“So,” Kamapua‘a said, scratching at his beard and staring down at Makani. “What you’re telling me now is—if I’ve got this shitting right—you just went and did what I extrapifically told you not to go and do.”
The bandit shrugged uncomfortably, looking about the jungle like some shitting tree would offer him the answer. They stood just outside their camp and Kama knew others were watching them. “Well, not exactly.”
“On account of you didn’t actually kill the shitting villagers?”
“More on account of extrapifically not being a real word.”
Well now that was just silly pig shit. “So the villagers are shitting dead, then?”
“Yeah, boss. I mean, not all of them, of course. But the village was loyal to Hakalanileo. And they resisted and all.”
Kama scratched at his chin some more. Then he threw his arm around Makani’s shoulders. “See, my friend, the way I see it is this: You can poke a boar with a stick and it’ll get mad. Maybe chase you a bit.” Kama squeezed a bit until his man let out a wheeze. Wereboar strength was good for that sort of thing. “You, my friend, didn’t just go and poke the boar anywhere, though. You went and raked the stick over its shitting balls. Now, do you know what happens when you rake a boar’s balls? I’m guessing you don’t know, or you wouldn’t have done it.”
“Boss …”
Kama pushed the other man away to arm’s length. “No, you don’t. Why don’t you go out in the jungle and find a boar and rake its balls and see what happens? That way, we’ll be able to predict Hakalanileo’s response to having a bunch of villagers eaten.”
“We didn’t eat them!”
Kama ignored that. Hardly the point. “Fine. You can’t find a boar? I’ll show you a shitting boar.” He stripped off his malo and waved his cock around in the breeze. “Here’s some boar balls, my friend. Go grab a stick and rake them. Go on, I’ll wait. Let’s find out how it goes for you.”
Makani looked studiously to the side, flushing and smelling all embarrassed and shit. It was easy to forget the effect such manliness could have on mere mortals.
Still, Kama’s ire was real enough, and deep inside, he felt the animal stirring with it. The Boar God could get out if Kama let himself get too upset.
Instead, he stooped to grab his malo and wrap it around his waist once more. “All right, then, well, done is done. You can’t unrake a ball and you can’t unrile a boar.”
A glance told him the rest of the bandit crew were now all staring at him with open mouths. Kama wasn’t quite sure why. Probably couldn’t have even heard a word he said from way over there.
Kama shook himself, then cleared his throat. Silly boar, getting all caught up like that. “We’re gonna have to be ready for war, is what we’re gonna do. Maybe even lay an ambush for Haki’s men. We should try to set it before dark. I mean, I can see in the dark, but you can’t.” He cocked his head. “Mortal.”
“I have a hard time telling when you are in earnest.”
“Earnest?” Kama shrugged. “Never been there, far as I recall. But I know a pile of pig shit when I smell it, and you went and stepped us in it.”
He led the way into the jungle, not bothering to look back to see if Makani and his crew followed.
* * *
The men shuffled about, setting snares and booby traps through every reasonable path through the woods. Haki hadn’t known where to find them so far, and that had kept them all safe from Kama’s shithole of a brother-in-law. Haki himself was about as threatening as a broken twig, but he had a lot of men.
Plus, that weird woman who controlled water. Definitely a threat, though Makani assured him the woman had left Kaua‘i. Shame, though, Kama would have loved to make piglets with her.
Either way, Haki’s folk had cornered him once before. Killed so many the Boar God had just … Kama shook his head.
Nope.
Best not to even think it.
Makani rubbed sweat from his face. “I don’t think those people would have acted without their chief’s knowledge.” Thus far, Haki’s men had sent little parties out into the jungle hunting Kama’s troop. Including one from the village Makani had just raided. The raid was supposed to be retaliation.
“Nope. Probably not without his blessing, in fact. Most people are always worried about doing things proper, following tabu. Eat this, don’t eat that. Be polite. Don’t hunt here. Don’t fart there. You can’t piss on someone just because you don’t like them. So many stupid tabus.” Kama rubbed his beard. “That’s why we killed the hunters, right? Fair’s fair, and they came into our jungle.”
“Hakalanileo claims rulership here, too.”
Kama found it best to ignore Makani’s stupider comments. The man was loyal as a dog, but he had the brains of an unconscious rock. Few mortals were blessed with kupua intellectuality, after all. Not their fault.
Shit, Kama ought to commensurate with the poor shitter. Didn’t even know real words when he shitting heard them. Instead, he just clapped the other man on the shoulder. “Well, now you’ve basically gone and declared war against him. Hopefully big sis will forgive me for killing her husband, but a boar’s got things he just has to do.”
Kama paused to take in his men. Twenty of them, all good men. Well … no, actually, probably not a one of them was in fact a good man in the way a kahuna would mean the word. Not much on tabus. And you know, there was the murdering, stealing, raping, and an excisive amount of shitting profanity. A man could be forgiven for thinking the whole band uncouth.
Incorrigible, the lot of them.
Kama wouldn’t have them any other way.
* * *
As predicted, old Haki’s men had come for revenge. Shame for them, they didn’t seem to find the camp until twilight. Twilight was a good time. Almost moon time, and a moon meant the boar was almost ready to come out of its cave.
The best was when Kama let the boar out, but not the Boar God. Just a piece of him, really.
A rope snapped in the distance, followed by a crashing log. Followed by a scream as some shitter got smacked to a gooey pulp.
That, Kama figured, pretty much counted as the signal. He raised his hand and his people arose, hefting their javelins and their slings, stalking through the jungle. Silent and incorrigible.
Kama, too, pursued after them, flexing his own muscles. He carried a spear, too, though once the sun finished setting, he wouldn’t need it.
He followed his men into a small clearing where already things had ejaculated into chaos. Which was fine. Chaos was way better than that other thing.
Shrieking, someone flung a javelin at Kama. He twisted sideways, caught the shaft in midair and spun it around, then heaved it back. His attacker batted the projectile aside with his spear and raced in at Kama, screaming like a shitter.
Kama whipped his own spear around like a giant club. The shaft whistled through the air before cracking down on his foe’s shoulder and snapping in half, even as the attacker dropped like a stone. Kama shrugged, tossed his broken spear aside, and took up the one the other man had dropped.
“Wereboar,” he said by way of explanation to the man groaning on the ground with a shattered shoulder. Then he stomped on the man’s head, felt bone crunch under his heel, and ground it down, just for good measure.
If you were gonna kill a king, best to do it all the way. And that meant making sure Haki had no men left to interfere.
* * *
For hours he’d chased after the shitting raiders.
He felt it, long before the moon rose. It was almost full tonight. He supposed it was better not to be full. Got the Boar God too riled up.
When at last the hateful sun dipped behind the trees and moonlight began to spill into the jungle, Kama dropped to his knees and flung aside his malo.
The god pushed against the inside of his chest.
It wanted out.
He grunted.
Groaned.
The boar could come out. Shit, Kama liked the boar. Boar God could go sit in a pile of pig shit, though.
His fingers curled into claws then began to fuse together. His upper arms shrank inward, bones compressing in a crunch of agony. Kama growled, the sound rumbling through the jungle. His jaw hurt.
Everything shitting hurt.
Always did. It was a good pain, yeah, but still pain.
His lower canines began stretching, like some akua had grabbed hold and was trying to yank them out. So big they didn’t fit into his mouth.
His groans turned to snarls and feral grunts.
His ribs shifted, broadened, making way for insides all changing about. Kama growled, banging his head against the muddy ground.
Oh, Kāne!
He beat his fist into a root. Only it wasn’t a fist anymore. A hoof.
Boar God had him by the balls now. Squeezing ‘em so tight they might pop, trying to get loose. Kama almost wanted to give in to the beast. Let the shitter run rampage and pulverize Haki’s men for their treachery.
Except … couldn’t control … the god.
Let the beast run, and the beast ran wild.
Bristles burst through his back as his shift finished. He threw back his head and snorted, a louder, more violent sound than any boar ought to have made.
But then, what boars got so big?
Growling, Kama charged off into the jungle, a massive, bristle-covered pig of glory.
Moments later he burst into a pair of Haki’s men. One screamed to see a boar bigger than he was. Kama charged forward, tusks lowered. The man turned to run, but Kama jerked his tusks up as he closed, gouging the shitter right in the arse. A shake of his head flung the man aside.
He reared up and dropped a thousand pounds of boar fury on the other man, felt bones snap like twigs beneath his rampage.
Shitters better run.
* * *
He’d left Makani and the men he’d brought far behind. Their would-be attackers had fled in multiple directions, making it hard to keep all the scents straight. Shitters.
“Kamapua‘a!” Makani shouted from some distance behind.
Kama snorted. Slow humans running around on two legs. Huffing, he forced the animal inside him down, forced himself back to human form. Shifting back hurt, too. Joints all popping and bristles receding back under his skin like splinters. Plus, the tusks felt like someone smashed them down with a rock.
Deep in Kama’s chest, the Boar God rumbled, eager to get at Makani and tear him apart for the interruption.
Well shit on that. Makani was loyal. A friend.
When Makani drew near, he tossed Kama the malo he’d discarded earlier.
“We’ve been here before,” Makani said, once Kama had donned the skirt.
Kama looked around. He stood on a mud patch, not far from the canyon, but down where he could see the ocean ahead. In the moonlight, the shallows actually looked green, vibrant like the jungles just beyond. Ahead of them rose a steep slope, carved in rough tiers by the ceaseless winds of La‘amaomao and her calabash. Yeah. Kama had seen this place before. He scratched his beard. “So they’ve doubled back on their own trails.”
“Or you’re leading us in circles.”
Kama frowned. “I’m leading us in circles because they’re going in shitting circles.”
Makani looked back at the men. “They’re wasting our time. Playing with us.”
That was fine. Kama loved games. Playing was a lot more fun than working.
Huh.
Wait … Was it fun in contrast to working? Would it still be as much fun to play, if he never worked? Or would the lack of contrast diminish his enjoyment? The only way to be certain was to stop working for a while—a few years maybe—and see if he got bored playing.
It was worth expectorating on.
“All right,” Kama said. “Let’s play then. If most of Haki’s men are here, looking for us, how many are guarding him at Waimea?”
Makani nodded grimly.
* * *
They pushed hard for Waimea, Kama once again in boar form. Kama’s best chance of taking down Haki was at night. Sunrise would significantly diminish his strength and strip him of his boar form. Losing that edge might prove fatal.
The town was eerily quiet when they burst in.
That stupid shitter had really sent all his warriors wandering blindly in the jungle, hadn’t he?
The heiau stank of charnel. Haki must’ve had the kāhuna sacrifice a bunch of victims to try to divine his location. Maybe it had worked. Maybe that was how they found them.
Kama snorted, charging forward on all fours, racing into the town. Where was the damn king hiding anyway?
He’d gone only a few dozen feet into town when the scent hit him.
Men. Lots of stinky men, just behind the palace wall. Haki had kept back his forces, but only to protect his own home, not the rest of the village. Kama glanced behind himself to see the rest of his band stalking forward, creeping between houses, moving up like … wait. What was that? In the jungle … torchlight?
Kamapua‘a spun around snorting and charging back the way he’d come, racing past his startled men. Sure enough, a horde of Haki’s men came raging out of the jungle, brandishing torches and spears and javelins and screaming war cries.
It took only a moment, before the men in the palace closed the trap like a crab’s pincher, rushing through the gate, some even vaulting the palace walls.
Snarling, Kama kept rushing forward. No one ambushed his men! No one tricked him! He was too shitting smart to get shitting ambushed by these banana shits! Kama slammed into the first man like an avalanche. His tusks ripped through the man’s gut like knives, spilling shit and blood in a waterfall over Kama’s back as he continued forward. The hapless victim was bowled over, flipped over his back, and tumbled to the ground in a heap.
And Kamapua‘a kept on charging. He was well over four feet at the shoulder, pushing five, and he had momentum no shitting mortal could hope to deny. Indeed, now Haki’s men just started leaping out of his way, flinging themselves to the sides just to get clear.
One wasn’t fast enough. Kama’s slashing tusks caught his shin and gouged it straight down to the bone. Kama’s trampling charge almost covered up the man’s screams of agony.
Kama drew up short at the jungle’s edge, reared onto his hind legs, and came down atop a man brave enough to charge in with a spear. Brave enough. Not fast enough. Bone crunched under Kama’s feet, and the man’s chest gave in with a sickening squelch.
He turned back to his men to see a massacre.
Haki had gathered hundreds of men now, and Kamapua‘a’s people were hopelessly outnumbered.
But he saw no alternative save trying to fight his way through. He could escape in the jungle, but he’d not leave Makani and his other people behind.
It meant it was time for some pig shit.
* * *
On and on the fight went. Kama lost track of how many of Haki’s men he’d killed. Most of his efforts had to focus on saving his own men, after all. The ambush had driven them back, against the wall of the heiau, and now they had nowhere else to go.
Which meant … Kamapua‘a the egregious, incorrigible wereboar might finally have lost.
Shitting bastards.
The thought of it, the fear of it, was almost enough to let the Boar God out. Let him rampage.
Kama dispatched an overly aggressive warrior no doubt trying to make a name for himself. Well, now his name was Tusk-In-Groin.
When Kama turned, a cluster of warriors had surrounded Makani. Kamapua‘a dashed toward him on all fours, kicking up dirt beneath his feet. And then the sun peeked out from the horizon. It struck him like a blow and sent him stumbling along the main street, digging a trench of mud. Muscle spasms ravaged him as the sunlight forced him back to human form, beating down the Moon spirit whose shape he had assumed. Having the spirit forced down by the sun was like getting kicked in the shitting balls.
Kama gasped, grunting through the pain. You got used to it, but it was never fun.
He looked up in time to see a warrior approaching Makani from behind. Kama’s friend was watching Hakalanileo, who had finally come out of the palace. Kama tried to call out a warning, but his human vocal cords hadn’t finished reforming. It came out as a mere guttural shout. Enough to draw his friend’s eyes.
Not enough to make him turn as an axe descended.
As it crashed into his skull and split it open.
Everything stopped. At least for Kama. For the others, it erupted into chaos. The roar of Kama’s men making a mad charge into Haki’s forces. And then warriors were on top of them, stabbing spears down again and again.
By the time Kama gained his feet, it was over.
“No …” Kama groaned.
A warrior with a spear rushed at him.
Kama roared in bestial rage, unable to form words. As his attacker drew near, Kama caught the man with one hand on his spear and the other on his neck. He hefted the villager in the air and slammed him straight down into the mud with one hand. The sickening crack told him he’d broken the man’s neck, probably his back too.
Kama shrieked mindlessly at another attacker. His fist crashed into the man’s chest, reducing him to a gasping heap on the ground. Few of the other villagers were paying him much mind, and those who did now backed away in horror.
Rage coursed through him like blood, until his jaw hurt.
A dozen warriors brandished spears at him, but none seemed intent to close on Kama.
“Kill the wereboar!” Haki shouted.
“No!” the kahuna Lonoaohi bellowed, waving his hands. “The akua demand a sacrifice!”
Kama screamed at those warriors still watching him. And the beast in his soul rose, roaring and screaming, until wrath became his World. He set into them with terrible vengeance, hammering his fist into skulls, snapping necks and driving kicks into men’s guts.
He flung a warrior into one of his fellows and the two went down in a heap, not rising.
“I’ll shitting kill you, Haki!” Kama bellowed. “I’ll kill you for this! I’ll let it have you!”
A spear lanced into Kama’s side, stealing his strength. Leaving him gaping down at the shaft jutting from his ribs. A lasso was flung around his neck, then another, and another.
Choking him.
Making darkness cloud the edges of his vision.
The last thing he saw was his big sister Hina, hand over her mouth, weeping as he fell.
* * *
It shifted around inside his gut. The Boar God. Trying to rise up. To rage. Except the shitting sun helped keep the god under control. A shame, since Kama sat bound with a half dozen ropes tying him inside the temple.
Shitting ki‘i masks were staring down at him. Laughing at him. The akua saw his plight, saw he had one of them inside him, and they did nothing. Just sat there laughing like shitters.
The wound in his side had begun to heal over—only shitting thing the Boar God did for him at the moment. Still hurt when he breathed, though.
The late afternoon sun stung his eyes when Hakalanileo came tromping over, stupid grin on his face.
“Big sis send you to make sure I was doing all right?” Kama asked.
“Oh, you don’t get to pretend to be family, pig. Not after you spent the past two years pillaging villages, burning our crops, and cutting down our coconut trees. Those are the actions of a traitor. Those are actions for which Milu will feast upon your soul in her icy underworld.”
Kamapua‘a tried to shrug. The ropes turned it into a pathetic wiggle. “Yeah, well … you banished me first. On account of me being too handsome or some shit.”
Haki rolled his eyes, then knelt in front of Kama. “You were a savage troublemaker from the day you were born. I should have killed you as a child, but I let Hina sway my heart.”
“Yeah, big sis is kind like that. What with not wanting to see children murdered and shit.”
Haki grabbed Kama’s beard and jerked his chin up. “Not even she can save you now, pig. The destruction you’ve wrought across the district has every ali‘i for miles around wanting to come see your sacrifice. It’s the only reason I’m holding the ceremony off until dusk.”
“Eh … would you mind holding it off until after dusk? I mean, even just shortly after would probably serve.”
“You are a moron. You think the rest of us no more intelligent than yourself. But I’ve known actual pigs smarter than you, Kamapua‘a.”
It hit him then. The Boar God’s wrath. It pushed up through his bowels, climbed up his chest, and coiled around his heart. And it squeezed until Kamapua‘a thought he’d burst apart. The rage.
It didn’t like being insulted.
It didn’t like it at all.
The ropes strained as Kamapua‘a’s muscles bulged, shifting and tightening even in the shitting sunlight. The Boar God was angry. It was really shitting angry.
Kama’s mouth felt thick, like the tusks where trying to burst out from his jaw.
Haki’s eyes widened and he abruptly rose, backing away. “Animal.”
“Keep talking, little fuck.” Huh. The words came out of Kama’s mouth, but it wasn’t his voice and certainly not his words. The sound was deep, primal. “Moon comes up, I’m gonna rip your spleen out through your nostrils and fucking eat it.”
What was a spleen? Did it actually taste good?
Haki blanched now. Maybe he thought he needed his spleen, whatever the shit that was. Either way, he backed out of the temple without taking his eyes off Kamapua‘a.
* * *
An hour later, by Kama’s guess, Hina came in, casting wary glances over her shoulder. Looking all in distress and shit. Kama hated seeing big sis in distress. That was a terrible place for her to be.
She had this gourd under her arm, and knelt in front of him, tipping it up so he could drink some water.
After slurping down a few sips, he looked at her. “You probably shouldn’t be here.”
“Hakalanileo has given me permission to come and say Aloha one more time. Your sacrifice shall be dedicated to Kū this evening.”
Ah. The war god. Well, seemed like a good god to offer himself to.
Hina leaned in closer, whispering into his ear. “Lonoaohi is with me.”
What, Haki’s kahuna? Hadn’t the king spent like a year demanding the kahuna come up with some vision to catch Kamapua‘a? He was sure someone had told him that. Unless it had been a dream.
Now, big sis leaned back. “Your sacrifice to the war god should serve to weaken the resolve of those loyal to Queen Poli‘ahu. Nine more men will follow you into Pō.”
“Huh. Planning to attack her on Vai‘i, then?”
Hina stroked his cheek. “She is resolved to destroy our dynasty, and I cannot allow that to happen. We are descended from Mo‘oinanea herself, Kamapua‘a. We have the right to claim Sawaiki as our own. The newcomers arrived from Kahiki could make powerful allies, but either way, Poli‘ahu must be forced to submit or she must die.”
Well what the shit did all that even mean? Was Lonoaohi going to help him? Was Hina saying Kama’s sacrifice would be worthwhile if it brought them all victory?
Shit.
Kamapua‘a hated being confused.
* * *
Just before dusk they came, the kahuna and his sons and other apprentices. They took the lassos and led him outside the outer wall of the heiau. The killings didn’t happen inside, of course. Even Kama knew that much.
The akua wanted their sacrifices, but no one spilled blood in the heiau. Tabu or some shit.
Lonoaohi held the execution club in his hand, its wood stained permanently red from so many victims. The kahuna, though, he looked away, up at the setting sun.
“You know,” Kama said, “if you just wait a bit more, that sun’s gonna set. I promise, waiting will appease at least one god.”
The kahuna sighed. “The sacrifice commences.” He hefted the club.
Oh. Well, shit.
Lonoaohi brought the club down on Kamapua‘a’s head with a thunk that had his teeth clanking together.
Kama groaned and worked his jaw. “Uh, you’re doing it wrong.”
The kahuna raised the club again, and again swatted down on Kamapua‘a’s head with just enough force to sting. Kama was about to object when Lonoaohi raised and dropped the club a third time snapping Kama’s teeth together once more.
“Owww.”
“Three times the akua have refused the sacrifice!” Lonoaohi declared.
“It is so,” one of his sons agreed, followed by murmurs of assent among his apprentices. One of them came back bearing a large bladder sloshing with what smelled an awful lot like blood. The apprentice dipped his hand in the bladder, then smeared blood all over Kama’s face and hair, letting it dribble down his chest.
“Uh …”
The man continued rubbing blood over Kama’s face until he had to close his eyes just to keep from getting blinded by the shit. A moment later, the ropes were loosened, and hands hefted him up into the air, carrying him like a corpse.
They brought him back inside the heiau and laid him upon the sacrificial altar. The stone was warm from the sun, but profoundly uncomfortable. Kama dared not open his eyes.
“Bring his left eye,” Hakalanileo said.
Ooo. Kama might rather be dead for this part. Especially since any scream might give away the ruse. A hand jerked his chin to the side, and a knife bit his flesh just below his eyelid. A scratch, really, though Kama didn’t much enjoy it. Whoever was cutting him also drew Kama’s left hand down to the haft of something stuck behind the altar.
A weapon?
Was that Hina’s plan? That he should free himself?
The man cutting him backed away, leaving the knife on the altar beside Kamapua‘a. Probably pretending to take an eye to Haki for the king to eat.
A moment later, Kama felt someone approaching. Hovering over him, maybe examining where the eye should be missing.
“What the—” Haki’s voice began.
Kamapua‘a seized the knife and jolted up, driving it into Haki’s jugular. Hot blood rushed over him in a spray. Kama jerked the knife free and rammed it into the king’s gut. He flung the king’s body aside like a doll.
An instant later, a shout went up among the fallen king’s attendants. They rushed him, shrieking of treachery. Kama tossed the sacrificial knife away and grabbed the haft of whatever lay beside the altar.
A massive stone axe.
Kama grinned. Shitters were in the shit now. Roaring, he met the first attacker, hefting the axe overhead and chopping straight down. The blade cleaved through the skull all the way to the man’s jaw bone. Kama kicked the corpse, freeing his axe, even as more men charged at him.
He dodged a spear, caught a warrior by the back of the head, and slammed the man face-first into the altar. The force of it shifted the stone slab and splattered the man’s skull and brains.
“Come on, you shitters!” Kama bellowed at them. “Come on and get shitted!”
“Murderer!” someone shouted. “Beast!”
“Yeah, yeah.”
But he could feel it, stirring inside. There was a beast in him. A god beast, feeding off Kamapua‘a’s own anger at his treatment. Haki should have loved him as a brother-in-law or uncle. Instead, the man had hated him, persecuted him, finally cast him out, and then hunted him. Planned to offer him to Kū.
How could he not rage at such injustice from his own kin?
And the sun had set.
It hit Kamapua‘a like a blow. The thing inside, reaching up and crushing his brain between its massive hooves. Tusks lanced through Kama’s jaw. A haze of red filled his vision.
* * *
A mortal ran at the Boar God waving a stick.
Amusing.
The Boar God was almost eight feet tall, muscles bulging. He caught the puny mortal with a hand around his neck. Laughing, the Boar God squeezed until the man’s head popped off.
Then he threw the corpse into a throng of mortals, bowling them over in a hilarious heap.
He had an axe, too. A large axe, worthy of his bulk. The host had served the Boar God well to provide such a boon.
Bellowing, the Boar God broke into a charge, sweeping the axe back and forth in great swathes. It hewed through limbs, splattered heads, and sent corpses flying in a typhoon of glorious carnage.
None could stand before the Boar God.
Oh, mortals had called him many names over the ages. Moccus. That one he remembered, almost as a dream now.
They called him that, from time to time. But now, he was just the Boar God.
And he was indignant.
These petty mortals had maligned his host and thus maligned him. It would not stand.
Heaving the axe up in both hands, the Boar God brought it down on a man, hewing him from skull to crotch with a satisfying squelch of flesh and crunch of bone.
They had begun to flee the temple, screaming, shrieking like the pathetic children they were. The Boar God raced forward, snarling, bounding out of the temple. A pump of his mighty legs carried him over the outer wall to land among the startled mortals.
A whole village of wretches that needed to learn to worship him.
He took off in great bounds, faster than any mortal could hope to run. A slap of his hand tore out a side of a wall, sending a house crashing down. An upswing of the axe caught a man and hurled him ten feet into the sky.
The so-called palace of these pathetic mortals lay ahead. The Boar God raced toward it, bounded over the wall, and landed in a shower of dirt. He pushed off the ground and charged forward, slapping aside a palm tree in his path.
Roaring, he hurled the axe end over end, smashing through the main palace wall. Crunch! In one side and crunch! Out the other!
A guard rushed to bar his way. The Boar God swept the mortal up in both hands and bent until the mortal’s spine snapped, then tossed the body causally up onto the palace roof.
A young man faltered before him, knife trembling in his tiny mortal hand. “K-k-amapua’a?”
Stop! The host screamed in the Boar God’s head. Stop it! That’s Niheu, my nephew!
Sometimes, the host was surprisingly strong. Strong enough to make the World sway, strong enough to bring the Boar God to one knee.
“I’m … gonna … fuck every last mortal here … into a pulp …”
A white blur filled his view.
* * *
Well, shit. That wasn’t supposed to happen.
That’s why Kama didn’t let the Boar God out to play.
And now Kamapua‘a had this headache like someone had hit him in the head with a club. Except … no, he didn’t think the headache had come from that. Not most of it.
Kana raced into the palace and shoved Niheu behind him. “What in Lua-o-Milu have you done, Uncle?”
“I … uh …” Well, Kamapua‘a had pretty much sat there, useless as a wart on the ass, while the Boar God rampaged through Waimea, was what. Sat there and watched like a stupid shitter.
“You killed my father,” Kana said.
“Uh … well that was mostly on account of him trying to kill me.”
Kana waved a hand at the carnage the Boar God had left in his wake. His nephew shook his head in obvious despair. Perhaps shock still had him at what had gone on. Few of the villagers had ever seen Kamapua‘a overtaken by the Boar God. Fewer still had lived to tell of it. “You’ve left me no choice, Uncle,” Kana finally said. “As the new king of Waimea, I banish you.”
“Aw, shit. Not again.”
“Not merely from the district, but from all this island. Because you are Mother’s blood, I’ll not call for yours. But you may never return to Kaua‘i.”