old on, my love, Te' thought as she crashed through the underbrush. I'm coming for you!
27
My legs trembled in fear as I watched the chanting tribesmen circling around the fire. I had no idea what they were saying, but judging from the brightly colored war paint adorning their faces and the intensity of their intonations, they must have been preparing for something big. But I knew their attack on Te's village wasn't due for another twenty-four hours. Was all this in preparation for the planned invasion, or were they getting worked up for something else?
I peered down toward my feet and got a sick feeling in my stomach. The twigs and logs assembled around the base of my stake looked threateningly similar to the type Teuila had used to start the fire in our lagoon.
Were they really going to burn me alive? Simply for stumbling onto their camp carrying a few small tools?
I'd always been reluctant to travel to third-world countries because I wanted to have the rule of law to protect me in case anything went wrong. But this was taking the abuse of human rights to an entirely new level. What kind of barbarians would treat another human being in this way?
At least they haven't raped me, I thought. Yet. Then I shuddered at another possibility. Maybe they're planning to cook me in preparation for a special feast. My charter captain had dismissed the notion of cannibalism being practiced in this region of the world, but Teuila hadn't explicitly denied it. Maybe these villagers looked at the odd stray Westerner who washed across their shores as a rare delicacy to be enjoyed in the same way we looked forward to the occasional roast turkey or rack of lamb.
I cursed at my stupidity for ever having strayed from the group hiking inland after we'd set ashore. But then I'd never have met Teuila, who was the most special person I'd ever known. I'd never have known a love as strong and pure as the kind I'd experienced in the short time we'd been together. There was something sweet and innocent about her, unvarnished and uncorrupted by Western civilization. The ironic thing was that we'd both stretched the boundaries of what we'd previously imagined possible by being thrown together in this unlikely place.
It was this clash of cultures that had brought me both the greatest joy in my life and the greatest despair. And now it was all about to end in the most horrifying way imaginable. Even worse, there'd be no way for Teuila to know what had become of me. She'd have to live the rest of her life thinking her lover had abandoned her without even saying goodbye after her friends returned to pick her up. There would literally not be a single human remain left of me for her to put the clues together. I closed my eyes and said a prayer, asking God to make the ending quick and to look after Teuila.
But just as I began my supplication, I heard the loud shouts of tribesmen approaching from the woods. I opened my eyes to see scores of painted warriors closing in on the men around the fire as they flung arrows and spears in their direction. The local group turned to face the attacking horde, hurling their own spears in self-defense. Within seconds, the attacking group had closed in on the surprised tribesmen, engaging in hand-to-hand combat with their makeshift axes and knives.
My eyes suddenly flung open when I recognized Teuila's father grappling with one of the tribesmen on the dusty ground. They rolled side-over-side a few times in the sand until Te's father gained the superior position. Then he raised his adze over his head and slammed it down, splitting the other man's skull in half.
Suddenly I heard the sound of another warrior's scream, and I looked up to see the crazed face of Manaia running toward me holding a flaming spear. Just as he reared back to fling the spike toward my helpless body, his face contorted in agony and he flopped to the ground with a large arrow sticking into his back. Standing a few feet behind him, Teuila stood wearing a lopsided grin. She nodded toward me, then she reached behind her back and grabbed a series of arrows from her quiver, felling the few remaining warriors still standing from the other tribe.
Within minutes, the battle was over as the warriors from the other clan lay sprawled on the ground around the fire with one or more stone objects embedded in their lifeless bodies. Te's father lifted himself off another dead tribesman, and after satisfying himself that the threat from the other side had been neutralized, he noticed Te' and approached her with an angry expression.
"O lau o fae inerti?" he shouted, acting surprised to see her.
"Mea tau!" she replied, holding her bow up and pointing toward the tribesmen she’d killed with her arrows.
The chief nodded in appreciation, then he recognized Manaia's figure lying on the ground and turned him over. Manaia groaned as he reached around toward the arrow still embedded in his back. Teuila's father said something to him, then turned him over on his stomach to inspect the wound. Then he grasped the shaft of the arrow and pulled it out of Manaia's shoulder and flung it onto the ground. He motioned to one of his men to bring him a tapa-cloth sling and Manaia sat up gingerly, placing his injured arm in the pouch. He glanced up at Teuila, pinching his eyebrows suspiciously, and she looked away from him disdainfully.
Te' strode up to my stake and began loosening the binds holding my hands behind the pole, but she paused when her father barked a command to her. She protested whatever he was saying, then he stormed toward me and pulled her hands away from the pole.
"What's going on?" I said, peering into Te's eyes. "What is he saying?"
"He wants to leave you tied up until he figures out what to do with you. He doesn't want to take any more chances that either one of us will run away."
"Oh Te'," I suddenly cried, overwhelmed to see her again. "I thought I'd lost you forever."
"Not as long as I live and breathe," Te' said, clasping the side of my face with her hands and kissing me firmly on my lips.
For now, at least, we were together again. But from the angry look on her father's face, I had no idea for how much longer it would last.
28
For the next fifteen minutes, the chief huddled with Teuila and Manaia as they gestured toward me in a heated discussion. Manaia seemed particularly agitated, pointing back and forth between me and Teuila like he was blaming us for the interclan rivalry. He walked over to where her father had discarded the arrow fired into his back and inspected it carefully, then he carried it back to the chief, shaking it angrily in Te's face. The chief muttered something to Teuila and she dropped to her knees in front of him, begging him to accept her version of the story.
Finally, he swept his hands in a dismissive motion and gestured to one of his guards to attend to me. The guard pulled a sharp adze from the side of his skirt and began walking toward me in a threatening manner. I could only assume from Te's anguished expression that her father had instructed him to kill me, and I closed my eyes, steeling myself for the worst.
At least it will be quick this time, I thought, tensing my body in anticipation of the final blow.
But instead, the guard circled around behind me and began sawing at my ties until my hands were free. I looked up at Teuila, breathing a sigh of relief, but she just peered back at me sadly, shaking her head. The chief said something to the guard and he pulled my hands behind my back and retied them, then he connected a longer cord, which he wrapped around his hand. Te's father pointed to three more guards and motioned toward the remaining villagers cowering in their huts, then he lifted his hand and waved it in a circle, indicating that it was time for the rest of us to return to the village.
The tribesmen got in formation behind the chief and the guard who was bound to me pushed me in the back with the butt of his adze, instructing me to join the line. Te's father said something to Teuila, then she led the way back into the jungle with the rest of the troop following dutifully behind. As Manaia took up the rear position, I looked back at the sad faces of the women and children peering on from the entrance of their huts and wondered what would become of them. The whole scene reminded me of something out of a Vietnam War movie, with me taking the place of the captured soldier having to do a forced march back to the prison camp.
* * *
By the time our band returned to Te's village, the morning light was beginning to stream over the lagoon and the women and children raced out of their cabins, overjoyed to see that their side had won the battle. The men were exhausted from the night-long march, but Te's father pointed to the middle of the square, motioning for them to begin work on something. The guard who was tied to me escorted me to the location where the chief had pointed and forced me to sit down in the sand. Then the rest of the group disappeared into the woods as they began hacking down trees and branches of different sizes.