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Awiwi cried out in fear and disgust as she kicked at an ubia that was trying to wrap itself around her ankle. The vine fell away. Then it snaked toward her again. Others followed.
Holding her baby tightly in her arms, Awiwi backed away. She had been retreating since the dawn of this terrible day. So had all the rest of those who had taken refuge on the Jayaya beach.
When the first light seeped into the morning sky, an army of ubias had swarmed out of the forest. The Uloans who were still asleep at the time died agonizing deaths, covered with ubias that leeched the blood out of their veins. Those who, like Awiwi, were fortunate enough to be awake had fought desperately to free themselves from their assailants. They fled their lean-tos and made for the beach, closer to the final embrace of the sea.
Behind them, their flimsy shelters were quickly overrun by swarms of ubias. People who had not been alert or swift enough to elude the attackers had become little more than struggling lumps barely visible beneath a writhing carpet of vines.
“Fire! Catch they on fire!” one of the elders shouted as he cut and tore ubias from his legs.
He rushed toward a cooking fire that still burned several yards away, and thrust a piece of wood from it into the mass of ubias that was still in front of him. With a sizzling sound, the vines shriveled and blackened in the flame. Wielding the brand like a flaming sword, the elder burned a wide swath through the ubias.
Others followed the elder’s example. Risking their lives to reach other fires, they lit the wreckage of their shelters, pieces of driftwood, patches of dry grass – anything that was combustible. Soon, a rampart of fire blazed between the Uloans and their attackers. The hiss and pop of burning ubias punctuated the crackle of the flames.
But the respite proved only temporary.
As the Uloans stared in renewed horror, the sheer mass of the ubias began to snuff out the flames. Unlike even the most obtuse form of beast, the animate plants of the Uloas bore no instinctive fear of fire, for all their vulnerability to that element. And they also had no fear of death. For them, the loss of hundreds, even thousands, of their numbers had no consequence. All that mattered to the Kipalende part of them was the fulfillment of their deadly purpose.
Slowly, the flames died, leaving a mass of charred ubias in their wake. And a new wave of vines passed over the remnants of the others. Again, the Uloans retreated before the onrushing horde of ubias. And a new enemy emerged as tendrils from rapidly growing mwiti roots erupted from the ground and coiled around the Uloans’ ankles and up their legs.
Overcome by a sense of futility, some of the Uloans simply ceased their struggles and allowed the plants to pull them down. Others continued to fight for their lives, even as the water of the ocean lapped at their heels.
“Legaba! Legaba! Save we!” many of them shouted, even though they knew their god no longer heard them.
Others uttered screams of rage and despair. And still others bore their fate in bitter silence. The end of their existence was in sight ... but so, on the horizon of the sea, was something else.
Awiwi was the first to spot what was drawing closer to them.
“Ships!” she shouted, her voice soaring above the din. “Ships! Them come back to save we!”
The other Uloans turned and looked to the sea. At the sight of the line of ships in the distance, they let out a long shout of relief and joy. But the cries of elation died in their throats when they realized the ships were not Uloan after all.