Island's End (16 page)

“Ragavan comes to my island only now. For long time before, he lives in another place far away.” She sighs. “My uncle helps my tribe make rule that we cannot come to your island. But Ragavan does not care about rules. And he is very strong.”

“But you are the oko-jumu! You must be more powerful than he is.”

“My tribe is very different,” Maya says. “Ragavan is much stronger than me, than my uncle.”

Although I can see now how different the strangers are, it is hard to imagine a tribe in which the oko-jumu is not respected as a guide. I give up trying to understand them. But even if the reason is unclear to me, it is good to know that Maya dislikes Ragavan too.

O
ver the next four days, Tawai grows stronger. Sometimes, while he sleeps, I follow Maya around. I do not learn how she makes her medicines or how she heals, but I enjoy watching her work. Speaking in her own language, Maya sounds commanding and sure—almost like Lah-ame. Best of all, Maya promises that as soon as Tawai is well, she will take us to her uncle’s home and from there, back to our island.

On the fifth morning after our arrival, Tawai is already awake when I enter his room. Maya, too, is there.

“Your brother is well,” Maya says. “We go to my uncle’s hut now.”

But Tawai pleads, “Do we have to leave today? Can we please stay and look at this island?”

“I am tired, Tawai,” I say. “I want to go home.”

He begs again. And again.

I feel as though there are two strong tides pulling me in opposite directions. If I give in to Tawai, I might feed his spirit’s fascination with the strangers, making it harder for him to return to our island. Then again, if we see more of this world, perhaps it will satisfy him and he will be happy to go home and stay there.

Seeing Tawai’s lower lip tremble as he starts to cry, I finally give in, unable to disappoint him when he finally seems his old self again.

“My brother is not ready to leave,” I tell Maya. “If I forbid him today, perhaps he will be tempted to return later.”

“Or he forgets about our island quicker if he does not see it before returning to yours,” she argues.

I wipe the tears off Tawai’s cheeks. “We will go for a short walk with Maya—so you can see a little more of this place. But only a very short walk.”

Tawai cheers up at once, but Maya sucks in her plump cheeks, making her round face look almost long. “Not good, Uido,” she says.

“I know you will keep us safe,” I say to Maya. “That is why I agreed to my brother’s wish.”

“I try.” Maya’s tone sounds angry. “I can only help little. Better we go to my uncle’s home soon.”

We follow Maya out of the room and through the healing hut, walking and turning through many rooms until I feel dizzy. But my little brother delights in everything—the hard floors that tire my feet and make them wish for moist earth, the still air that makes me long for a sea breeze. Every time Maya stops to speak to people, Tawai pulls at her hand, wanting to know whatever she says, reaching for everything she touches.

I avoid looking at Maya, worried that maybe she is right about looking around for even a little while. But it is too late now to change my decision.

O
utside, the touch of the breeze around my legs and arms feels wonderful. I wish I could take off the dress and let the wind stroke my entire body. The sky looks gray here, but still, it rests my eyes just to see the clouds blowing overhead.

I almost scream when something comes at us, rumbling like thunder. It looks like a box-shaped animal with two huge, bright eyes.

“What is that?” Tawai breaks away from us and runs toward it. I race after him, Maya at my heels. We pull him back just as the thing stops with a high-pitched squeal.

“We call it ‘car,’” Maya says. “Careful. Must not go near car.”

As the car continues past us, I see that it is a kind of land boat. A man is sitting inside it, and some sort of magic is making it move. It leaves behind a gray cloud with a bitter taste that makes my throat itch. But the car delights Tawai. “Everything is better on this island,” he says. “You have so many magical things!”

At Tawai’s words, Maya’s body stiffens. She leads us along a hard black path. Strangers point at us and whisper to each other as we go by.

Near a small, flat-roofed hut by the side of the path, we see a little child drinking something orange out of a see-through pitcher.

“I want to taste that, Maya, please,” Tawai says.

Maya nods, disappears inside the hut and returns holding a pitcher full of bubbling orange water.

Tawai takes a gulp and laughs. “It is cold, Uido! It tickles my throat. Here, have some.”

The bubbly orange water makes my tongue tingle, but I find it too sweet for my taste.

We walk past a man who is shouting at the top of his voice from behind a mound of bananas. Next to him, I see a child weeping. Unlike the other strangers, the boy has only a small piece of cloth around his hips. He is so skinny I can make out the shape of the bones in his chest and shoulders.

He wails as if he is hungry, but he cannot be—food is plentiful on this island, and there is a pile of fruit just beside him. I wait for him to take a banana, but he does not. Hearing the child’s pitiful whines, I lose my patience with the strangers’ ways. Tired of wondering what is wrong with the child, I take a fruit from the pile and hand it to him. Immediately, he runs away, clutching the banana to his chest as though it is precious. I stare after him, confused.

The shouting man leaps out from behind the fruit pile and blocks our path. He grabs my arm. I try to struggle free. He thrusts his face close to mine.

“Uido!” Tawai runs at the man. But the man tightens his grip and shakes me so hard that my head snaps back and forth on my neck.

Maya steps between me and the man, speaking to him rapidly and pushing him backward. The man lets go and I rub the back of my neck. Maya drops flat, shining circles into his palm. The man’s hand closes over them and he walks back to the mound of fruit without telling me he is sorry.

“What did you give the man?” I ask Maya. “Why did he let me go suddenly?”

“We call it money.” She holds a circle out to me. I roll it in my palm. It is shiny, as though it is made from metal. I bite it gently to see how hard it is.

“What will the man do with this money?” I see no use for such a tiny piece of metal.

Maya searches for the word. “Trade,” she says after a moment. “I give man money. Man gives us banana.”

“Why would anyone trade for food? Even the children of our tribe know better than to be greedy about food. It is everyone’s to share.”

Maya looks at the ground and says, “Our island has much food. But we do not all have food. There is much money. But not everyone has money.”

I think of the yellow hill of bananas Ragavan brought for our tribe—people he does not even know. Yet here, on his own island, there are hungry people. And even Maya did not help the hungry child or seem to think it was wrong to hoard fruit. I cannot understand how any tribe can allow their children to go without food.

Ahead of us, I see a woman thinner than even the boy. Her back is hunched but her skin is as black as mine, her hair as tightly curled, her lips thick as Natalang’s. I wonder if she belongs to one of our sister tribes from Lah-ame’s stories, or even perhaps to the part of our tribe that Lah-ame left behind on this island.

I smile at her, but she does not speak to me. Instead, she pulls at the arm of a man walking past us. The cloth over her body is muddy. Her palms are outstretched and she wails. I sense she is begging for something.

The man shouts at her in his language and raises his hand over his head as though to beat her. The woman cowers like a frightened animal, then turns, whining to Maya. Maya reaches into her bag and gives her a shining circle of money.

Tawai runs ahead but I reach out to touch the woman’s sunken cheek. Her skin feels as dry as a withered petal. Worse, I hardly sense her spirit at all. It seems weaker than even Tawai’s was when he was ill, almost as though it has already left her body.

“Let me help you,” I say softly. “Please, tell me what you need.” But the woman backs away from me and limps off to the side of the path.

Maya lays her arm across my shoulders. “We cannot help this woman, Uido.”

“But she looks like me. Is she from our tribe? Lah-ame said he left behind hundreds of others.”

“She is from tribe like yours,” Maya says softly. “But after they try to live here, they become small and weak. Most tribes who come out of jungle lose their way.”

“Why?” I ask, although I sense the answer. I feel a loneliness here on this island. A loneliness that is darker and colder than anything I have felt, even when I journeyed alone through the swamp. It seems to come from the way the strangers live. Their huts feel like empty boxes; yet they fill the air outside to bursting with harsh noises. They have learned to capture water and light; yet they push away the spirits that live within water and light and all other things.

“Uido,” Maya says, “in jungle, your people’s lives are part of something bigger. Here, their lives break into small pieces.”

“Why did they not return to their jungles?”

“Men like Ragavan cut trees. Kill animals. Then my people build houses where jungle was. Not many islands like yours still left.”

“So where do my people live now?”

“Your tribe is gone,” she says.

“Gone where? Another island?”

Maya shakes her head. “All En-ge are dead.”

“Dead?” My body feels suddenly heavy. I sink down to sit on the hot path, unable to move forward. I never knew those others in my tribe, but still, they were my people.

“You see now?” Maya sounds desperate. “Some of other tribes are still alive, just smaller than before. But even they lose much when they try to live just like us.”

M
aya pats my back but her touch does little to comfort me. I ache for the warmth of Danna’s hand.

Upset at myself for avoiding until now the full meaning of Lah-ame’s warning story, I walk toward Tawai. He has stopped not far from us, in front of a woman who has glittering necklaces and bracelets spread out before her.

“Look how long this necklace is, Uido.” He snatches one up. “It would hang down to Mimi’s navel.”

I pry it from his fingers, saying, “It is time to go back now.”

Tawai pouts until Maya tells him we will go to her uncle’s home in a car. At once, Tawai cheers up. We follow Maya back to a place outside the healing hut where several rows of cars stand. Tawai shouts and stamps his feet. “We are going in a land boat!”

Maya walks up to a blue car and opens a door like in a room. She sits on a chair inside. Tawai jumps up beside her. I climb in and squeeze close to Tawai.

The land boat growls and we jerk forward. Tawai squeaks with excitement as the ground outside the window moves faster and faster. We race away from the village of tall box-shaped huts and past a treeless patch of land covered with tall grass.