Fires of Eden

  Trumbo dropped the smoke-filled bottle into Cordie’s tote bag. “Let’s get the fuck out of here,” he whispered, knowing full well that they would never find their way out via the route they had taken in.

  Cordie nodded and turned. They both froze.

  Kamapua’a stood blocking their way. The giant hog was grinning.

  June 23, 1866, Aboard the U.S.S. Boomerang—

  I read over my breathless, scribbled entries of less than a week ago and cannot believe that I wrote them. Those words and events belong to a different person, a different life.

  The steam propeller has just put out from the Kona-Kawaihae docks on its slow voyage to Lahaina, where I expect to meet friends and take a week of rest at their upland plantation before going on to Honolulu and thence to the Orient via the Pacific Mail Steamer Costa Rica. Mr. Clemens and Reverend Haymark departed yesterday for Honolulu on the inter-island packet Kilauea, Reverend Haymark back to his mission on Oahu, and Mr. Clemens back to California via Honolulu. He has booked passage on the sailing ship Smyrniote, and Mr. Clemens informed me that he has full confidence that he shall reach San Francisco, since no ship with such an odd name would be welcome in Davy Jones’s Locker.

  Of the hours and days immediately after our rescue of Reverend Haymark, my memory is hazy, at best. I do not even recall penning those fantastic lines which precede this entry in my journal. The events of the resurrection of our comrade are dreamlike…no, beyond dreamlike…removed, as if they occurred to a fictional character.

  I remember our arrival in Kona. I remember Mr. Clemens’s proposal of marriage two evenings ago as we stood on the dock and watched the sunset. I remember my refusal.

  My friend was hurt. I hurt for him. I remember removing my glove and touching his cheek gently. “May I ask why you cannot consider this offer, Miss Stewart?” he said formally, the hurt audible in his voice.

  “Sam,” I said softly. It was the only time I had ever or would ever use his proper name. “It is not that I do not wish to marry you…or that I do not love you…only that I may not marry you.”

  I saw the confusion in his face.

  “When the old woman touched me,” I began, knowing correctly that I would not be able to explain, “I felt…something. My destiny. I must travel and write and make a name for myself in the world, however small a name, and this would not be possible were I to become Mrs. Samuel Langhorne Clemens.” I smiled then. “Or even Mrs. Thomas Jefferson Snodgrass or Mrs. Mark Twain.”

  My correspondent friend and true companion did not return the smile. “I do not understand,” he said. “I wish to write. I wish to travel. I have already prepared a proposal to my newspaper that I travel around the world and send back the type of correspondence I have written here in the Sandwich Islands. Why could we not enjoy these things together while pursuing our separate professions, Miss Stewart?”

  I could only sigh. How to explain to this fine, courageous man that he was a man—all things were possible for him—while I was a woman, and must make possible those things I wished to have.

  But I admit that at that second, I wished to have him. Samuel. My brave companion. My love.

  “I shall love you forever,” he said next, as the sun fell beneath the earth’s flat line somewhere toward the Orient. “I shall never marry another.”

  I touched his cheek again. How to explain to him that I was certain—I knew—that the fate he described for himself would be mine, while he would almost certainly choose another within a short time. His need for companionship was as tangible as the soft touch of his cheek against my palm.

  I realize that I am dwelling on these personal things at the expense of describing Reverend Haymark’s unceasing amazement at being alive, or our fantastic trek up the Kona Coast amidst fire and flame and earthquake, or the equal amazement of the Christian inhabitants of Kona and Kawaihae at our survival.

  By tacit agreement, none of us discussed our true adventure. No mention was made of Pele or speaking hogs or of the Ghost Kingdom of Milu. The Sandwich Islands do not have a bedlam set aside yet—there is no formal asylum—but there are many isolated places they could have marooned us should we have spoken such things aloud.

  I do not feel like writing about those hours and days after the resurrection and our return. I will mention how bereft I felt when I turned in that grass hut and found the old woman gone. I knew that I would be connected to her for the rest of my life—indeed, I suspect that my descendents, the female ones at least—shall share some such connection for generations to come. I mourned her leaving.

  I mourned the departure of my one life’s love yesterday. Mr. Clemens and I shook hands quite formally on the dock, with Reverend Haymark and the dozens of others watching. But I saw the emotion in his eyes. I trust that he saw the tears in mine.

  There are tears in my eyes at this moment, I will not allow this. I will stop writing until I regain control.

  A cockroach the size of a dinner spoon just marched from the pillow on my berth to the rough bit of wool they call a blanket. It watches me with beady eyes, sensing that I fear cockroaches and cannot bring myself to touch it.

  It is wrong. I have faced beadier eyes and fiercer opponents. This vermin’s days and moments are numbered.

  Freedom from fear is a heady thing, stronger than whiskey, and it bodes ill for cockroaches here and everywhere on this wide planet.

  “Byron,” said the hog, “so nice of you to drop in.” Its snout thrust in Cordie’s direction. “Is this an offering to me?”

  Trump glanced at Cordie and then back at the pig. “Sure,” he said.

  The hog made a sound in its massive throat. “I’ll eat it in a moment. First, we have business to do.”

  Trumbo waited.

  “I see you helped yourself to Sunny’s soul,” said Kamapua’a.

  Trumbo shrugged. “It seemed to be self-serve.”

  The growling from the monster hog’s belly might have been a chuckle. “Fine, fine,” it said. “But there is still a price.”

  “My soul?” said the billionaire.

  “Fuck your soul,” said the hog. “I’m talking a trade.”

  Trumbo’s eyebrows twitched, but he remained silent.

  “When I best that bitch Pele and regain my control of this island,” continued Kamapua’a, “I plan to take on human form for a decade or two. I will be free to roam the earth again. I have been watching from my underground cell as things have changed on the surface. In mortal form, I could be a chieftain of one of these tribes again, but I have other plans.”

  “A trade,” said Trumbo.

  The hog smiled more broadly. “Precisely.” It took two steps closer, its trotters echoing on the hard basalt. Cordie could see the moisture on its broad snout and feel the warm bellows of its breath. “We can do a deal, Byron,” it said in a conspiratory, male whisper. “You and I.”

  “Why should I?” said Trumbo.

  The giant hog took another step closer. Its breath was unbelievably foul. “Because otherwise I will chew your guts and bones and set your miserable soul in the foulest reaches of this cave for all eternity,” said the hog, its deep voice rising.

  “OK,” said Trumbo. “I’m listening.”

  The hog took half a step back. “You take Sunny’s useless little uhane back to the Japanese, do the deal, and get your three hundred million dollars,” the creature said. “You return here and we do a trade.”

  “What kind of trade?” asked Trumbo. “You want the money?”

  The hog grunted. “The miserable kahuna summoned us to destroy you,” it said. “But we had no intention of doing so. It is Pele whom I wish to destroy. You and I are alike, Byron. We were born to dominate. Born to subdue…women…the land. I understand your urge to bulldoze and rape. I understand it well. I don’t want your money.”

  Trumbo nodded thoughtfully for a moment. “I still don’t see what we’d be trading,” he said at last.

  Kamapua’a showed his grin. His eight eyes were bright. ??
?We trade places for a while, Byron my friend. I become you. You become me.”

  Trumbo’s face remained expressionless. “Let me get this straight…the deal you’re offering me is that we trade places? That you get my body and I get yours?”

  The hog nodded.

  “You get to be a handsome billionaire with homes and women on three continents,” continued Byron Trumbo, “and I get to spend a couple of decades as a giant, smelly pig living in a cave in Hawaii. Is that the deal?”

  Kamapua’a’s grin remained in place. “That’s the deal, Byron.”

  Trumbo nodded. “And why the hell should I be interested in a deal like that?”

  “First,” grunted the pig in the voice that seemed to come from his belly, “you will be allowed to live. I will not devour your guts and bones. Second, I guarantee you that in my fifteen or twenty years in your body, I will enlarge your financial empire to a scale never before seen on this planet. You came down here as a man on the skids…desperately trying to shore up your tumbling empire by selling this miserable hotel for a few hundred million dollars. When you return to your body, you will own the world, Byron Trumbo. And that is not a figure of speech.”

  “I’ll end up owning the world if I stay in my own body,” said Trumbo.

  The hog grunted. “Thirdly,” he continued as if Byron had not spoken, “while you are King of the Underworld, you will have unlimited power over the ghosts and demons in this world. You will have power over the elements above, commanding the lightning, the tide, and the great tsunamis. You will taste power the likes of which you currently cannot dream of.”

  Trumbo rubbed his cheek. “Will I have all the powers you have now?”

  Kamapua’a shook his great, bristled head. “I am not a fool, Byron. If you assumed all of my powers, you could cancel our deal anytime you wished and establish yourself as king of the world above. No, I will need the majority of my powers while in your body, using them to make you rich and famous beyond your wildest dreams. But I assure you that being Kamapua’a, lord of the Underworld and of all he surveys, will be the high point of your life. And—as I say—when you return to your mortal form, you will inherit the riches and powers I have amassed for you.”

  “What if you decide to stay human forever?” asked Trumbo. “No, no, no,” grumbled the hog. “Your mortal form is acceptable, but it is mortal. I have no wish to die. I am a god.”

  “That’s another point,” said Trumbo. “My body will be old if you sublet it for two decades…almost sixty.”

  The hog’s teeth gleamed slick in the dim light. “At the height of your powers, Byron. I will treat your mortal form with greater care than you do now. It will be fit, tuned to a fighting edge…after all, I would be disappointed if you wasted the empire I will earn for you. And you should be reminded that your brief stint as a god will prepare you for greater things than any mortal has ever achieved on the earth above.”

  “So that’s it?” said Trumbo. “That’s the deal?”

  “That’s the deal,” said Kamapua’a. “If you say no, you die here and now and your soul will rot down here forever. If you say yes, you gain illimitable power and wealth and taste the magnificence of being a god. What do you say, Byron Trumbo?”

  Trumbo seemed lost in thought for a long moment. When he looked up, his face showed resolve. “Well,” he said, “since you put it that way, I say fuck you.”

  Cordie would not have imagined that a hog’s face could show amazement. This one did.

  “Fuck you and the sow you rode in on,” said Trumbo for good measure.

  The giant pig actually bellowed, its roar echoing from the lava tube ceiling. “Why have you cast all away to deny me, mortal?” Byron Trumbo shrugged. “I was never that fond of bacon,” he said.

  The hog showed all of his large teeth. “I will take great pleasure in devouring both of you,” it growled. “And then I will devour your ghosts.”

  “Look!” said Cordie, pointing beyond the hog.

  The monster glanced over its own bristled back. The young Hawaiian woman who stood twenty paces away was not a ghost—she was barely a woman, more a beautiful girl—but her dark eyes were bright and hard.

  Kamapua’a snorted. “Be gone, bitch,” the hog said to Pele. “You have no power here. This is my domain. These mortals are my dinner.”

  The young Hawaiian woman did not move or blink.

  “Now,” said Kamapua’a, returning his attention to Trumbo and Cordie. “Die.” The monstrous form trotted forward on its little pig legs.

  Cordie stepped between Trumbo and the wall of pig flesh, fumbled in her bag, and came out with her revolver. She pulled the hammer back just as the hog grunted another laugh.

  “You must be joking,” came the belly rumble. The thing wriggled its snout and the pistol flew from Cordie’s hands, clattering against the cave wall. The pig trotted toward Cordie, its face and teeth filling her vision.

  An earthquake threw both Cordie and Trumbo to the stone floor. Even the giant hog stopped and braced itself on its tiny hooves. The monster snarled over its shoulder at the silent Hawaiian woman. “Damn you, bitch. I tell you, you have no power here. I will deal with you in a moment.”

  Byron Trumbo and Cordie heard the rumble before they felt the heat. Something was rushing down the lava tube at them with the speed and noise of a freight train. Suddenly, an orange glow illuminated the walls.

  “Lava!” cried Trumbo, and turned to run. There was no time.

  Kamapua’a laughed and showed his backside to Pele. “Do what you want, bitch. They will die by my teeth before your pitiful fire reaches us.” The hog snarled and leapt at Cordie.

  Cordie had lifted out the wine bottle carrying Eleanor’s soul, and now she uncorked it. Eleanor’s form flowed out and around like smoke in a vortex.

  The hog skidded to a stop on the rough floor. Other ghosts swirled and fluttered now, agitated by the approaching lava. The orange glow had intensified and the heat was terrible.

  “Move, damn you!” bellowed the hog as Eleanor’s ghost swirled between him and Cordie. Less than a foot separated the hog’s gnashing molars and Cordie’s face, but the ghostly shape twisted and blocked his every lunge.

  “You are forbidden to interfere with her,” said Cordie, her voice small. “Pele has so commanded.”

  Kamapua’a roared in earnest then, and pieces of the cave ceiling tumbled down. The hog wheeled and lunged toward the stunned Byron Trumbo. The glow of the advancing lava illuminated the cave like an orange searchlight.

  Eleanor’s ghost shifted like quicksilver, interposing itself between the monster and the man. Again, Kamapua’a had to slide to a halt rather than violate the unbreakable kapu of Goddess Pele. The thing turned back to Cordie, who stood unprotected. The lava became visible behind her, swirling around the bend in a blast-furnace tsunami of molten rock.

  “Quickly,” said the young Hawaiian woman. “To my side.”

  Cordie bolted to the left of the hog, Trumbo to the right. Kamapua’a started to swing toward Cordie, the ghost of Eleanor blocked him; he reversed himself to catch Trumbo in his teeth, but again the smoky ghost form interdicted him. The hog’s trotters slammed and echoed on stone. Both mortals were too fast. By the time the monstrous pig had wheeled on its oddly delicate little legs, both Cordie and the billionaire had sprinted the last twenty paces and were standing next to the Hawaiian girl.

  “NO!” screamed the hog and the echo made the cavern shake worse than any earthquake. Kamapua’a put his massive head down, pawed the earth, and charged like an oversized bull in an undersized arena. Cordie and Trumbo both flinched, but the monster smashed into an invisible barrier three feet from the beautiful Hawaiian maiden.

  The girl raised her hands. Her voice was as lovely as her aspect.

  “O the top of Kilauea!

  O the five ledges of the pit!

  The heaven wakes up.

  The earth is awake.

  The sea is awake.

  I, Pele, am the god
dess.

  This work is mine.

  I bring the fire.

  I bring the flame of life.

  E ala e! Flames awake! Lava arise!

  The kapu of rape and death is over.

  It is lifted.

  It is flown away.”

  The haole ghosts flitted around Pele, Cordie, and Trumbo like a swirl of smoke, filling the air around them. Eleanor’s ghost flowed back into its waiting wine bottle. Cordie slammed the cork back in. Kamapua’a bellowed again. Rocks tumbled and fissures opened. The wall of lava, when it covered the last dozen yards, arrived almost too quickly to be seen.

  Cordie saw the bristles on the hog burst into flame in the second before the lava enveloped him, and then she was crouching, closing her eyes, feeling the heat of the molten rock and wondering that her last thoughts were not more important than Shit!

  The lava flowed around them, the heat terrible but not the killing stroke it should have been. Cordie heard the monster hog’s final scream but did not see it volatilized or borne away by the rushing lava stream. Magma surrounded their invisible shell of a barrier, flowing past in black and orange chunks. There was an explosion of steam behind them as the lava struck the ocean.

  Then they were rising, the girl’s arms raised, rising on a smooth, invisible elevator, passing up through the fissure and out the expanded blowhole as if such things were commonplace.

  The girl lowered her hands. Cordie blinked and felt the sea breeze, smelled the rain. The barrier was gone. Behind and to the south, lava flowed and steam hissed, but there was nothing between them and the Mauna Pele a few hundred yards to the north.

  “Come with me,” Cordie said to the child and goddess. “I need your help.” She lifted the bottle with its smoky soul.

  The young woman shook her head. “You have the words.”

  She reached out and touched Cordie Cooke Stumpf’s head. “You belong to the sisterhood of Pele. Go.”

  Byron Trumbo started to go but found that his legs were not ready. He sat down heavily on the smooth rock.