by Matt Larkin
That was what she was doing, too. Finding her moment. She needed information. Malin—Rahu—had claimed she didn’t know who she was. And the more she had thought about it over the last few weeks, the more she’d wondered. Before Calon’s men held her down, before Calon forced this spirit into her body, she remembered nothing. She must have been young, of course. After that, they’d brought her and the other new Buaya Jadian here, to train alongside the Macan Gadungan. Pohaci had grown up on this island, but surely the Moon Scions who had ruled this place would have had some kind of records of their charges.
Of course, in her heart she knew pursuing this was just a way to run from the truth. Rahu had taken Malin. Rahu, a demon escaped from Rangda’s underworld, had possessed her beloved. Probably the ghost had suppressed the tiger spirit. Pohaci had never heard of a ghost possessing a Jadian before, but then, the Jadian had only been around a few decades. She couldn’t see both spirits functioning in the same body, not really. Perhaps the tiger was buried, much as Malin himself was buried. But for a moment, he’d reached the surface. He’d tried to spare her. Which meant deep down, Malin was still in there, and she could still get through to him.
Pohaci sighed, climbing the up the rocks. The temple, a monument from ancient times now reinforced with wooden rafters, had become the Moon Scion’s quarters. It stood apart from the island, separated by a land bridge that arched up over the sea.
From the highest rock, she could see guards watching over the temple entrance. So the Moon Scions still held this place, despite Malin’s revolt. Odd the Jadian had never moved against them, but maybe the collapse of the Lunar Empire had left them leaderless. Perhaps they’d been content to dwell in the wilds here, finding a simple life. And she couldn’t blame them for it, though she was going to disrupt it.
Pohaci dropped off the rocks into the sea, then swam around to a secluded cove. The cliffs that surrounded much of the island created a few sheltered beaches where the Buaya Jadian liked to sun themselves. And to avoid any inquisitive Moon Scions eager to force them into training. But when she reached the beach, only a handful of her people rested there. They were in human form now, laying about atop one another. Five of them, where once she would have expected at least a dozen.
They watched her as she approached, though they didn’t move until she stood right over them. “Where are the rest of our people?”
A man sat up. Lengser, the storyteller. He was older than her, one of the oldest of the Buaya Jadian. He’d spoken with authority among them, though never claimed to be a leader himself. “Gone, mostly,” Lengser said. “After Bukit, I came back here for peace. But when most heard the empire had fallen, they dispersed.”
Pohaci surveyed each of the remaining Buaya Jadian in turn. “This is our island. I plan to take it from the Moon Scions. They have no place here, anymore.”
Lengser watched her for a time before sighing. “Pohaci, we don’t want to fight them anymore. They leave us be out here, why can’t we leave them as well?”
“This is our place. They should have left long ago—and there’s something I need from the temple.”
Lengser shut his eyes before speaking. “Very well, Pohaci. You know we’ll follow you.”
Yes. She’d known. Ever since she came back from the Bowels, since Malin had saved her from the Bowels, her people had looked to her as some kind of leader. Chandra alone knew why.
Pohaci turned and waded back into the sea. Her kemban and sarong clung to her as she swam back toward the temple, her people following behind. It would be easiest to discard her clothes, but she might want them once they took the temple. In any event, she’d want her ekor pari. The bladed whip, in the hands of a master, could tear through flesh like a sword.
Near the temple she treaded water, taking in the looks of her people. With a twist of her hand, she had them scaling the rocks alongside her. They would climb up the back of the temple and overtake the Moon Scions before they knew what was happening. The rocks were slick, and not easy to climb, but being a spy meant taking these kinds of routes. And the Moon Scions had made her a spy. They had created the weapon that would destroy themselves.
Atop the cliff, she squeezed out her hair. She’d always kept it only shoulder-length for that reason. So much easier to dry, and she found herself in the water on a regular basis.
Pohaci waited until the rest of her people had climbed up, then she crept around the temple. Crouched in the shadow of the foundations, she could see the guards clearly, but they’d never see her. She nodded at Lengser, who’d crept up beside her. The others must have circled around the other side of the temple. Good. Still, until the right moment. And then overwhelm the foe with speed.
She launched herself forward. Pohaci had a hand on the Moon Scion’s shoulder even as he started to turn at her approach. She punched him in the kidney then shoved him forward. The man plunged over the rocks, screaming as he fell to the sea twenty feet below.
The other guard had a knife in hand and advanced on her. At least until two Buaya Jadian bore him to the ground. One slid a knife into him. Pohaci wouldn’t shed any tears for dead Moon Scions. It wasn’t like she told her people to spare them.
Instead, she hurried inside the temple. Much of the complex had been converted into living quarters, training facilities, and a mess hall for the Moon Scions, though an open atrium still housed a shrine to Chandra. Purbararang was in that shrine, marshaling her soldiers, a half dozen of them, when Pohaci burst in.
Pohaci smiled, baring her teeth. Yes, she was glad the witch was still here. The woman had caused enough trouble in Bukit, even helped Ratna trap Pohaci. “Funny, isn’t it,” Pohaci said, uncoiling her ekor pari as she advanced on the soldiers. “We find ourselves reaping the rewards of our actions, until at last the gods grant us more than our due. Still, all debts must be settled.”
“Kill them!” the witch shouted.
Soldiers rushed toward her people. Pohaci swung the ekor pari in a wide arc, tearing open the face of one soldier and scoring the arm of another. Both fell, screaming. The Buaya Jadian were on them in an instant, pounding them senseless. Another man tried to attack her with a spear. Pohaci flicked her wrist, slashing open his shin, then stepped past the screaming man.
Purbararang used the moment to dash in, trying to impale her with a keris. Pohaci caught the woman’s arm in her own, pulling her forward to lock the blade under her armpit. The witch struggled, but didn’t have Jadian strength. Not quite. “Weak Blessings?” Pohaci said. “I’m sure that must be very frustrating.” She shoved the woman down.
The knife clattered away, and Pohaci cracked her ekor pari right in front of the witch’s face when she reached for the blade. “Be still. You’ll live longer.”
The witch glowered at her, but raised her hands in surrender.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SIXTY
As many years as Pohaci had spent on Bangdvipa, she’d never even known this temple had a library. The Moon Scions had kept some areas of the temple to themselves. She was sure they’d have records, but the sheer scale of it left her speechless. The library was thirty feet on a side, and all the walls were covered with scroll racks, books, and ledgers. It would take a lot of time to sort through it all, assuming what she wanted was even here.
A week here, and she’d gathered all the remaining Jadian on the island to her. “This is your island,” she’d told them. “Moon Scions and others may come here only with your permission. Never let anyone master you again.” It was what Malin would have wanted.
A few Moon Scions had survived their assault, so she’d imprisoned them in cells in the back of the temple. Fortunate that her former masters had built those cells. She’d seen them once before, in her youth. In a prank, she’d dyed one of the soldier’s clothes with turmeric. The man had been a brute, a boor who enjoyed mocking young Buaya Jadian, calling them reptiles. He looked rather amusing with his clothes turned bright yellow, but the lord of the island had not seen it that way. She’d spent two nights in one
of these cells without food.
Purbararang and her other prisoners received food and water. Pohaci was not like her former masters. Still, cells built to hold Jadian held Moon Scions just as nicely.
Now another day had gone by, and as the afternoon dragged on, her eyes began to hurt from staring at these old records. Pohaci didn’t much care for reading. She didn’t remember even learning how—she’d known, and so been exempted from those classes as a child. Spies had to know how to read, her masters had told her, but they’d been impressed enough with her knowledge to leave her be.
She’d found her name in the records. Pohaci, child of Anjasmara. That was it. Oh, they had records of her training, her accomplishments. The time she’d proved the fastest swimmer in her class, the time she’d taken second place in a Silat tournament. And the record of her being assigned to House Soma. As per the request of War King Rahu. But why would the War King himself request a specific werecrocodile? And if he had wanted her, why did he so often loan her out to House Kshuparaka?
For that matter, who was Anjasmara? There was no record of such a person here, and House Kshuparaka had seemed to keep rather thorough records on all the Jadian they’d trained. Of course, Pohaci knew her parents must have died when she was young, so this Anjasmara had probably never been here.
Pohaci sighed and shut the book. Purbararang was House Kshuparaka. They had run this island, so maybe the girl could tell her more, but so far she’d said little, other than the occasional jibe. Pohaci could probably force it out of her, though she hated doing it. Torture was not only distasteful, it was counterproductive. Beat someone long enough, they’d confess to anything, whether it was true or not, just to make the pain stop.
Best for both of them if the witch cooperated. If not, maybe Pohaci should just send the woman to meet her mistress in Kahyangan.
Pohaci rose and worked her way toward the cells in the back of the temple, beyond the atrium. The sun would set soon, she could see it through the skylight. Maybe tonight she would become the crocodile and dive beneath the waters. Maybe that would cool her mind.
Sooner or later, she was going to have to confront Rahu. Whatever he’d wanted from her when she was younger, now he was in Malin. And for that crime alone she’d send him back to Rangda.
A metallic scent caught her nose as she neared the cells. Blood.
Pohaci dashed around the corner. Purbararang was there, in her cell, hands clutching the bars that ran floor to ceiling. A cage for an animal. And now House Kshuparaka’s own daughter rotted in this cell.
Her arms were bleeding. Pohaci paused to take in the scene. Purbararang had painted Spirit Glyphs on the floor and back wall. Painted them in blood. From the way the witch’s chest rose and fell, it had taken a lot out of her. But when she saw Pohaci, she laughed.
“What have you done, witch?”
The woman snickered. “You’re going to have a visitor very soon, crocodile.”
Pohaci walked over to the cell and kicked between the bars, smashing her foot into Purbararang’s face. “I’ll deal with you later.” The woman lay on the floor, unmoving.
Rangda take all witches. Pohaci ran through the temple, drawing stares, but everything seemed in order. At least until she exited the temple.
There, a man knelt over Lengser’s body, withdrawing a bloody knife. Pohaci bellowed at him, a wordless roar of rage, and he rose. Her wrath died in her throat. That was the man her people had killed when they took the temple, the same guard they knifed in this very spot.
She had to do something, but she froze. Her fingers went for the ekor pari wrapped around her waist, but they were slow, stiff. The man rushed her, slamming his shoulder into her chest. The impact flung her against the temple wall, and she dropped the weapon.
The man advanced, cracking his neck. He snarled like an animal.
Pohaci struggled to rise. “How are you alive?”
The man laughed, the sound gurgling in his throat. His eyes glowed red and he lunged forward, grabbing her shoulders. She jerked against him, but he was strong. Moon Scion strong, or stronger. He flung her out over the land bridge and she landed with a thud.
She pushed herself up again. She could smell the sunset coming. “I’m going to bite your face off,” she said. Any moment now, the cursed sun would be gone, freeing the crocodile within.
The man laughed again, his unnaturally deep voice echoing off the rocks and ringing in her ears. He cracked his neck again, then jerked his head from side to side like a tiger tearing away chunks of flesh. Blood spurted from his neck as skin ripped open.
Pohaci gagged, almost falling over again as she backed away. What in the name of the moon?
The man grinned, his smile too wide. Then his head tore free from his neck, entrails flowing behind. Pohaci retched at the sick plopping sound his organs made as they followed his head away from the body. It screeched, the sound shooting through her mind like an arrow. An arrow shot from the underworld.
A leyak.
Malin had spoken of the one he’d fought years ago, when Pohaci was still a child. The damned, escaping from Rangda’s underworld. Servants of the Demon Queen. And Pohaci had dropped her ekor pari back by the temple.
The head flew around her, shrieking. Its teeth had grown into fangs, dripping some kind of venom. She threw herself flat, barely avoiding the thing as it dove right at her. Blood from its entrails splattered her. In a heartbeat she was up and running, not toward the temple, but away. She needed her people’s help to fight something like this. They had returned to their beaches and dwellings on the island, most wanting little to do with the temple.
Alone, unarmed, she was no match for the demon. And it was a true demon. Malin had warned her to pray she never saw a real demon. Now she knew why. When it shrieked again it took all she had to keep from freezing in place and cowering. Just keep running. The leyak’s entrails snared around her legs, sending her sprawling.
It squeezed so tightly, it felt like her bones would snap. The thing reared its head back like a snake ready to strike. Pohaci punched it in the jaw. That staggered the demon for a moment, so she slapped both her hands closed on its temples, then kicked the loosened entrails off her leg.
She’d taken only a few steps when she noticed another figure at the end of the bridge. “Help me!” she called to the woman.
“Help you?” the woman said. Her voice held same unearthly tenor as the leyak. She walked forward, revealing her face in the moonlight. “You are nothing.”
Pohaci gasped.
One of Ratna’s eyes and a good section of her left cheek were missing, revealing the bone beneath. A red light glimmered in the depths of her empty eye socket. The flesh around the wound looked rotted. Her once beautiful hair hung in limp clumps around her face. But her steps seemed anything but weak or failing.
Sweet Chandra, she truly was Rangda wasn’t she?
Behind the Demon Queen, more otherworldly shrieks echoed from the rainforest. Sometimes screams followed. The leyaks were killing Pohaci’s people, and she could do nothing.
Pohaci leapt from the land bridge, starting her shift in midair. She had only half become the crocodile when she hit the sea, but it was enough. She dove deep. A spear of ice lanced through the water just in front of her, like an icicle from the highest peaks, only ten feet long. Pohaci swam around it. Chandra, please say the leyaks couldn’t follow her here.
She’d swim for the mainland.
And Chandra help them all when Rangda came there.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED SIXTY-ONE
Tracking Bendurana to Kutai might not have proved so difficult, if Landi had been able to enter Daha. As it was, she’d had to trade for new clothes by working in villages, repairing houses. She just couldn’t bring herself to steal clothes. However far she’d fallen, whether she was still Arun Guard or not, she was not a thief. Getting on roofs without the Sun Brand was much more difficult, of course. But having clothes without holes in them would made it easier to get answers, and Ben wa
s distinctive, not only for his darker skin and strange locks, but for his profession. It had taken him to so many places that eventually she’d found people who had known him.
And some of those claimed he was here in Kutai. He’d spoken of the city to her once or twice, so she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. Of course, he made it sound like a cesspool of vagrants, pirates, and criminals, so why Ben would want to live here, she couldn’t say. Then again, she probably shouldn’t be surprised by that either. Ben was Ben.
No one questioned her approach into the city, though a few men leered at her. She pretended not to notice. She’d learned a long time ago that confronting every such man would mean spending half her day breaking hands and faces, and she had no time for that.
Instead, she walked through the city, one hand wrapped around the hilt of the keris strapped to her waist, the other in a death-grip on her small pouch of pearls. She’d sweat long and hard in the sun and rain to earn those, and they wouldn’t last long even if no pickpockets got to her. Really, she was lucky for those days on the streets with Chandi, who had tried so hard to teach her discretion. Surya, she’d been innocent of the world back then, though she’d never admit it aloud. Innocent to think she could simply ask a question and get an answer, without others knowing.
Here, people watched her every move. She could feel their eyes upon her, even if she didn’t see them. She made her inquiries as discreet as possible, but somehow, it still seemed people were staring at her, whispering behind her back. Or maybe Chandi had just made her paranoid about such things.
One boy she asked nodded. “I’ve seen a Serendibian,” he said.
“Take me to him.”
The boy looked her up and down, then folded his arms. The child couldn’t have been more than ten, and he was sizing her up?
Landi sighed, and withdrew a small pearl, holding it up before her. “When we find him.”
