Redemption: Supernatural Time-Traveling Romance with Sci-fi and Metaphysics (6 page)

“Lu!” she calls out, looking
around frantically for her man. “Lu!”

The crowd parts as Zo approaches
her and lowers the body from his shoulder onto the ground. An almost silent
scream, more of a high-pitched moan, escapes from Mi as she recognizes the man
lying before her. It is Lu. He looks at peace, as though he might wake at any
moment, but Mi knows that he is dead.

Thrusting Wu into Ka’s hands, she
drops to her knees and grips Lu’s body, shaking him in an attempt to rouse him,
but his head hangs limp and lifeless and his body feels cold to her touch. Mi hears
the sound of someone shouting and realizes it is her. Not knowing what she is
doing Mi gets up again, staring round at the crowd without really seeing them.
She turns, then, and runs, heading nowhere, just running as the tears stream
down her face and her world crumbles around her. Eventually finding herself in
the seclusion of the forest, she drops to the ground.

No Lu,
she thinks, sobbing bitterly.
No Lu… no life! How Lu dead?
In her
mind, she sees Zo standing there, holding her man in his arms, a look of
triumph and hunger in his eyes.
Zo!
At the thought her heart seems to freeze for a moment.
Zo kill Lu. Zo take my man.
And then she realizes what must surely
happen now.
Zo take me!

Haunted by these dark thoughts,
her sobbing continues until, weary and empty, she falls asleep.

The screech of a night bird,
sounding much like a child’s scream, wakes her and she looks around the
darkness.

“Where this?” she says, but there
is no reply. The only sound comes from the forest creatures moving in the
night. “This forest! How here? How…” but then the horror of her situation comes
flooding back. “Lu,” she moans, hugging her legs for comfort and to ward off
the chill air. “Lu.”

The night bird cries again, and
it reminds her slightly of Wu’s cries.
Wu,
she thinks, jumping to her feet.
Wu need
milk! Where home?
She looks around the darkness, straining her ears,
listening for any familiar sounds. Suddenly she catches a faint chanting behind
her in the distance. Heading in that direction she emerges from the trees and,
in the light from the Sky God, she can make out movement around the caves. She
runs then, keeping low and fast, the tiredness of her legs forgotten in her
desire to get back to Wu.

What this?
Mi wonders as she
approaches the caves to see the tribe gathered together dancing in the
moonlight.
Dance? Why dance?
And then
she realizes that the tribe is performing a ritual for the God of Death.
Death dance for Lu.
The faces of the
people are sad, and as they dance Bak chants in a deep voice. As she watches,
the pain in her heart grows. Mi had hoped it was all a mistake, that Lu wasn’t
really dead, but now she cannot escape the truth.

Lu dead. My Lu gone.
She feels the
tears welling up again and her body shaking with grief.
Lu not see Wu. Lu not chief… Lu gone. How dead,
she wonders again . . .
How Lu dead?

Turning away from the dancers, Mi
hurries to the cave where she knows his body has been placed. She doesn’t have
much time. The others will be here soon to take him away to the special place
of the dead, and she needs to find out
how
he died. Lu’s body has been laid on a mat made from woven branches. Hurrying
over, she falls to her knees and starts kissing him, holding his body close as
the tears begin to flow again. At last, as she grows calm again, Mi sits back
and searches for a wound. It does not take long to find what she is looking
for. As she checks the back of his head, she discovers two deeps cuts, cuts
which might at first appear to be made by some wild beast, but as she touches
them Mi is certain they are the marks of an ax. Only a man could have done
this, and there was only
one
man it
could be. Though it brings Mi no comfort to be right, her suspicions are
confirmed.

Zo kill my Lu!
A mixture of rage and
fear boiled inside her and she clenches her fists. “Zo!” she says, spitting the
word through gritted teeth.

“Mi,” says a voice behind her and
she spins round to see Zo standing outside the cave, staring fixedly at her. As
he catches Mi’s eye, he smiles at her, not a friendly or comforting smile, but
one of satisfaction. He points to her and then to himself and the message is
clear. “Zo take Mi!”

She backs away, shaking her head,
but knows there that no one can stop Zo from taking her. He will take the
leadership of the tribe and then he will take her. “No,” she breathes, the word
barely a whisper. Other members of the tribe gather in the entrance and Mi
looks away, her heart heavy and filled with an icy dread. And in that instant
she knows what she has to do.
Mi go!
There
is nothing else for it. She must leave the tribe. She must find a new home.

Ka is sitting in the mouth of her
cave watching over the sleeping Wu. As Mi approaches, she stands up and places
a comforting hand on her shoulder. Mi turns to point back towards those
involved in the death ritual.

“Zo,” says Mi, the fear causing
her voice to shake. “Zo bad.”
 

Ka nods to show she understands. Zo
does not have a good reputation among the tribe’s womenfolk, many of whom have
experienced his aggressive advances, forcing himself on them in their caves at
night or cornering them in the forest when no one else can hear their struggles
or protect them. Last summer, one young woman, a girl called Ru, was found dead
in the forest, her body bloody, her neck broken, and although no one could be
sure, everyone believes Zo was behind it.

“Mi go,” says Mi, pointing away
across the hills.

“Go?” Ka sits up, looking at her
with concern.

“Mi go,” she repeats. “New home.
You keep Wu. Wu safe. Mi come back. Take Wu new home.”

Ka does not try to convince Mi to
stay, but simply assures her that she will take care of Wu. Other women in the
tribe have young children and can provide him with the milk he needs.

~

It is with a deep sadness that
Mi feeds Wu early the following morning, knowing that breasts other than hers
will nourish him in the days to come.

“Mi come for Wu,” she tells him,
when he has had his fill. “Mi love Wu.” She passes him to Ka and gazes at him
briefly, before taking up her bag, filled with fruit and dried fish for her
journey.

“Wu safe,” says Ka. “Mi be safe!”

Mi nods, blinking back the tears,
and turns away. She peers out of the cave and looks around carefully, but it is
early enough to ensure none of the tribe has yet arisen. Even the Sky God has
yet to reveal himself fully above the distant hills. Quietly, and without a
single backward glance, Mi hurries away from the caves, towards the place where
the Sky God travels at night.

She chose this direction after
recalling stories she heard as a small girl. Her father had told her about
another tribe, who had travelled this way many years before, people who seemed
to be very different from those in his own tribe. Their skin was lighter, their
bodies less hairy and instead of being covered with pieces of animal skins
these people wore clothing they had made themselves, something he had never
seen before. They had also exchanged strange sounds between each other, words
which Mi’s father had found impossible to understand. As this is the only other
tribe Mi has heard about, she heads in the direction they took all those years
ago.

She has no idea how long this
journey might be, and she is still weary from Wu’s birth and the shock of Lu’s
death.

Must find home,
she thinks, determined
to find a new tribe so she can have a life with her son.

That night, as Mi travels through
a forest and can no longer see to find her way, she sleeps in a large tree. The
next night, finding herself in open land, she digs a hole to hide herself for
the night. Thankfully Mi’s father taught her well and she knows how to
recognize predators and to hide from them. She knows which plants are safe to
eat so she can supplement the two-day provision of food in her bag. And she
needs it as two days soon become three, and then four, each one marked by
cutting a notch in her bag with a flint.

On the morning of the fifth day,
she arrives at the wilderness, an endless terrain of sand stretching away into
the distance. She stands and looks at it, the Sky God blazing down overhead,
and wonders what to do.

“Bad land!” she whispers. She has
heard of such country in the stories of her tribe, a land so barren that
nothing can grow on it or live in it. A land that blinds you with light, burns
you with heat, freezes you in the darkness and drives you mad with hunger and
thirst. “Bad, bad land.”

Could she really expect to cross
this desert land? Wouldn’t it be better to return and take her chances back
with the tribe? But Mi knows she cannot return and, shielding her eyes from the
glare and bracing herself against the heat, starts out across the sand.

 
“Bad land make hurt,” she says, as her head and shoulders
begin to feel the searing pain of the Sky God’s gaze and her feet ache from
walking across the constantly shifting ground. “Hurt and hungry.” Her hand goes
increasingly to the food in her bag, and while the pieces of fruit give her the
energy to continue, they are already beginning to dry out and fail to satisfy
her growing thirst. As night approaches, she is glad of the relief from the
heat, but it is not long before the cold sets in, seeming to reach deep into
her body. She tries to dig another hole, but it is too difficult for her
shaking fingers and instead she lies down in a shallow depression and draws the
sand up over her body. Despite the chill, her exhaustion finally gets the
better of her and, resting her head on her bag, she drifts into a deep sleep.

When she wakes, it is already
light and she can feel the coming heat of the day.

Quick,
she thinks.
Go now. Sky God burn soon.
Weary and
aching, she climbs to her feet and, ignoring the sand clinging to every part of
her body, she continues her journey across the wilderness. It is not long
before the heat becomes almost unbearable and, reaching a hand into her bag,
she discovers it is empty. Her lips are cracked and her head aches horribly. In
her desperation for water she begins to dream about waterfalls and rivers
filled with fresh water, about her lake and the refreshing summer rains.

“Water!” she says, almost
shouting with excitement as she begins to run towards the horizon. “Bad land
make trick!” she says, when she eventually arrives at the place and there is
nothing there but the endless sand. She looks again to the horizon and spots
what appears to be a distant lake. “Water!” she cries, all thought of the trick
forgotten at this new promise of water. Keeping her eyes fixed on the lake, she
doesn’t spot the thing sticking up from the sand and trips over it, falling
heavily to the ground. With a great effort she turns her head to see what it
was and spies the skull of some large animal, the bone bleached white by the
Sky God.
Death,
thinks Mi, staring at
the eyeless holes.
Bad land bring death!

She tries to get back up to her
feet, but she simply doesn’t have the strength. Instead, she begins to crawl
across the dunes, but it is not long before even this is too much.

“No move. Hurt.” Her body feels
so heavy and sleep seems such a beautiful escape from the pain and the thirst.

The last thing she sees, as she
finally gives in to the darkness, is the vast lake shimmering on the horizon. “Water,”
she whispers. “Water.”

Chapter Six

I
n Mi’s dream, she is swimming in the lake outside her cave. Lu is
with her and together they are enjoying playing in the water with their son.
She holds Wu in her arms as he splashes happily and she laughs as the spray gets
in Lu’s eyes. He splashes them back and, thirsty, Mi tries to catch the water
in her mouth, but somehow none goes in. The thirst grows and Mi ducks down
under the surface to drink, but still she cannot catch any in her mouth. She
breaks the surface of the water and is alarmed to see that Lu has vanished.
Looking down she finds that her son has also disappeared, and in his place she
clutches her empty bag. The thirst is almost unbearable and she tries once more
to drink from the lake, only to find that the water has also gone. Instead she
is buried in the hot sand of the desert, trapped, alone and dying. She opens
her mouth to cry out, but her throat is so dry she only manages a hoarse
rasping sound.

“Is okay.”

At the sound of the strange
voice, Mi opens her sand-crusted eyes and peers up into the face of a man. She
pulls away and looks around in concern, spying a couple of other men standing
nearby.

“Is okay,” says the man again and
smiles kindly at her.

Mi blinks, a frown forming on her
brows.
Strange words.
But though she
does not understand what he is saying, the man’s friendly expression is
comforting. He gives her what looks like a bag, though it moves in a curious
fashion. He hands it to her.

“Drink,” he says.

Mi frowns again, unsure what is
expected of her. “Bag?” she says. The man places it in her hands, but the feel
of it is strange and slightly disturbing so she quickly gives it back. The man
laughs, and holds up the bag to his mouth. There is what appears to be a piece
of bone attached to the bag and, as the man raises the bottom of the bag, a
stream of water flows from the bone into his mouth. “Drink.”

Mi’s eyes widen in amazement. “Water!”
she says, reaching out as the man passes her the bag and she copies his action.
A jet of water shoots into her eye. Blinking and moving her head up, she
catches the water in her mouth. It is cool and refreshing.

“Bad land make thirsty,” she
says, between gulps. “Good water!” Mi drinks it greedily, quenching her
terrible thirst. When she has finally had enough, she hands the bag back to the
man.

“Come,” he says. “We go now.”

Mi frowns at the unfamiliar
sounds of his speech, so he points away across the sand before reaching out a
hand to help her up.

“Go?” she asks, but the man frowns
back, clearly unable to understand the word. After a brief hesitation, Mi takes
the man’s hand and, standing up, feels the aching in her legs and the pain of
her burned back and shoulders. She stumbles and the man quickly puts his arms
around her waist in support.

“Is okay,” says the man. “We
help.”

Slowly, with the assistance of
the three men, Mi walks in the direction the man pointed. Looking up, she sees
again the lake in the distance.

“Water?” she asks, wondering if
it really could be a lake. “Bad lands make trick?” But as they get closer, she
can see it clearly is a vast body of water. “Big lake!” she says, impressed by
its size. It is much bigger than the lake near her cave.
Cave,
she thinks, saddened by the thought of her old home.
My tribe gone. My Wu gone. Need Wu!
All she
wants to do is go back and find him again, but she cannot yet, not until she
finds a new home and a new tribe.

As she trudges wearily across the
sand, Mi eyes the men who have rescued her and is surprised at how different
they are to the men of the tribe back home.

Strange men,
she thinks, looking at their
arms.
Small hair.
These men are
indeed much less hairy then the men back home. In fact, apart from their chests
and legs, the rest of their skin has none of the thick curls she is used to.
Instead their arms and legs appear to be covered with small, light brown hairs,
while their heads have flowing locks of similar color.
Like lion,
she thinks, resisting the urge to touch. Their faces are
free from hair, which allows their features, much softer than those of Mi’s
tribe, to be clearly seen, and their skin is a lighter brown than her own.
Mi find tribe?
She thinks back to the
people her father spoke of.
Mi find new
home? Mi safe?

The man who gave her water
notices that she is staring at him and smiles.

“See,” he says, pointing to the
area ahead. “My village.”

Mi follows the line of his finger
with her eyes and, as they make their way over a small hill, she stops, gazing
open-mouthed at the sight of the tribe laid out before her. She is on the edge
of the desert, and tufts of grass have been appearing for some time. Ahead of
her, the grassland begins in earnest, a long sloping plain that sweeps down towards
the water which stretched away to the horizon with no discernable end. She
smiles, happy for the first time in days.

“Big land!” she says, pointing to
the left, where a wild-looking river runs down to fill the lake. “Good land!”
She points to the right where a great forest disappears into the distance along
the shore. “Many people,” she adds, as she points directly ahead where, on top
of a grassy hill, the tribe is going about its day’s work, moving around among
what appear to be large boulders covered in animal skin.

“Where caves?” she asks the men,
but they just shrug at her unfamiliar words.
Sleep in forest,
she suggests, but wonders whether these strange
people even need to sleep and hide away from the creatures that hunt in the
night.

“Come,” says the man, an arm
still around Mi’s waist, and begins to lead her down the slope towards his
tribe. As she walks with him, Mi begins to cry, partly at the sorrow of being
parted from her own people, but mostly because she realizes that she is safe at
last. She has found her new home.

~

It is not long before the four
of them begin to climb the hill to the tribe’s village. Mi is surprised to find
that the area is surrounded by a ring of wooden stakes that have been hammered
into the ground, cutting off all access to the tribe, except through a narrow
gap.

“Tree?” she asks, pointing at it
with a frown.

“Fence,” says one of the men
behind her. “Keeps village safe.”

“Fence?” she repeats, shakes her
head in bewilderment at the strange word.

They walk together through the
gap in the fence and make their way through the skin-covered boulders, which
are much bigger close up than she had imagined. She stares at one and reaches
out a hand to touch it when, to her amazement, a woman bursts out through the
skins and heads off across the village.

“Trick!” Mi shouts in alarm and
jumps backwards, bumping into one of the men and together they fall into a heap
on the floor. A small antelope-like creature sniffs at her hair. “No!” she
says, pushing it away. “No eat Mi!” She climbs to her feet and edges towards
the place the woman came from. She reaches out a hand to touch it again,
cautiously, though, in case the curious mound produces another person. As she
touches the skin, it moves easily and reveals what lies within
—
not a
boulder, as she thought, but large, open space. She peers inside and can make
out two small children playing on the ground. Beyond them are many objects
which Mi does not recognize, but there is also a pile of skins, similar to
those she slept on back home.

“Sleep?” she says, pointing at
the skins, but the children just stare at her. When she tries miming sleep to
them, head resting on her hands, they start to laugh and, with a start, she
realizes what this strange place must be.

“Cave!” she says excitedly,
turning back to the men. “Skin cave.” But again the men do not understand her.

The man with the water bag
points, saying, “Hut.”

“Hut,” says Mi, smiling at the
strange feeling this new word makes in her mouth.

The man beckons her to go with
him, and together the group makes its way to the center of the village.
Stopping next to one of the larger huts, the man points to the entrance.

“Go in,” he says. “Women here.”

Nervously, assuming this is what
the man wants her to do, she pushes through the skins into the hut. She is
surprised to find that it is quite bright inside, a curious orange glow coming
from something on the ground. To one side of it sits a woman of a similar age
to Ka, wearing an antelope hat and necklaces made from berries and herbs.

“Sit,” says the woman, gesturing
to the ground next to her. Mi sits down and, looking curiously at the light, she
reaches out a hand to touch it.

“No!” the woman grabs Mi’s wrist,
pulling it back from the flames. “This is fire. Hot!”

Mi snatches back her hand and
looks at the woman questioningly.

“Fire,” repeats the woman,
pointing to it. She pretends to touch it and then shakes her hand violently. “Ow!”

“Fi-ow?” says Mi, trying to copy
the strange words.

The woman laughs and shakes her
head. Pointing at herself, she says, “Bagra.”

“Bagra,” says Mi, also pointing
at herself.

“No.” The woman takes Mi’s hand
and points it correctly. “Bagra.”

“Bagra,” says Mi again, finally
understanding that this must be the woman’s name. “Mi,” she says, pointing at
herself.

Bagra can see Mi is worn out and
without saying another word she gives her something to eat. The food tastes strange
to Mi and it’s unusually hot; Bagra got it from the fire, something Mi has
never experienced before, but her apprehension is swiftly overcome when she
realizes how hungry she is.

“Food good!” she says, pushing
the food into her mouth with her fingers.

When Mi’s hunger is finally
satisfied, Bagra encourages her to lie down and, tired and aching from her long
journey, she soon finds herself drifting into a deep sleep.

~

In the days that follow, Mi
finds herself quickly settling into life with this new tribe. At first, it all
seems very different. Like the men who brought her here, the people have
lighter, less hairy skin than her own, and their faces have softer, friendlier
features. Although they hunt large game, there are also smaller animals that live
with the tribe, creatures that look like small buffalo and antelopes, all of
which seem contented to stay here among the humans.

Good land
, she thinks, smiling at all
she sees.
Good food. Good cave huts. Good
home. Mi and Wu safe here
.

Although the tribe has the forest
nearby, they also grow their own plants, tall grasses that provide them with
grain for a curious food that looks like a large stone, referred to as ‘bread’,
and various tasty herbs and roots. Above all these wonders, however, Mi finds
herself most fascinated by the fire.

Baby of Sky God,
she thinks, watching
the women bring it to life, rubbing long, dry sticks together in a way that Mi
finds impossible to mimic. And before long, this fire is born, bright and hot,
providing warmth during the cold of the night, and light in the darkness of the
huts. It even gives protection to the tribe, as the wild animals are afraid to
approach the fire, and even the animals in the village keep a wary distance
from it. In addition to the bread and plants, the people eat meat, but not raw
as Mi’s people did. Instead, they cut the flesh into pieces and heat it on
stones placed in the fire or in special, stone-hard bags called “pots”,
together with herbs, roots and water.

For most of the time, Mi stays
close to Bagra, who is one of the leading women in the tribe. Bagra teaches Mi
about everything around, showing her how to grind the grains harvested from the
tall grass, how to use a bone needle to stitch together animal skins and the
special fabric made by some of the other women, and teaching her new words.

“Stones,” says Bagra, as she
shows her the equipment for making flour.

“Stones,” Mi repeats, running a
finger across the rough surface.

“Grain.”

Mi takes a handful of the wheat,
letting it run through her fingers. “Grain,” she repeats, watching, fascinated,
as Bagra pours the wheat between the stones, turning one on top of the other,
crushing and splitting the grains.

“Flour,” says Bagra, lifting the
stones apart to show her the coarse, white powder.

Mi touches it. “Make bread?”

“Make bread,” says Bagra, smiling
at how quickly Mi takes in the information. Mi finds herself able to pick up
the strange language of the tribe fairly quickly and she enjoys learning the
meanings of their words.

Her own people mostly
communicated with gestures and used only a handful of sounds, but here, they
have many words with which to describe the things around them.

One afternoon, Mi watches a woman
making one of the pots from the soft, brown clay that is collected near the
shore of the lake.