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THE TIDE OF ANGRY PEOPLE almost sweeps me off my feet. They rush at soldiers, the clash of wood against metal splintering the air. There is the whine and thunk of the slingshot as a rock clangs against armour, returned by the whistle and thwack of an arrow burying itself in flesh. All around, men and women howl, whether in rage or pain, I cannot tell. Han drags me to the side, avoiding the worst of the melee.
“Stop! Stop this madness!” I shout, but my voice is lost in the chaos. Those nearest me pause, both the army and the civilians, but it’s only momentary. Others rush in with weapons raised, and then they fall back to fighting. The stench of sweat and blood fills the salty air.
Jeffett sits on his horse, laughing, a sound so sharp he sounds deranged. It doesn’t last long. Despite his guards, the mob starts closing around him, trying their best to pull him down by sheer numbers. His horse shies away, lashing out at the people crowding it. Jeffett pulls out his keris and starts thrusting at them.
“Stop!” I shout again, trying to project my voice farther. “Han! Tell the troupes to stand down!”
Our troupe members are the only ones proficient with weapons amongst our people. If they disengage, the civilians will follow, and maybe there would be less bloodshed.
He nods, sending out signals, both with his hands and a series of whistles. Strange lulls appear in separate bubbles all across the field. But where our people stop, the soldiers press forward. I look for Jeffett, but he has disappeared in the melee. The thudding of hooves show that his horse has run free, and Jeffett is not on it any longer.
A sharp whistle pierces the air. Azman’s voice rings above the mass of writhing bodies. “Stand down!” His hand is raised in a closed fist.
Finally, finally, both sides rest with their weapons lowered.
I nod at Azman in thanks. He sits, straight-backed on his horse, glaring down at his own men.
“Back in line!” he snaps. “Where is your discipline? Have I spent so many months training you only for you to break ranks when it really matters? You shame yourself in front of your raja!”
The soldiers slink back to their positions.
“Han,” I say. He nods and sends out another series of signals. Across the field, troupe members pull the villagers back, bringing their wounded along with them.
“Who shot the first arrow?” I ask.
Azman repeats the question. There’s some shuffling and scuffling, and then two burly soldiers drag a hapless archer out in front of us.
The archer cowers in front of Azman.
“Why did you do that?”
“Raja...Raja Jeffett...” is all he manages to stammer out before Jeffett’s mad laugh rings out again.
He’s held in a headlock by two men. One of his own soldiers and one of the younger ketua kampungs. I blink in surprise.
“You don’t hold any power over my army, Yosua,” he says, then chokes as the men holding him tighten their hold. “Azman!”
“Release him,” Azman orders.
The men’s grips loosen, but they do not let him go. Azman and I exchange looks.
“Let him go,” I say.
“But Tuanku!” the ketua kampung protests, before he releases his hold on Jeffett. Beside him, the soldier grimaces, then releases Jeffett with a shove, sending him sprawling on the ground.
Jeffett slowly picks himself up from the ground, rubbing at his neck and shoulders. “You come at me with a mob!” he spits.
“Your mob started it,” I reply.
“Kill him and be done with it, Azman,” Jeffett says. “Then gather the men. We have more important things to do than deal with this traitor.”
Azman remains stock still, his eyes fixed on me. If it weren’t for the swishing of his horse’s tail, he would be like a painting. A soldier on a horse.
“Come, Azman, we cannot stand here all day, as entertaining as it is,” Jeffett says.
Azman stirs, as if he has come to a decision. “I will arrest him,” he says.
“Arrest him? You’re supposed to kill him.”
“That I cannot do.”
Jeffett splutters. “Why not?”
Azman meets my eyes as he says, “Yosua’s accusations have merit and you have not denied that you murdered Tun Garett and Marla. A new investigation is warranted, especially since we have not resolved the case.”
Jeffett glares at him. “I see where your loyalty lies.”
Azman gulps, but remains stoic. “My loyalty lies with the truth.”
“Fine,” Jeffett grouses. “If you wish to waste time and money on another trial, I’m sure we can accommodate you. After we return from Maha.”
“I insist on a fair trial, no matter the cost.” Azman nods, then turns to me. “Will you come with me?”
I study the man I once thought of as my only friend. He looks weary, dark circles under his eyes. His hands clench the reins as harshly as he is holding on to his self-control. His words come back to me: I’m sorry. I thought I was doing what was best for you. He’d been manipulated by Jeffett just as I had been.
“Yes,” I say, raising my hands in surrender. “Stop, Han. This is for the best.”
Han stops where he is, dropping his hands. “As you wish, Tuanku.”
“I’m trusting you, Yosua,” Azman says.
“You can trust me,” I say.
Jeffett scoffs.
Azman presses his lips together, then says, “Arrest Jeffett as well.”
“What?” Jeffett splutters. “Azman, are you crazy? By what authority—”
“As the Temenggung of Bayangan, I have the right to make arrests to ensure the peace of the kingdom,” Azman replies, clenching his jaw.
I stare at him in surprise. Temenggung?
“You cannot arrest your own raja.”
“There has been precedence,” Azman says with a wry smile. “If you believe in the rule of law in Bayangan, then you, too, must face judgement.”
Jeffet growls, “I put you there, I can take you down—”
“If you are proven innocent, I will resign from my post.”
Jeffett shakes his head. “We don’t have time for this, Azman. The ships are ready. We need to board and head to Maha before we lose the element of surprise!”
“We will not be going to Maha,” Azman says.
“Stop this nonsense at once!” Jeffett splutters. “Men! To me!”
The ranks shift nervously, looking between their military leader, Temenggung Azman, and their national leader, Raja Jeffett. Huge portions of them look beyond to the rows of ketua kampungs and villagers that stand with the troupes, exchanging gestures of recognition. This is going to be a disaster. The Bayangan army is divided and restless—for all that Azman has tried to mould them into a proper army, the new recruits are still too raw. I scan their faces and find that I recognise some of our regulars in the market.
O Kudus, what am I supposed to do here? How do we defuse this situation without more bloodshed?
Everyone is on edge, and I’m convinced they will fall back to fighting at the slightest provocation. Inspiration strikes me.
“O people of Bayangan, hear me!” I address the army. “I stand before you, not as your raja, but as one of you. One who has carried your burdens, one who knows your pain. Regent Jeffett has torn you from your families and your kampungs to fight his war, one that has no bearing on you. He has overstepped his authority in this. The fight against Maha is one that you will not win. It is one that you need not bear. Sultan Mikal has promised us his peace; let us take what he offers and leave war behind.
“Harvest is coming and your ketuas need you at home. Without you, our crops will wither and rot, our trade will stall, and our families starve. Bayangan will not survive the next few months. We must look within and rebuild our economy—and to do that we need peace. Not war!”
A murmur passes through the ranks. I press on, ignoring Azman’s surprise and Han’s frantic signalling.
“I stand before you accused of believing in Kudus, and I readily admit my guilt. I stand accused of breaking my exile, and the truth is staring you straight in your face. But I returned for one thing and one thing only: to right a wrong in the kingdom that I love, to make sure that justice is found for my parents and for those that Jeffett has wrongfully accused and sentenced.
“I do not need you to put me back on the throne. I will leave Bayangan if you decide to exile me again. But I cannot allow a murderer to sit on Baya’s throne and wear a crown he is not worthy of. I cannot fault Jeffett’s heart for Bayangan, but I cannot condone his actions. That is all I have to say.”
The murmur increases, rising into a roar. People are shouting at each other, yelling over each other, and for a brief moment, I wonder if I have made everything worse.
Sweat drips down my face, down my back. I grimace at Han who makes a wry face back.
Jeffett’s face spreads into a mad grin. He raises his hands, calls for quiet, pulling himself together in practised dignity that I cannot hope to emulate. He claps his hands together, cupping them so that it seems to echo even in this open beach.
“People of Bayangan,” he says, echoing my opening, “you know me. I have been with you for decades. You know that everything I do is for the best of Bayangan. I am forced to admit my wrong here—I thought that Yosua was a good candidate for the throne, much like his aunt, our beloved Permaisuri Layla, was. If I am guilty of anything, it is that! But no, I have been proven wrong over and over again. All Yosua does is stir up contention throughout Bayangan with his deviant ways, ways that go against our very laws!
“He stands before you a heretic, a worshipper of false gods—and he does not deny it. Instead, he is proud of it! Can you not see that if you let him live, he will continue to bring Bayangan down the path to destruction? Back to the past we’ve fought so hard to change?”
Jeffett stands with his arms wide, his head bowed, as if inviting their criticism. Then he looks up and over them like a father surveying his children. “I ask you to trust me one more time. I have done many things that you may find shocking, but it has only ever been for the love of Bayangan, for the good of her people. I have tried so hard to steer our glorious kingdom in the right direction, and I could not allow deviants like Yosua and Garett to take her down the wrong path.
“Listen to me, my children. I warned Garett many times—yet he resisted my advice and scorned my counsel. I had no other way to make him listen. I thought then that I needed to remove his influence from Raja Yosett, to help my poor misguided nephew to see the truth. If Yosett were to be guided by me, then surely, we would be able to soar again. I begged, pleaded with Garett over and over again to no avail, one last time.
“So I killed him. I did not want to. I was forced to by Garett’s own hand. He would not listen, instead calling me a deranged old man. Me! His oldest and best friend, his own brother-in-law, the one who raised his sister when she was left orphaned. You know me! You know that all I work for is for the good of Bayangan. Garett’s death was for the good of Bayangan. I had to do it to wake you up, Yosett.” He looks at me with no remorse in his face, eyes pleading for me to accept his actions.
“And so you killed your own sister too?” The question slips out of my mouth before I can stop it.
Jeffett lets tears fall from his eyes. How theatrical. I want to take him by the shoulders and shake him, slap him until he comes to his senses.
“Oh, Marla, my poor Marla. What happened to Marla was an accident. I did not intend to lift a finger against her, but she woke up and saw me. I had to silence her. I did what I had to. Fortune did not favour me in that moment.” He sighs deeply, then wipes the tears from his eyes.
“After that, I sought to guide Yosett back to the right path—to remove from him this foreign influence that saps his strength and his rationality. But no matter what I did, he refused to listen. I offered him incentives, but it didn’t work, so I had to threaten him instead. Still, he remained hard-headed and hard-hearted, and I knew then that he had to go. There was no way to remove the cancer of Maha from him, so entrenched is he in their ways!
“You have to believe me, O my children. All I’ve ever done was for the good of Bayangan!”