by T. Wyse
Kechua felt the giant’s form move over the path, ever searching. Instead of tearing into the foliage; instead of burning it down or uprooting every tree, Talah gently parted each bush with ginger care.
“If they report me to the elders like you think . . . hoping they’ll exile me? Think it’s that easy?” He bent another bush above Kechua, but his care prevented him from seeing the boy. “Only people like your folks get exiled; only drunks and idiots.” The giant stopped after giving the small challenge, a pensive clicking filling the empty space.
Azure leaves shimmered with trembling anticipation, bowing low to the ground. Their colours changed from blue to green, then back to blue as the footsteps beat their rhythm.
“Even if the old woman petitions and it happens”—he searched another bush further down the trail—“then I’ll come back and kill you, but I’ll kill the old man first. Get some red on those black walls.”
The rhythm slowed and the rustling leaves calmed slightly. Kechua felt the tension unwind from its tangle. The breathing and clicking slowed, and the giant’s path shambled and swayed back down the trail, his words muffled into inaudible grunts from its unhinged jaw.
The distance within the verses was not enough to ensure the safety of the others; not quite. Kechua remained there, reaching out with his sight, trying to probe the heart of the man’s fury. No, there was no satisfaction in him. The embers remained unquenched.
The boy rolled backwards, pushing further into the obscuring bushes, and a new chorus was punctuated by the great beating drum of stomping feet.
“Almost got away, almost!” the muffled slobbering beast sang joyously.
Talah pushed through the bushes, careful not to uproot or tear anything, but rushed forward in pursuit. The plants slapped at Kechua’s face as he rose to his feet. Brambles tore red lines across his cheeks, and the damp, earthy stink of the forest rose in symphony with his own pouring sweat.
Close, so close to the crescendo. A paw groped for Kechua’s head, holding it for a moment, but slipped away as Kechua ducked and rolled. His roll broke the wall of foliage. He found himself upon a bed of moss, his arm stinging from leaning on it.
The moss formed an outer layer to the circular clearing. A group of stones formed the barrier to an inner circle of dirt untouched by any plant; unspoiled by any footfall either clawed or shoed. The air hung heavy and stilled. Even the trembling canopy above swayed with a slowed rhythm, in some awed accordance with the sacred circle.
He rose, sucked deeper into the circle’s embrace. The symbols upon each of the arrow-shaped stones glimmered, tickling him with a familiarity he couldn’t quite—
The hand of the forgotten pursuer fell upon his head again, but that time, it clenched down hard.
“Neat little place,” Talah muttered, and Kechua’s face met the ground by force.
The hits came in a rhythm. The predictability of it, along with the expectation of the pain, helped to dull it. The ferocity of the strikes, enough to crack one of his cheeks, also bode well for the strength of the winding dance.
Surely the beast’s ire would stay upon him for a week, perhaps more.
Kechua’s ears rang as numb warmth poured into them. Although a little further than usual, he was free and could push it more.
The stomping feet retreated, giving a short pause to ponder the circle of stones. Kechua rose in whatever silence he could muster to creep away from the turned back.
A stick presented itself just beyond the halo of moss, and holding it, he returned to the song while swinging it with a hyperbolic shout.
He caught Talah in the same spots as the pipe, the same timing between them, and ended with one to the giant’s shoulder blade. Talah turned around and caught the stick after Kechua swung it at his hands, just like before.
“That hurt.” A trickle of slick drool ran through the parted, snarling teeth. A few pondering clicks of his rolling jaw passed as Talah glanced over the bleeding and wretched boy before him.
“Did say I was going to kill you,” he muttered, a trace of resignation in his mumbled words. He flung the stick upwards with enough force to toss Kechua back into the centre of the circle. He caught the boy as though striking for a home run, but Kechua only buckled to his knees.
“C’mon, just beg me to stop. That’ll be enough.” The stick rested on Kechua’s shoulder, tickling the tendon of his neck.
A smile crept onto Kechua’s face and a quiet chuckle mingled with the pain wracking him.
The swinging began at his side once more, moving to his shoulders and legs, surgically aimed at where the bones jutted out. With each strike, the rhythm cooled and hardened into place, but blood pooled within the boy. The cramps of dying muscles flowed over his flesh like a skinning knife.
Kechua fell to the ground, the awareness of the circle fading. He listened to the faint churning below; the rhythm of long-forgotten ceremonies and dances. The strikes continued and he allowed himself to be lost within the song of the earth below, warm and flowing like his leaking blood.
Kechua closed his eyes. He grinned, unable to laugh through the pain, but felt secure in the purpose of the moment.
***
Later, the boy sat in the Shaman’s hut. Swaying from one side to the other, he tried to ease the pain of the mending bruises, but he found no permanent place of comfort and danced restlessly. The fire crackled in front of him with an eerie dimness, lending a faint, dancing warmth against Kechua’s mending cuts. His eyes wandered as he swayed, the shadows hanging thick and low. All but the face of the man across the fire remained shrouded. Darkness pooled in his eyes, weaving an unsure picture of leather and wrinkle.
On the left side of the fire sat an empty plate, painted in unsure and trembling red. It emerged from the darkness, the faintest hint of a slender pair of fingertips appearing briefly, only to submerge back into the depths. A pot slid into existence beside the empty plate, and though sealed, Kechua smelled the filth within.
In turn, Kechua completed the ceremony, though he had to catch himself in a biting stumble from one of his shoulders. He slid a new full plate around the right side of the fire. The rationed bread and processed cheese appeared so orange it resisted the red of the fire, seeming to glow defiantly a moment before accepting the darkness.
“Used your new freedom.” The old man chuckled, though the face remained a chaotic static of red.
The boy sat in silence, the fire itself seeming to speak to him. Somewhere above him, the glinting of dead black eyes reflected the flame. The old man crunched at his meal, the acidic stink of cheese blowing over the fire.
“Is there nothing?” the boy asked, itching at his sealing scars.
“Hm? What did you expect?” the man sputtered through a mouthful. “Did you expect the spirits to come swooping down from the heavens the moment you acted in ‘nobility?’” The man almost gargled on the word.
“Maybe.”
“Haven’t heard my lessons then,” the old man grumbled. “How many of the stories are just; kind? How many of them reward the valiant when the spirits involve themselves? You think stepping in front of a fist nets you glory?”
“Not one moment, no.”
“Not a lifetime of moments.” The shaman crunched on his bread. “They will take you if and when they choose.”
“I may not remember the names, the exact stories, but I remember the patterns. I remember the things that drive them. I remember that there are kinder spirits; mothers and creators, noble warriors, gods of the land!” The boy leaned forward and stumbled as a bruise in his leg cramped up, taking his air away.
“Mothers! Creators! Noble warriors! Gods of the land! Reveal yourselves to this worthy, radiant soul!” Chunks flew from the shaman’s mouth, igniting on contact with the fire and spilling an ashen cheesy stink onto Kechua’s face.
“Nobody?” The man feigned shock, shooting punctuated glances around the tent. “Not one of you will walk with him. Not one of you will bask in his nobility and glory
?”
The boy shivered, his leg cramping tight, the muscle stretching and pulsing with a jagged, ripping pain.
The old man inhaled deeply and broke his own rhythm, his voice softening ever so slightly. “What you have done is not bad, but it is also not good. To earn the respect of the spirits, you must understand this or at least try to with more sincerity.”
After more crunching, he returned to his sour, condescending tone. “I will not praise or scold, but know that I will tolerate no more lateness. You are an adult in the eyes of our old ways, and whatever softness I have ever shown stops today.”
“Yes, shaman.” Kechua swayed forward.
“Blessed,” the old man said. The fire swelled and trembled with the utterance, the black eyes twinkling above. The word carried a jingling taste, gripping his brain like the ashen cheese clung to his face.
“Sticks better than my other words, I see.” The old man chuckled. “A birthday gift, sent from those ever watching, to you. It is a truth about yourself, and the English form of it tastes like vulture’s leavings, but this is the form they give.”
Kechua leaned in, feeling the fire lap at his face.
“Blessed.” It fell from the man’s lips once more, and the fire roared upwards as if he had breathed gunpowder into it. “It is the name for those born like you, those who wounds will not linger on; those who feel what others cannot—see what others cannot. Through whatever choice, however flawed, the world has given you this gift and burden, and it is yours to carry; yours to choose.
“This word is why you were sent into my care. Remember it, feel it within your head and soul. It seems you have chosen to fight, so we will begin to train your body; to push your endurance.” The old man gave a chewing snort and added, “Clearly you will not be a great sage.”
“Go, get rid of that and come to me in the morning. We will speak more then.”
“Yes, shaman.” The boy slipped again from the burning pyre, his burdens in trembling arms.
***
The boy again lay in the circle, his ear to the ground and eyes closed. The song’s rhythm had evolved over the course of five years, requiring he add to it to fight back with more gusto; to learn how and when to offer his screams and when to embrace the pain. Yet with each passing year, Talah’s hate focused on him with the increasing tempo of an addict’s hunger.
His clothes no longer dangled about his limbs, but they instead bore a faded weariness. A new shirt displayed a chipped version of the ‘23 Fly’ logo, and the off-white had long ago been soiled into a camouflaging red with brown spots. A rough leather belt secured his pants to his waist, and smaller leather straps braided up his legs to seal the oversized cloth to his calves. The material of the pants was lost to the staining sand of Glalih, becoming a consistent earthen red of simplistic stitching. His hair remained the same—shining and straight black—down to the beads, ensuring it stayed relatively straight.
The young man lay in the universe of bare soil, the darkened trunks of ancient trees forming the outer walls of stark reality. He took turns laying and crawling, pausing with the stillness of concentration only to move to another spot like a dog, unsure of oncoming rain through the trees.
The stones, almost as familiar to him as Anah or the Shaman, stood ever lurching and silent around him. Even five years later, the moss dared not encroach upon their runed faces.
There the sounds of the earth sang truest. The hesitant hush clinging to the circle let his senses wind deep into the world below. Only there could he be sure.
False twilight filtered through the branches above, reaching whatever unspoken taboo the place below held. Three days had passed and the noonday sun peered down upon his frame, reminding him to eat, drink, and steal a grudging moment to rest. When the nights came in full, he allowed himself to collapse onto the earth only to chase the same feeling in his dreams.
Restlessness overcame him, his form moving in sporadic and sudden bursts. Each time, the dissatisfaction of the position overwhelmed him. He would move his palms to another point in the ground before resuming his intense deliberation. He danced in his dizzy pool, his muscles aching and begging to surrender the chase.
Something pierced through the din of the earth below, adding an irritant serving to break the boy from his trance. He rose from his bestial position, his soiled hands painting fresh mud over the dried smudges on his pants.
He knelt with his back to the intruder, his footsteps cautious and unsure, but too light to be his beast.
“So, how goes it?” Her voice mixed a tart shrillness with a fine gravelly undertone.
He returned to the soil without answering. Her footsteps beat against the ground like a chainsaw grinding against a morning bird’s song. She knelt with a practiced softness onto the earth, her jeans managing to show some blue among the stained brown and flecks of glittering red sand.
“No good, Anah,” he croaked, his voice betraying the exhaustion of his very soul. “It’s getting worse.” He moved with a stiff exhaustion and rolled onto his back, resting his palms against the earth below. “I’m sure of it now.”
“You should come back. Your birthday’s soon, and the circle’s looking for you—all of them, not just Mana. One of them even went to the old man. He told them he didn’t know. Lied for you. Though I think he wouldn’t have told them where to find water if they’d asked.” Anah let out a shrill tittering laugh that clawed at Kechua’s ears.
He raised his palms a moment and glanced at her form, a distraction from his meditation, but not entirely unwelcome.
She would have been mousy if not for her height and the girth of her shoulders. Lean and angular muscle defined her figure, though her cheeks had years before hollowing out like her grandmother’s had. Her neck and forehead were freckled with blackened spots, and the touch of a practiced dentist had straightened her teeth for the most part, though the reduction of the pointed upper jaw had caused her canines to bend inwards as a penance for her indulgence.
Her soiled and sun-bleached blue jeans hugged her legs with hints of incoming fraying. Her shirt—an ill-fitting echo from his childhood—spoke a ghostly “23 Fly” across her chest, the ink long since peeled away. Her shining jet black hair, though purposely frazzled, held a stark line of dyed red to frame one side of her face.
“You need to come back.” Anah leaned in and lowered her head to meet his eyes, though not joining him on the earth. “If you’re sure, then you don’t need to stay here anymore, right?” She offered a grin and a nervous giggle.
“What do they care?” he muttered, his words drowning out the rhythm below. “I’m just the idiot who doesn’t listen, right? Sixteen years and only Mana ever really speaks to me, and now suddenly, they’re all so interested.”
“It’s true, but to be fair, we’re all interested.” Anah cocked her head and pivoted around his prone body, her red strands wriggling loose and tickling at the earth. “Even Talah wants to see ‘Kechua the man.’” She let out another stifled giggle. “Really. Even him.” The forced smile melted and her face softened a moment.
Kechua allowed silence to fall, the rhythm below flowing into him. Anah leaned in and clasped at his chest, her breathing and the closeness of her heart a warmer rhythm that dissolved the sea of anxiety away. He let himself fall into that; into the warmth of her touch, but instead of falling into sleep, he rose with her still gently attached.
“Is this going to be worse than dancing for the tourists?” he asked. “What was it like for Talah?”
“Different ancestors, different expectations. I think they were just glad that Talah could be bothered to do it. But it definitely won’t be like the shows.” She leaned in on his shoulder, a soft and slow giggle punctuating her words. “I think you’ll get the full treatment. Could be days of preparation; lots of costumes. I know how you just love the costumes.”
She emitted a shrill laugh as his body tightened at the mention of the dress.
“Full treatment,” the slurred words emi
tted from outside the circle, beyond the wall of the trees. “Sounds good.”
Anah slipped away, sliding backwards against the earth, leaving Kechua to savor the lingering warmth of her touch.
“C-come on, Talah. It’s his birthday. They won’t be happy if you beat him and . . . ” She was silenced by a single charging stomp that coughed up dust from the wet earth.
“I’ve got a birthday present for you Kechua.”
Anah shriveled even further back, her giggling uncontrollable.
Kechua opened his eyes and craned his neck to meet his accomplice in the rhythm. Somehow, the years had only doubled the creature’s mass, and though he, too, had been the benefactor of the dentist’s mercy, his maw hung loose and slavering. Making Talah more human did nothing to wipe away the beast in his face.
“H-happy birthday, my friend,” Talah gurgled with a vicious curl of his lips. He presented a black slab of something.
“Y-you, just stop!” Anah’s voice trembled, her giggle overflowing into her words.
“Go, tell them I’ll come back . . . but I need some time. If I’m not back in time tonight . . . ” Kechua bobbed his head, letting the beat of the world flow into him, awakening his muscles and mind.
“I’ll feed the old man. Again,” she warbled with a nervous laugh. Anah shuffled around the outskirts of the circle, pausing a moment beside Talah, her heartbeat pumping with such ferocity that Kechua could feel its trembling.
Talah pivoted his neck and gave her a snapping grunt, causing her to stumble back. A stomping feint in her direction sent her bolting into the azure leaves and beyond, her sobbing giggles disappearing into the flow of the shivering leaves.
“Got this special from a friend down south.” Talah rolled the object, revealing it to be a knife. “Said it’s something different; something authentic from the old Aztec days. Bone handle, chipped obsidian blade.” Talah spun it in his hand, his eyes following it lovingly. “Beautiful.” He gave a slack grin.
The strike came with predictable timing and force, and Kechua rolled away, slipping to the edge of the runed stones. Talah waited, tossing the blade up and down in flourishing circles.