by Jeffrey Hall
The Treeback glared down at Wish from his height, a foot above Wish’s own. He was waiting for a reason to use that axe in his hands, and Wish wasn’t about to give him one. He had tried hundreds of time to stop Moso, but it felt that every time he did it only drove the Chassa further into his debts and addictions. Maybe it was the near attack on his life by the bearded thug. Maybe it was Moso’s brash attack on the trogi. Or maybe it was just that Wish didn’t do well with people, even the ones he cared about.Whatever the reason, he was done trying to help.
“Don’t come whistling to me when Lavender’s taken your tail too. I’m through. You’re on your own.”
Moso smiled. Lighten up, you trit! It’s only a little bet.
Wish backed away.
Moso held up his hands. When I see you in the morning, I’ll be jangling like bells with lunars.
“Maybe I won’t be waiting for you in the morning,” yelled Wish over the din as he pushed his way through the crowd, not bothering to look back. If the monkey wanted to get himself killed then he was free to do so, just so long as it didn’t include his neck too. A neck he would no longer risk if he didn’t ally with such a fool.
But even as fury blazed inside of him, and he heard Boz’s words uttered not long ago, calling him a fool for partnering with such a person as Moso, the thought of separating from him for good felt more painful than any anger the Chassa may have put him through.
Who would he confide in? Who would he trust?
He pushed open the double doors and escaped the oppressive press of the Lavender Light, breathing in the liberating, humid air of the Fangmoran dusk. The last glimpse of the great fire flared boldly behind the Knotted Mountains, a brilliant slice in the sky, dribbling a purple pus over the smattering of clouds that hovered over the Crone.
And in that fresher air his anger lessened, and he knew that when his partner came knocking on his door, he would once more enter the jungle with him in search of their fortune, whatever that may be, his problems be damned just as Moso would say about Wish’s own.
He sighed, his hand grabbing at the sack of coins on his hip as he stared at the fading light of the sky.
If Wish hurried he could return to the Trough prior to the rise of the sister, the first moon, and deliver his lunars. And if it went quick enough, he could be back in the jungle before the canopy came to life with the lights of the dazzler wings and fire worms, a spectacle that outdid any skyline of the city at night. A sight that often let him close his eyes in peace and gave him dreamless sleep. Sleep where no one followed him into the darkness. Sleep where he did not see his mother, his father, Moso, the priestess, or her…
He wasted no time.
He stuck to the same alleys they had used to reach the Lavender Light, avoiding the drug dealers, thieves, and other manner of unsavory characters that swarmed to the shadows during nightfall like insects would carrion. Though the alleys were dangerous at this time, he preferred them to the onlookers he would find on the main streets.At least the alley-dwellers kept to themselves.At least they knew better than to attack a well-armed man like Wish. By these routes, he made it back to the southernmost part of Fangmora, the place where he and Moso had slipped into the city only hours ago.
The Trough.
The slums rose sleepily before him, a shadowy heap of homes tucked beneath the wall, some only discernible from the crumbling rocks that made the barricade by the doorways that pocked their faces. Fires flickered inside windows and just in front of stoops, small signals that civilization still survived despite the crush of darkness the encroaching jungle cast over the walls. Even from his distance Wish saw the Trough’s residents crossing in front of the lights like lost figures pacing about the flames in hopes of finding salvation. At the other end of the long row of houses there stood a single home whose walls were made of thorny bramblebush and whose roof was an amalgam of great nori and throb leafs. It looked as if a beast slumbered atop the dwelling, but was too big to clean its matted fur. A small sliver of flight flickered in its front window.
He went to enter the Trough, but was stopped by the commotion in front of the nearest house. A group of four Green Men stood between the rest of the street and a pair of Fangmoran soldiers. A Treeback, a great gorilla whose fur was as brown as bark, was jabbing his finger intoa soldier’s golden chest plate. Though the soldier had his hand on the short sword that hung from his hip, he did not draw it, even as the Treeback berated him.
“Why should you have a right to any of these people’s taxes when all you and your king do is standby and watch as the jungle tears down the walls and lets its creatures sink their teeth into them?” said the Treeback.
“The jungle is it?” said the soldier. He was a Lemura, and his black snout moved beneath his helmet as he spoke. “How strange is it the last time there was a gantama to come over the wall there was a trail of bluis fruits leading out of the forest. Almost as if somebody was baiting it...”
“Accusing us of evil acts, are you now? The king has been increasing his tax on the Trough for years. He’s hung debtors from the vines that dangle from the temple, yet he has done nothing with the money he’s gained from those taxes except purchase fine rums, exotic women, and pets. His evils and the evils of his lackeys know no end.”
“Are you calling us evil?” said the soldier, laughing.
The Treeback nodded. “Anyone who hangs onto his robe has no conscience. I’ve seen your type murder. I’ve seen them rape. I’ve seen his advisors come down from the temple just to have a go with some Trough girls. By the Flaw, even his botamancer was found guilty of capturing and torturing innocent folk who happened to step down the wrong alley. You are all a shadow swallowing this great city whole.”
Wish listened with interest, but continued walking. What the Green Man said was true. Bones hung from the temple of Notha even now.The king’s cruelty and greed were renowned, but the Green Men’s wasn’t much better. They were just two scavengers fighting over the corpse of the Trough, snapping at each other to suck the last marrow of tax from its downtrodden citizens. Public spats like this were a common occurrence, yet they only ever led to one party walking away. He had no doubt that in a matter of moments, the soldiers would step down, as outnumbered as they were, and the Green Men would continue their rounds in collecting their own tax from the rest of the people in the Trough.
Soon their voices were out of range, and Wish stood before the house with the shaggy top. The door was slightly opened, as if the place were expecting him. He slipped through it and found his father sitting in his chair, the one with the high back, the one when rocked squeaked like a scared rodent. The small flicker of light Wish had seen in the distance was a lit candle that sat on the sill of their home’s only other window, the one that faced the wall. The one that faced the jungle. Two shelves lined the closest wall.Upon them sat a box full of feathers his father had collected over the years, a human skull, and a collection of other bones.His mother’s.The result of an old Fangmoran tradition to keep the dead close.
A blue akara bird fluttered beside the candle, taking seed from his father’s extended hand as he whispered to it.
The door closed behind Wish as he entered, and the sound of it clicking shut made the bird fly away back into the jungle and made his father turn. A smile expanded over his face.
“Isn’t that just like the jungle to never let me have more than one of its own at a time. It gives me you, but takes back the bird. It’s a fair trade, I suppose.”
“I didn’t mean to scare him,” said Wish.
“I am surprised it flew away at all.”His father scratched his beard in thought. “Akaras used to sit on our shoulders as we picked the bluis, waiting to pluck the rotten fruits that fell away from the limbs as we plucked the good ones. They are very friendly creatures.”
“Perhaps it didn’t recognize me as a friend.”
“Perhaps it would if you spent less time acting like a beast and more time acting like a man.”
Wish
shifted uneasily. Between the time it had taken to gather the contract from Boz, to finding the trogi, and then the journey back... It had been four days since he had been home, and each day he was away his father’s worry grew, even as old as Wish was. He supposed his father knew the jungle well enough to know that even Wish’s experience with it did not equate to safety, just like Boz. But it did equate to lunars.
Wish pushed the two lunars he had earned from Boz onto the table beside his father. His father eyed them, and then laughed. “Did you have to skin a jagrall to get them this time?”
Wish shook his head. “Have the Green Men been by yet?”
“Those hoatzins? They’ve knocked twice today, scared away a redfoot the size of my hand from the windowsill.”
“What did you tell them?” said Wish. He felt a knot grow inside his stomach. His father’s crassness never played well with outsiders, yet he never tried to correct it.
“I told them to take the fist they used to pound on our door and scurry it up the tight caverns of their teekas.”
Wish slumped. “Father...”
“What? All they do is blabber. Their threats are as thin as a snake’s waist. Besides, what are they going to do? Coax a chimari through our window? They know my son is the great Wish Bibango.” He puffed out his chest and made his voice sound serious. “Didn’t you hear? He can make chimaris dance with a snap of his fingers.”
“It’s not a chimari I am worried about. It’s the Green Men themselves. People have been winding up with their throats slit,” said Wish, recalling the body he had seen only two weeks ago slumped over the lone fountain that decorated the Trough’s main street. A person he had seen argue with the Green Men on many occasions.
His father batted away his concern like one would a fly. He grabbed his cane leaning against the nearby wall and used it to sturdy himself as he came to his feet. With its help, he limped over to another table, where he lifted a pot of crown tea, a drink kept cold by the reaction of the dueling tea leaves sunk into water with a splash of snapper venom. His father balanced on his cane as he tried to pour the contents of the pot into a smaller cup.
Wish went to help. “I can do that for—”
“I am fine,” said his father. “Can’t earn lunars. Can’t waddle about outside. Can barely stand up on my own. At least let a man pour his own damn drink.”
He took the cup and limped over to one of the two beds tucked into the corner. One with ragged thin sheets and a dirty pillow; the other was mostly clean and made as if done to tempt Wish into sleeping in it.
His father sat down, a grimace coming to his face, before finding comfort on the mattress made of nori leaves. Across the small room, the lunars Wish had offered him still sat upon the table, untouched.
“Next time they come, you’ll pay, eh?”
His father took a sip from his cup.
“Father—”
“Pay with moons you’ve earned by spilling your own blood, yet again? Some father I am.”
Wish shook his head. “There was no blood lost.”At least not his own. The sad visage of the dead trogi still lingered in his head. “I know what I am doing.”
“No you don’t. I’ve never seen a more lost boy in all my life. What type of man spends his life hiding away in the jungle, swinging away in the trees like a primitive ape, sticking out his neck for the blood bats to suck like sap from a tree, yet runs at the first sight of a wall, of a crowd, of another person?”
“I—” Wish tried to argue, but his father wasn’t finished.
“I curse the damn gantama that pushed me from the tree and took my leg. It took me from the bluis trees, and worst of all, it introduced you to the jungle.”
Wish still remembered that day. How his father screamed. How the gantama yelped with joy as it stole the bag of fruits his father had plucked that day. The dread Wish felt as he stared into the jungle, knowing he needed to face it in order to find his father’s bag and earn enough to pay off the Green Men, even back then. He never found the bag, but he found something even more important that day. A comfort in the jungle. A beauty in it. An ability to make sense of it and face the chaos it consisted of. That feeling, that skill, had been lucrative to him ever since, but it had also earned him the position of jungle-diver, an occupation that made the rest of the population uneasy. His father was no different.
The jungle was a curse to civilization, and anything or anyone that came from it, the same.
“The jungle isn’t as bad as you think,” said Wish.
“No? Look what it’s done to you. Where is my boy hidden beneath all those scars? All that strange armor? All those weapons dangling from you like new appendages?” He took a sip of his tea. “It’s even taken away your name. Wish. Hmmmph. What happened to Ati?”
“I am still Ati,” said Wish.
“Are you? The Ati I once knew was a sweet, caring boy who clung to my legs like a spider would a tree when looking at the jungle. He used to appreciate others. He used to find comfort in the walls of the city. Now you run to the forest like a pup would its mother at the mere sight of another.”
“That’s not true,” Wish argued weakly. As much as he liked to tell himself it wasn’t, the sight of the jungle peeking in through the window was giving him comfort even then, promising to silence all the noise of the city with the constant, wild din of the forest’s citizens. Promising to take him away from his father’s accusations.
His father laughed. “Oh? Then why did you come here with these lunars and not the Nest?”
Wish stood motionless. “She doesn’t want to see me.”
“It doesn’t matter. Even if that was true it does not absolve you of your duty. I’ve heard the whispers about that place. It is crumbling just like the rest of this city. No one is finding use in their god. How can they afford to keep themselves alive?” His father pointed to the two lunars on the table. “Take it and give it to someone who actually needs it.”
“You need it,”Wishsaid sternly.
“Two lunars? All the Green Men ask for is a half. What am I supposed to do with the rest of it?”
“Save it until the next time they come knocking at your door.”
His father shook his head. “And let another starve while I sit on them? Take those lunars or else I’ll throw them into the jungle, back to where they belong.”
Wish sighed. “She won’t accept it.”
“Then donate it to her lady. They won’t refuse an offering to their goddess.”
“Father—”
“Do as I ask, for once!” His father’s voice boomed, and the strain that it caused him was visible as the rage in his face dissipated into exhaustion. “I’m...I’m still your father. Though you take care of me like a child, I’m still your father. I know what’s best.”
Wish argued no further. As much as he wanted to tell him he was wrong, as much as he wanted to search out an excuse to not do what his father was telling him, he knew he had been cornered. He had money. They had a need. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go to them, it was just that he didn’t want to be reminded of his rejection.He didn’t want to be reminded of their time together.
He went over to the lunars on the desk and picked up one. “This is all I’ll take. The other you must give to the Green Men.”
“I’ll see how far I can shove it into their lying, smug faces if that’s what you are asking of me.”
“Father—”
“Fine. So long as you promise me you’ll go there tonight.”
“Tonight?” said Wish, hoping he could at least postpone the inevitable ire that was bound to infect him.
“Why wait and starve them any further? Go tonight or I’ll give the coin to the next bird that lands on our windowsill and tell it to drop it on top of the Crone.”
Wish chewed his lip, searching for a way out. I could always take the lunars and pay the Green Men myself, he thought, but quickly talked himself out of doing it. All that would lead to was more bickering with his father,and all t
hat would do was stall his return to the jungle.
“Fine,” said Wish. He placed the coin in one of his pouches and went back to the doorway, only stopping when his father spoke up again.
“I have two more favors to ask of you.”
“Yes?”
“Sleep here tonight. At least let me have one night of easy rest knowing where you are and that you are safe.”
“The other?”
“Tell her I hate her for pushing you further into the jungle.”
Wish exited the door and did not look back.
Wish stood before the church doors soaking in the light of the first two moons, the sister and the brother. People still hurried along the Gold Row behind him, returning to wherever they called home in hopes of finding sanctuary there against the jungle and the city’s deviants that emerged with the shadows of the alleys as the night opened the gates closed by light and let the darkness spread like a flood along the rest of the streets. The cracks in the building before him looked deeper thanks to the shadows, as if the stress of the night somehow compounded the fissures that marred the structure, making it look as though if the wrong leaf were to fall upon its roof the entire building might topple completely. Wish’s hand shook as he pushed open the door.
Inside he was greeted by a chamber filled with statues of eggs.Things as large as heads, they lay clustered together in threes as if put there to incubate in invisible nets. Candles sat atop the tallest of the three, allowing just enough light to see the various colors the eggs had been painted. Blue, brown, and gold, the hues of the three moons. The center of the church’s religion. Moans and whimpers emanated from the short hallways that ran from the main chamber. Wish always thought the noises made the place feel wild, like a swath of the jungle had found residence somewhere in the city. If not for what awaited him inside, he might have found sanctuary there like the others that called the place home or flocked to it to heal.
Two figures at the far end of the chamber turned as he stood in front of the doors. The taller of the two touched the other’s chin, dismissing her, before turning and walking down the small path between the clusters of egg statues. From the way she sauntered, the long feathers that were sewn into the bottom of her robe and splayed like black daggers, the tall curves of her ears reaching out from her silhouette, Wish knew it was the Grand Priestess of the Great Bird, Risa Aragala, the Fossala woman said to be first in line to welcome the Great Bird’s progeny when they finally hatched from the sky and returned to Caldoon.