PoraBora

Chapter Forty-Nine

Pora sweated. The hull had turned into an oven, like those they'd dug into the dirt to cook lavished cuts of swine on Wai Polu. He didn't want to be a swine. He wiped his brow, as Hui wiped his, and they both shouted frustrated words that the other couldn't understand.

"How are we going to get him out?" Pora demanded. He didn't think it was quite hot enough to melt steel.

"'O sebuni," growled the boy. He wiped his forehead again as if it made a difference. His hair was matted to his head and neck.

Pora's was too, and he ran a hand through it, regretting it as it soaked his skin in sweat. His feet slipped on the feathers. The fowl fluffed uncomfortably, laying on the ground with a wing spread and a leg out. They should have died, or at least have been dying, but Maye did not allow it, and whatever godly blessing it extended kept the birds alive.

It wasn't doing Pora any favors.

As far as he could figure it, there were two steps. Unchain Maye, and break a hole for him to escape through. Pora could only hope the god wouldn't be too stiff to fly away and remembered how long it had taken it to take wing on Ila'i, when he'd all the space of the island to build up speed.

Maybe three steps, then.

Pora wiped his face. He couldn't think of three steps. He felt sick and sluggish, and throwing his head out the window didn't do much to help. The air outside was just as hot.

He could taste the oil in his mouth, sour enough he wanted to puke just to taste something else, and it filled his nose worse than sweat. He wiped his forehead again, as Hui hammered the head of his spear into Maye's lock.

Pora couldn't take it anymore. He dashed for the door, his toes burning on the floor, and bolted for the upper layer. Nobody else remained below deck; every room was blank, every hall empty. So he went up another layer, up another ladder, until he made it to the hatch. He didn't hesitate. He struggled it open and poured himself onto the deck.

The warriors didn't look. They were staring at the god.

Pora stared too. Keasau burst from the water immediately off the bow, between the two hulls of the white-top, and it rose, and rose, a mountain on the deck's horizon. The whale was pure black, losing its shape as oil poured over it and drowned the bow.

Warriors leapt aside but were still caught up in the ooze. They screamed as their flesh burned. Others scrambled to help them and bring them clear, koa grabbing Akapuans, Akapuans grabbing koa. Pora rolled to his feet as the whale's weight shoved the bow down and grabbed the hatch so he would not slide towards the oil.

Keasau was bigger than he had imagined. It echoed an angry bellow, three mouths opening at its front. Warriors flailed as they lost their footing, grabbing whatever they could. Most of it slid with them, crates of extra cannonballs, linstocks, and entire cannons. There were fowl, too, flapping airborne, talons scratching against the metal hull as they tried, but were unable, to get a grip.

"Keasau," said Pora, as the whale began to slide down the boat. Its flippers lifted slowly, like sails dragging wind, and gradually melted into great hands.

The god's hands crushed cannon after cannon and all the men beside them.

"Maye is here!" Pora shouted. "Maye is here on this ship, Keasau! You have to stop before you sink him!"

A cannonade interrupted, launched from a boat astride, and the balls pelted into Keasau. It bellowed and slipped back into the water, leaving the ship to upright itself.

Pora ran to the rail and saw the ocean had become like his island, covered, slick, and dark. "No!" he shouted, "Stop! Stop destroying everything!"

The warriors did not respond, and the god did not come back to the surface. Pora spun back to face the deck, where warriors were getting to their feet, groaning from the floor, or rolling and howling in pain. One man, blinded, stumbled over the side.

Had it been like this at his island? Had Yuppa and the others been boiled alive, cursing Pora's inadequacies as their protector as they screamed their way to the bottom of the sea?

He did not remember heat.

But it didn't matter. The end was the same. Pora growled and steeled himself. Right now, he had to save Maye.

Pora raced back down the hatch to Maye's chamber.

Hui lay in the feathers. He wasn't moving. Pora slid to his side. The warrior was still breathing, but he was unresponsive as Pora lifted him. His whole body was hotter than Pora felt.

Pora looked up to Maye. "Can't you save him?"

The god did not give him an answer. Pora struggled to get the boy onto his back, but he was too heavy, so Pora dragged him by the arms into the hall.

Fowl clambered out forcibly, clawing their way over Hui and Pora. They didn't make it any easier, for even in the hall they had nowhere to go.

The ladder was impossible. Pora wasn't strong enough to lift the boy, but he did get the hatch open. He was sweating again. He wasn't sure that he had ever stopped.

Pora nearly had the warrior half off the ground before he slipped his grip. The thud made Hui groan. Pora redoubled his efforts. He had to get him somewhere cool. But there wasn't anywhere cool. Even the seas boiled with Keasau's rage. Still, the deck had to be better than down here.

"Kekelala wa'i?"

Pora looked up to see one of the warriors who had grabbed him. He glanced back to Hui, but the boy's broken spear had been left back in Maye's room.

"'O akanai pela piki," said the warrior. He dropped through the hatch, skipping the ladder to land a foot on either side of Hui. He grunted as he bent down, grabbing the boy and dropping him over his shoulder. "Alahihi nu pela 'e eke'e."

The man went up the ladder. Pora watched, then followed, before he remembered, "Maye!" and ran back.

Pora dropped back to the bottom floor, grabbed the fowl, and threw them up, two at a time. There were too many. He had to get back to Maye.

He ran to the god's door and looked in.

The god's great beak was open, and he panted too, his carved face blank.

"Don't give up, Maye!" Pora exclaimed, and he slid onto the feathers, grabbing the spearhead and picking up the lock. It blazed as hot as anything, but Pora ignored the heat and realized the lock had already been broken.

Pora tossed it aside, found where the chains were no longer held together, and unwound them in a hurry. Maye did not help, even as Pora tried to lift his legs up to get the chains out from under him.

The back legs and wings were locked separately. Pora groaned, slinging sweat from his chin. He couldn't...he couldn't....

Then he wasn't alone. A dozen warriors, koa and Akapuan, filed into the room, grabbing the fowl and hurrying them out the door. Four examined the locks. None of them had the key. Pora knew it because he'd seen it with the chief on the other ship.

One of them had been the one to take Hui. He dragged the chain out of the way and slapped a hand on Pora's back. "Hananai. Huhuii anuha wa."

He would be dealing with Pora next.

One warrior fired his weapon. Pora dropped to the feathers, thinking he had decided to deal with Pora now. But it had been fired at the chains. A piece snapped, and the warriors worked together to pull the ends of the chain closer together so that they could unhook the broken link. Maye's flock screeched, throwing out their wings and flapping across the hull floor.

"They're helping!" Pora told Maye weakly.

Maye pushed himself up on his front legs and whipped his head around, nearly throwing the warriors to the floor. But they'd gotten the chains unhooked. Maye must have felt them loosen because his wings snapped open as far as they could go.

It wasn't far. The chains had been wrapped tight. But the men braved the thrashing god, throwing themselves back into it, loosening and unraveling the chain.

Pora moved to help, but he stumbled and dropped to his face. Fatigue pulsed through his body. No wonder, he thought, that Hui had passed out. Pora tried to get back to his feet, but he didn't move, and gradually the noise faded, and his sense of feeling faded, even as hands grabbed him and tugged, and all he could think was, They got me.