The Storm of Blood

 

Down from the hills the land was a pattern of green fields and darker gatherings of orchards and forest flowing to the sea, where the city of Jinan hunched like a barnacle clinging to the shore.  It looked ugly to her, and Jaya took pleasure in thinking she would soon wipe if from the face of this sacred island.  The afternoon sun slanted down across the water, setting the clouds on fire, and the whole sea was the color of blood.

The southern horizon, over the water, was all a black frontier of churning cloud and lances of violet lightning.  The monsoon had begun, though it had yet to come ashore.  For days she had watched ships scuttle in from the sea to take shelter in the harbor here, anchoring themsleves securely, ready to hold out through the torrents of rain and wind they knew would come.  Even the outlanders had learned the ways of the great storms that came when the seasons turned.  She would use that to grind them into pieces.

It was good to look on the sea again, to watch the waves roll and swell and fall in on themselves, the crests growing higher and higher as the storm out to sea gained intensity.  The thunder was distant, but that would change.  She felt the winds shifting as she closed her eyes, feeling the breath of the sea on her face, smelling the salt and blood and the seaweed and dead fish rotting on the beaches.  As familiar as her own voice.  The gods were close to her now, and she remembered all they had laid upon her.  The favor shown by Arang who had saved her life, of Ularu who had spared it, of the blessing of Sa-Hantu who lit the deep with his fire, and of Hamau the tigress, who haunted her wake like a promise of vengeance.

Dhatun stood by her, and she was glad of his presence.  He frowned down at the town spread along the shore.  It had not been made for defense, and the walls were low and old, but it was plain measures had been taken since the battle at the Basu, and from here they could see barricades raised to block the streets inside the gate, and logs used to raise the walls higher and reinforce them.  The two cannons she had captured would not breach a hole easily.

The Red Sun

 

Smoke turned the sky dark at midday, and it turned the sun red as blood.  Jaya looked out from her hillside vantage and saw the line of fire stretched across the countryside, and she tasted the smoke of the ruined farms and the slain Utani.  The Mordani, the giants, were on the move, and they came with fire and steel.

She had expected they would react to the destruction of the manor house and the slaying of their elder, but their wrath was greater than she had foreseen.  She had not thought them foolish enough to raze the very farms and plantations that made them lords.  That their rage would cause them to scourge the land itself in the hopes of driving her out of her forested sanctuary.  Now they beat the bush and the scrublands, driving all before them, and by tomorrow morning they would reach the edges of the forest itself.

Her one-eyed messenger came through her assassins and bowed low.  “One has come who says he is known to you.  He has the marks of an Ekwa raider.”

Jaya felt her heart leap, and she smiled.  “Bring him, bring him quickly.”  She had not dared to hope that Dhatun had survived the wreck, all those years gone.  She wondered if it would be him, or another of his kind come to seek her out.

It was him.  He towered above the smaller Utani, lean and hard and marked by the intricate tattoos of his people.  He wore his long hair in a nest of braids, but they were no longer limed white and stiff.  She realized he must have been here since they wrecked, and not returned home to his people.  Yet he still carried himself stiff and proud as he walked, and smiled his tight-lipped smile when he saw her.

“My chief,” he said, and gave his small tilt of the head that was all the bow an Ekwa would grant.  “I never doubted that you lived, and when I heard the tales of this uprising, I knew it must be you.”

She smiled and then embraced him, glad of the feel of his solid, sinewy muscle.  “I am glad to find you alive as well.  There is no other I would rather see today.”  She looked at him.  “You have not returned home.”

He shrugged.  “My people are much feared here, I have lived on the wild coasts, spear-fishing and stealing from the dirt-grubbers.  It is a long voyage home, over uncertain seas, almost impossible alone, in a hide boat.  I awaited a sign, and now I have one.”