possible. Instead I followed her lead.
“Are you sure they will like this?”
“It is better,” she said. “I will tell them you will make a baby.”
To hear Lela, children were the most precious commodity in that valley. I shoved from my mind any notion of how I might actually go about making a baby and assisted her in her attempts to spread the dirt on my skin. My arms, my legs, my belly, my chest, my back, my face—all of it was soon tinted brown.
“I will too soon make a baby,” she said, working on my feet.
“You’re too young!”
She stood and grinned wide. Two of her bottom teeth were missing. “No, miss. I already give this blood. I will be chosen.” She said it as if nothing could possibly make her more proud. I wasn’t sure whether to reprimand her or cry for her.
It was then, standing under the tree as I awaited my trial, that the raw humanity of the inhabitants in the Tulim valley first overshadowed my fear of them, if only for a few moments. Lela was only a girl doing her best to belong, like any girl her age in any social circle anywhere in the world.
I assumed that she, like me, had been brought in from the outside. What was more, she seemed to have come to terms with her place in this world.
She lifted a slender hand to my mouth, pulled down my lower lip, studied my teeth, and ahhed .
“It is very pretty,” she said, and released my lip. “It is very healthy, this teeth. I will tell them.”
“Where are you from?” I asked.
“I am from this Tulim.”
“But where did you come from, before this Tulim?”
She hesitated. “I am wam , miss. I come from this Indonesia. It is where I learn English.”
“What is wam?” I asked.
“This is offspring of animal and Tulim, many years past. You are wam, miss. Only this lords and this people are not wam.”
A voice called to us from the council, and Lela hurried to untie me from the tree. “They call. We go. I will tell them, miss. You will make this baby.”
Chapter Seven
THIS LORDS, as Lela called them in her broken English, were positioned around a massive rectangular slab of gray slate about a foot thick set upon four stumps. I say positioned because I immediately saw that each side of the table hosted a unique group.
These were the leaders of the three tribes that occupied the Tulim valley, and as a group they looked as imposing as the scarred man who’d plucked me from the sea.
I couldn’t shake the certainty that I was walking directly to my death. The script was already written and I was only following the same path many others had taken before their demise.
I should run now. I should spin and flee into the jungle to face whatever fate awaited me there, beyond their reach.
And yet I walked confidently. One foot in front of the other, captive already in a world that offered no escape.
I stopped at the edge of the thatched roof. To a man, they stared back at me. It was as if I were not only in another world but in another dimension altogether, a newcomer to an alternate reality.
My head swam with a sense of déjà vu and my heart, beating quickly already, slowed to heavy beats.
Maybe this was all a horrible nightmare. An illusion that was swimming through my head as I slept peacefully in the white sailboat, still in calm seas. Perhaps at a single prod from the captain, or at my son’s fussing, I would wake to find all well.
Lela gave me a gentle nudge. I looked at her. The plain reality of my predicament returned, free from illusion. But of course I’d known the full certainty of it already. My mind, so strained by terror, had offered me a moment’s reprieve, however absurd.
She gave me an encouraging smile and glanced at the one side of the table that was unoccupied. I faced the council and edged forward into a yellow glow provided by the fire pit in the middle. Smoke drifted up to the blackened ceiling high above.
Each group consisted of five men, four of whom stood on the ground or sat on rocks behind their
“Are you sure they will like this?”
“It is better,” she said. “I will tell them you will make a baby.”
To hear Lela, children were the most precious commodity in that valley. I shoved from my mind any notion of how I might actually go about making a baby and assisted her in her attempts to spread the dirt on my skin. My arms, my legs, my belly, my chest, my back, my face—all of it was soon tinted brown.
“I will too soon make a baby,” she said, working on my feet.
“You’re too young!”
She stood and grinned wide. Two of her bottom teeth were missing. “No, miss. I already give this blood. I will be chosen.” She said it as if nothing could possibly make her more proud. I wasn’t sure whether to reprimand her or cry for her.
It was then, standing under the tree as I awaited my trial, that the raw humanity of the inhabitants in the Tulim valley first overshadowed my fear of them, if only for a few moments. Lela was only a girl doing her best to belong, like any girl her age in any social circle anywhere in the world.
I assumed that she, like me, had been brought in from the outside. What was more, she seemed to have come to terms with her place in this world.
She lifted a slender hand to my mouth, pulled down my lower lip, studied my teeth, and ahhed .
“It is very pretty,” she said, and released my lip. “It is very healthy, this teeth. I will tell them.”
“Where are you from?” I asked.
“I am from this Tulim.”
“But where did you come from, before this Tulim?”
She hesitated. “I am wam , miss. I come from this Indonesia. It is where I learn English.”
“What is wam?” I asked.
“This is offspring of animal and Tulim, many years past. You are wam, miss. Only this lords and this people are not wam.”
A voice called to us from the council, and Lela hurried to untie me from the tree. “They call. We go. I will tell them, miss. You will make this baby.”
Chapter Seven
THIS LORDS, as Lela called them in her broken English, were positioned around a massive rectangular slab of gray slate about a foot thick set upon four stumps. I say positioned because I immediately saw that each side of the table hosted a unique group.
These were the leaders of the three tribes that occupied the Tulim valley, and as a group they looked as imposing as the scarred man who’d plucked me from the sea.
I couldn’t shake the certainty that I was walking directly to my death. The script was already written and I was only following the same path many others had taken before their demise.
I should run now. I should spin and flee into the jungle to face whatever fate awaited me there, beyond their reach.
And yet I walked confidently. One foot in front of the other, captive already in a world that offered no escape.
I stopped at the edge of the thatched roof. To a man, they stared back at me. It was as if I were not only in another world but in another dimension altogether, a newcomer to an alternate reality.
My head swam with a sense of déjà vu and my heart, beating quickly already, slowed to heavy beats.
Maybe this was all a horrible nightmare. An illusion that was swimming through my head as I slept peacefully in the white sailboat, still in calm seas. Perhaps at a single prod from the captain, or at my son’s fussing, I would wake to find all well.
Lela gave me a gentle nudge. I looked at her. The plain reality of my predicament returned, free from illusion. But of course I’d known the full certainty of it already. My mind, so strained by terror, had offered me a moment’s reprieve, however absurd.
She gave me an encouraging smile and glanced at the one side of the table that was unoccupied. I faced the council and edged forward into a yellow glow provided by the fire pit in the middle. Smoke drifted up to the blackened ceiling high above.
Each group consisted of five men, four of whom stood on the ground or sat on rocks behind their
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