Child of the Dawn (16 page)

'Then I—will stay away—from the men," Maukiri replied nervously. "But we need someone strong...."

"You have a team?"

"One of the novices invited me."

Tepua let out a long breath. "No. You play. I'll watch and cheer you on."

Maukiri grimaced with disappointment, then quickened her pace. Ahead, the forest opened onto a grassy plateau. The crowds were even thicker here than they had been at the assembly ground, and the humidity was worse. Tepua wondered if she could find a quiet stream, relax in cool water awhile before the match began.
 

As she and Maukiri were making their way toward the women's archery course, she heard a voice behind her. "Tepua! You must come." Curling-leaf broke through the crowd and caught Tepua's elbow. "Matopahu is here. He has challenged Fat-moon."
 

"Challenged?" She felt her pulse beating. Eye-to-heaven had said that the
ari'i
intended to prove himself. Now she understood his risky plan.
 

"Come," said Curling-leaf. "I know a place where we can watch him."

"He won't want me there," Tepua answered sharply.

"I cannot believe that."

"You watch for me," Tepua urged her friend. As Curling-leaf hurried back toward the thickest cluster of people, Tepua fought an impulse to follow her. If she could hide somewhere and observe without being seen...

Maukiri tugged at her, and Tepua tried to forget Curling-leaf's news. Teams were assembling around the smaller stone platform used by women. Aitofa, Pehu-pehu, and others of high Arioi rank stood together, peering along the uphill course, pointing out features to each other and speaking in low voices.
 

Suddenly Tepua pulled away from her cousin. "You'll do fine without me," she said, then darted after Curling-leaf.

"It is you again!" A tall figure stepped in front of her. She looked up and saw Uhi, the long-faced Arioi, with his foreign sunshade.
 

"I want...to watch...the men's match," Tepua said, catching her breath. "But I must not be seen."

'That is easily done, my pretty," he answered, taking her hand. "I'll show you where to hide." He led her away from the crowd and into a wooded area by the side of the course. They were not the first here. Other spectators, many in pairs, had found places, but some seemed more interested in each other than in watching the contest. Tepua's thoughts were far from
hanihani
, but she knew she could not say the same about Uhi's.
 

"You promised to tell me about that sunshade you are wearing," she reminded him.

"It belonged to a stranger, a sailor from a distant land. That is all I can say."

"You said you knew more," she protested.

"Why are you so interested?" He turned and stared at her intently.

Tepua's tongue felt dry and she wondered how to answer him without revealing too much. She certainly did not intend to talk about her troubling vision; so far, only Aitofa knew about that. Tepua thought about her recent visit home.
 

"When I was traveling in the atolls," she said awkwardly, "a small foreign boat nearly smashed on the reef."

"That is all?"

She stiffened, trying to hold the painful memories at bay. "I have seen foreign sailors. I know what their weapons can do," she whispered.
 

"Then the atoll people must be weak and their gods helpless," he answered with a laugh. "Foreigners avoid our waters. They would not dare approach Tahiti or Eimeo, where so many war canoes are ready to defend the land."
 

Tepua gritted her teeth at his insult to her people. "Someday it will happen," she retorted. "A foreign vessel will reach our shores—"
 

"
Aue
! That old prophecy! I have heard it too many times."
 

A sudden blast of the conch-trumpet made Uhi spin around. "They are already starting the match," he said ruefully. "We have wasted time arguing when we could have been..." His voice trailed off as the first archer, Fat-moon himself, mounted the platform. The chief knelt, faced uphill, muttered a prayer, and sent his arrow skyward. A cry of excitement went up from the crowd. Tepua shaded her eyes, peering up along the rising stretch of the course. In the distance, a man carrying a white flag ran to plant it where the arrow had landed.
 

The archers stood in line, one after the other, each taking a single shot. By waving their flags, attendants told the spectators when someone had beaten the current distance mark. After Fat-moon's team finished, Tepua drew in her breath as Putu-nui's first archer approached the platform.
 

When she had last seen Matopahu, his shoulders sagged and he was covered with dust. Now he looked freshly washed and oiled. His chest gleamed; his white
tapa
garments were dazzling even in the hazy sunlight.
 

'This fool will not last long," Uhi jeered.

"Wait until he has shot," she retorted.

"You know this Matopahu?" Her companion came up behind her, his arms twining about her midriff, his
maro
pressing against her lower back. "Yes, if you are from Wind-driving Lodge, I am sure you do. All the women of that troupe have spread their legs for him. But he's no use to you now."
 

She suppressed an urge to stamp on Uhi's foot. Matopahu was kneeling, drawing back his bow. She dared not make a sound.

In the still air she heard the twang of the bowstring and the arrow's hiss. The crowd remained silent as the attendants marked how far the arrow had flown.
 

"What is this?" shouted Uhi, suddenly pushing her aside. He rushed from cover and peered along the course. "The Tahitian has beaten Fat-moon's mark!"
 

Tepua felt jubilant. Perhaps Matopahu's shooting would prove something today. If he could lead his team to victory, the chiefs would see him with new eyes.
 

"It is only one point," she admitted. She understood the difficulties of the game. On this first round, Fat-moon had set the distance mark for his team. Now his opponents would score one point for each arrow that passed it. But if they failed to score again on the next round, they would lose all their accumulated points.
 

"You are right," said Uhi. "It will not happen again."

Tepua watched tensely as the game went on. For two or three rounds, Fat-moon's arrow would fly ahead and Matopahu's would land just behind. For another two, the reverse would happen. Even when Matopahu scored, his teammates rarely were able to do the same. Several times Fat-moon's team neared victory, but was held back by the requirement that the winning points be made on successive rounds.
 

Meanwhile, the sky grew cloudier, and Tepua heard a stirring of wind in the trees. The first raindrops pattered onto leaves, sending a few onlookers to seek cover. The heavy scent of moist vegetation filled the air. "Now we will all have a bath," Uhi muttered, taking shelter under the broad leaves of a
hotu
tree. Tepua did not follow him. Matopahu was approaching the platform.
 

A sudden torrent of rain fell just as he raised his bow. Matopahu shot, but the arrow, caught by the downpour, plummeted, falling only a few paces ahead of him. Water streamed down his grim face as he gave way to the next member of his team.
 

Tepua watched as the archers resolutely tried to continue despite the downpour. She knew that nothing short of a hurricane would stop them. This match had been repeated for generations, team positions passing from father to son. Someone must have given up his precious place to allow Matopahu to shoot.
 

Yet for all their determination, the others on Putu-nui's team turned in a dismal round, easily outdistanced by their opponents. Each time that Fat-moon's archers planted an arrow beyond the best shot made by Putu-nui's team, his team scored. How many points, she wondered, could he gain in this single round? Perhaps enough to end the game.
 

"It is over," said Uhi, gesturing toward the scorekeeper.

"Nine!" came the shout from down the course.

"Count again," Fat-moon demanded. But he was still a point short of victory.

The weather proved fickle. Or perhaps, Tepua thought, the gods were having sport. In the next round, a gust of wind blew Fat-moon's arrow far off course. Matopahu's team scored three, and the other team's points were wiped out again. She began to shiver from the rain on her wet skin.
 

"I know a comfortable place nearby," suggested Uhi, coming up behind her. "These games go on and on, sometimes for days. Why suffer when we can learn the outcome later?"
 

The rain grew heavier. The archers' garments were soaked, plastered to their bodies. All the onlookers had moved under the trees. Tepua saw paint running in bizarre patterns on the faces and bodies of other Arioi, but somehow Uhi had kept dry. "I will stay here," she said firmly, not caring that water streamed down her cheeks or that her garland hung in ruins about her neck.
 

 

Matopahu felt a burden of weariness as he approached the shooting platform once more. The game had gone on far too long. On this stormy afternoon darkness was closing in early. He could barely make out the distant flags behind the veil of rain.
 

In the recent rounds he had lost track of the score. He was convinced that there could be no victor before dark. The contest would have to continue in the morning, and perhaps last another full day.
 

All he could do now was hold off Fat-moon for one more round. Then the contest would certainly be postponed. He knelt, put his arrow to the bow, but the shaft slipped from his fingers and fell at his feet. Behind him he heard groans of despair. This was not a good way to begin.
 

He felt numbness in his hands and recalled, with dread, the
aha-tu
curse that had bound him. But all that was gone. Nothing mystical was at work here, he told himself. Cold and rain had caused his fumbling. He flexed his fingers until the feeling returned. Even then he did not shoot. A premonition of defeat made him pause and collect his thoughts.
 

What is the true purpose of this
te'a
game? he asked himself. It was not intended for the glory of men, though many made it so. This was the game of the gods, governed by rules they had set down long ago. It was to please the mighty ones that men played it.
 

Matopahu thought of his own ancestors, whose spirits had long watched over his family. His brother had turned away from those protective spirits, Matopahu believed, putting his trust in gods who had no special interest in his affairs. That was the reason for Knotted-cord's downfall.
 

"It is for you that I make this shot," Matopahu whispered, invoking the name of his great ancestor. "It is your name that I will teach to my sons—if I survive to have any." He felt a stiffening of tension in his arms and a rush of heat to his fingers. He took a deep breath.
 

Then he drew back the string and released. In the gloom he could not see where the arrow went, but he heard a cry from behind him. To his astonishment, men left their places and began charging up the course. In the distance he saw the attendants vigorously waving their flags.
 

"It is over," people shouted. Matopahu remained on the platform. He saw Fat-moon far up the course, pointing and arguing, then examining the arrow that stuck from the ground.
 

Matopahu felt an odd shock go through him as he stepped down from the platform. Had he really won? As the cries rang down the course, the tense muscles in his face gave way to a grin.
 

Still not quite believing that he had made the winning shot, he noticed that his companions were already carrying the traditional peace offering from the victors to the losers. As a token of consolation, each man must present a drinking coconut to a member of Fat-moon's team.
 

Putu-nui whooped and gave Matopahu such a hearty slap on the back that it nearly knocked him over.

"Come," said the lesser chief, who could barely contain his glee. "You must make the offering to Fat-moon since yours was the winning arrow." He handed a coconut to Matopahu, who approached the leader of the losing team. Fat-moon glared at him, took the nut from his hands, and threw it in the mud.
 

Matopahu stared in disbelief as rain mixed with the spilled coconut juice. Putu-nui gave an angry cry, clenching his fist about his bow. Players and spectators alike turned fearfully, eyeing the scene. Wars had started over such insults.
 

Would Fat-moon and Putu-nui dare break the peace of the gods? Quickly Matopahu interposed himself between the two chiefs before they could confront each other. He turned to Fat-moon and tried to put an ingratiating expression on his face. "I regret," Matopahu said, "that the gift I offered you was not good enough. When you come to visit me in Tahiti, I will give you something far better."
 

From the corner of his eye, he saw Putu-nui back off, as if the other chief were having second thoughts.

Fat-moon sneered. "In Tahiti, you have nothing. Not a pig. Not even the dung of a pig."

Matopahu refused to be baited. The stakes were too great. "I will have all that was taken from my brother," he answered quietly.

"You have won an archery contest, not a war," Fat-moon retorted. "Do not talk of victories that are not yours."

"Then I will say only that the gods are watching us. This is no time for ill will." He felt someone nudge his arm. It was one of Putu-nui's men. A coconut, among the largest he had ever seen, and already cut open for drinking, was thrust into his hands. He sent a silent prayer to the gods. To Fat-moon he said, "This one is suited for a great chief, is it not? Will you share it with a man who has nothing, only the strength in his arms and the spirit in his body?"