years. Unlike most etheric beings, Sun spirits had adapted to daylight, even learned to harness it. They could, were they so inclined, prove a force of beneficence toward mankind.
Unfortunately, Maui had rarely seen them thus disposed. All self-proclaimed gods seemed forever given to megalomania, perhaps even solipsism, and La had proved no exception.
With a sigh, Maui wiped blood from his split lip. His injuries would heal soon enough. Minor inconveniences. He crawled over to lean in near La’s face. “Far to the east, in the vestiges of Hy-Brasil, Quetzalcoatl has established himself as lord among the people, a sun dragon, in a land where you might find welcome. If I release you, I will have your word you will go there and leave the Sawaikians be.”
The would-be god scoffed. “Release me now, bow down, and I won’t tell your precious humans just who and what you really are, titan.”
Maui sighed again and shut his eyes a moment. The morning sun cut through his eyelids, painting them red and hot. It really had been t
he wrong answer, even if La didn’t understand half so much as he thought he did. When he opened his eyes once more, Maui moved to kneel upon La’s chest, to wrap his hands around the Sun spirit’s throat.
La’s host’s throat, really, and killing this body would not solve the problem. Sooner or later, this being with a taste for worship would find its way back across the Veil and try to claim another body.
Not here, though, Maui hoped.
He squeezed until his fingers dug through flesh, met vertebrae. La’s eyes stared defiance, even as his neck collapsed beneath Maui’s fingers. Even as his blood poured out in great cataracts, streaming down the mountainside. In those eyes lurked a warning he would return.
With a sniff, Maui at last rose and flung the blood from his hands.
He withdrew the orichalcum chain and wrapped it into a loop to hang from his malo. Still somber, he descended down through the cloud level, walking and walking until he could at last make out the lush green valleys below and the endless Worldsea beyond.
Who would have ever imagined the world could become thus?
Even now, millennia after the cataclysm others called the Deluge, Maui could not help but find himself caught aghast at it all. Despite the cycle of eschatons, if anything should have remained inviolable, he would have thought it the landscape. And yet now, the four great continents themselves had vanished as surely as the four great cities of Faerie.
Did such devastation fall upon his shoulders?
The rise of the Leviathan, even temporarily, had nearly destroyed the Earth itself.
All that remained were these archipelagos here, and hints of continents to the far east. For the people of Savai‘i, he’d wanted to believe these new islands, heretofore untouched by man, might offer succor. A place to live out this era in relative peace, secure from the expanding influence of Hiyoya and the wars among Manua’s brethren across the sea.
But there was no peace.
Manua had established his kingdom on Vai‘i, yes, and along with the pyromancers Maui had given him, he hoped the man would rule well. Except the new king found himself constantly beset by spirits from beyond Pō. The menehune raided Manua’s villages for slaves and hosts, and now, without the Sun god checking their power, that problem might well grow yet more dire. Mist spirits lurked in the fringes, no doubt eager to draw hapless mortals in with their whispers.
And Kanaloa remained ever a threat, a remnant of the Leviathan’s passage.
Not for the first time, Maui caught himself wondering if the whole cycle might come undone. If the destruction last time was so great that mankind might never recover, that no Destroyer would rise again and cleanse the world. If everything Maui had ever done would prove for naught, in the end.
Or maybe finding himself forced to murder La had left him maudlin. There was always the temptation to give in to despair. Repugnant as the cycle sometimes seemed, the alternative was too harrowing to even consider.
It was afternoon by the time he made his way to the base of Haleakalā, where his family’s house lay. A simple hut, really, sitting beside a river that ran down to the sea if one followed it far enough. The burble of waterfalls feeding the river relaxed him and—more importantly—Hina and their son.
Maui paused on the lower slopes of Haleakalā, uncertain quite what he was seeing. The whole house had collapsed as if a great wave had slapped up against it. Netting lay strewn over the riverbank. A plank of timber was stuck in the mud, standing up at an angle. The palm leaf roof was blown into …
There.
Halfway back into the jungle, Hina lay unmoving in a puddle of mud, the two girls clutching her tight.
No.
No, this was impossible. He hadn’t seen this. No vision had revealed this, not like this.
Wailing, Maui raced to her side and dropped down, knees squelching in blood and muck beside his family. Nanamaoao’s eyes were open, staring at nothing, face a mask of pain and terror, her little hand twisted in an awkward angle. And Hina … Maui rolled his wife over to reveal ribs crunched inward as if some enormous force had punched her. She’d died in agony, her insides collapsing.
His roar of pain and defiance reverberated off the valley.
Not this.
Not again.
Maui collapsed into the mud, unable to form thought. Nothing, save that he would look into flame, see the end of his beloveds, and see who had wrought this. Someone would suffer for this.
Suffer so very desperately.
Part I
Third Age of the Worldsea
1
Just offshore a sea turtle swam through the crystal blue waters around Sawaiki. From the rocks where she sat, Namaka could feel the turtle, could feel the fish, could feel the children surfing atop the waves, trying to master their boards. Over the past two days, the villagers of Puna had already begun to reconstruct their destroyed homes, to rebuild the boardwalk that would once again support them, connect them to the sea. The ocean was almost as much a part of the islanders as it was of her, and she was a mermaid and the Sea Queen.
Except, much as the Sawaikians loved the endless Worldsea, now they had reason to fear it, even if they did not yet understand those reasons. Farther offshore, leagues away in the great reef, the mer city of Mu had fallen to the he‘e. Once, Namaka had thought the octopus people near mythical and far removed from humanity. All that had changed. Now, through their betrayal of Mu, and through Hiyoya, she knew the he‘e controlled much of the world behind the scenes. Their motives were hard to guess, their very thought patterns and speech alien. But she had to assume they intended to dominate all the Worldsea.
She would need to liberate Mu, and soon. But before she could spare time for such things, a more immediate crisis on Vai‘i demanded her attention.
Hi‘iaka was dead.
They had to save her.
The Waters of Life might do so, but every moment wasted reduced the chances for restoring Namaka’s youngest sister.
“You’ve been staring at the ocean for an hour,” Upoho said. The wererat had arrived that morning—Namaka had sent for all their allies to come here, to Vai‘i, so she and Pele could begin this search in earnest.
“I’m absorbing mana.” On visiting Mau‘i she’d briefly soaked in the Sacred Pools to replenish the energies she’d lost fighting first the taniwha and then Pele. It was hardly enough. “I cannot say what ordeals lay ahead of us. The first time Pele and I found a spring of the Waters of Life, it lay deep underground beneath the mountains on Uluka‘a. And it was guarded by a he‘e.”
Upoho clucked his tongue. “Locals have some fish roasting in the imu. Come eat. Then we can all discuss things. No use worrying on an empty stomach.”
She glanced at him, wincing again to see the scarred ruin of his missing eye. Pele had done that. She had maimed Namaka’s foster brother in her desperation to rescue Lonomakua. But then, maybe Namaka should never have abducted someone so dear to Pele.
Namaka allowed Upoho to guide her back to Puna, toward the palace Pele had taken over. Namaka’s younger sister now reigned here, though Namaka had gathered the place had once belonged to the woman’s advisor, Naia. If the former queen held any bitterness over the loss of authority, she hid it well.
Slaves laid out meals in both the men’s and the women’s houses within the palace, and Namaka joined her sister in the women’s house, along with Naia. Upoho left her to head to the men’s hut where Makua and Moho—a visceral dread crept into her mind to even consider the Fire spirit—were no doubt resting.
Beyond, Lonomakua had taken over another house to hold Hi‘iaka’s body. The kahuna engaged in continuous chanting to keep her soul from fleeing into the dark of Pō, aided at times by the sorcery of Kapo. The mermaid part of Namaka could feel it—the distortion in reality their actions created, a psychic reverberation through the currents of Pō, leaving her ill-inclined to venture near to that house. Despite her desire to speak with Pele’s kahuna and push him to reveal his secrets.
“We are disadvantaged this time,” Pele said around a mouthful of poi. “We don’t know this land nearly as well as we did Uluka‘a, nor have anywhere to start. My best suggestion at present is to consult the local kāhuna.”
Namaka frowned at that. Naia—or Pele, perhaps—had sent out their head kahuna, Kamalo, all around the district trying to send the souls of the fallen lest they linger. Everyone had more than their share of work to rebuild this place.
She slunk down across from her sister, ignoring Naia, unable to suppress her glare. All of this had happened because of Pele’s betrayal of their truce. Her sister had made a habit of betrayal, hadn’t she? Indeed, she had murdered Leapua, and that Namaka could never forgive. Still, Namaka had agreed to work with Pele to save Hi‘iaka. Their youngest sister meant more than their grievances.
Pele seemed to take no notice of Namaka’s dour mood, though, swallowing before blathering on. “Kapo’s been here far longer. She spent most of that time on Mau‘i, enough to believe the Waters of Life don’t lay there. There are powers, she tells me, on Lana‘i. Strange powers from Pō and beyond, things men have feared since coming to Sawaiki. On Moloka‘i as well, sorcery seems stronger. I hesitate to head to either island while things remain uncertain, so I expect to consult all the kāhuna in Vai‘i first. I’ve already sent messengers calling any who would come in friendship, even from the old dynasty.”
Namaka sat in silence, watching her sister prattle on. She cared very little for the dynastic struggles between the prior immigrants to Sawaiki and those more recently come from Kahiki. The part of her that remained Nyi Rara longed to join the mer who had fled Mu and go to their aid, but she could not abandon Hi‘iaka.