The Angkhora Warriors

Part 17: Dark Whispers

Arjana left secretly in the night, and Uma followed without him knowing. His eagle alerted him to his tail and halfway through the journey, he decided to let Uma join him. The journey may mean something to Uma, he thought.

Before they continued, his eagle told him there was another follower. He looked down the path and waited. Before long, Oja appeared. She too had followed. Uma looked at Oja, but her friend didn't want to say anything.

The eagle flew and led them to an Inn in the South.

They entered the local Inn and ordered meals and rice wine, speaking softly, as their main intent was to listen to the stories being told around the Inn. Everyone seemed to be talking cautiously. It could be heard in their low voices and the way the people looked around, especially in the shadowed corners. Uma noticed a frail monkey man with an eyepatch hobble into the Inn. She recognized him from Tanamera and the Lotus Inn brothel. He approached the innkeeper and whispered something to him while pointing toward the back room.

When the frail monkey man left the building, the innkeeper stepped into the back room. Uma took a quick gulp of her rice wine, then approached the bar, walking around so that she could see into the back room. The back door was open, and she spotted the keeper loading packaged meat into the back of a cart. After he finished loading, the keeper returned to find Uma waiting for another drink. "That was a lot of meat," Uma said.

"Yeah, fools got a bunch of mongoose-bears that he's gotta feed," the inn keeper said as he filled her mug up from a large barrel.

Mongoose bears?

"Must really love his pets to be feeding that sort of food," Uma chided.

The inn keeper shrugged as he collected coins for the rice wine.

She stepped outside and glanced around. Nobody that could see her gave her any attention and the frail man wasn't in sight. She found an alley between two buildings and jumped on the wall, climbing to the top. From there she could see the cart pulling away from the Inn. She lunged from rooftop to rooftop as she followed the cart. Eventually, it stopped at a small house on the edge of the village, where she spotted two mongoose-bears tied up by the house.

Once the man unloaded the cart and went inside, she got as close as possible and peeked into the windows. No one was in the house, even the frail man wasn't in there, but she noticed that there were steps that led downstairs. As she scoped around the house, she found a small window in a dig out which could see into a basement.

She angled herself flat with the ground and tried to investigate the window, but it was covered. A small flap in the corner was open, so she encroached a little closer. She could make out a small group gathered in the basement. As she moved closer, she could hear conversation and the grunts, low growls and chitters. Mongooses.

There were seven of them. A crow man, monkey men, mongooses, and peacock girl. The room was filled with haze from spice pipes. Peacock Girl was preparing the spice, burning them a little on a steel plate over an oil lamp, then stuffing them into bronze pipes. They were all dazed except for Crow Man and Peacock Girl.

Suddenly, the haze grew blindingly thick and a loud thud hit the floor. "Hehe. Hey, friend, you've smoked too much?" Monkey Man, with one eye patch, asked his friend, suspecting that he may have fallen unconscious to the floor. "And we haven't reached the party yet. Hehe."

There was no answer from his friend and the mongooses started becoming suspicious. Peacock Girl withdrew herself and hid in the corner.

Uma had thrown in a smoke bomb.

Monkey Man with one eye patch stood up and felt his way slowly through the smoke and reached for this friend on the floor. "Hey, bro, are you alright?" He touched his friend's back shoulder and shook him, but his friend didn't respond.

He looked up and there was a ghostly silhouette standing in front of him holding two daggers in her hands. He moved away slowly from his friend, hoping the assailant wouldn't see him. Suddenly, a blow dart hit him on the neck. His mouth foamed, gasping for clean air through the smoke before crashing into the wall.

The Mongooses drew out their parangs. Peacock Girl pulled out a handkerchief and covered her nose from the smoke. One of them walked closer to the monkey men and started slashing blindly, hoping to hit the assailant. A metal star flew into his right eye and pierced it. He screamed and his friend moved closer toward the sound of the pain. He too got hit by a throwing star on his right ear. He started slashing aimlessly toward the right and then he hit something. He recognized the scream, it was a mongoose's. He saw his friend fall to the floor, his forehead split in the middle. He continued to slash aimlessly. Before long, he felt the back of knees being knifed and he fell kneeling to the ground, then a sharp pain ran across his throat. He dropped his parang and tried to stop the blood oozing out from his throat. He fell to the ground gurgling in his own blood.

Crow Man turned back into a black crow and flew out the window. Uma threw a throwing star but missed.

The last mongoose man slashed into the smoke like a blind man. He hit the chair beside the table. Peacock Girl screamed and huddled herself tighter. He made another wild swing and smashed a clay vase.

"Come out! Come out! I will kill you!" the mongoose man screamed.

A dagger flew across the room, piercing through his skull, and he fell to the floor.

Peacock Girl stared into the smoke, trying to see who the assailant was. She recognized the silhouette but it took a moment to figure out the person clearly.

Uma emerged from the smoke and Peacock Girl could see her clearly now.

"Ah, it's you." She crawled out from under the table, dusted herself off, and sat on the chair.

"Where are they taking you?" Uma asked.

Peacock Girl didn't answer. She looked away. She didn't want to answer. Couldn't.

"A party...?" Uma asked. "A celebration? Where's the Mongoose Village?" Uma persisted, anger in her voice.

Peacock Girl kept quiet. Getting nervous in her seat.

"Where's the Mongoose Village??" Uma asked, louder this time.

"I... I... I don't know," Peacock Girl answered meekly.

"You don't know?" Uma slammed her fist on the table.

Peacock Girl started to tremble and shiver. "I don't know. I don't know. If I tell you ... they will kill me," she said, her voice a whisper.

"Do you know what they did to me?" Uma shouted at Peacock Girl. "They killed my father. They wiped out the whole Clan! Everyone. Including children."

There was silence for a while.

"But I saved you!" Uma said to Peacock Girl. She stuck her dagger onto the wall and started crying. "I saved You!"

Peacock Girl pulled herself together and after another moment of silence, she replied, "And you think I have anyone left?"

Uma looked at Peacock Girl and didn't know how to feel.

"You think I have a family to go back to?"

The silence was heavy as they stared at each other.

"The location is beyond the Banjaran Mountains... in a hidden cave under a giant tree." Peacock Girl teared up a little, knowing that by revealing the location she had just put a death sentence on herself. "Inside the Dark Forest."

Uma looked at her and Peacock Girl stood up and wrapped herself with a fur coat. She walked up the steps halfway, turned around, and muttered, "Thank you for saving me." Then she rushed out the door and disappeared into the windswept night.