The Toils (Book One)

IV. The Key Pits

Thatcher shook Sinclair, willing him with all her might to wake up, but deep inside her, she knew it was of no use. Standing over the archer, Riwai gave him a kick to the ribs rousing him back to life. 
The archer groaned, and gave a small cough. 
"Kodi", Thatcher shifted Sinclairs corpse from Kodi underneath, a pool of blood lay under him, rivering from his arm.
"Get up!", Riwai wrenched the archer from the floor. 
"Is he breathing?", Ruataupare looked to Thatcher, then down at Kodi on the ground. Thatcher held the back of her hand under Kodis nose and gave a brief nod of confirmation. 
"We need to get him back to Pa, get him tidied up", Ruataupare climbed the last two stairs and helped Thatcher pick Kodi up off the grimey floor. 
"I doubt he'll make the journey", Riwai responded gravely, holding the wriggling archer by the biceps "Stop, or I'm going to break your arms", he snarled at the archer.
"Back to the shoreline, then, we need to cauterize the wound", Ruataupare responded, and Riwai gave her a thumbs up. 
CRACK! 
"OW! JESUS!", The archer collapsed to the floor in pain, howling and crying. 
"I TOLD YOU TO STOP WRIGGLING!", Riwai boomed, having just snapped the archers arms at the elbow, his scraggly unkempt black hair draping around his face as he sobbed on the ground, knees to his chin. 
"I'll bring the body out when I'm done sweeping the boat", Riwai spoke over the screaming archer and gave nod to Sinclairs corpse.
With a grunt, Thatcher and Ruataupare lifted Kodi up the stairwell and back out onto the deck of the boat.
"You", Riwai leaned down onto the ground and came face to face with the archer, "Where are you from?".
The archer spat into Riwais face, and without missing a beat, Riwai planted a fist into the mans mouth, knocking loose several teeth. 
"OWWW!", the archer screamed out in pain. 
"WHERE ARE YOU FROM!?", Riwai demanded again, saliva flying from his mouth as he shouted. 
"SAHUL!", the man lisped, the three top teeth of his mouth now laying on the floor amongst a mixture of blood and grime. 
"And where is that?", Riwai got closer, so close he could smell the blood radiating from the archers mouth. 
"Two and a half thousand miles west of here", he gave over without need for provokation. 
"Why are you here?", Riwai interogated, "How many more of you are there?". 
"We were fishing and got lost, there were twenty of us, we lost half a dozen and I presume you've just finished off the rest", the archer sobbed, wiping blood from his lips, "We've been out on the water for months trying to get home".
"There's no more home for you", Riwai spoke darkly, before taking his club from his waist and cracking it ovre the archers head, finishing him with an almighty thud.
Riwai stood and took a flaming torch from its holster above the stiarwell. He replaced the club back around his waist next to his sword and began looking around the damp sleeping quarters. 
Twenty five hammocks were tied around the beams that stretched from floor to roof. 
He waved the torch in front of him, taking in the grim quarters, his right hand gripping the handle on his sword in case the archer lied about how many people were truly on the oceancraft. 
Reaching the end of the hull, he turned back and ascended the stairs back out onto the deck of the ship. 
Tantitively, Riwai pushed open the door to the cabin and entered the small room. In the center was a large guiding wheel, a wheel whose purpose (he assumed) was to steer the ship as it glided across the water.
Opening the cupboards he found what they had come for; food. 
Stacks of hard, barely edible bread, ununiformed crackers, and dried fruit; bananas, apricots and pineapple. 
He took a fabric back from ontop of the cupboard and began loading up the loot. 
Then a second bag, a third bag and finished loading up a fourth bag. 
Dragging the loot out onto the deck of the boat, he could see the others rowing back to shore. Entirely unsure on how to get everything down to the ground, he placed it against the railing and made his way back down to the sleeping quarters to grab Sinclairs body.

Ruataupare and Thatcher lifted Kodi from Randalls canoe. 
"I knew this was a suicide mission - did you listen? No! You just went and ran off doing your own damn thing!", Randall chastized Thatcher as he heaved Kodi onto the sand.
"Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!", she struck him across the face with an open palm, he recoiled, grabbing his face. 
"What the-?", Randall spat blood, "Did you just hit me?". 
"Get some wood, we need to start a fire quickly before he loses more blood", Ruataupare ignored them and rushed toward the trees at the other side of the beachfront.
Thatcher turned on her heel and followed Ruatuapare across the sand. 
"WHERE THE HELL IS SINCLAIR!?", Randall yelled after them, but neither could be bothered responding. 
Thatcher squinted, searching the forest floor for a branch big enough to start a fire with, Ruataupare began snapping branches from a tree to Thatchers right. 
"Go find some rocks, they need to be big enough to strike together!", Rutaupare commanded Thatcher, "And dry foliage! DRY!", she emphazised.
Thatcher bowed her head and darted a few metres into the bush, scanning the forest floor for rocks. In the distance stood a large ponga tree, tall, hairy, and topped with koru fronds. 
Thatcher jogged towards it, placing her hands upon the trunk and running them up and down, feeling for moisture. 
Determining it was sufficiently dry, she started tearing fur from the trunk and stuffing it into her underclothes. Attaining six-or-so handfulls, she ran back to the edge of the bush, dodging roots sticking sharply from the soil. 
"Got it!", she shouted passing Ruataupare lifting braches from the ground. 
Crouching on the sand next to Kodi, Thatcher ran her hands through the sand - making a small bowl in which she unloaded the contents of her bra. 
"Cover this", Thatcher instructed Randall as Rutaupare dumped a handfull of small branches onto the ground next to them. 
Randall rolled his eyes, but nonetheless sat on the ground and hovered the top half of his body over the small sandbowl so as to stop the wind from blowing the hairs away. 
"You found some rocks yet?", Ruataupare shouted at Thatcher running toward the edge of the bush. 
"On it now!", Thatcher shouted back, vanishing into the treeline.
Without so much as looking at Randall, Ruataupare lifted a brack and snapped it in two over her knee. 
Randall said nothing, but observed Riwai rowing back to shore, twenty or so meters away. 

In the bush, Thatcher began running her hands along the forest floor, hunched over and watching rigidly for bugs. 
A few steps in, she found a rock the size of her palm. Holding it tightly she continued to move forward, stopping at the end of a sword being held in her face.
The rock thudded hollowly on the forest floor - "Shhhhhhh...", the man behind the sword lifted his forefinger to where his lips should be. From his toes to the tip of his nose he was clad in black fabric - looking like a mummy in all-black. 
Thatcher raised her hands, staring into the mans eyes.
"Walk", he growled lowly, his tangled mange of hair saturated in sweat and wisted around his face.
Thatcher turned back to the beach front and walked out hands high above her head.
"Did you get the-", Ruataupare stopped speaking as the swordsman stepped out behind Thatcher.
Looking to his legs, Ruataupare saw the letter C painted roughly (but clearly) on the fabric wrapped around the mans thighs. 
Riwai climbed from his canoe and walked slowly to Ruataupare, torn between wanting to protect his leader and stop the situation from escalating further. 
"I watched you raid that ship", the swordsman spoke from behind the fabric, "whatever you took, I want it!".
"Goodluck", Riwai scoffed, "It's floating in the ocean", he pointed to the canoe with Sinclairs body still stuck in the hind seat, the dried fruits and bread had escaped their bags and were floating atop the water. 
"You're lyin'", the swordsman hissed, ticcing his head, "You give it to me, or I'll drive this blade through her skull". He stepped closer to Thatcher, the tip of his blade touched her scalp. 
"I'm not lying, go scoop it up", Riwai gestured once again, "that's all there is".
The swordsmans breathing became uneasy, shaking as he surveyed the situation. 
"You'll attack me the minute I step towards the water", the tip of his sword began to shake along with him, his entire disposition becoming evermore frantic. 
"If you don't step towards the water, the food'll be destroyed forever", Thatcher spoke back to him. 
He lifted his sword from her head and grappled her around the throat with his arm, pulling her into a chokehold. 
"Walk with me!", he grumbled into her ear, his breath escaping the cloth and touching her ear.  
Shoving her forward, he dragged her to the water. 
The waved lapped at their feet, the swordsman shoved her into the surf - "Pick it up; bring it to me". He held the sword at her back, and glanced over his shoulder to watch the people back on the sand.
"Hurry up!", he snapped at Thatcher using the back to scoop up the food in the water. 
No one spoke, they watched Thatcher shivering in the water. 
Riwai took a step toward the man, who twisted his head to glance at him - "One more step and I'll have her feet".
Riwai stopped, and looked to Ruataupare who silently shook her head as if to say "don't be dumb".
Thatcher threw the man the first bag, and began scooping up the next bag worth of food.