“It’s not … suitable for you.”
“Okay, tell me then. I can take it. I know how cruel the world is. I watch the news.”
He sighed before continuing the tale.
“One night, several drunken men forced their way into her hut and abused her after she rejected them. She tried to fight them off, but Marila did not anticipate the violence she experienced from the men. Transforming in the human world was a slow process and by the time she had the energy to change, the men have already left, leaving her bloodied and bruised.”
My chest hurt hearing Marila’s past. No matter how many times you hear about it in the news, in the media, in movies, it still shocked me every time I heard about rape.
“What did she do after that?”
“She tended to her wounds, but she was surprised at the hatred she received from the women who accused her of seducing their husbands. Marila was not a kind-hearted being to begin with, and the incident brought out the worst in her. She realized how vile humans could be and justified that imposing her own sense of justice onto the human world was fair. Marila left her cottage and moved to a more secluded area in the jungle—preparing to unleash her wrath to the men who abused her.”
Lolo waved his arm and put the images back on the air, showing me Marila’s transformation for the first time.
“Are you sure you want to see this?”
“I have to, Lolo,” I said, holding my hands together. He waved his hand and the image moved.
The sun was orange outside her hut as Marila wiped her body with something that looked like oil. Slowly, Marila’s back curved, almost splitting her shoulder blades. The skin on her back cracked like dehydrated land and batlike wings pushed themselves out, stretching wide and long. Her hands shook and increased to twice their size. Sharp claws ripped out of her fingernails, designed to rip off flesh like hot knife on butter.
Once the transformation was complete, Marila flew to the village and waited for the men to stagger to their homes after a drunken night out. Seeing her chance, Marila attacked all five men with such speed and anger that there was barely time for any of them to scream for help. She sliced their throats and ripped their chests, pulling their hearts out of their ribs. It only took minutes for her to mangle them, leaving a bloody mess of flesh and entrails.
Without thinking about it, I grabbed Lolo’s hand and he froze the image of Marila’s face, bloodied and grinning with evil glee.
“Were you watching all this from Engkantasia?”
He nodded.
“But how can you just watch it and not do anything?”
Lolo sighed, placing his other hand on top of mine. “We don’t intervene with your world. Only very few of my people cross over and we keep track of them but we don’t do anything unless it threatens our whole existence.”
I understood what he was saying, but I didn’t agree with it. Whoever was king then was definitely powerful enough to stop what Marila was doing. Instead, he just watched because it wasn’t important enough for his intervention.
“What happened next? I don’t want to see the rest of this anymore,” I said, turning my back against the image. Lolo wiped them off the air.
“Satisfied with her revenge, Marila took the men’s hearts and flew back to her hut. She transformed back into her beautiful human form, cleaning herself off the men’s blood and innards. Smiling and contented, Marila went to the kitchen and started cooking the men’s hearts for dinner as the final act of justice, humming a lullaby to herself. She never had human flesh before and she was surprised to find that it was the tastiest treat she had ever tried. Her revenge changed something in her that night, but Marila never noticed it. She was much too enthralled by her newfound food. Although part of her knew her revenge had been fulfilled, Marila’s anger wouldn’t disappear.”
“So she just kept on going then? Killing, eating hearts, and you just watched?”
Lolo was quiet for a while.
“Marila was the first of their kind. We had no basis on what to do with her. We had to deliberate the most efficient way of dealing with the situation.”
I stayed silent, not knowing what to say. The images burned behind my eyelids. I shouldn’t have watched it.
“What happened next?”
“The villagers thought they were attacked by beasts and stayed in their huts after the sun had set. Marila wanted to make the women suffer—those who accused her of seducing their husbands and shunning her from the village. The more she thought about it, the more her anger boiled. By the time she had transformed herself, Marila was convinced she was justified for seeking out revenge. One by one, Marila hunted the women. With every kill, she got hungrier and angrier. She became addicted to human flesh.”
I grimaced at the thought of it all. It was a good thing my stomach was empty. I was feeling a bit queasy thinking about it.
“Marila’s terror spread out further. Night after night, she moved from village to village, not caring about justifying her actions anymore. All she knew was that her discovery had woken something inside her and it was addictive. Each night when she prepared to transform, mild changes occurred in Marila. During the day, she was still the beautiful woman in human form, even more glowing than before she started eating human flesh.”
Lolo showed me an image of Marila. Her skin was even more supple and creamy, her hair so silky it practically rode the air, her eyes were bright and her lips red as blood. But her transformation had gotten worse. She now looked more like a bat than human. Her sharp claws had grown longer, her teeth had turned jagged and pointed, her eyes had turned red, bulging out of their sockets. Her face had broken into a snout, her tongue had grown longer, and her arms had started to grow fur.
“Marila was too addicted to human flesh she didn’t take notice of the changes happening to her. As the stories of a flesh-eating monster spread around nearby villages, the people started to lock themselves in their houses after nightfall. No one would dare walk close to the jungle once the sun had set. It became harder and harder for Marila to hunt at night, which angered her and increased her craving for humans even more. Her addiction intensified, driving her close to madness. She decided to take more drastic measures.”
I saw Marila on top of a hut, brushing aside the nipa roofing wide enough for her to stick her mouth in.
“What is she doing?”
“Marila would extend her tongue until it stretched close to her target. It was enough to kill them and she got what she wanted. Sometimes, she victimized pregnant women, aiming for their unborn children.”
“Oh, my God,” I whispered, getting more scared of the monster I would have to face one day.
“She had her tongue cut out several times because of this, but still, it didn’t stop her from going back for more. The villagers created a patrol to protect their families, armed with primitive weapons, spears made from bamboos, knives, and bolos. Knowing she would be in danger in the nearby villages, Marila moved on to farther areas, risking the extra miles she had to fly at night.”
“Marila’s transformation evolved over the weeks, designing itself around the single most important purpose in her life—hunting. During the day when she was in human form, Marila rested, not even bothering to cover up a pretense of being human anymore. She craved for the darkness to hide the form she truly wanted to be in. Since the farther villages had not been attacked before, they were very vulnerable. Her only fear was that the sun would be up before she was able to get back to her hut. She wanted to find a way to fly faster before dawn.”
An image of Marila flashed above my head. She was preparing for her hunt, wiping extra oil around her midriff, coating the skin with the potent potion. As the transformation began, Marila scraped her stomach with her talons and pulled her upper body from her lower body, stretching the skin until it ripped.
She poured more oil onto her exposed midriff, screaming as the pain rippled through her body. Slowly, her tissues divided, separating her upper half from her lower
half. It was like her body knew what she wanted and pushed itself to make it happen. She kept on pulling until only the upper half was flying around the room. Marila let out a loud triumphant shriek, feeling the lightness of her weight, giving her extra speed for her flight. She flew out the window, leaving her lower body on the floor inside her hut.
“Marila soon discovered how fast she could go without the weight of her lower half. She flew further and further away to a village she had never been before, salivating at the thought of a fresh fetus’s blood. She was so engrossed in the hunt that she forgot to notice dawn creeping in the horizon.”
I saw Marila flying back to the jungle, a blur in the coming dawn, the light chasing her until it caught a wing. It burst into flames, slamming her down into her hut. She attached herself back into her lower half as the morning sun hit her. Her entire body was engulfed in flames. She struggled to splash a jug of water onto herself. She sat on the floor, burns all over her body, her clothes singed, her arms bleeding. But Marila seemed to be oblivious to her pain. It was like something had clicked in her head, the power she had over the humans, the fear she put on them, and the taste of their flesh. She started to laugh, maniacal and sinister. If evil had a smile, that would be it.
I jumped, startled as Lolo continued with the story. “What Marila did to herself cost her everything but she didn’t care. Because of it, she could not fly in the sun anymore. But it didn’t hinder her plans to procreate with humans. She wanted to have her own army in the human world.”
“Still, your kingdom did nothing but sit and watch as she ate one human after another?” I didn’t even try to hide the contempt in my voice. Why would I want to join a realm that just sat idly by as humans were being murdered?
Lolo continued as if he didn’t hear what I just said.
“Although she violated the rule of the land, she wasn’t a threat to the kingdom. She was a threat to the human world, but Engkantasia saw that that was not our business. If the humans wanted to rid their world of Marila’s cruelty, then they would have to find their own solutions. Engkantasia only intervenes when the kingdom is in peril.”
“However, when Marila fell pregnant, Engkantasia feared for its safety. A half-creature could mean a future threat to the kingdom. Marila’s evolution to a vile creature had been passed on to her offspring and no one knew what this would mean for Engkantasia once the creature came of age. So we sent a team of our top warriors to collect Marila and her daughter, Maita. Even with Marila’s powers, she was helpless against the warriors. She had no choice but go back to Engkantasia where she was imprisoned indefinitely. As for Maita, no one really knew what happened to her. Rumors had it that some of Maita’s clan members snuck her out of Engkantasia into the human world and hid her. She was taken as a baby and therefore she had no knowledge of what her heritage was. She would have come of age a long time ago, which meant her abilities and her transformation would have already happened. My father had no knowledge of Maita as this was before his time as ruler. There were stories that she found a way to get back into the human world to find her father and live a normal life. Every now and then, a team would be sent out into the human world to find Maita, but they would always come back empty handed.”
Maita definitely lived her life in the human world. The fact that we saw a manananggal meant she survived all those years ago. Or maybe it wasn’t her but her offspring. Whoever it was, she had been hiding all these years, trying to avoid the royals from capturing her. But now she had risked everything to get to me. That meant it was open season. And I was the prized deer.
I felt like there was an anvil on my chest, suffocating me. I was suddenly so aware of how tired I was. I excused myself from Lolo and headed off to my bedroom without any dinner.
Chapter Ten
MAMA’S DIY
ENGKANTASIA BOOK
Tiyanak
The tiyanak is a vampiric creature that imitates the form of a child. It usually takes the form of a newborn baby and cries like one to attract kindhearted people. Once it is picked up by the victim, it reverts to its true form and attacks. The tiyanak is the most scheming of monsters.
The tiyanak takes sinister delight in leading travelers astray or in abducting children. Sometimes, it may take the form of a specific child. Its face is part gargoyle and part demon with piercing red eyes. It has a strength that’s unexpected from a small creature. Many underestimate it because of its size, which always leads to the victim’s demise.
The size and speed of the tiyanak make it a difficult enemy to target. But once captured, the tiyanak can be overpowered by severing its head. During the day, the tiyanak can only take human form if it is out of its shelter.
S taring at my bedroom ceiling had become a sleeping ritual for me. I had memorized the almost invisible cracks, the flowery pattern, and the shape of my bedroom light. I stared at it like it held the answers to all my questions. I wasn’t so interested about school anymore. If not for Alyssa and Mark, I would have feigned sickness every single day.
Jason was a promising and intriguing new friend, but it was better to keep my distance. What was the point of having a new friend when you couldn’t really share anything with him anyway? He was probably back in the warm snuggly folds of a very happy Melissa. I hated him for giving up so easily, but I knew I shouldn’t expect him to be waiting for me to warm up. It wasn’t like he didn’t have options especially with the way he looked.
I moved to my side to watch Wilbur sleep. He had taken so well into utter domestication. I made a bed for him using an old woven basket, fluffed with a soft pillow. His food and water bowl sat next to his bed. Being able to communicate with a pet had its advantages. I didn’t have to worry about cleaning up his poop. He knew where to go after I explained it to him. I wanted to reach out to Wilbur but decided against it. I didn’t want his little body to be riddled with the anxiety I was feeling about everything.
It made sense to me then, the little things I thought were pure fluke when I was a little girl. When I was four, I went to school a couple of blocks from where we lived in the Philippines. It was a short distance from our house inside a gated community so I used to walk on my own. We had an old dog named Juanito and every day he would walk me to school before walking back home on his own. When the bell rang at three o’clock, I’d find Juanito waiting outside the school, ready to pick me up after class. I was amazed that the dog knew my schedule and kept me company on the short walk home. Even then, I already must have some extra sense to connect with animals.
As much as I wanted to have a normal life, I knew there wouldn’t be such a thing for me. Even after Lolo had left for Engkantasia, I still wouldn’t be a normal girl. My abilities were here to stay. That I knew for sure. I would be hiding a secret for the rest of my life if I stayed here, and I would be leaving everything behind if I decided to take on the throne in Engkantasia.
I closed my eyes and forced myself to relax so I could finally fall asleep. Moments later, I sank into slumber, riddled with darkness and creatures I had never seen before. I was trying to fight something I couldn’t see but none of my abilities worked. I was very aware of my mortality and the helplessness. I tripped on a tentacle sprouting out from a huge tree and fell into the gaping mouth of the earth.
I woke up drenched in sweat, my heart racing, and my head throbbing. Wilbur jumped out of his bed, too, startled by my fear. Although I knew it was only a dream, I felt motivated to train even harder. I knew I was up against unspeakable monsters whose ability I wasn’t aware of. I needed to be prepared for anything. I slumped back down on the bed, hoping to catch a few more hours of sleep before going to school, but after much tossing and turning I decided to get up instead. There was no point forcing myself to sleep when I knew it wasn’t going to happen.
It was only five-thirty in the morning. I couldn’t even remember the last time I woke up this early, or if I ever did. I heard something downstairs, a cry. A baby’s cry? How could that be? None of our close neighbors ha
d children that young. I walked downstairs as carefully as I could, trying not to trip in the dark. The sound was coming from the front door. Had someone left a baby outside the house? The cry was getting louder, more frantic.
I stopped in front of the door, uncertain whether I should open it or not. We had enemies and I had to be careful. But a baby was just a baby. I opened the door for just a fraction, enough so I could see outside. There was a baby on the front step. He was naked and lying on the cold hard concrete. My heart broke for the little baby, alone out in the dark on a chilly night. Who could do such a thing?
I picked him up, looking around to see if the person who left him was still around but the streets were empty. I opened the door wider to take the baby in the house, humming a quiet song to calm him down. The baby stopped crying and looked at me.
“Karina, don’t move,” Lolo said. I didn’t even hear him walk down the stairs.
“It’s just a baby, Lolo. Someone left him near the front door,” I told him, still cuddling the baby.
“Karina, listen to me carefully. Open the door and put the baby back where you found it. I need you to trust me on this,” Lolo said, walking cautiously toward me. I looked up, confused by his instructions. The fear in his eyes caught me by surprise and I felt my pulse quicken. Why was he so scared of a little baby?
“Lolo, it’s just a baby. This isn’t a …”
“Tiyanak,” Lolo said, finishing my sentence. My entire body turned cold. The baby had stopped crying but I couldn’t push myself to look at it, afraid of what I might find.
I remembered the tiyanak mentioned in my old books. Being such a religious country, Filipinos believed that the tiyanak was an aborted fetus coming back from the grave to avenge its death. Old folks used this tale to scare pregnant women out of wedlock from aborting their babies. I always thought it was just a story, another one from the horror books. I wish it stayed between the pages.
The Girl Between Two Worlds Page 7
