“The Son of Heaven asked if there were anything that mortal men could do. ‘The portal must be shut once more, and locked tight,’ the old priest told him. Then he told the Wukarta king how to find the Seven Keys, the Keys of Power, that would seal this unnatural gate forever and protect the world from the seeping corruption of the Seven Hells. ‘One Key,’ the old priest said, ‘you already have in your possession—it is the Khodam, the kris forged from the bone and blood of the star princess. The rest of the Keys you must gather as quickly as you can and, in a ceremony of solemnity and power, they must all be thrust into the Navel of the Earth to close and lock the portal to the Seven Hells once and for all.’
“So the Son of Heaven selected six of his greatest warriors, three strong men and three brave women, and they scoured the Earth for the remaining Keys—and after many adventures, many trials, the talismans were brought home to Yawa, all six of them—each one a strange and wondrous object—and all were transported to the Navel of the Earth and with magic, a mighty spell-making and the help of the ever-living Gods, the barrier between the world of men and the Seven Hells was remade and the Earth was sealed off from the darkness of the other world. The Wukarta were safe once more.”
“I do love a happy ending,” said Ketut.
Semar ignored her sarcasm. “The plague abated, the demons and monsters were killed by heroes in epic combats or hunted into extinction by men of valor; other fell creatures, those who survived, took refuge in the dark places of the remotest parts of the world, hiding from the eyes of men. There they remain until this day.”
Jun nodded approvingly at the ending of the tale. Ketut yawned.
The Frankish dwarves had retired from the arena to warm applause, and they were replaced by a family of Yawa players, dressed in gaudy robes and fantastical masks. As Jun looked on they rolled into the center of the area a little cart that unfolded, sides, back and top to become a madly painted stage and the players leaped up on it and began to tell the story of the discovery of the Eye. It seemed a team of intrepid delvers, all devout Vharkash worshippers, according to this unlikely rehashing of the legend, set out to discover the Key for the glory of the Rajas of Sukatan by exploring deep beneath the Gray Mountain. The Yawanese players made no mention of the sordid search for gold nor of the thousands of wretched slaves who toiled and died there to enrich their masters.
Neither this fanciful story nor the tale of the great plague was unfamiliar to Jun. He was aware of it, in the way that he was aware of dozens of other myths and stories of the Laut Besar that were performed by the shadow-puppeteers or recited by the traveling story-singers at court. He had even been forced to learn by heart some of the epic poems that dealt with this subject matter.
However, now, what he had always believed was mere fable had taken on a whole other dimension, a far more real and frightening aspect. The Khodam, that decrepit, rust-spotted old kris that had always sat at his father’s right hand in council was a real object of steel and wood—and real magic: he had seen it glow with power when his father wielded it. It had been stolen from him by someone who was prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to take possession of it, including murdering his father and burning his summer palace to the ground. Myths about the Khodam, bedtime tales for children, had been transmogrified into real life: his life.
And what of the man who had stolen the Khodam and slain the Son of Heaven—and who now, Semar said, wished to view the Eye of the Dragon in his cousin’s kingdom: what did he want? It seemed perfectly obvious to Jun, although Semar had not spelled it out. This sorcerer, this Mangku person, clearly wished to collect all or some of the Seven Keys of the Earth for a terrible magical purpose. Jun did not think that the Seven Hells actually existed; they were clearly a metaphor for something or other, a warning to lead a good and moral life. Nor did he truly believe that any so-called dread portal could be opened into another dimension with these Seven Keys. But at least one of the keys, the Khodam, was an object of real power, and whatever Mangku wanted these things for it was not for the benefit of mankind. Quite the opposite.
The benefit or otherwise of mankind was, however, not Jun’s primary concern. His task was to regain the Khodam for his family and return to Taman in triumph and take up his inheritance. He assumed the Khodam was on that ship in the harbor and well guarded—but how could he retrieve it? First he must defeat, or kill, or somehow neutralize the terrifying Mangku. But how could he go about that? What did he know about the sorcerer?
Very little. He commanded a powerful ship full of hundreds of murderous pirates, none of whom seemed particularly magical. He was able to make raids on peaceful islands such as Taman, murder, rape and pillage, apparently with no fear of reprisal. And then sail calmly into a civilized harbor a few hundred miles away and demand an audience with the local Raja. He had protection—this Mangku—he had a free hand to do whatever he wished in the Laut Besar. And there was only one person who could give a ship full of bloodthirsty pirates that license: the Lord of the Islands, Ongkara, King of Singarasam.
Mangku was clearly in the service of Ongkara. But why would the Lord of the Islands authorize Mangku to attack weak little Taman? For the Khodam? Yes. Certainly. Jun could think of no other reason. But why did Ongkara want to possess the symbol of the Wukarta?
Jun’s pondering was interrupted by a blast of trumpets and there, across the arena, was his cousin, with a handful of ministers, courtiers and priests, filing into the seats of the royal enclosure. Cousin Widojo looked different from the last time Jun had seen him: he was a good deal taller and considerably fatter, but there was something else, too. His plump round face with its feathery black mustache looked unwell. There was a greenish tinge to his skin and even from thirty paces away, Jun could see that he was sweaty and uneasy in his self. A touch of swamp fever, he thought, or maybe just a monstrous obat hangover.
The Yawa players were packing up their little cart and with much whooping, waving and bowing they sallied out of the arena. As the crowd yelled, “Widojo! Widojo! Widojo!” the Raja stood, and lifted his pudgy bare arms. The kupang-dispensers, big woven baskets of coins at their waists, began to make their tour of the area, scattering handfuls of money to the cheering crowds like farmers sowing grain in a millet field. Jun was disgusted—it was unutterably vulgar, this Yawa custom. A mere buying of the populace’s affection and quite unworthy behavior from a member of the ancient Wukarta clan. He stood dead straight, stone-faced and proud as the kupang-dispenser came past, ignoring the shower of copper coins. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ketut, grubbing on the dusty ground like a beggar to gather up the largesse. Dewa, he thought. Breeding will always show in the end.
Jun looked over at the royal enclosure and saw with a sense of freezing shock that the man seated to the Raja’s right, in the position of greatest honor, was none other than his enemy: Mangku. The sorcerer was not looking in his direction but Jun still felt the urge to cringe below the barrier, and only a great effort of will kept him upright. He looked over at Semar but could not catch his eye. The old man had pulled a fold of his ragged gray sarong over his head, as if to ward it from the sun. He looked even more than usually like a vagrant.
The Raja was addressing the crowd now, his voice ringing out over the arena with the help of a brass speaking trumpet. “People of Sukatan, greetings! We gather here today to view the greatest treasure of our fair city, the flower of our community, the talisman that protects mankind from all the evils of this world and the next—the Eye of the Dragon.”
The masses cheered their approval. There was another blast of trumpets and a company of Palace Guards marched into the center of the arena in a compact body and then dispersed to the four corners where they stood in groups of twenty men scowling at the crowd. They were big bronzed men, naked from the waist up, clad in flame-red sarongs and bearing steel-tipped spears, each with a ridged iron club tucked in the back of his belt.
More trumpets and
a gang of four huge slaves marched in, bearing a large, heavy-looking sandalwood box suspended between two poles. In the center of the open box, nesting on a bed of golden velvet was a large mass of gold-and-greenish stone. The slaves carried the box slowly around the perimeter of the arena and its passage was marked by the sounds of indrawn breath and more than a few cries of joy and wonder. As the box was brought past the travelers, Jun craned his neck for a better look: the treasure did look remarkably like the mythical creature’s eye, with a large, round, dark brown pupil in the center of a creamy oval of stone, with green-yellow striations around the edges. The socket that held the Dragon’s Eye was a cup of knobbled yellow metal. Jun had only a brief glimpse of the Eye before it was whisked past him by the four big slaves but he felt a warm gust of awe, and a deep and rather unsettling longing to possess it.
The Raja was speaking again, bellowing through the speaking trumpet. “As you all know, my people, the Eye has been in the possession of my family for many hundreds of years.” There were more cheers. A cry of “Widojo! Widojo” went up but soon petered out. The Raja boomed, “It is one of the greatest treasures of the Laut Besar. And the Wukarta of Sukatan have been proud to be its custodians. But now, my friends, now the time has come for the Eye to be passed to another, greater power, where it can be used for the betterment of all mankind, for the benefit of the whole world.”
The crowd fell almost silent at his words. A ripple of bewildered murmurs spread around the arena. One man was muttering to his neighbor to ascertain what he had just heard. Jun frowned and looked over at his cousin in the royal enclosure. Widojo was sweating even more than previously; he was twitching, making little jerking motions with his arms as if wrestling with some invisible opponent. Beside him Mangku had his head bowed, his eyes closed: he looked as if he were fast asleep.
The Raja wrestled the speaking trumpet to his own lips. “I have been persuaded by my good friend Mangku the Wise, who now sits beside me, that I should render up the Eye to his master and mine: Ongkara, Lord of the Islands. For who is more fitting to possess the Dragon’s Eye than the Dragon of the High Seas himself? His beloved envoy Mangku here assures me that the King of Singarasam will use the Eye in a way that will increase the happiness of all the diverse peoples of the Laut Besar, not just a few thousand privileged men and women in Sukatan. It’s time to be magnanimous, my friends. It is time to think of all the peoples of Earth and not just ourselves . . .”
Jun was astounded. He could never have imagined anything like this occurring in a thousand years: a Raja giving away his greatest treasure?
He looked over Ketut’s head at Semar but the old man was bowed under his sarong. Jun distinctly heard him mutter, “No, the Eye of the Dragon must stay here.”
A heartbeat later, out of the now-silent crowd, a man on the far side of the arena shouted those exact words, “No, the Eye of the Dragon must stay here.”
There were several more scattered shouts of complaint from the three public sides of the arena but most people were too stunned and confused to react.
Semar said very quietly, “The Eye is ours. The Eye is ours.” And a woman with a glittering golden nose ring ten paces to his left leaned over the barrier and shouted the very same words, “The Eye is ours!” and kept repeating the phrase until it was taken up by all the people around her.
Widojo was still jerking and twitching in the royal enclosure. “Silence!” he shouted through the trumpet. Some of the bellowing of the crowd abated—although not all. “The Eye of the Dragon belongs to the world! It is not ours to keep.” Widojo was now waving his hands in the air. Jun saw that the sorcerer had lifted his head. He was looking directly in his direction. Jun lifted a hand to hide his face from the stare.
Semar muttered, “The Eye must stay in Sukatan!” And a man in the middle section of the arena shouted the same words. And suddenly everybody was shouting that, too, thousands of voices, men, women, young, old, all around the arena chanting the words to a regular beat, “The Eye must stay in Sukatan. The Eye must stay in Sukatan. The Eye must stay . . .”
It was as if the whole population of Sukatan had come together in one voice to shout their disapproval of the Raja’s actions: the words rolled across the arena like waves, chopped and broken but ever moving across the space. “The Eye”—“Must stay”—“In Su-ka-tan.” A hypnotic beat: Ba-bom. Ba-bom. Ba-bom-bom-bom.
In the storm of noise, Widojo was consulting with a splendidly dressed older man with lily-white hair and clad in a military-style blue jacket dripping with gold lace. He was pointing directly at Jun and obviously giving urgent instructions.
Semar tugged on Jun’s sleeve, and said, “Time to go!” and the three of them began to push their way through the sea of chanting, angrily gesturing Sukatanese. The crowd was boiling now, almost set for a full-scale riot. “The Eye—Must stay—In Su-ka-tan”—everyone from sedate mothers to snot-nosed children, from slim young men to bowed grandfathers was yelling the same words in the same pounding rhythm. Jun felt the same tinge of mass madness he had felt in the temple the night before. He looked nervously at Ketut, but she was tight-jawed and silent, eyes fixed on Semar’s back as she pushed through the throng. The travelers nearly made it to the entrance, so nearly, when Jun felt a hard hand slap onto his shoulder and he was hauled round to face a pair of grim-faced, bare-chested guardsmen. Another seized his arms from behind. Jun saw Ketut struggling with another two huge half-naked men armed with spears. He said, “Unhand me, scum. I am Prince Arjun Wukarta. I am cousin to His Serene Highness Raja Widojo Wukarta, who will doubtless make you pay for your insolence to his beloved kinsman . . .”
Then an iron club sailed out of the blue sky and smashed him into blackness.
CHAPTER 17
Extract from Ethnographic Travels by Professor Tolmund K. Parehki of the University of Dhilika
The Wukarta Rajas, who were the rising secular power in the east of Yawa, grew jealous of the vast wealth of the Mother Temple—and one year boldly refused to give tribute either in goods or in human lives. And so a great and bloody war began between the warrior kings, who claimed that the blood of the stars flowed in their veins, and the priests of Vharkash, who did not fear death because they knew for certain that if they died in battle, they would be rewarded with a place at the heavenly court of Vharkash the Harvester for eternity.
The war lasted nearly a hundred years but, in the end, the massed bowmen of the Wukarta slew the last horde of fanatical Vharkashta recruits, cutting them down in their thousands and watering the fields with their blood. And peace came to Yawa. The Mother Temple was taken under Wukarta control—the blood rites were banned. Human sacrifice and the practice of magic were made a crime punishable by a slow, horrible death. The religion of Vharkashta began to change. It evolved into the benign and tolerant faith we know today, concerned with healing the sick and succoring the poor, doing good works, bringing the light of Vharkash to the benighted—although some claim, of course, that many of its atavistic elements remain.
The Wukarta Empire waxed full with the downfall of the Mother Temple and they and the priests eventually became allies in the ruling of the whole Kingdom of Yawa—and beyond. They created colonies all around the Laut Besar, and gave them princes of the blood to rule over them. And wherever the Wukarta went, the priests of Vharkash went with them. Five hundred years passed. The Wukarta fell to bickering among themselves—the princes of the smaller Wukarta kingdoms, Taman, Molok, even the tin-pot little outposts in the jungles of Kalima and Sumbu, joined forces to make war against the Kingdom of Yawa. And, as all mighty empires must do, it fell, tearing itself apart in a civil war that, so the legends say, lasted a full ten years and stained the whole Laut Besar red with blood.
The Empire of the Wukarta in Yawa was destroyed. All that remained were the little kingdoms here and there, where overbred princes lorded over their docile people, and grew ever more idle and ignorant of the world wi
th each passing generation.
They manned the pumps all the rest of that day and all through the long night, too. Even Farhan took his turn at heaving the iron bar round and round, hour after hour, in the black depths of the ship, as the water lapped around his knees and the wheezing pumps surged up and down and squeezed the bilge up through fat leather pipes to spurt and spew over the side. At around midnight, it became clear that, after the frantic efforts of the ship’s crew to get a spare sail over the side and roped into place, less water was coming in through the two cannon-smashed holes in the hull than was being pumped out. And in the dawn, with every living man on the edge of exhaustion, a good twenty leagues from where they had left the wreckage of the two Celestial cruisers, the Mongoose limped into the wide mouth of a river.
Using six pairs of very long oars, they maneuvered her slowly, sluggishly, out of sight from the sea, up a smaller tributary off the main flow and into the thick Yawa jungle and there they moored her, lashing her tight between two giant trees, and finally rested their weary bodies.
On more than one occasion during that dark night of fevered labor Farhan had been sure that the Mongoose would sink and he had wondered what it would be like to drown. Would he be taken by the sharks before he drowned or after? Another fear had haunted him, too, and that was capture—for the three remaining Celestial cruisers had been spotted in the small hours a league or two away, shooting bright white starburst rockets into the air in an attempt to locate them in the darkness. To have been spotted would have meant certain death or worse. But they had slipped away unseen, thank the Gods. However, it was clear that the Celestial Republic would not forget their bloody actions over the past few days.
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