PoraBora

Chapter Fifty-Six

Makaia looked up at Akoni. Six koa held him down. Another had his spearpoint pressed against his neck. Three more were dead, and others were wounded. Spears were made into splinters. Makaia's deck had been pounded out of shape. Blood smeared his arms.

Akoni worried it would help him to slip free.

"I killed you," growled the chief. His headdress had fallen to the floor. One of the koa stood on it.

"I know," said Akoni.

Makaia glared. "Do any of my men still live?"

Akoni did not approach any closer. He did not trust seven men would be enough to hold Makaia back, and didn't trust his own weapon either. "No."

To Makaia's credit, he did not slump. "So you've got your justice."

"Men like us do not put shells in justice," said Akoni. "But I have your ship, and that's all I came back for."

Makaia snorted. "Did you swim up from the bottom feeders? Did the six-gills find you so unpalatable?"

"It must have been all the oil," said Akoni. "Have you found any shackles?"

"Better to break his arms," said one of the koa.

"Shackles, Akoni? You did not strike me as the merciful type, but I suppose your home will thank you."

That was his assurance, then. Another man, it would have been a bluff, but Makaia? Akoni could practically see the boat in his mind's eye, sailing near his wife's glass ship and waiting for a word, a sign, a go-ahead that Akoni's family was to be slaughtered, or captured, or otherwise taken care of. Or a fleet to threaten the entire island. Or did he mean his rig, and the rigsmen still there?

"I should offer you the same chance for peace you offered Ila'i," said Akoni.

"Too late for that," said Makaia.

Akoni supposed so.

"What do you intend to do?" Makaia asked.

It would be so much simpler to kill him, thought Akoni, feeling a familiar headache. Dead, they needed no one to stand guard, no one to make sure he didn't get out of his bonds. Dead, he couldn't flash a message to sea or call in his other fleets. Dead, he couldn't find a way to escape and hunt down Akoni.

It was why Makaia had finally thrown Akoni overboard.

"Kill him," growled the koa who held the spear at Makaia's throat. "Let him see the night sea. Then we'll be able to take back our island."

Makaia shook his head. "Kill me, imprison me, whatever you choose, my brother, will change nothing. Akapua will not rest until Taipala is unified. Until the blessings are conferred to all shores. My fleet will not stop until Keasau is in hand. Until Maye is found. Until the people find peace and prosperity in these once peaceful, prosperous islands. I am sorry Akoni has convinced you that you must fight against it."

"You convinced us," said Hui. "When you attacked our island."

Makaia looked down, his eyes closed. "Fish for every child. Fowl for any meal. You defend your dying world; I will continue dreaming of these possibilities."

They took Makaia to his brig, where there was no porthole. Akoni hoped his shackles would hold. The koa didn't seem like they counted on it. They stationed ten men in its hall. Akoni doubted ten would be enough if Makaia smashed through the door. He made sure one of his rigsman stood guard at a time too. Someone he could trust to remain attentive.

Noo'omu was more than happy to take the first watch since it got him out of moving the bodies to the deck.

Akoni wished he could float them off properly in wooden caskets, or at least drop them into the ocean. But the fleet would see them, and his surprise hadn't ended yet.

He followed the bodies to the deck, carrying the corpse of a young man with him. He laid him with the others.

"I'd forgotten what it was like," said Tua quietly, joining him in the starlight.

Akoni was silent.

"Part of me wishes Makaia already won the islands," said Tua. "So that it would be over."

It wouldn't be, thought Akoni. As long as men like him were around. Horrible things, he thought solemnly. Is that what I came back for? He remembered the peace he had felt, for just a moment, suspended in the end, and sighed. He looked for it in the night sky but was left only with a continuing hollow feeling.

He recognized it, for it had been with him since he had joined the navy decades ago.

But he did not recognize what he saw above, in the stars.

There was a whale.

End Part 3