Karen Lord - Redemption in Indigo

'What? What?’ Paama yelled distractedly.

Giana was ready to scream herself, but she was too out of breath from making her short legs keep up with Paama's.

'Just use the Stick!’ she gasped.

'You're right. We do need a stick, but there isn't one big enough!’ Paama said, looking around in desperation.

They had drawn level with the boys in the water. Paama danced sideways along the bank, keeping in line with them and in pace with the slow current, but hesitant to risk diving in and struggling to bring one wildly flailing body to land.

'If only there were a branch or snag that they could hold on to,’ she wailed.

There are any number of trees that grow on the banks of rivers, and it is in the nature of trees to occasionally lose a limb to age and decay. Time and wind cooperated to bring to breaking strain the dying branch of an overhanging tree several metres downstream. The branch tore free with an awful creaking and cracking and fell with a sloshing splash into the river, immediately lodging firmly against the rocks. The boys drifted into it and clung fast. Giana stopped short, stunned by Paama's words and their effect.

'Thank God,’ gasped Paama.

Then the third boy rushed up and helped Paama drag the stricken youngster out of the water. His would-be rescuer, who was still curled over from that hard kick, was able to pull himself out onto the bank without help. Giana stood for a moment, hands limp at her sides with relief, watching as they sat or sprawled on the grass and fussed over the injured boy. He was sobbing and coughing from the pain in his wrist and the water he had swallowed while screaming, but he was too loud to be anything but alive. She came up to them, put her arms akimbo, and looked down at them critically.

'Well, I suppose that wasn't too bad, though it was a bit? Much. A more subtle use of the currents, perhaps, or—'

'Shut up,’ said the uninjured boy, getting up and shoving roughly at her shoulder.

She staggered back and stared at him, appalled at such rudeness.

'Stop that,’ Paama snapped. ‘Both of you, make yourselves useful and go up to the village and get help.'

The boy trotted off immediately. Paama turned her full attention to Giana. She seemed increasingly irritable now that the crisis was over.

'And you, little girl, don't come back down to the river unless your mother is with you. Can you imagine if it had been you in the water? You might not have been so lucky.'

'But—'

'Don't answer back. Do you want me to tell your mother what a disobedient little girl you are? Now go!'

Giana went.

The evening's debriefing was depressingly short.

'How are the lessons going?'

'I don't mean to be difficult, but explain to me again why Paama needs to be taught how to use the Stick when she seems to be playing it so well by sheer instinct.'

'Don't make me mention any names.'

There was a contrite silence, and then, ‘I know, I know. I'm a little stressed. I have had to face some challenges because of the nature of my chosen shadow.'

'Be direct. Remember, you don't have to take away her memories. But no-one else must find out.'

'I know,’ muttered the junior djombi morosely. ‘I know.'

The morning after, Paama was sweeping her doorstep when she looked up and saw the little girl from the river. She was walking alone, despondently kicking at dust with her bare toes. Paama's heart softened.

'Child, come here,’ she called.

The girl came up to her and looked up into her face with a surprisingly anxious expression. Paama remembered how many times she had scolded her the day before and was instantly contrite.

'The boys will be all right. They have been warned not to play in the river again until they are older. So, you see it's not just you.'

The girl didn't seem satisfied by this news. She said sorrowfully, ‘I didn't go down to the river to play. I went to see you. '

Paama was surprised and touched by the earnestness in the child's tone but did not know how to respond to it. Then she found something to say.

'I have just finished baking small cakes. Would you like to come in and have some?'

The small face lit up. ‘Yes, thank you!'

When they got inside, she seemed slightly dismayed that Paama's sister and mother were also in the kitchen, but after a few of the cakes were inside her, she was much more cheerful.

'May I come back and see you tomorrow?’ she asked Paama with the directness of innocence.

'Yes, once your mother agrees,’ Paama said.

'She will now that Gran has spoken to her. I think that mothers worry far too much about their children, don't you? It's very stifling.'

Paama raised her eyebrows, but Tasi and Neila looked at each other, smiled, and shook their heads fondly. The child was so precocious—an endearing trait at six, but Paama silently hoped that Giana's mother would shake it out of her before six more years were past.

a senior djombi misses something dear to him

We are going to leave Paama and Giana for a while, because there are other things happening elsewhere that we should examine now lest they surprise us later on.

Picture a hall. The roof is vaulted timber with winged creatures carved into the beams that arch overhead. It is like looking into the bottom of a boat, most likely the Ark, given the presence of the creatures, and yet perhaps not, since no such beasts ever survived the Flood. The floor is cold stone, dark and light, like an oversized chessboard. There are pillars, also of stone, that lend a solid, reassuring support to the descending arc of the roof. The stone of the pillars glitters faintly, as if hewn of some unpolished gem.

Beyond the pillars are more pillars, presumably supporting similar roof structures, a whole fleet of upturned boats to the right and to the left of this main enclosure. If there are walls, I cannot see them to give you any report of them.

It is supposed to be majestic, the hall of a high lord. Instead, it is empty, sterile, and cold, speaking not of present pomp, but of ultimate futility. It proclaims that all is vanity.

There is a throne. The throne is unoccupied.

Now that you have that scene firmly in your heads, I can bring in the villain.

No, Ansige was not the villain of the story. He was the joker, the momentary hindrance, the test of character for Paama's growth and learning. He was the unfortunate, but not the villain. You may have felt sorry for Ansige, you may have laughed at Ansige, but you will not laugh at this person.

I have mentioned previously the three different categories of undying ones. Never assume that these categories represent boundaries that are never crossed or lines that cannot be redrawn. It is not the known danger that we most fear, the shark that patrols the bay, the lion that rules the savannah. It is the betrayal of what we trust and hold close to our hearts that is our undoing: the captain who staves in the boat, the king who sells his subjects into slavery, the child who murders the parent.

The djombi are like the human creatures they meddle with, apt either to great evil or great good, and sometimes they switch sides.

This one was the unknown danger. He had switched sides. He had started with benevolence, with the belief that there is a fine potential in humankind waiting only to be tapped. He now viewed the whole stinking breed as a pest and a plague. We may view him as a villain, but he would see us as cockroaches.

He had made for himself a very striking shadow. During his days of borrowing shadows, he had noted how responsive the human creature could be to a messenger clothed in classic beauty. As he became more powerful, he was careful at first, making his image handsome enough, but not too handsome to excite envy, and always being careful to add that slight signature difference that underlined his alien nature. Then he did less of walking with the creatures and more of observing and influencing from a distance, and he discovered that a form closer to the ideal obtained better results for his brief visitations. Even then, if he had only realised it, he had started to slip, caring less and less about the people he was supposed to be helping, and focusing much more on the respect and admiration that he felt was his due right as a superior being. When at last he became cynical, he set his form and features to the zenith of perfection, and then, instead of choosing a subtle mark, he made his skin deep indigo—a stark and utter setting apart that provoked as much of horror as of awe, mingled as it was with that unearthly beauty.