Oontab [Episode 7]

Tandoop

The day before, Tandoop had been at his father’s, Tanook’s hut near the forbidden forest, and he saw a shadow steal away toward the forest. Tandoop grew curious.

He trailed the shadow and discovered it was the Prince climbing a tree at the beginning of the forest pathway. The Prince then covered himself in hunter’s clothing. He followed the Prince around the village and came to a stop at the top of the slope just after the forbidden forest at the West of the village. Concealing himself beneath trees and shrubs, he watched a hostile exchange between the Prince and someone who he recognized as one of the palace guards, judging from the clothes he wore. After a while, the palace guard ran off into the night and the Prince, with some other men, climbed down the hill that angled dangerously to the great chasm.

What disappointed him was the fact that Edongo, the son of the dead brother of his father Tanook, was there too.

Surely, he would get to the bottom of this.

Tandoop wriggled his flat nose to shoo a housefly away. They were attracted to the dog droppings at the back of his father’s hut. Tanook was as much a hunter, therefore, an animal killer, as he was an animal keeper; of dogs precisely. He was the one who persuaded the people of the importance of dogs since they could be subdued more easily than any other creature could. Tandoop often found the dogs a burden, because they simply could not be taught how to clean their own droppings or to find better places to put them. If it had not already become a custom of Gardutkar not to kill dogs, Tandoop would have perfected the hunting skills he learnt from his father by killing the dogs his father kept.

Tandoop and Edongo had been specially called upon by Prince Greda to join his team of hunters as he was made prepared for the coming kingship even though he was instructed to pick from his servants. The Prince simply hired them both as servants and put them in the team. Tandoop knew he was called upon because he was the son of Tanook, the best hunter in the village and he had grown to be one too; he also knew that Edongo was called upon because he was friends with the Prince and had been there with him that night at the base of the forbidden hills. That way, he could keep the partakers in his mischief close to himself. On that hand, Tandoop could find out what was really going on there.

Fonjam

“In my own home, in my own Kingdom, I am voiceless. A toothless mad dog. What I want is irrelevant, and it’s not fair at all!”

“Hmm, well, it’s not yet your kingdom completely. You are only an image of your father for now. And really, I don’t understand why you are so upset, because you have all the privileges you need, you're Oontab o.”

“Don’t be a goat. I know that it is not only about privileges. But just because I am the prince does not mean I always get to do what I want. How can I be great if I cannot do what is in my heart to do?”

“What you feel is right in this case has to make both you and your people pleased, and - ”

“Fonjam, I cannot please everyone. And wait, who gets to decide who I should please?”

Greda sat up, continuing before Fonjam could respond, “You see this very tree,” using his palm to gently beat the branch he was sitting on so that it sent a slight tremor to the leaves, “we climbed the tree, so we are at the same height with it. If someone was down there…” he pointed at the space on the ground which the trees around them encircled. It had mostly soil with withered grasses sticking out from it, and the afternoon sun beamed at the center of the space, “then you can say you have the advantage over him because you can see what he cannot.”

Fonjam smiled. “Eh-hen?” He said, beckoning Greda to go on.

“A tree can see its destination, but it will never reach it.” Greda put his hand on his chest, “but if a man climbs that tree and sees his destination, but forgets to come down from that tree, he will never reach it, all the same.”

“So you are the tree?” Fonjam mocked.

Greda ignored the question, “See what I am saying; if I climb the back of my father and elders and see a destination, how do I get there if I don’t come down from their backs?”

“Oooh! Right, because you are no longer a child?” Fonjam understood.

“Of course! I can find my way since it is the same destination we see!” Greda answered.

There was a short silence. The warm breeze was part of their conversation, and it blew at the trees and made the leaves to quiver. They both came here often to talk. It was the outskirts of the village, a specific corner far enough away from the cliff with scanty trees.

“But, different ways lead to different paths no matter how slightly you turn away from one path. And I really think you are overreacting about this whole issue. I am speaking to you as a friend.”

“Fonjam! You are not listening! Who is in charge; the household of the King or the Spokesman? I am the Oontab! Do I have to go through a stupid training process spelled out by some stupid gods to - ”

“No! No! No! Don’t do that my Prince!”

Fonjam yelled, putting his hands close to his mouth beckoning Greda to be careful with his words.

“You see what I am saying?!” Greda said to the air, his eyes bulged as he shrugged in frustration.

“No, my Prince, that one is completely out of it! It is a matter of the gods! Do not anger the gods by such an insult! If not that…well…gone are the days when lightning would strike people who spoke ill of the gods.”

“It has never happened, Fonjam! And it will not! Ah! Why are you so superstitious?!”

“My prince, you sound as if you have absolutely no regard for the gods - ”

“And then whaaaat?!” Greda barked.

“There are many things beyond our power to control, so the gods - ”

“The gods, the gods, the gods! You seem to know a lot about the gods, Spokesman Fonjam.” Greda cut in with a sarcastic tone in his voice.

Fonjam was weary. Prince Greda always took him in circles with this same argument. Prince Greda continued.

“Look, the truth is, these things don’t sound like things that the gods themselves would say.

They sound like things men would come up with, and it is very easy to make men do what you want when you say ‘gods have said’.”

“But you know about your father’s, the King’s victory in the past. It could be that that was his own preparation for the throne. The gods planned it that way. The only difference is that no Spokesman was involved. It just happened according to the plan of the gods.”

“But how would you know that?”

“Err... The gods cannot be questioned.” Fonjam replied.

“Cannot or should not?! Well, I am questioning them, right now!” Prince Greda raised his clenched fist at the sky – as though the gods lived there – and screamed with all the anger he could muster, “Gods of our laaaaand! Why?! What?! Who?! Where and When?!” then he jumped down and stomped into the bushes, leaving his best friend Fonjam lying on a branch in the tree, bewildered.

“Greda, it is not funny, take those words back.” Fonjam said, jumping down to follow him. Then he heard an approaching rattle in the bushes.

“Prince?”

There was another rattle.

“Prince Greda?” Fonjam called out looking forward then backward. He had just began to panic walking faster along the path between a line of shrubs when he rushed into Greda who had suddenly jumped out from behind a tree with a trunk the width of his muscular body.

“Fonjam, look at this!” Greda appeared again, his anger of a few minutes ago seeming to have dissolved by what he wanted Fonjam to look at. “I know what it is… It is a… a… a… snake. A creature father told me about!”

“A what?”

The creature positioned itself between them and hardened its neck.

“I think it is not happy.”

“Maybe it is the gods that sent it after what you said.”

“Don’t be stupid Fonjam. Many of these existed before. I just did not expect that there would still be one anywhere here - ”

The creature hissed and in the blink of an eye, clung to Fonjam’s foot with the only two teeth it had then it let go and slithered away.

“Ahh! My leg! My leg!” Fonjam yelled.

“Fonjam! Are you alright?”

“No I am not!” Fonjam angrily replied, trying to catch his receding breath.

“Let me call the Spokesman.” Then he ran off, out of the bushes, past an assembly of stones which separated the village from its outskirts, and through the village as fast as he could. It would have taken much longer if he had walked, and Fonjam could not afford that time, from the frightened look on his face. He approached the village market square reached for the village gong to hit it and call for Bantaik, then he waited.

When Bantaik came, Prince Greda explained the situation to him, panting, and showed him where it had happened.

When Bantaik saw Fonjam’s foot, he did not seem surprised at the attack from the creature and how it was making his foot swell. Fonjam was hardly breathing and his eyes were closed as though he was dead. Bantaik took a leaf from the tree Fonjam and Greda had climbed, put it in his mouth and chewed until it was phlegm. Then he spat it out in his hands and rubbed it on Fonjam’s foot, saying an incantation in the process.

“What will be, be,
And what be not, not,
If flows from gods, it be.
If flows from without, it be rot.”

Instantly, yellow water fizzed and flowed out of Fonjam’s hurting foot from the two holes the creature had bored and he gradually became conscious again.

“Yes, my Prince, it be snake. If it come again, do not run. Use big stone and crush head of snake.”

Son of Foulatt

I saw again, my people wailing, some on the bare ground lamenting and others treating the wounds of their injured friends and family.

I saw the hunter stand over a dead woman, holding her new born baby. I saw heaven bleed and I saw heaven smile.

But where is Foulatt, the Spokesman? Where is he, to witness the turning of events? The shaming of a King and exalting of a hunter?

A man with a deep voice yelled from the crowd, “Let us make the hunter King! Let us make him King!"

I even heard a chant rise from the roaring response. I still chant it in my nightmares, as I now watch darkness encumber light.

The chant grows louder and they raised him up for everyone to see.

Oh! Foulatt! Look at your son! Did you know that in Existence, even in Gardutkar, you, a Spokesman will have the blessing of the gods, even after you have defiled your loins with the birth of a child?

The little girl beside me; is her mother dead? We don't know, but we weep together as I comfort her; a child comforting a child.

We knew not that we were comforting ourselves for this reason: King Fanoba was Manlum reincarnated, and his darkness continues.

We sang, now we wail. Because men have changed, and darkness encumbers them at every moment.

Hunter, son of Foulatt, I praise you no more, because King Fanoba's spirit, the spirit of doom - which destroyed our people and our land - has corrupted you.

Sapas, the little girl, her mother, and the people of this village are doomed because of your corruption.

Hunter, son of Foulatt, you are no King; I praise you no more.


~ Rotyuk, son of Ouwl'El, lost writings of Rotyuk.


“My name is Sapas.” The girl held on to Rotyuk's hand again. “Please help me to find my own mother.” She pleaded, tears falling down her cheeks for the first time.

Kanaka

Kanaka was having those strange dreams again. He had not yet stated his real purpose of returning to the palace, even though he had made King Mogg believe he had, and he was finding less of the need to do so as he basked in the sweet memories he had from his past when he lived at the palace with the king as a child. The dream; it was the reason he had come in the first place. This night, it came back.

It was a misty place in the forbidden forest. Kanaka knew he had never been to the forbidden forest, but in the dream, he just knew he was there. King Mogg was there, and… Rotyuk was there too. He could feel the darkness around, and the shadows which accompanied the dim light that scarcely burst in through the trees from the sky at sunset; they crept all around him, teasing to have his body as soon as he was no longer aware. But he was aware, and his senses twice their strength. Strange, it was a dream that seemed as real as reality itself. Maybe more.

Time was slow and lagged irregularly as the conversation between Kanaka and the other two men seemed to come with the movement of their mouths first, then the voices, then the actions, last. At a point, there was a disturbance in the trees above their heads and when Kanaka looked up, he saw crows with no heads falling from the sky like rain, splattering their blood all over the soil, and from the drops of blood came sprouting red plants that grew into trees in a few seconds.

Kanaka often begged to leave the dream even before it ended, but it usually ran its full course before it did, so he got used to watching the terror pass, yet each time, it had a freshness that petrified him to his bones.

The gruesome display right in front of him – even though he was as well in it – brought him to the greatest of horrors when he grabbed hold of Rotyuk, and struggling with him a little bit, took him by his arms and flung him into a red pit. He watched himself do this to Rotyuk, and he could not stop it. It was his bloodied hands, it was his feet he could see when he looked down. The chasm appeared red with a substance smeared all over it which he could not identify, but it was easy to assume that it was blood. Kanaka looked at his left arm and he was deeply cut by Rotyuk’s fingernails; they were dug into his skin. King Mogg looked at him with empty and lifeless eyes and said,

“Well done - ,” and his voice was drowned by the screaming Rotyuk.

Kanaka was not sure about a lot of things, especially now that the dream had pushed him to looking for meaningful answers, but one thing of which he was certain as surely as ripe mangoes fell from their tree, was that he was neither scarred by Rotyuk, nor had he killed him.

Two things.

To be continued...

- Telsum Bini