Speaker for the Gods, week 22
War on the Windward Fields, part 2
The ground quaked once again and it wasn’t the High Speaker’s doing. We were clear of Keone’s koali’i, but his front-line forces now converged on our little band. Ground shifted beneath our feet; just as before, it took a moment to sense the change. As we scuttled along that broken plate of earth, it shifted back towards level and warriors swarmed over the lip to pursue us. My lungs burned, my legs were lead and I hated every ounce of the satchel’s weight with all my heart. To’means poured in from the north, trying to head off our foes—we’d been seen and might even be saved. Up ahead, Staves did furious battle with a clutch of four white-painted men. He dropped them one by one, silently like goats who don’t expect the butcher’s knife. But more were coming, and even the Colonel needed our help.
Ienith put an arrow past my ear and into a man’s spine. More bolts followed, wobbly things loosed on the run that buried only their tips in flesh. A blast of hai’oleo-infused air buffeted Staves’ assailants, staggering them just long enough for him to cut a throat and spring away. Three tattooed men pursued, wielding terrifying seal-bone hatchets the size of my head. I approached at a jog with my machete, backed up by Kapono and his knives. Ke’iwa held his flail left-handed, the shark-toothed oval gripped in his right. I saw its purpose now: a cestus, held in his fist with the inch-long serrated shark teeth bristling from his knuckles. The Kane called toothed weapons leiomano and like anything from the revered shark they bore weight beyond mass.
Ke’iwa flicked his left wrist; the flail leapt like a snake but snared like an octopus. Weighted tentacles wrapped themselves around two hands and an axe. With a yank the man went stumbling forward, met at the climax by a savage cross from Ke’iwa’s right fist. The cestus hulled his skull, taking most of the face away in a single cherry-red flap to reveal an awful featureless red behind. He fell and a second twitch of the To’mean’s wrist released the flail like the he’e’s suckers losing interest. A second foe bore down, axe raised high; I dove for his ankles at the last moment, slashing sideways for a blow that cut deep but glanced off the bone. The axe came down behind me while the poor man went sailing into Kapono’s embrace. Knives opened his throat and that was that. Ke’iwa tied up the third axeman, who swung feebly for a moment before a leiomano punch put him down. Staves seemed winded but never for a moment did I doubt his fighting fitness. We tacked away from the shrinking crack and swarming invaders.
The plate kept dropping at Keone’s direction, rolling to push down at its northern edge. Suddenly an open field became a six-foot ledge—scalable, but we were still a hundred yards out. To’mean troops had crossed onto the plate and now flowed past us in the other direction, clashing with those chasing us, screaming and flailing and dying and whipping by like red poppies on a roadside. I glanced at Ienith and took a moment to find her behind; she’d stopped, baring her teeth while loosing arrows over the melee.
“You said to keep running!” I screamed over the racket, making my way back to her.
She turned to me. Rage masked her face but spared her riveting, perfect eyes. “I’m a High Speaker,” she declared. “A general. My army is here. With my help they’ll take the day.”
“That’s bullshit!” I snapped. The others called from up ahead—for her, not me. “We came this far to get you away. Keone broke off to kill you. He wrecked Mahoe Kahu to kill you. I know you can win this. He knows, too, and he won’t let it happen. Not today. So run and live. Please, ipo.”
It seemed to dent her armor. Ienith thought a moment. I was right and she knew it; she gnawed her lip and threw the bow down like an angry child with the quiver following. “Then save me,” she spat, striding past me and speeding to a run.
We came to the wall at last, which by now had grown to ten feet. Hai’oleo whipped clouds towards Keone’s position at his kaua’s rear and he diverted attention to push them back. Exhaustion had helpfully transitioned to numbness, my lungs and legs resigned to the later pain I knew would last days. “She goes first,” Kapono insisted. I squatted with the Herald, linking fingertips to give Ienith a platform. She took the boost, gripped a protruding hunk of stone, and pulled herself up to the reaching hands of her men.
“Fuck off,” Staves said when offered help himself. Swords went into belt loops and his blood-soaked hands sought a purchase on the wall. Kapono started his own climb, more eager to join his Lady than help us. Since I already squatted, I turned to Ke’iwa and offered help. Ienith’s brother had just placed his dusty bare foot in my hands when we heard a noise like an approaching whistle: a piercing howl like a chemical rocket on the New Year. I spun my head to see a lance of fire falling from the sky. Another meteor, smaller than the first and faster, heading straight for us.
I felt the blood leave my face. “Staves!” I screamed. “Get down! Off the wall!”
He turned his head, eyes going wide with shock. “Shit!” he screamed, and leapt off to land like a cat. Kapono looked down, confused. He can’t hear it, I realized, rushing the wall and waving my arms for him. The Herald turned and at last he saw the falling star. It struck the wall dead-on with all the fury of its maker’s hand.
I was lifted off my feet and woke up abruptly face-down on the ground, though I didn’t recall lying down to sleep. I felt very strange. Hot grit rained on the back of my neck and pooled between my fingers, though it seemed I was hovering just above the ground. There was only a little pain, diffuse and liquid, pooling in the lowest spots and sloshing about with any movement. My ears rang and men ran every which way, content to ignore those still on the ground. Keone had collapsed a section in the earthen wall some forty feet across. To’means fled up the debris—easier to climb than the wall, though the wounded quickly found themselves trampled. A dozen bodies built the ramp higher. Staves lay crumpled near me, his jacket standing out through its layer of soot and dust. No sign of Ke’iwa; nothing left of Kapono.
Either you’re staying down or you’re getting up, a tougher man once told me. I rolled to my knees, groaning with pain and effort. My limbs moved like lead. A quick self-inspection showed nothing serious: cuts and bruises from the blast and debris, nothing too serious. I fell my first time trying to stand, the satchel strap somehow tangled with my ankles. Finally on my feet, I checked on Staves. He bled from a grievous head wound but still breathed. Keone’s troops were descending, the To’means having already protected their High Speaker and unwilling to face more meteors. I had no way to carry the Colonel, and frankly no inclination. So I left him. You’d do the same for me, I thought.
I ran through what felt like waist-deep sludge, pumping my legs but seeming to find no purchase on the ground. A man died next to me, taken in the back by a thrown spear. The crowd of bodies grew thick, mashed up against the gap, more than it could possibly take and all desperately aware of this miserable fact. Dozens abandoned their weapons to scramble up the wall—no small feat given the quakes still churning in the ground. Scanning for a hold, I saw a familiar black dragon tattoo snapping down from the ledge to help the climbers. Ke’iwa didn’t answer when I called, unable to hear over the battle.
Choired voices from the To’mean side built melodies that flitted amongst turning clouds. Ienith’s shrapnel howl surged past them all, towering above the earth and boring through my guts. Brave To’means fell all around as I trudged towards Ke’iwa, still atop the wall. Feeble waves weren’t enough; so many begged for his help and my sooty face blended into the crowd for the first time coming ashore. As the hai’oleo built, Ienith’s brother turned and fled back to friendly lines. I’d have to try the climb alone.
Water erupted from the wall’s base, surging out between rocks, shedding the climbers shrieking from the wall as the earth’s infernal heat was released in hissing steam. The fountain ceased as quickly as it started, but the damage was done. Dry climbing surfaces suddenly ran with scalding-hot mud and nobody could climb a foot. Above the downthrust the To’mean army conchs forlornly sounded retreat. Enemy infantry were among us now, battling the To’means who now realized they had no choice. Men fought like animals in ankle-deep runoff.
Maybe I should have felt angry, abandoned or disappointed. In truth, I was tired. It was all too much, after so many days fighting and fleeing what felt like the planet itself. A bookish and neglected child could never have predicted this end to his story, so far from home and the libraries’ mirrored halls. He would imagine himself a miraculous exit from this scrap, likely involving dragons. It would be terribly exciting.
I could have gone so many stupid ways, could have paid for so many debts that never came due. Instead I faced death, not for the first time but certainly the most hopeless time. Killed in the line of duty, hunting treasure, fighting for the woman he loved! Fine stories all. This way, thought a tired and selfish man; this is good enough.
I turned to the battlefield. Our foes fell on us, a pack of them wielding red wooden war clubs with decorated heads and wearing cuirasses of thin twigs molded into wicker frames. Keone’s army was a stew of garbs and styles, but each tribe seemed to fight as a distinct unit. We say this or that about “the Kane,” but a man’s identity in the islands comes down to a single patch of land. If a taro farmer from the hills met a Waimanalo fishmonger, they’d speak the same tongue with nothing in common to speak of. I took off the satchel with the red frigatebird and set it on a knee-high stone to keep it out of the water. Sorry, Los Angeles. Hope somebody finds you. Sorry, Friar. Hope somebody reads you.
I stood there by the stone, hanging back in my typical fashion until the melee came to me. The invaders squared off with To’means one-on-one, bellowing challenges and wielding a wide array of weapons. I found myself challenged by a man not too much bigger—thicker, more like—and wielding a great rectangular shield that covered him from knee to breast. Terrible visages had been carved in its surface, all tusks and teeth and exquisite decorations where more demons couldn’t be worked in. Gouges marred facade: time-worn scars, though the man was young and undersized for the tool. A family heirloom? I shook the thought away and held the machete before my face. When preparing to kill a man, one shouldn’t pen his biography. For his part, my opponent spat some foul nonsense about the cocks of my fathers. Kane is a wonderfully expressive tongue.
I tried to think of a comeback but couldn’t quickly translate it. Instead I swept my machete dramatically back and poised it behind my shoulder. He raised his right-hand weapon: a polished wooden pole some four feet long and sharpened to a nasty point on one end, a short and simple spear in stark contrast to the wild shield. The visual style might clash, but shield-and-spear was a fighting style tried and true. His weapon would go clean through cloth and flesh, while my machete splintered senseless wood. Suddenly wanting my own shield, I scanned the nearby corpses but saw none to turn back the spear. I’d have to use his.
My foe screamed and charged. This was very much a Kane trait, one appreciated by this coward. He raised the bulwark, threw his weight behind it and kept the spear at waist level. Searching for a soft spot, my eyes flew to his bare brown feet slapping the ground. Don’t swing for the feet if you can help it, I’d been taught; they’re always moving, hard to hit true and leave you bent over. But this wasn’t the time for indecision, and for a moment he was half blind behind the shield’s edge. Dropping into a crouch, I stepped into him, spun and swung low like a stick through a ball. Heard a scream but knew it wasn’t much of a hit. Once I whirled back around to face him I saw the deep cut in his right calf. The white-painted warrior faced me, gritted his teeth and lunged with the short spear. I chopped down on the haft hoping to sever it, but failed and swiftly brought the blade back around to keep him on the defensive. He raised the shield and my blow—a good one powered by hips and back—broke on the bulwark. Splinters flew as a demon’s leering face flew away in a chunk. I felt a momentary pang of regret for ruining such a pretty thing. Rain was falling now, the smell like a wet coat soaked in blood and half burned.
The spear came again and I felt a lash of pain down my left forearm. Cloth tore, blood sprang out to soak it. I shouted and leapt back, but it was only a long groove cut in the skin and my arm still had strength. Thank god for wooden weapons. Scuttling right, I tried to hug the outside of the shield and had it rudely shoved in my face. This was better than the spear tip and so I kept in constant contact, shoving against him, resisting his attempts to get at me around his own guard. With the machete pinned against my chest and my right hand gripping the shield’s edge on the side opposite his weapon hand, I was stuck. An idea popped into my head: a risky solution to the problem of the tower shield. I dropped the chopping blade, freeing a hand to snatch the knife from my vest’s chest pocket. Yanking back on the shield rim, I rolled my back across its face and swung around it like an opening door. I flipped the knife from left to right and stabbed at the first piece of flesh I saw, sinking the blade right through skin and muscle to the bone. With my left hand I grabbed the shield’s rim again, repositioning complete.
His agonized thrash shook loose the knife. I stabbed again to gouge a second flesh wound. The spear shot out, but I still held the right rim and kept my clear shot at his left flank. He needed to drop the shield and try his luck with more space, but was so attached to this thing that was supposed to protect him he couldn’t even think to do it. Instead the fellow slipped the spear behind the shield, driving it to the other side. I let loose the shield and stepped left, back across its face to grip the far side, flipping knife hands once again and stabbing the exposed elbow. He screamed and violently thrashed the shield, driving me off balance.
I took a step back to keep him falling. This was terrible, to have the advantage and lose it like that. I had to get back inside the spear’s range and so I went low again while he readied the weapon, turning on my heel to delivering a savage donkey kick at my foe’s wounded leg. My boot heel caught it clean and I felt the man’s balance give. He fell back, throwing his arms out to the sides as a cry of shock and pain escaped his mouth. The wicker cuirass crashed with the crunch of kindling sticks and a splash of brown water, stopping his back a split second before head and limbs flopped to impact awkwardly in the muck. He still held the spear, but its point was off to the side: the best opening I’d get.
I dropped to my knees on his chest, raising the knife high as I did so. It took a long time to fall. The young man’s eyes were rolled back at first from hitting his head, the mouth agape and nostrils flared to recollect lost wind. I could see a long way down his gullet. As the blade drew closer and his eyes returned to center, they grew wide. It wasn’t surprise—he’d been surprised at the fall and this was different. It was as though he’d found something, lost it and knew for the first time precisely how dear it had been. And just like that, the knife’s journey was over. Plunging into the throat just above the Adam’s apple, the tip cut through fibrous tissue and erupted in his mouth with a gout of crimson. I saw his tongue lifted like a flap by the black blade. His spine arched, his body thrusting upwards to Heaven with all the impossible strength of the dying. There was movement in my right eye; I only had time for a glance. My enemy’s last deed was a swing from his left arm that brought the shield around and directly into my right temple. I remember a loud noise, and lights like many Suns in the same sky, and roaring pain before the shadows swallowed me whole.