Page 5 of Bird Season

main island, waving at the various indistinct spectators with his insipid grin. “They know it will not be long now.”

  Poke was with the group at this point, but off to the side, too aware of the tension hanging in the air. But Teto was right. The time was fast approaching. Each competitor was by now always wearing his hei — a headband made of mahute and sewn to include a cushioned cup within it.

  “You look sullen over there, Poke.” Teto broke the aimless chatter going on among the group, random talk about the different people that were surely at the top of the cliff. Family members and friends who were, no doubt, already eager to learn who would be this year’s victor. “And hungry,” he added maliciously.

  “Shut up, Teto.”

  Teto sneered. “We both know what the real prize is this year, don’t we, Poke?”

  Poke spit on the ground and turned away. It was time to check on his secret nest, with everyone thinking he was sulking while they performed for the assembled crowd. They knew they couldn’t even really be seen, but it didn’t stop them from exhibiting themselves like fools.

  When he reached the nest, he saw things were different. The tern had a different look in her eye, one that Poke saw as a mélange of things — there was maternal pride but also pleading. She ruffled her feathers at him and gave a light cry as he approached.

  Poke’s eyes widened at the sight. She nestled atop three eggs to keep them warm. This was it, then.

  He looked behind him and could see no one. He heard only the sound of the sea’s surf crashing against the slight cliffs of the islet.

  Moving forwards, he extended his hand slowly. He wanted to be delicate. There was no need to rush, and he could be careful.

  The tern easily understood what it was that Poke wanted. Needed.

  But he’d failed to hear the quiet footsteps of Teto following him, and when he reached down to pull one of the eggs from the nest, he felt Teto’s powerful hands on his shoulders, wrenching him backwards.

  The two struggled, but unlike their fight over Hefua, this time Teto had the advantage of surprise. He struck Poke hard in the stomach multiple times, and kicked him in ways designed to incapacitate.

  “Now I win, Poke,” Teto said, leaving him crippled with the pain of the blows.

  Writhing on the rocky ground, Poke struggled to get up, to fight the searing pain, as Teto lashed out at the bird, smashing her violently off her nest. He grabbed an egg and positioned it within the pocket of his hei. The sight was one of ancient power for both young men. The ancestral timelessness of the competition, in which the fathers of their fathers had partaken, was on.

  Teto broke into a fast run and was quickly into the water of the sea. Never as lean or as athletic as Poke, he was also no weakling, and he swam in the roiling waves of the sea with strong and powerful strokes. If the crowd on the island had not yet seen that one of the men was in the water, it would not be long until they did. And then the sounds of gongs and drums would echo loudly, calling all of the island to the top of the cliff.

  Poke’s response was yet fast and quick. He was on his feet only minutes after Teto left and he ran to retrieve a second of the eggs, flying at the nest. A part of his mind wondered why Teto had not smashed the remaining two, ensuring his victory. It would have been the sort of thing Teto would do. It was the sort of thing Poke thought he should do, to ensure that none of the others could secure the last egg. But he could not bring himself to do it. The squawking of the tern trying plaintively to defend her eggs resonated loudly in his ears and he could not be the one to deprive her of anything more than he needed.

  He ran, following on the heels of Teto, the egg nestled within the soft compartment of his hei.

  His many long hours of training, far more than any other competitor, served him well. His long arms and legs moved him powerfully through the water, slicing through it in a way that allowed him to close the distance to Teto.

  At one point, he lifted his head to gauge the distance to Teto, who was still ahead, just reaching the sheer cliff face. Teto paused to look back in that moment and they were close enough that their eyes could meet at the distance, the hatred each felt for the other plain.

  Teto’s eyes also registered some shock, for Poke had gained far more ground than he anticipated was possible. Throwing his head briskly so that droplets of the salt water flew from his hair, he began his scrabble up the cliff face, his hands grabbing for the meager handholds of rock.

  He was perhaps a quarter of the way up the cliff when Poke reached it, and again Poke’s superior training was evident. His hawkish eyes allowed him to spy the best holds, and he was able to maneuver with only the smallest bits of rock protruding from the cliff face. He glided up the side of the island with a grace impossible for Teto to match. With his chest heaving to pull in as much air as he could, Poke ascended the vertical wall until he was level with Teto’s height.

  The two of them paused there for the briefest of moments, Poke looking to his right and Teto to his left so they could judge the progress of the other. With only a fifth of the cliff left to climb, the roar of the ocean surf below gave way to the roar of the crowd above, cheering the two of them on. It was easy now to discern each of their names being shouted in encouragement as the crowd above identified the potential victors. If Poke had been able to listen carefully, he would have heard his name cried more often and more loudly than Teto’s. But he never would have cared. Only one thing was important now.

  Poke saw blood running down the side of Teto’s leg where he’d scraped his thigh on the cliff, and was aware of his own trickle of warmth flowing along his arm and part of his face. The climb was laborious, their speed causing them to jounce against the rock. But both were mostly oblivious to the pain, knowing the prize awaiting them was beyond any discomfort or injury they might suffer.

  It was Poke in the end who pulled himself over the edge to triumphant cheers of the assembly. His biceps bulged as he heaved himself over the rock, his skin caked with salt dried from the seawater and stained the dull pink of diluted blood.

  The crowd rushed forwards, but was held back by the tangata manu, the victor of last year’s race. Draped with a robe of feathers extending all the way down his back and with sleeves that covered his arms, every hair of the tangata manu’s head was shaved, including his eyebrows. His fingernails were long, like talons, not having been cut since the day he had won this very competition. He stood with slightly bent knees.

  He was the birdman. And it was to him that Poke needed to deliver the tern’s egg.

  Beside him was the white virgin. Confined in a cave for nine months, her skin had lightened to make her the palest one in all the crowd. The effect was heightened by garlanded flowers adorning her body, all of them as bridally white as the pure downy clouds above. A ringlet of them crowned her head.

  And to Poke, she was so very beautiful.

  In the excitement of the moment, the horror of the memory flashed before his eyes. The night he learned Hefua had been chosen by the tangata manu to be the virginal prize in this year’s competition was the most horrific of his life. He always wondered whether Teto somehow contrived for the selection.

  She’d been given only a single night before being secured within the cave, to be fostered by the previous virgin and her attendants until the competition. She’d spent that one night with Poke, neither of them sleeping, and shed many tears fearing her fate. He’d held her in his arms by the beach as she cried, trying desperately to suppress his own tears and to have enough strength to reassure her.

  He promised her that night that he would do all he could to become her mate. He would train and compete. His agony over the last months, driven by the constant thought of her sequestered away, had tormented him, but had also driven him in his training with a fervor unlike any other.

  Now here he stood. The first to have arrived this spring from the islet with a tern egg. He was victorious.

  They were a poor substitute for the kiss he longed for, but he grasped the
shells of his lei and pressed them to his lips. When he looked at Hefua’s face, her eyes brightened with excitement. In those eyes was a vision of deep love that had only intensified during her solitude in the cave. He was her savior, the way he had been so many times over the course of her life.

  But as her looked her, his chest heaving from the exertion, he saw the excitement turn to fear. It was because Teto was by now pulling himself up over the cliff edge now, he was certain. But everything was going to be all right. It was impossible now for Teto to hurt her. Poke would have every power of the island. Hefua was still to be his, in all the ways he’d dreamed.

  “Poke, no,” she whispered, taking a step back.

  The crowd grew silent as, one by one, each person looked at Poke, watching behind him as Teto made his way to his side. Then a murmur began to swell within the crowd.

  Hefua screamed. “No!”

  It was then that the tangata manu stepped forwards, moving awkwardly with bent knees, his toes splaying with every step. His head bobbed with each movement. He stood directly in front of Poke, his beady eyes darting back and forth expectantly over Poke’s face.

  Poke reached up to remove the egg from his hei to offer it to the tangata manu. The smooth shell of the egg felt wonderfully perfect under his hand.

  Until he felt the liquid. Water? From the sea? No, it
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