PoraBora

Chapter Thirty-Five

Night fell before they landed on the northern beaches of Ila'i. They all stepped out: Makaia and his four warriors, U'ekeo and his Navigator, and Akoni. Akoni wouldn't have brought so many, but Makaia had always been a man who liked to have people watch.

Perhaps that was why he did not question the joining of the second Navigator, a woman waiting on the beach. The Navigator of the Landed, he was introduced. Miimikani.

Altogether, they were quite an audience.

The sand was soft enough Akoni wished he could remove his boots. He didn't have many chances ashore, but his bonds made it a difficult thing. The others were barefoot. Their occupations and uniforms didn't present as much danger to exposed feet. Tar stains were the least of a rigsman's worry: Akoni had seen enough boiling skin and blisters to keep his boots with him everywhere he went.

Ila'i's Chief U'ekeo had made his decision, but that didn't mean he had to be happy about it. His every step felt like it was meant to crush Makaia, and he only looked at the man when his back was turned.

Akoni might have smiled. Your plan is working, Makaia, he thought dryly.

The Navigator of Landed seemed even less happy to be there, if possible, even though she had forced herself aboard. She glared as much at U'ekeo as at anyone. Ila'i did not have a Navigator of Landed, Akoni had thought when Makaia accepted her company, but he supposed they had not had a Navigator of War, either. New dilemmas often brought rise to new advisors, and Makaia's conquest was certainly a new dilemma.

The Navigator of Fowl walked up the sand with a greater sense of belonging than any of them. As Makaia looked about the coastline in appreciative wonder, the Navigator of Fowl, who seemed to Akoni to be a very unremarkable man, and was probably only Navigator because of a draw of sticks or to pay back a long-standing favor, only looked where he was going.

Makaia's four warriors trudged through the sand, using spears as walking sticks. They each had their firelocks.

It wasn't, U'ekeo had warned them, going to be a short hike.

There were no lights or lanterns as in the villages, peeping out of windows with a yellow, flickering glow. They had only the moon and stars, making the sky easy to find but everything else a matter more difficult. The rising cliffs were all one, dark shape.

"I don't see why we can't have some light," grumbled the Navigator of Landed.

"It's not often you get to see the night sky like this," said Makaia. "Let us enjoy it."

It was every night, for the people of Ila'i, but they didn't say anything. Akoni didn't either, because he knew Makaia didn't care particularly much about seeing the sky. He cared about spotting anybody else's lanterns, to see where the rest of Ila'i's people had run off to. To see, perhaps, if anyone was trying to escape.

And if they were? Would Makaia bother to stop them? If they were truly to live as they were before, they would have to be allowed on their boats. What could they do but warn the other islands?

Surely, Akoni thought, that would be all it took. Ila'i had seen their strength and knew the countenance of their own addition. That was information that would spur the other islands into action. Makaia couldn't afford it getting out if he was planning on continuing his chase for Keasau.

Well, Akoni wasn't going to mention it. The man wanted Ila'i to accept his takeover, and that wouldn't be helped by barricading their ships in their harbors.

You can't have everything, Akoni thought, and he wondered if any of Makaia's Navigators had ever told him the same.

So they crept in the dark, focusing on where their feet landed, while the warriors focused on them. They had lanterns unlit, wells full of ready oil. If anyone tried to sneak away, they would go on to find them with little trouble. Maybe, thought Akoni. They did not know the land of Ila'i. A tunnel could be hard to find when you were looking for a person.