Three days after the encounter with Damian’s hallucination in the woods, I headed out to collect more wood for fire. There were only two of us to go retrieve the logs and whatnot, and we took shifts. I gathered for three mornings in a row and then he would search for the next three mornings. The last day we would go together so that we could stock up in case of an emergency. Today was that day.
I took a swig from the leather pouch of water slung around my chest and walked out into the growing sunlight. It would be my eleventh birthday the next day, and it excited me. It was one step closer to being able to marry Amawa-na, should she say yes. I prayed that she would.
Akeem-in, the other collector, came running out of his house, calling to his adopted mother over his shoulder. He was late for our meet-up, as usual. He was one of the tribemembers that slept late, even though he knew none of us should. Too much sleep could kill you.
“Are you ready to go, Akeem-in?” I asked, an amused smile playing on my face.
He opened his mouth to say something, when a loud voice drifted down to where we stand. It startled us enough to snap our heads in the sound’s direction. The shouting wasn’t from the effect of being in danger, but rather a result of pent-up anger.
We drifted closer to the noise, and when we were close enough, we peeked around the corner of the house hiding our presence, out to the center of the village. There, with the Head Tribe Leader, stood Damian-sai, huffing air in and out of his lungs as he pointed in the direction of the densely packed trees. His face was twisted with anger and his eyes flashed with rage. What was going on?
Cautiously, I pushed past the corner of the house and out into the open where they could see me, should they look over their shoulders. Damian-sai said something else in response to the Tribe Leader, but I couldn’t hear; I was still too far out of range.
I began to walk closer, my nerves on edge as Akeem-in tried to call me back and warning me to remove myself from their view. I shushed him and kept walking. Worry was already taking over my system for Damian-sai, when he suddenly stormed away into the bustling forest. The Tribe Leader shook his head and turned, his back to me, to walk away and disappear into his house. Akeem-in came running up, his eyes darting to and fro frantically.
“What happened? Did you hear anything?” He asked, his body shaking with a mixture of excitement and fear. He was always so scared; he would even jump at his own shadow. Akeem-in always reminded me of a groundhog in that way… “Where’s he going?”
“I don’t know,” I shrugged and peeked over my shoulder. People were just starting to wake and come out of their houses, greeting each other with hugs. It was, I guess, a way to show love first thing in the morning. The Tribe Leaders believed that if we share love as soon as we opened our eyes, the rest of our days will be filled with it, but I was never much of a hugger. I guess that was why I agreed to do this job, to go collect firewood before the sun rises. I’d only hug people I knew or if I was forced to return one. Otherwise, I stayed far away from it.
Amawa-na came out of her small house, a bright smile on her beautiful face. It made my heart melt, and for a moment I wanted to tell her about what had happened with Damian-sai. But… but maybe if I tried to fix this myself and not run away like last time, maybe she would see that I really did care and that I wanted to understand and accept what Damian-sai was going through. Maybe she’d understand.
“I’m going after him,” I told Akeem-in, and his head snapped around to stare at me with wide eyes. “You don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”
“What about the wood?” He stuttered. “We were supposed to look for a bunch together today, remember?”
“Of course I remember, Akeem-in,” I sighed, my eyes darting to the still spot in the trees where Damian-sai had disappeared into moments before. “It’s just… my friend needs help. Something hasn’t been quite… right with him lately.” My eyes found Akeem-in’s again. “I need to go after him. I’ll catch up with you later. Go in that way,” I pointed to the trees to my left, the opposite direction Damian-sai had disappeared into, “and circle around to meet me over there where he went. Okay?”
Akeem-in sighed and nodded.
“Okay. I’ll see you in a little while.”
He slowly nodded and walked in the direction I’d told him to go as I turned to the area Damian-sai went. I took a deep breath and jogged to the trees. I called for him as I got further in, the gaps lengthening between his name where my ears took over and listened for anything bustling about.
“Damian-sai?” I shouted again.
There was a groan to my left and the large leaves by my calves rustled. I practically jumped out of my skin, but I could see feet poking out through the greenery, the shoes worn out and ready to be replaced. I pushed aside the plant and through the brightening shadows was a face—Damian-sai’s.
He body, his face, was bruised and cut up, and he was passed out in the dirt that covered him head-to-toe. His brow was furrowed and his mouth hung open, air wheezing in and out his throat and lungs as the heat around him thickened with the rising sun.
Panic bubbled up in my tight chest and I was suddenly on my knees, trying to shake him awake. Cuts laced his torso and bruises lined his bare shoulders and neck. A long bloody gash sat across his forehead, something I guessed was what knocked him out. What could have done this kind of damage? A bear wouldn’t have left him like this, nor a wolf. Sure, they were fed plenty, but they wouldn’t just leave perfectly good prey out in the middle of nowhere.
“Damian-sai,” I pleaded, looking around. The injuries were recent; the animal could have still been in the area, waiting to pounce on me too. “Damian-sai!”
“Fear the sea… fear the… moon…” he whispered, still unconscious. A howl echoed in the distance, distorted and too strange to forget. It sent chills down my spine.
“Damian-sai!” I continued to shake his shoulders. “Damian-sai, wake up!”
“Fear them all… Trust…”
“Damian-sai!” I shouted, hoping it would wake him up this time.
“Trust nobody…”
“Wake up!”
His eyes flung open and he bat at me, trying to get me off.
“It’s okay—Damian-sai, it’s me—it’s me!”
He froze, his eyes focusing on my face as his brain tried to recognize it. Finally, he dropped his hands, only to bring them up to his head once again, uttering a low cry of pain. I wrapped one arm around his torso and the other around one of his arms and helped him up. He shouted as pain rippled across him, and another howl sounded, closer this time.
I used the tree I’d found him beside to help us steady ourselves as I slung his right arm around my shoulder. He groaned with every step we took back to the village, and I tried to stay silent. Questions could wait until he was better, no matter how curious I was about the horrid situation. I’d have to be patient.
We reached the clearing and, almost immediately, some of our people saw us. Several hands came to help Damian-sai to his house and to assist in laying him down while one of our doctors went to check on him. Amawa-na was frozen with shock as she watched it happen, and later I found her standing outside his door, staring at it.
“You can go in if you’d like,” I said aloud, coming up quietly behind her.
She startled and turned around toward me, worry in her eyes. They found their way back to the door, silence behind it as Damian-sai rested. She nodded.
“I know.” Her voice was a whisper as it wavered out. “I just… I wish I could have been there for him.”
I touched her back to comfort her. “I know. Me too.”
She curled into me and rested her head on my shoulder, and I wondered if I’d ever be taller than her, especially if I was going to ask her to marry me one day.
“Do you want to go in?” I choked out through my rapid heartbeat.
Amawa-na was silent for a few moments, her head still on my shoulder. Finally, she pulled away and looked me in the eyes as she nodded.
“Let’s go together.”
She took my hand and I nodded too, trying to hold back a smile. I was happy about the physicality of the moment, but… not about Damian-sai, and I didn’t want her to think I didn’t care again because I really did.
We opened the door and walked in, Damian-sai’s brow furrowed beneath a plant laying across the gash on his forehead. There were some more littered across his body where he had been cut, saturated with whatever medicine the doctors used to heal him with. They couldn’t really do anything about the bruising though.
We stood next to him for the longest time in silence, hand-in-hand. I reflected back on the moment I found him out there. He had seemed so… broken was the only word I could come up with. He looked close to death. And what he was saying…
“Amawa-na,” I whispered to her. She sniffled and uttered acknowledgement of my saying her name. “He had been whispering something. He whispered something like ‘fear the sea’. And then he said the same thing about the moon and the same thing about ‘them all’. And then he said trust nobody.”
“Why?” She asked, turning toward me for a moment.
“I—I don’t know. He was passed out.”
Amawa-na shook her head. “Then it probably means nothing.”
“Amawa-na?”
Damian-sai moves his head slightly, wincing, and she immediately turned her attention to him, relief flooding her eyes.
“Oh, you’re okay!” She smiled, resisting the urge to hug him.
“Duh,” he laughed, his body shaking as he sat himself up, the leaves plastered to his skin. His eyes darted to me, fear flashing in them for a moment, and then back to Amawa-na. “Nothing can kill me.”
She slugged him in the shoulder. He winced, but laughed out loud.
“Don’t ever do that to me again!”
He laughed and I chuckled with them.
“Yes ma’am,” he saluted, grinning, pain still present in his eyes.
I walked over to where Amawa-na was standing.
“What happened?” she asked.
Damian-sai just shook his head. “Nothing. I fell.”
She cocked her head to the side, her face giving off her dramatized disbelief. “You expect me to believe that—”
“Yes,” he said, his tone making it sound like a command. “Because I say that’s what happened.”
She literally bit her tongue as she glared at him, and backed up a few steps, crossing her arms over her chest. “Fine.”
“Can I talk to Tamir-in for a second in private?”
She looked as if she was about to protest, but he gave her a pleading look and she backed off. “Whatever.”
Amawa-na shut the door behind her and Damian-sai’s attention was suddenly focused on me.
“What did you see?”
I shrugged, my heart beginning to race. I felt like I was in trouble. “I just found you in the woods like an hour after you were yelling at the Head Tribe Leader.”
He nodded soberly, running his hand over his face. “The, um… there was a woman. She was real scary looking, and she… she—you’ve got to believe me, Tamir-in, please. This is going to sound strange.”
“Well spit it out then,” I said, sitting down on the floor in front of him like a small child listening to a story. I was willing to open up and listen. “I’ll be quiet until you finish.”
His breath was shaky as he inhaled, and he gripped the edge of the bed as if he’d fall off at any second. Perhaps he would; he looked rather too woozy to think straight.
“This is hard to do. I… I told you what happened before and you walked out on me and Amawa-na stayed behind. But this time…” He sighed. “I don’t want to scare her away or make her worry any more than she all ready does.”
“Why?” I asked, breaking my promise of silence for a moment.
“Because… ugh…” he rubbed his temples. “Okay. I’ll just tell you. Um…. There was a thick woman and she was scary looking. Black hair with strange purple clothing… and she was—she was… glowing. Purple. I—I didn’t know what to do because she definitely freaked me out. She smiled and then she was surrounded by a type of purple fog, and she changed into a leopard—the one that had talked to me. She began to walk closer on her four legs and I tripped—she was on top of me in a second, only she was the woman again. Her strange, impractically tall shoe was against my chest and holding me to the ground. Two guys with blemishes all over their faces smiled down at me scarily, and their hands held shiny knives. The woman backed up. She told me something. Something like, ‘You poor, unfortunate soul.’ And then the two guys attacked me. I couldn’t get up; I was strapped down by the same color glow she had! It was—it was terrifying! I couldn’t move, I couldn’t—” He tried to catch his breath.
“We were always told magic doesn’t exist like in the tall tales whispered around the village, but… I think that’s what I witnessed. And I think I would have died out there if it weren’t for you, Tamir-in. So thank you…” He was silent for a moment as I watched his face. He didn’t seem to be lying, and he looked genuinely scared. “She said my name while the men were breaking my skin. And at one point, I broke free somehow and I began to fight. I heard her laugh and she—she said something. And then everything was frozen and the purple glowing was all around the three of us, holding us still. She walked up to me and watched me for the longest time. And then she said ‘You’re a strong one, Damian. But not strong enough. Yet.’ And then everything went black.”
I nodded slowly, taking everything in. If his story was real, then there was a threat out there that could turn into whatever she wants. But since that wasn’t the logic of the “real world” I secretly dismissed it. I wanted to tell him that maybe he just hallucinated again—but how would one explain the cuts if that were the case?
“Okay,” I said, nodding as I stood up. “Well, I hope she doesn’t come around again, then.”
“But what did she mean?” His eyes were pleading and my heart ached for him. I wished he could see that none of it was real.
I sighed and opened the door to exit. “You should get some rest, Damian-sai. You won’t heal if you put all of that stress on your body.”
His eyes drifted to the floor and he nodded. “Okay. Thanks for listening,” he said quietly and laid back down.
I shut the door behind me and saw Amawa-na sitting on the stage across the village, picking at her fingernails, and, for a moment, I questioned the truth behind his words, leaning more to believing him. But I wasn’t sure I wanted to.