Bright Eyes

34.2. The Blood of the Covenant . . .

The moment Toa and Awiyao stepped into the whare whakairo a plump middle-aged woman with dark blue symbols etched into her lower lip and chin strode forward and grasped Toa's hands, the skirt of her loose sleeveless dress—a garment woven in colors of white and blue, with a row of feathers attached to the top of her dress—rustled around her ankles, her long curly dark hair swaying as she walked, leading him and Awiyao to where six men stood and seemed to be waiting—Kaihautu, Huatare, the Babaylan, the Tohunga, and two armed men stationed there with them.

    "You and your brothers will have to leave Moana as quickly as possible," the woman, Toa's mother, said as she pulled her youngest son toward the center of the hall, Awiyao trailing a little behind them. "The Tohunga and the spiritual leader of the Kadasans will explain to you three—four, I mean," she corrected herself upon catching a glance of Awiyao, fully aware now of his presence, "all you need to know of the things that are to come."

    There was a sureness to her voice, a steadiness, Toa noticed. As if this, all that was happening now, wasn't quite new to her, as if she had known this for quite a while now. Just as the Tohunga and the Babaylan did. Just, as he realized then, his father did, too.

    "Whaea," Toa began, looking her in the eye, "you've known this for some time now, haven't you? You and Papa and the Tohunga. Tell me, what is it you have not told us? What secret are you keeping from us and from the rest of our people?"

    "Toa, there is no time," said his mother, severely. "The Tohunga will explain everything on your way to Sanctuarium, and it will all make sense by then."

"I wonder, Whaea," Kaihautu interrupted with a sigh, one that came off rather irate, its underlying tone almost sarcastic, "why you and Papa have decided to let Huatare and I accompany Toa to Sanctuarium. We all know there is no need for Huatare and I to go—well, of course Toa knows nothing of this, and perhaps his Kadasan friend is just as ignorant as he is." He gave off a strange dour chuckle. "But it is the truth, isn't it? All that matters to you is to save the heir, and the heir to the position of Rangatira doesn't necessarily mean the eldest."

    All eyes turned to Kaihautu, then.

    Beside him stood a man stocky in frame, burlier than both Kaihautu and Toa, yet a little shorter than either of them, a stark contrast to Kaihautu's slender, taut figure. Yet he, Kaihautu, and Toa shared a similar complexion of tan skin, albeit a little darker from being under the sun longer, had the same shade of sable hair cut short. He looked up at Kaihautu, the look in his face one of utter puzzlement.

    "What do you mean, Kaihautu?" the burly man, their blood brother Huatare, asked.

    Kaihautu ignored Huatare's question and stepped forward, toward his mother, toward Toa who stood right next to her.

    "Yes, Whaea, I've known," he said, the look in his eyes bearing a cold, quiet rage. "For years now," he added.

    "Kaihautu," his mother said, pleadingly, reaching for his hands, "please, please, my son, forgive me. I regret not having told you directly; your Papa and I should have done so earlier. But that does not mean that—"

    Kaihautu moved his hands out of his mother's reach, positioned himself in a way that towered over her, intimidated her, silenced her.

    At this, Toa slid between Kaihautu and his mother, standing firm and tall, managing to hold his brother's stare with his own. "What's the meaning of this, Kaihautu?" he asked. "Why do you speak to Whaea this way?"

    Kaihautu gave off a laugh devoid of any humor.

    Toa looked straight up at him, noticing the deep blue of his blood brother's eyes swirling dangerously, a brewing storm within. He knew his mother was keeping something from him, so was his father and the Tohunga, but this, what Kaihautu seemed to be talking about, seemed an entire different thing, nothing that had to do with the war and the enemy that were to come.