The Jumbie God's Revenge

by Tracey Baptiste

  They had to stop more frequently to clear the path. The crowd, soaked to the skin, shivering, and tense, grumbled. Several children cried and the rain came down harder. Corinne wondered how long it would be until they reached the caves.

  Thunder exploded across the sky and something above them cracked. The ground shook. A moment later, a large boulder tumbled down the hill.

  “Back!” Bouki called.

  The rock splintered as it descended, coming fast. It bounced off a ledge just above them, spitting rocks and clumps of dirt onto the crowd before continuing down the mountain. The ground shuddered once again, then became still.

  Bouki led them forward again, but another tumble of wet rocks fell, hitting him and knocking him off his feet as they tumbled after the first boulder. Malik ran to help. A gash at Bouki’s shoulder bled. He put a hand over it, and someone from the crowd ripped a sleeve off their shirt to bandage the cut. Hugo pushed through to the boys and picked up Bouki off the ground as easily as if he was a baby.

  “I’m okay,” Bouki protested.

  Hugo set him down but watched carefully.

  Bouki continued on, but warned everyone to stay as close to the side as possible. They squeezed together on a narrow ledge, pressing their bodies into the mountain.

  “Get away! Get off me!” Maya’s mother screamed. She lurched forward, nearly knocking someone off the path. She looked terrified as she held on to a baby, and Maya and her younger siblings cowered around their mother’s legs.

  “What is it?” Pierre asked.

  The woman narrowed her eyes and jutted her lips at a small hunched woman with her gray hair braided in cornrows. She looked almost as old as the white witch. “Her skin is fire!” said Maya’s mother. “Feel it!”

  Someone reached out to the woman, and the word jumbie rippled through the crowd. As people turned to look at those around them, several pairs of eyes settled on Corinne. She felt their gazes against her skin like insects boring into rotting wood.

  “Wasn’t it a jumbie who saved your children?” Mrs. Rootsingh asked above the grumbling voices.

  Corinne moved to the old woman and took her by the elbow. She almost pulled back because it was true that the woman’s skin was fire hot, but she didn’t want to give anyone the satisfaction. Pierre gave her a questioning look and she shook her head very slightly to let him know that she was fine. The rain drove harder, but no one moved.

  Allan went to Corinne and held the old woman’s other hand. “I was a jumbie, too,” he said. “And Corinne saved me.”

  Mrs. Ramdeen looked at her boy adoringly. She tugged at the fabric of her sari where the rain had plastered it to her legs and walked over to help the old woman along. Mrs. Ramdeen’s eyes flicked to Corinne a moment, but like Corinne and Allan, she didn’t let go. Together, they walked on.

  “Anybody who doesn’t want to be around a jumbie can head back down the mountain,” Bouki said loudly. “The rest of us—”

  Lightning and thunder simultaneously ripped across the sky. Every drop of rain illuminated in the light, and every creased worry line and every tensed muscle in the crowd was thrown into sharp relief. Once again the ground rumbled, stronger this time than the last.

  Bouki’s eyes became wide. Malik immediately began to shove people up ahead, to where there was an overhang in the rocks. Corinne and Dru followed his lead, pushing and pulling as many forward on the narrow strip cut into the mountain as quickly as they could manage.

  “Dru!” Mrs. Rootsingh called.

  “I’m coming, Mama!” Dru said, but she wasn’t. She was handing a small boy to his mother.

  The ground again shook violently and the sound of tumbling rocks grew louder overhead.

  As the last of the crowd made it across the path, a river of mud came sliding down the mountain, bringing rocks and bushes and a few smaller trees with it. The mud caught Corinne’s feet, but she managed to get her arms around a medium-sized tree in the path of the mudslide. Others were not so lucky. People got overtaken by the mud, knocked off their feet and pulled down the mountain. Anyone close enough reached their hands out, grabbing what they could—arms, legs, or bits of clothing to pull the fallen to safety. The mudslide grew wider as it came. Plants and rocks peeked out through the rolling earth, and then got sucked under. The silver belly of a dead fish flashed at the surface one moment and disappeared the next. A matted, broken wing floated by. Bouki shoved Malik and Dru out of the way, putting them on one side of the river of mud and debris. Corinne was still holding on to the tree as the muck spread around her, too wide for her to grab Bouki’s outstretched arm. Pierre reached from the other side, but the mud widened further, pushing him away, too.

  “Corinne! You’re going to have to jump,” Bouki said.

  The little tree started to bend from Corinne’s weight and the force of the mud pushing against it. Corinne wrapped her feet around the strained trunk, and it bowed further. Corinne’s hands were wet and her grip was slipping. If she didn’t fall soon, the tree trunk would break and take her tumbling down with it. Either would send her into the river of mud, and straight down the mountain over sharp rocks and steep cliffs.

  “I’ll catch you,” Pierre shouted. “Jump!” He reached toward Corinne, still being pushed back by the widening mud river. Corinne knew he wouldn’t let her fall. On Pierre’s side were most of the crowd and the safety of the caves. On the other were all of her friends. The trunk creaked and began to crack. It was now or never.

  Corinne tucked her feet under her the way she did when she was jumping from one coconut tree to another. She leapt off, landing against Bouki on one side of the river. On the other side, Pierre let his arms go limp at his sides. His body crumpled with the same worry Corinne had learned to recognize in his face.

  When the mud stopped running, Bouki tested his feet on it, but it was still unsteady and slick. “We can’t cross it,” he said.

  “What now?” Dru asked. She looked at her family on the other side of the mud.

  Malik pointed in a different direction.

  “We will have to go around,” Bouki said. He looked across at Hugo and Pierre. “Don’t worry, I know another way. Get inside.”

  Everyone but Mr. and Mrs. Rootsingh, Pierre, and Hugo made for the caves.

  “I will be okay, Mama,” Dru shouted.

  “We’ll be there soon,” Bouki added.

  Corinne couldn’t think of what to say.

  Their parents stood in the rain watching until Bouki led them up another path and out of sight.

  10

  The Weight of Water

  The roof of the white witch’s house was gone. The wind had ripped it right off from over her head and had peeled the wood from the walls like skin from a fig. The witch had no choice but to cower under the only solid thing in that house—the long wooden table—and wait while the water poured in around her from the sky, and from the rising swamp.

  She knew very well that one hurricane didn’t follow another on the same path so quickly. It meant that something was amiss. She scratched at the bare spots on her head as she considered what exactly was the problem. A bright red ibis feather floated past her on the swamp, pummeled by the rain, and a thought suddenly hit her.

  She peered into the storm, telling it, “Oh. I see.”

  After the first storm, the white witch’s house, which had stood on a small, muddy island in the swamp for ages and ages, had been reduced to little more than a few jagged sticks jutting up to the sky.

  Most of the seeds and leaves she collected for medicines had spilled onto the sodden floor of the shack. Their carefully wrapped papers were torn and soaked, the bags ripped, and a few bottles lay cracked on the floor.

  Things like this were not a bother. There were always ingredients that could be gathered. Though some were more difficult to procure than others and it would take time to reassemble her stor
es, the witch had been in this position before. Many times, in fact. Every hurricane season she braced for the worst, and survived, usually needing to climb her old bones up to fix the galvanized roof or nail more wood into the rickety walls. She had always managed. But this time, she would need a new shelter. The swamp provided privacy, but not much else.

  The water rose higher, lifting the legs of her wooden table and making it wobble. It was time to go. The witch scraped together what was left of her patience. Her body was stiff and cold, and moving was excruciating, but there was no choice now. With her oil lamp, some matches, and a small bag of herbs, the white witch moved down the slick stone path that led away from her house, taking uneven steps as she navigated across. Without even looking at her feet, she knew the exact places to step that would not make her slip and fall. It was, after all, a path of her own invention, designed to keep people out, to force them into the foul-smelling swamp water, to make them think twice before coming to her door. It had not always worked. She would never say so out loud, but in truth, she was the tiniest bit grateful for that.

  The witch made it to a network of mangrove trees where the roots rose out of the water, their thick trunks arcing high overhead like a natural roof. The roots twisted together tightly enough to make sturdy, if breezy, walls. It would be a safe harbor provided the witch could find a deep-enough space in which to settle herself. With the brackish water up to her knees, the witch followed the trees, looking for anywhere she could rest easily and wait out this next storm. As she moved, the water deepened, lapping up to her thighs, and then all the way to her waist before she spotted a good place. But to get there, she would have to swim.

  For anyone else, this would mean the end of the meager supplies they had brought along. But not for the white witch. She untied a cloth at her waist and wrung out the water. Then she put the herbs and the lamp on her head, covering it with the cloth and wrapping the ends under her chin before tying it securely. She eased into the swamp, keeping her head above the surface, and made for the little alcove. The weight of the water in her skirts and blouse made things more difficult, but the witch understood how panic could undo even the best plans. She moved slowly, stopping to float a little and breathe, then continued on until she was close enough to the little root cavern.

  Once there, she made a final push and grabbed on. She looped her fingers into some of the higher roots and pulled herself inside with her one good arm. The useless arm made a good-enough prop when she needed to rest, but it could do little else.

  With patience and after several slips of her hand, she got most of her body into the shelter. She settled her rump against a thick root, unwrapped the cloth, and took down the lamp, matches, and herbs. She pushed them into a space above her head for safekeeping. Then she pulled her legs in.

  “Look at me, folded up and jammed in this hole like a rabbit.” She laughed, and her laugh turned into a cough. “What a way to spend a day.”

  The hurricane blew louder and the rain came down harder.

  The witch moved as far back into the little space as she could, then settled against the mangrove roots, trying to ignore the way they dug into her back and sides. She closed her eyes. It would be a long time before she could get out and back to her house to fix it. Maybe it was the roots poking at her, or the wet sticky feeling of her clothes against her body, or the fact that she knew for certain she would get no rest in this space, but the witch called out in irritation, “Water jumbies on land. Land jumbies in the water. I suppose there’s only the sky left to bawl.”

  As soon as she said it, her jaw slackened. The witch remembered a storm from years ago, eerily similar to the one that raged all around her now. She looked at the gray sheets of rain as if she was looking out at the long-lost face of a friend. “Well,” she said. “You come back again? But what for this time?”

  She sighed. She was old old old, too old for all of it. She wished to sleep. It had been years since she had had a good sleep. She was always up at midnight to catch the best of the magic from the herbs and plants she picked. She could not sleep past the first crack of dawn because the scarlet ibises that were her neighbors were a flapping, squawking riot in the morning as they set out. She often slept in the afternoon after market, when the sun was hottest, but even then, it was not enough sleep. Never enough. She was tired.

  So tired.

  There was nothing to do now but wait. She wondered how long the rain would last this time. The water in the swamp rose higher. It wet the hem of her skirt. Then it covered her hips. Its cold on her old bones made her even more uncomfortable. Then the water was to her waist. Then it almost covered all of her bad arm.

  The witch watched the water’s surface ripple under the weight of the raindrops as it rose and rose. She watched it cover the trunk of the largest tree in the swamp, which housed the majority of her bright, noisy neighbors.

  “You won’t hear me complain again!” she said to the tree, since none of the birds were present.

  She thought of all the things she still needed to tell the girl, the half-jumbie like herself. “She isn’t too stupid,” the witch thought aloud. “She will figure it out.”

  By the time the water had begun to soak into the short white braids at the back of her head, the witch was perfectly certain Corinne would be fine.

  When the water touched the bristly hair of her chin, her eyes brightened. She remembered Corinne looking out on the horizon.

  “Oh, I see now,” she said. “She wasn’t looking up high enough.”

  The water was up to her bottom lip. As it continued to rise, the white witch sent a final message. It rippled out on the water, stretching out of the swamp and into the sea.

  “I hope you know you can’t fix this mess alone.”

  And then the witch slept.

  11

  Adrift

  In the churning sea, Mama D’Leau’s body whipped through the sand-filled water. She could barely see or feel the currents to find her way. She had a vague sense of the coral reef to her left, but where it was exactly, and how far, she couldn’t say. She hated being turned this way, like food stirred in a pot for someone’s dinner.

  She tried to pull herself together. In all her born days she had never been treated so.

  You rule the water, you will let a little rain stop you? she asked herself.

  She strained against the pull of the currents, twisting her body to pry herself from their grip. But nothing worked. She was as helpless as a piece of driftwood, or a broken sprig of sargassum.

  The current turned, and her tail screwed up and around her body. She nearly squeezed herself to death. Then the current released and bashed Mama D’Leau against the surface of a rock. She felt a sharp edge slice her skin. Her thick braided hair provided some cushion, but she hit her head so hard she could barely think.

  The strength of the storm struck fear into her heart.

  The water pulled her away and crashed her into the rocks again. She felt the sting of another cut near the end of her tail. The pain traveled up her body and brought tears to her eyes that mixed with the saltwater of the sea. She wrapped her tail around the rock, anchoring herself in place. She would have to wait out the storm there, cowering, angry that it made her feel so small and helpless.

  As she pressed into the side of the rock and felt the sea beating around her, trying to pry her loose so it could bash her again, she heard the words of the witch coming to her like an arrow through the chaos of the stormy sea.

  I know, Mama D’Leau replied. I know.

  She waited for the white witch to respond, to make a suggestion, to say something typically cold and harsh, but there was no answer.

  12

  Back at Last

  Bouki led them through the cracks of the mountain, searching for another path. The wind whipped branches past them and sent mud and stone hurtling toward their bodies. It was almost im
possible to hear, so Bouki led them with hand gestures, beckoning when it was safe, holding up his palm when it wasn’t. A gust blew Malik off the path. Corinne grabbed his hand quickly, but a bird slammed into her wrist. Her grip slackened as the bird fell limp to the rocks below, and Malik slipped from her grasp. Bouki caught Malik’s other hand just in time. Corinne and Dru grabbed hold and together they pulled him back up.

  “We should go back,” Corinne shouted into the rain.

  “We can’t.” Bouki pointed his dripping chin in the direction they had come. Another mudslide had closed off the path behind them. The only way was forward.

  Malik pushed himself into a little cleft between two large rocks. He leaned there, panting for a moment, then shifted his weight to get out and slipped into the shadows in the blink of an eye.

  “Malik!” Bouki screamed his brother’s name, though Corinne couldn’t hear it. Another gust blew across them, whipping the name from his mouth, and leaving only his open mouth and strained face for Corinne and Dru to read. He rushed after his brother, holding on to the two sides of the rocks and peering into the darkness.

  “Where is he?” Corinne shouted over the roar of the storm.

  Dru pushed past the two of them and looked in. “Here!” she said. Then she slipped between the rocks and disappeared.

  Corinne and Bouki looked in. They couldn’t see anything.

  “Come!” Dru called.

  “Do you see a way in?” Corinne asked Bouki.

  “No. There’s nothing.”

  Corinne wedged herself into the crevice between the rocks and tried to push through. The rocks scraped against her arms and chest, but a moment later, she was on the other side, in a dark space with Dru and Malik standing next to her. Bouki was still looking in, squinting. “You’re going to have to squeeze through,” she said.

  Bouki looked skeptical, but he sucked in his stomach and entered the sliver sideways, keeping his face flat. Corinne, Dru, and Malik grabbed his arm and pulled. Bouki fell on the rocky floor of the little cave and looked up at his brother. “Hello,” he said.