Even if Edward left in the morning, he could probably still out-pace the boy. But there was too much at stake and too much that could be decided by minutes.
Edward twisted his neck to kiss her. He felt her fingers slip under his shirt to touch his stomach. He turned around and kissed her more. Her smooth hands rubbed his back.
“Callista Knowles, I love you,” he said.
“I thought you were going to say, Callista Knowles, will you marry me?”
“That, too,” he said.
She poked him. He kissed her again and then he pulled away slightly.
“I have to go,” he said.
She laid her hands on his chest. He was still holding her to him. “You have to go now,” she said. The pleading left her voice.
“I do,” he said. “Can I borrow your car?”
“Will I get it back?” she asked.
He just looked at her. Good question. She tossed him the keys off the table.
“It’s good we go way back,” she said. He smiled.
He held up the keys. “This is my insurance you don’t run around on me while I’m gone.”
“There’s a doctor with a Corvette in the neighborhood. He could come pick me up.”
“I’ll take my chances,” said Edward. He kissed her once more and let her go. He had to get moving. He pocketed the bottle of “t-pills.” “Can you do me a favor?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“I’m going to ask you a few questions and give you a few directions before I go. You are in no way in danger personally, but I don’t want you to take any chances. You don’t need to worry, but you need to be careful. Does that make sense?”
She nodded. “Do you think that boy saw me?” she asked.
“Yes, I think it’s possible. Like I said, I don’t want to take any chances. I’d like for you to lay low until I get back.”
“That makes sense,” she said.
“Is there anyone you feel you can trust here?” he asked.
“James.” She cleared her throat. “Dr. Seacrest.”
“Corvette?” he asked. She laughed. “I see.” She laughed again. “Is he in town?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Could you shut the clinic down and stay with him for a few days until I get back?”
“Is that really necessary?” she asked.
“Please?” he asked.
“Will you not go if I don’t do it?” she asked. He narrowed her eyes at her playfully. “All right. I’m sure that will be fine.”
“Start this morning first thing. And if you see any Onge or suspicious-looking natives in the neighborhood, promise me you’ll go into town and hole up at Seacrest’s office? He has an office?”
“Yes and yes.”
“It’s just precaution,” he said, more for his own benefit than for hers.
“I know,” she said.
“I love you, Callista.”
“I love you, Edward.” She kissed him again.
He stepped out the back door. “Goodbye.”
“Goodbye,” she said.
He turned around to look at her once more. She was beautiful, leaning on the countertop. She still wore her black outfit. Her blonde hair casually framed her face. Her blouse hung loose with a couple of the top buttons undone. He knew that under any other circumstance, he wouldn’t be leaving until the morning.
Under any other circumstance, I wouldn’t be leaving at all.
40
Callista’s town car drove much faster than any other mode of transportation Edward had used in the past months. It was an older model; he was taxing it to its limits on the roughshod road.
Rain began to splatter and then pour onto the windshield. The only lights he had on the road were the moon and the headlights. Still, he took his chances and kept up the pace.
The highway would only take him to the edge of Onge territory. From there he’d have to hike through the jungle. The most direct route to the village was straight through the thick of the wild. Otherwise he’d be forced to make a long trek on the winding cart path of the traders.
Edward slowed as the rain intensified. He couldn’t keep track of everything - watching the road, the potholes, the curves, riding the hydroplaning, focusing through the beating of the water against the car top, and all between the wipe of a windshield. 160 kilometers per hour had been quite easy to manage twenty minutes ago before the rain. Now 60 kph was quite taxing.
The dull ache in his body had lessened even further. It worked. It worked it worked it worked! He smiled, thrilled, and pounded the steering wheel with his hand. He hadn’t had time to celebrate. The revelation had been smothered in the other, equally momentous revelation: She loved me. It had been real. She loves me…
His mind turned to the trance substance once more. There was no sense in getting giddy. If he did not solve his problems with the nirvana effect and Mahanta, there was nothing to celebrate.
Part of the problem was solved. He had in his pocket the t-pill, the answer to the after-pain and the key to keeping a step ahead of the Onge. Edward’s trance was longer and barely hurt. He wondered how many times he could take it in a day.
Three times in less than two days had been unbearable. It was quite likely that he could trance four or more times each day with the t-pill and still not get the same after-pain as one injection.
He quelled his excitement. He needed to concentrate on the road. The rain eased, and he accelerated. The road dipped downward.
Edward saw a pair of lights ahead. He squinted past his windshield wipers. At the bottom of the hill, he spotted an old purple car parked on the side of the road. Its headlights were still on, illuminating the rain, and it was parked cock-eyed on the shoulder. Edward could not slow down. He couldn’t waste any time. As he zoomed by, he could make out two figures. They seemed to be natives. The adult figure was changing a tire. The other was a boy, pacing in the rain, as though supervising. The boy jerked his head up to Edward’s passing car as soon as he heard it. Edward could see the face distinctly. Tomy.
Onge in a car? It was one of the most bizarre things he’d ever seen.
His spine chilled. If he had stayed the night, it could have been much more complicated. Cars turned the “sun and moon” trek to Lisbaad into just a few hours. How did they get cars? Why?
The why was obvious. Mahanta had more secrets.
Edward watched them in his rear view mirror. He saw just the headlights for a moment, then the silhouette of Tomy jumping up and down in excitement. As Edward reached the top of the next hill, he saw Tomy’s car swerve back onto the road. The boy must have somehow recognized him.
Edward accelerated further. Still, the headlights in his rear view mirror were getting closer. It wasn’t until he hit close to 150 kph that he began to gain some distance. He hoped that the road didn’t swerve. He was relying on blind chance. The windshield was smothered with water mere moments after the wiper passed. He could only see a good twenty meters in front of him, and at that speed on that road, he may as well have been blindfolded.
Edward resisted the temptation to pop another t-pill. For every danger he faced now, there were ten more waiting for him once he got to the jungle. He would definitely need a trance to get through that trek; and then there was his encounter with Mahanta, if he ever reached the boy-turned-god. He would have to take his chances, here.
Edward hit the top of another hill. The car caught air, and Edward wrestled it into staying on the road. Tomy and his tribesman were almost out of sight. Edward needed to get several minutes ahead of them to be able to hide his car without their detection.
Will I get it back? He remembered Cali’s humor.
That depends on if I die. He smiled. He wondered what she would have said to that. Probably, well, then you can’t have the car. He’d be in her bed right now.
I should probably start slowing down. I’m getting close.
The car hydroplaned, then skidded through a muddy spot on the dirt road. He shot past
a windblown sign: “Hard Right Turn Ahead”. Edward slammed the brakes. The car slid further.
Ahead Edward saw a massive clump of trees. He had reached the edge of the jungle. The road twisted at an odd angle to shoot into the woods. It was meant to be taken at 40 kph. Edward was still zooming at 120. He pumped the brakes, then yanked up the hand brake as he took the turn.
It wasn’t enough. The car responded to him, but the rain and the terrible road were merciless. In his slide, the back tire slammed into the dirt incline at the edge of the curve. The car spun left. It started rolling. Edward braced himself, getting as low as possible in the vehicle, thankful he’d buckled his safety belt.
The car only made a quarter roll before its hood slammed into a tree with a deafening crack. The back swung around and made its own impact against another. The collision jerked Edward sideways towards the roof of the car, the seat belts digging hard into his shoulders and torso and knocking the wind out of him. His head got dangerously close to the roof of the car, but stopped with a jerk before he hit it.
The engine had stopped running. The car had no power. The only sound Edward heard was the rain. Except for the bruising pain from the seat belt, and the soreness in his neck, he was uninjured. The collision had thankfully left the cabin more or less intact. He sat there just listening to his own breathing. Any minute now Tomy’s car would be coming by.
Edward took a moment to pray before he did anything else. God, thank you for sparing my life. It’s a sign to me that I’m not working against you.
Lord, please forgive me for the breaking of my oath. Please do not forsake me. Every sin I have committed against you I will make up tenfold.
I know you have a purpose for me, Lord. Please give me the strength to fulfill it. Give me the strength for what I must do.
He didn’t say, “Amen.” He felt it wiser for his whole night in the jungle to be a prayer. He felt he somehow had a better chance mid a direct communication to his maker.
And God, I know it’s stupid, but please let me have Cali. Please don’t take her from me.
His scientist side told him that there was no evidence of a God that actually meddled in the affairs of men. At that moment, he hoped there was. After all, he’d just seen his life flash before his eyes.
Edward tried the door facing up. It wouldn’t open.
Edward pulled himself out through the smashed windshield. One of the remaining glass shards scratched him. He ignored it and strained his eyes to the north. Down the road a couple kilometers away, he saw the pair of headlights he was looking for peek out over the hill. He still had a minute before they reached him. They were driving much more slowly, now. They must know about the turn. They’ve done this trip a few times.
Edward’s mind started down the path of, how long have the Onge been doing this?
The pressing necessity of dealing with that pair of headlights, however, forced his thoughts to the task at hand.
41
Next to Da’lin sat the boy Tomy, the Messenger of the living god. Using Manassa’s magic nectar, it had not taken Da’lin long to learn to drive the car.
Da’lin had never been a courier to a boy before. It was Manassa’s law that one must speak to the messenger as one might speak to the god, and one must listen to the commands of his messenger with the same deference. It seemed odd to Da’lin, listening to a fourteen year old as he might respect one of the tribal elders.
But Tomy only said what Manassa told him. And Da’lin was never one to question the holy. Manassa was a god; it stood to reason he was always right. That was fine for Da’lin.
Tomy was irritated. His feet were covered in mud and were everywhere in the car - on the dashboard, on the door paneling, on the seat. Tomy could not sit still.
Da’lin was not a clean man or a neat freak, even by Onge standards, but it was his car. At least, he drove it. No Onge in living memory had even rode in a car, let alone driven one. He preferred to keep it like the white man had it when Da’lin stole it from him.
If Tomy were just a child Da’lin would just knock him over the head or throw him out of the vehicle. But he was not a child. In many palpable respects, he was Manassa.
The boy kept talking. He wouldn’t stop talking.
“That was the white man, the white man I was following. He hunted me. He tried to get me. He saw me. Manassa will be angry. Manassa will not be pleased. He’ll be angry with you, Da’lin. And he’ll even be angry with me. Edward is ahead of us, Da’lin. You must go faster. It is as Manassa wishes.”
“How do you know what he wishes?” asked Da’lin even as he pressed his foot on the accelerator. The rain was subsiding, but he was already going far faster in the storm than he felt he should risk.
“He speaks to me, even as we sit here now. His word to me is as the air I breathe. His whispers are the wind.” He was quoting some of their oral history, now. Da’lin didn’t believe him but did not want a bad report from the boy to get to Manassa. “We must catch him. We must bind him and bring him to our god.”
“Didn’t you just want to watch him?”
“I’m afraid that he’s already betrayed us. We must take every precaution.” They drove over another hill. “Why are you slowing down? We can’t even see him anymore.”
“There is a curve here, just before we enter the wood.” As they reached the bend their headlights illuminated the undercarriage of Edward’s car. It was bent forward in the middle, wedged between two massive trees at the jungle’s edge.
“The white man!” screamed Tomy. “Stop the car! Stop the car!” Da’lin slowly braked. He was not about to flip his car and join the white man. The Messenger of Manassa needs to learn the patience of his master.
Before the car even stopped, Tomy was outside of it, sprinting to the wreckage, climbing around it, looking for the missionary. Da’lin cautiously stepped out of his car, leaving it running in case they needed to make a quick getaway. “His body’s not in here,” said Tomy.
“Maybe he survived and is now making his way on foot,” said Da’lin, taking a few more steps towards Tomy so he could see him better. The rain was still coming down hard enough to obscure his vision.
“Maybe so,” said Tomy. “It would be a long way for a white man to travel in the jungle.”
“I saw him duel Dook. He is no normal white man,” responded Da’lin. He looked around for signs of the missionary. Tomy saw them first.
“Tracks,” he shouted, pointing at the muddy road. Da’lin walked over to examine them. They were pointed away from the village.
“The white man goes the wrong way!” shouted Da’lin over the rain. Tomy was still at the wreckage. Da’lin’s eyes followed the path of the footsteps into the darkness of the jungle.
“There is no sign of him here,” shouted Tomy.
“There!” yelled Da’lin. He spotted Edward first. Da’lin had never seen a white man move in such a manner. As a matter of fact, he’d never seen a human being come close. It was as though the white man were held up by strings, as though the unseen god of gods were pulling and tugging his body as a toy. Da’lin was reminded of Mahanta’s supernatural duel with the panther.
The white man leapt onto the car, slid all the way across the top, and flipped down through the door in one fluid, graceful motion. Da’lin ran towards him.
“Get him!” yelled Tomy. “Get him!”
Da’lin did not want to lose his car. Moreover, he did not want to lose his life at the hands of this boy. The adrenaline let him overcome his fear of the white demon. There was some awful, dark medicine, some white magic in him that was making him dance like a god.
The white man started the car moving, but its wheels spun out in the mud. The rear tire in a rut in the dirt road. The white man tried again. Da’lin drew closer. He would reach him.
The white man did something funny with the brakes, tried again. The car lurched forwards out of the rut. Da’lin grabbed him and hurled him out of the car. Cat-like, Edward landed a meter away and in
the same motion launched at Da’lin.
Edward’s blows lacked power, but they came with such speed and fury that Da’lin could only stagger back. The white man used not only his hands and feet but his knees, his elbows, his head, his every body part to strike Da’lin, and Tomy could only get halfway to the fight before the Onge driver had fallen.
Da’lin watched the white man leap over him back into the car. He saw Tomy charging, but this time it was too late for the Onge. In a blur of mud, Da’lin’s car lurched off. Tomy was shrieking.
“Get up! Get up you weakling! Get up! We must hurry! The white man crushed you! Just wait until Manassa hears this! You have failed our god!” Da’lin was in a fog. Tomy slapped his face to wake him up. My car, Da’lin was thinking. My car... “Why would you leave the car running!” yelled Tomy. “He stole the car! He’ll make it to the village before us, now! Get up!”
Da’lin pulled himself up from the mud. His nose bled. He wished that the white man had hit him hard enough to have his ears stop functioning, but no such luck.
“We must run,” said Tomy.
Da’lin obligingly started trotting down the road. He had no problem with hoofing it. If he hurried, maybe he could get his car back.
“Wait,” said Tomy. He pulled out two vials from his pocket. “We must run.”
42
Lila, newly widowed adulteress and girl of sixteen, walked past the guards of Manassa’s temple. They were expecting her, at Manassa’s instructions, and let her pass without so much of a glance. As was customary with the Onge, she wore little clothing, but she made it a point to lose her skirt on the long walk to Manassa’s bedchamber so that only a loincloth remained.
She walked into his quarters with impunity. He was working with a microscope at his corner desk. He had turned before she even entered the room.
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