The Empire in the Eastern Sky

Chapter 2

I jerked awake to a wave of pain coming from Maya shaking the front of my thread-bare tunic. I nearly dropped the toddler from my lap  "Ayu, I'm hungry," Maya whispered but her voice came out scratchy. She was coughing and scratching against her neck and also her body. Our wet clothes had dried while we're napping and it stuck against our skin. It start to itch everywhere. 

"Not now, Maya. Not until we're safe," I look around and saw that it was daylight. Maya stood over me and was picking at her skin. I saw the tell-tale sign of mosquitoes bites on our exposed skin along with traces of salt and sand. Hunger and thirst began to claw my inside but I was worried that the pirate slavers would come for us. We have been navigating through the swamp all nightlong and my feet were still bleeding from the sharp exposed roots and the burns from rescuing my sister. Everywhere my body stings and blood crusted from deeper wounds and I noticed I lost a length of my thick dark hair. I could hear my grandmother berrating me about trying to cut off the length by myself. Now they're hanging uneven and the part that were missing had crinkled and coarse from the fire. I guess my longtime wish for a shorter hair was being realized only that it came with us being orphans.

I choke down the tears and bend down to Maya with a worried expression. She escape unharmed from the fire but I was worried about her lungs. How long had she been under our dead grandmother's body? I looked around and saw that we're too deep in the swamp to see the sea and the sands are getting drier. I scratched at the side of the tree where green moss grow on one side of the tree. The moss only grow at the side where the sun never hits. 

"Are we going home?" Maya asked when I motioned her to climb on my back. She paused behind me and then she wraped her arms around my neck and I heaved her on my back. I know I had a wound behind me and Maya putting her weight on it was agonizing. But I'm the big sister. I must persevere.

"We don't have a home anymore. We can never go back home," I clenched my teeth and I began to walk. The sand was harsh on my bleeding sole but the thought of us being enslaved by the pirates was more unbearable than this pain. I can't let them have us. Not now that they had taken our brother a couple of months ago when they raided another fishing village north from us. Tanggang was staying at an uncle's place when they attacked. We had feared such thing would happen to us but I had hoped they would come so I could rescue him. How could I be so stupid.

The village counciller helmed by the head, the Penghulu, had sought petition for help against the pirates but it was too late. Piracy was made illegal by the western laws as do slavery but it meant nothing to the poorer coastal settlements without proper security. There's a reason why we're isolated as a village. It made it harder for the larger settlements to tax us folks when we're too far from civilization. We're peaceful people and the sea work was enough to support our family. But I know by now that nobody would come to help us. We're too far from the nearest port at that took several hours of boat rides. The only way to cross through our village was by sea as the jungle was too thick and there were no road to walk on. In fact, I never been this far off my home village. 

Every step I took began to weight on me. With no food and water, I don't think I could last with my own sister on my wounded back. I manage to ignore the worst from the pain which I had learn to do so but it was getting harder to stay awake and not to let Maya slip off my back.

The sun was unforgiving on us. It was noon and the heat was brutal despite us being in the part of the jungle where the canopy was too thick for the light to come through. The floor was littered with thick dry leaves which comforted my aching bare feet. Soon my body began shook uncontrollably Mouth too dry from the sea. My eyelids too heavy. Maya was shouting something but I didn't take her any heed. My focus was to keep away from the seaside. I don't know how far I've gone but it was all I could do.

My feet slipped and I can't stop myself from being hurled to my front. Maya screamed and we tumbled down the ledge. My body became lead and I was too helpless to do anything. Then I felt cool water against my lips and I opened my mouth to let it wash the saltiness away. I saw Maya trying to shake me awake but I can't hear her. My words slurred and the world around us spun around and it never stop. Maya pushed me to another side and I saw that we fell at the side of a river. But I couldn't move any of my body and I lost the battle to stay awake.

The light around us dimmed by the time I opened my eyes again and I saw a large elephant in the middle of the forest. There were people coming out from its back and they're waving. Maya was screaming my name. Hands feeling my neck and body. A man wearing a turban was looking down at me while a dark-skinned woman shook her head. I closed my eyes and opened them again to a pair of golden eyes ringed with dark black khol and orange and white stripes.

"Are you death?" I whispered and gave in to the darkness.