by Matt Larkin
He shrugged. “Perhaps this apprenticeship may serve to temper her into something useful. Her powers have proved largely inconsequential, thus far. A disappointment, compared to you and your other sister.”
“Inconsequential?” He was serious. She pushed herself up, forced herself to meet his gaze. “There are people here who care about her. You’re going to just let her run off across the whole damn Worldsea? What if she dies on the way? What if we never see her again?”
He chuckled, the sound filling the cavern with echoes deeper than any man’s laugh had a right to. “Suffering and death are the meaning and entirety of human existence. There is no cure. Only cycles of pain, agony to be feasted on by their betters. Beings like us. Your petty sentiments mean nothing, child. We are predators, born to rule this world.”
Pele backed away from his mad tirade, shaking her head long before he finished speaking. “What are you?”
“Transcendent. This sentimentality, this desire for ‘ohana, it is your greatest weakness. Come back to me when you’ve burned it out. Then we will speak of forgotten secrets. Then we will speak of your greater destiny. For you are of my brood, child, as are your sisters. A grand destiny will unfold before you.”
Damn him. Was she so easy for him to dismiss? Her anger sent the cavern trembling, and he turned back with a raised eyebrow.
“Do you truly believe anything happens on this island without my knowledge or approval? Your mother may have ruled Uluka‘a, but I am ever-present.” With that, he turned away from her and descended back into the blood pool.
That stopped her. Heart pounding so loudly he had to hear it, Pele backed away. The cave seemed poised to close in around her, to crush her.
She turned and fled, scrambling out of the cave as fast as the darkness allowed.
The sun had dipped low on the horizon when Pele stumbled from the cave, her whole body shaking. Her stomach lurched again, and she fell in the bushes and retched. Most of her few childhood memories of her father were clouded, distant. But this was a fresh horror. He’d called her one of his brood. ‘Aumākua protect her! What did that even mean? She’d thought Kū-Waha-Ilo’s children mere byproducts of his lust.
But this made it sound like the creature wanted children with Haumea for some more definitive purpose.
Her destiny?
What?
She looked at the sky.
She shook her head. Kū-Waha-Ilo was monstrous. She could only assume he’d devoured the owners of all those bones, perhaps drained them of their blood to fill that profane bath of his. He had all but confirmed the legends, that he absorbed mana from his countless victims.
Pele wiped her mouth then rose and made her way back to the pool, where she washed her face. Beautiful and serene as this valley was, it housed a monster. He bathed in blood. Maybe she should just bury it all in a volcanic eruption. She could drive the volcano into a grand detonation, cover this entire valley. Using her power on that scale would no doubt have horrific ramifications across this entire side of the island. Whole villages might be endangered, maybe even swept away. The toxic residue would pour into the sea and kill the local wildlife. And she couldn’t even be certain she’d finish off Kū-Waha-Ilo.
“Find what you were looking for in that cave?” The haughtiness had crept back into Kū-Waha-Ilo’s woman’s voice.
Something in Pele snapped. Her hair ignited and her hands glowed like they were made of living magma. The woman shrieked and fell as Pele rose to tower over her.
“Who are you?” Pele demanded.
“H-Hiilei.”
“No. You’re a little bitch Kū-Waha-Ilo is trying to plant his seed in.” Pele grabbed Hiilei by the hair, but it turned to cinders almost instantly, filling the air with an acrid stench.
The woman screamed again.
Pele shook herself and let the fires about her dwindle. What was she doing, traumatizing this petty girl? This woman had no idea what she had gotten herself into. If Pele was a proper queen, she’d try to save the woman, not frighten her with a pointless display. Her father either wanted Hiilei as a place to sate his lust, or, as she had just claimed, to increase his brood.
Either way, though, he did want Hiilei. Pele hesitated. Kū-Waha-Ilo was a monster. And if Pele truly wanted to defeat him, to force his help, maybe she needed to become one as well. How vile. To challenge her father, she needed to become like him. And if that was the price to save her sister, she would have to pay it. Her father had called Kapo inconsequential. He was wrong.
“Get up.”
Hiilei did so, slowly, eyes locked on Pele’s hands. “If you hurt me, he’s going to …”
Pele grabbed the woman by her shoulder with one hand and lit a torch in the other. She half pushed, half guided Hiilei back into the cave. Just what would Kū-Waha-Ilo do to protect his woman? Would he help her save Kapo?
In the open cavern, Pele pushed Hiilei down to her knees. Then she lit a second torch, holding the flames on either side of the trembling woman’s head. “Kū-Waha-Ilo! I have your woman, monster. Show yourself!”
The cavern remained still long enough Pele began to wonder if Kū-Waha-Ilo had left by some other exit. The place was so massive, there could very well be a half dozen other tunnels leading out. As she pressed forward, he came strolling toward her, dripping a trail of blood behind him.
“Help me,” Hiilei whimpered.
Pele glanced down at the woman, but Kū-Waha-Ilo did not. He never took his eyes off Pele’s.
“You’re going to help me, or I will burn your woman’s face off.”
“My woman?” He chuckled. “Three moons and still she bleeds. She does not appear primed to carry my lineage. I approve of your tactic, but you have vastly overestimated the bitch’s value. Burn her, by all means.” He waved a dismissive hand and turned away.
“Kū-Waha-Ilo!” Pele shouted.
“Oh,” he said without turning around, “you really should call me Father. I hear it’s tabu to refer to your parents by their names.”
Hiilei whimpered, though whether at learning Kū-Waha-Ilo cared nothing for her, or that the woman holding her hostage was his daughter, Pele didn’t know. Nor truly care.
“You think I won’t harm her?” Pele demanded.
“I hope you do. I’m certain it will make you stronger, more useful. Either way, I would have consumed her in a few days anyway.”
“W-what?” the woman screamed.
He waved his hand around the cavern. “Where do you think all these bones come from, you stupid bitch? Infertile, useless specimens. Not every woman has the strength to carry my seed, after all.” Without waiting for further reply, he walked back into the darkness of the cavern.
Pele’s fingers contracted, constrained the flames, even as the land began to rumble with her rising anger. It was wordless, formless indignation that this creature could so dismiss human lives. His lover was—no. No, it soiled the word ‘lover’ to use it in reference to Kū-Waha-Ilo or any of his victims. That’s what Hiilei was. A victim. She was no doubt born on this island. One of the very people her queen should have protected. And Pele had instead burned half her hair off, then dragged the woman down here and threatened to melt her face. Whether Hiilei was seduced by Kū-Waha-Ilo’s power or merely seduced by him, she was innocent of any real crime save pride.
And Pele couldn’t leave her here to face the horrors Kū-Waha-Ilo would no doubt visit upon her. With a sickening surety, Pele knew he had spoken the truth. He’d have fucked the woman, tortured her, and eaten her. If not tonight, the next night, or the next.
“Get up,” Pele said. “Get up, we’re leaving.” She let one flame wink out and hefted Hiilei to her feet.
Kū-Waha-Ilo was never going to help her or anyone but himself. Nor did she have anything to threaten him with save danger to his own life. Even if she could have beaten him in a fight, this woman would have been a casualty. How could she not be?
Pele guided Hiilei back outside then pointed to the river. “Foll
ow it long enough and you’ll reach a village. Don’t ever come back here.”
“You’re not going to burn me?”
“I never was.” She hoped the woman couldn’t see through her lie. Pele wanted to believe it herself. “Now run, girl.”
The sun had long since set. By now, if the woman had half a brain, she was far away.
Content the woman should be gone, Pele pressed her fingers into the stone around the cave. Maybe she could not bury this entire valley nor fill in the whole cave.
But she could collapse the entrance.
Kū-Waha-Ilo might have another exit. But at least she would ruin this little paradise for him, considering what he’d done, how he’d treated her.
Fire rose inside her as she called forth the heat of the Earth. She screamed in pain and ecstasy from the effort until, finally, the tunnel cracked open. Blasts of lava spewed into the cave and poured down its steep slope, shot up into the ceiling. A river of lava tumbled inward, enough to cover the mouth. Pele sucked the heat and warmth out of that, forming igneous stone over the entrance. Finally, she collapsed on the ground, spent.
Exhausted, she crawled back to the pool and lay down by her fire.
25
Turned out, sieges were shitting boring.
A lot of sitting around, waiting for shit to happen. A few moments of screaming and running away while Kaupeepee’s men hurled rocks and javelins and actual shit on them from far above.
Nobody ever found glory with shit in his hair and a javelin stuck up his arse.
King Huma of Lihue led the siege of Haupu, at least so far as the warriors were concerned. The man was Kamapua‘a’s uncle, Aukele’s father, and generally a crotchety little shit that never got over the deaths of his sons. But despite gray hair and a belly big enough to look like he’d swallowed a pig, the man was there, every day, watching the fruitless assaults on the fortress atop the cliffs.
Of course, so far as Kama could tell, Huma wasn’t actually in charge of pig shit.
His ex-wife Uli—Kama had never really thought of the old sorceress as Mother—had managed to come out of being a hermit somewhere to direct people to save Big Sis. Figured she’d care about one of her children, Kama supposed.
The woman had welcomed him to the assault with a straight face, a nod, and an acknowledgment she hadn’t forgotten her wereboar son. She just didn’t give a shit.
Every attempt to break through Kaupeepee’s gates had failed. Mainly, because it wasn’t a gate so much as a giant shitting boulder blocking the only tunnel climbing up through a sheer cliff.
Worse, at night, it shitting snowed on their camp. Balls of ice, hard as rock, came falling from the sky like Wākea was having a shit on them or something. Who ever even heard of ice falling out of the sky? It smashed through palm roofs and cracked canoes and generally disrupted the whole night. A few people even got cracked skulls from that.
How would they explain that to Manua? “How’d you die?” the Ghost King would ask them before he’d let them into the dead villages.
“Uh, a ball of ice broke my head …”
Stupidest shit Kama had ever heard.
Manua would probably go and say, “Shit, you’re too stupid to be dead. Get the shit out of here.”
Now, the sun was setting again, and Uli claimed a big house. Chanting came from it at night like she was praying or invoking the ‘aumākua, but no one told Kama shit about what was going on.
He could guess though. Some sorcery nonsense. Dangerous stuff. Kama would know, what with an akua crawling up out of his gut every so often. It shifted around, even now, seeming to feed off Kama’s growing frustration with the whole situation.
A shitting eel. An eel boar.
“You were right,” Malie called for him, as he passed by near his men’s hut in the camp.
“Yeah, I’m always sometimes right.” He ducked inside. “Right about what, this time?”
Malie frowned, at least on the side of her face that could still move. Poor woman would probably never be whole again, but it didn’t seem to pain her anymore. “I talked to Lonoaohi, and he confirmed Uli is working sorcery.”
“Eh, trying to break open the gate rock with words, huh?”
Malie glanced over her shoulder. “No. Trying to stop Poli‘ahu’s own sorcery against us. Half Huma’s men have been down with the wet shits for days on end. Lonoaohi says the Snow Queen sent some akua among us to curse us.”
“Eh.” Yeah, Kama had smelled the issue. Never heard of people blaming bad gods for the shits, though. “So, her magic is not strong enough?”
Again, Malie glanced over her shoulder, then leaned in close. “Between you and me? I think the kahuna is terrified of Poli‘ahu. He thinks she holds congress with akua from Lana‘i and beings out from the depths of Pō. This snow and ice? That’s nothing. She’s breaking the men’s will, stealing their mana. Much more, and they’ll all be running home weeping.”
Yeah. Shit.
Kamapua‘a should have killed her back on Mauna Kea. He’d stopped himself just to save Pele. What a mess that had turned into for all concerned. He scratched his head. “What should we do?”
“You’re asking me, Boss?”
“You’re my second now.” And maybe … maybe she was almost as smart as he was. It couldn’t hurt to listen to what she had to say. “We, uh … we need to develop some contours for her stratifications.”
Malie frowned, but he could tell she was trying not to smile at his plans. “You mean counters for her strategies?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Maybe you can move the boulder blocking the tunnels.”
“Eh … well, not me. Not without …”
She nodded. “I know. I get it. You have to become the god.”
“Nah. I don’t think you do get it, my plucky bandit friend.” Kama worked his shoulders. “See, it’s not easy to put it back inside once it gets out. Gets harder every time, and it keeps pushing to get out. Suppose I let it free, and it does move the boulder and open the way in? What do you think happens then?”
“The Boar God goes on a rampage and kills Kaupeepee and all his bastard raiders. Everyone goes home happy. Awa and luaus abound.”
Kamapua‘a almost wanted to scream at her, though it wasn’t polite. He wanted to shout he couldn’t control who or what the Boar God would assault. Couldn’t stop the monster if it decided to kill Hina and defeat the whole purpose of this rescue. Couldn’t stop it from slaughtering, raping, and desecrating whoever and whatever it felt like.
“It might not go like that.”
Malie sighed, grabbed his wrist, and pulled him into the house. Really, tabu claimed she should have lived in a separate space from the men. Kama had considered tabus shit before, and the war ground didn’t make it easy anyway. There were women’s houses, but most weren’t for warriors.
Besides, he needed Malie close. He relied on her.
One of the other bandits shoved a plate of poi at Kamapua‘a. Besides Malie, four more of his crew had come along for this. Not many left from his days as a bandit in Kaua‘i. Kama missed those days. Back then, he mostly only worried about how to best annoy Old Haki, that shit.
Now, he had to fight wars and struggle not to become a monster, and, oh yeah, he mostly already was.
When he closed his eyes, he saw Pele’s bruised body, broken face.
“Why are some people born kupua?” he mumbled.
Malie snorted. “You are asking the wrong woman. Lua-o-Milu, ask your mother. She’d know these things.”
But Kama doubted she really knew. Not much. Something about old bloodlines of Mu, but no real answers for why some, like Pele, controlled elements, while others, like him, got possessed by vicious animal spirits.
Maybe Malie was right before. The world wasn’t a place for people. They were just intruders here, struggling to hold on a little while longer.
“Come on,” Malie said. “Would you really want to be normal? Average?”
“Aver
age.” Kama paused with a fistful of poi halfway to his face. “I’d still have my good looks and luscious brain.”
“Uh, huh.”
They ate and talked and Malie even managed to make the others laugh once or twice. The laughter died out when reports came that one of Huma’s men had actually shit himself to death.
Kama hadn’t even known that could happen.
Shitting was supposed to be relaxing. Relieving. Not lethal.
And still, he couldn’t stop thinking about what Malie had said.
Ask your mother.
Yeah.
Uli couldn’t see him until the morning, of course. She was all busy with chanting a mele and doing the hula and who knew what else, trying to stop the Snow Queen from ruining this siege with ice balls and rivers of shit.
Then Uli needed sleep, which was boring.
Then, finally, they let Kama in to see her.
His mother sat on a reed mat, inhaling smoke from some bowl of herbs and rubbing two fingers back and forth across her brow.
Kamapua‘a plopped down in front of her. “Headaches?” The woman looked older than he remembered. A kupua, yes, and to look this old, he had to wonder how many years she had passed. A hundred? Twice that? Didn’t seem like she had much left.
It should have saddened him, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel much of anything for her. She’d left Hina to raise him. Big Sis was the one. Always her.
“It happens,” Uli said, voice raspy and eyes glazed over.
Probably wasn’t sleeping much, what with trying to control the Snow Queen all night.
Well. Maybe best if he just got right to it. “You know what’s in me? Figure you must, and that was why you didn’t raise me.”
Uli breathed out slowly, still not really seeming to see him. “I didn’t raise you because Kalana died and I couldn’t face the world, Kamapua‘a.”
“Ah. Yeah, that. But, uh. About the thing inside.”
She pushed the bowl back. “Legends claim that Old Mu had sorcerers, much greater than those we have now. They trafficked with powers they didn’t understand, couldn’t control. Maybe they bound the first shifter spirits. Maybe … maybe it happened even before that. No one knows what unfolded in the darkest spaces of history before memory of time existed.”
