Witi Ihimaera - Sky Dancer

“I’m sorry. I don’t know why you weren’t informed. But perhaps we can talk about that another time.”

She was interrupted by a noise in the background. “Hurry up, Lottie,” Quentin called. “There’s an all-points alert out for us on the police network. We gotta go.”

“I thought you should know,” Lottie continued, “that Arnie went with Skylark.”

“I thought he had,” Hoki said. “He wasn’t supposed to.”

“No? He had the claw, the beak and the feather. Ah well, it’s too late to bring him back. Anyhow, just as me and Quentin were leaving the house this morning, I heard Arnie’s voice. Don’t ask me how these things happen, but I think he was trying to get a message through to somebody. He was saying something that sounded like, ‘Mother Ship, are you there, Mother Ship?’”

Hoki gave a gasp of excitement. “What was the message?”

“It sounded like —” Lottie made a guttural cry, imitating a falcon. The sound was so piercing that Hoki had to hold the phone away from her, but she recognised it immediately. It was the call falcons made whenever they needed her.

“Did you get that?” Lottie asked

“Loud and clear,” Hoki answered.

She put the telephone down. Francis appeared, spruced up enough to go to a dance.

“Kua reri koe?” Hoki asked. “So you’re finally ready.” She loaded him down with the backpack of drink and sandwiches and accidentally on purpose, while she was helping his shoulder straps on, mussed his beautifully combed hair. Before he could do a moan about it, she also gave him the shotguns and ammunition.

“What are you carrying?” Francis asked.

“Nephew,” Hoki answered, pretended to be hurt. “I’m just a little old weak lady on crutches.”

Hoki pushed Francis out of the door and followed him up the cliff path to the plateau. Francis stood guard while Hoki laid out the kai. While they were eating, Hoki told Bella about Lottie’s call and her curious claim to have heard Arnie calling for help.

“She must have been dreaming,” Bella said. “Anyhow, there’s nothing we can do for them. They’re on their own. Whatever they’re facing, they’ll have to face by themselves.”

“Yes, I know,” Hoki answered. “I feel so helpless, so frustrated about it. There must be something we can do.”

Once smoko was over, Bella and Mitch went back down to the house for a break. Bella needed to check her traps, and Mitch thought he might go into Tuapa and see some of his mates on the wharf. Hoki and Francis began their watch on the ripped sky, firing intermittently at the seabirds, but Hoki brooded over Arnie’s message. As a young boy, no matter what trouble he was in, he had always relied on her to be there for him.

It was pure frustration that did it.

The day was hot. Hoki glared at the rip in the sky. “Oh, bother, bother, bum,” she said. She walked towards the rip, took a deep breath, balanced herself on one walking stick, gave a mighty heave and threw her shotgun up and into it. The shotgun cartwheeled through the air, went through, and there was a flash as it disappeared.

“What did you do that for!” Francis looked flabbergasted. “You could brain somebody doing that.”

“If seagulls can go through it,” Hoki answered, “so can other things.”

Francis shook his head and muttered, “Well, a shotgun’s no good without ammunition. Waste of a good shotgun.”

In a temper, Hoki grabbed some bandeleros of bullets and gave them to him. “Here,” she said. “Biff these through the rip. Don’t argue, just do it. And while we’re at it —” Before Francis could stop her, Hoki had taken his favourite penknife from his pocket. He had a box of matches there too.

“These are going as well.”

Hoki chucked the penknife and matches through the rip.

“Are you nuts?” Francis yelled. “That was my best penknife. I had to send away to America for it. Stupid woman —”

“Stupid, am I?” Hoki glared. “You’d better watch it or you’ll be next.”

Francis backed away. All Hoki could feel was just the slightest satisfaction that, at the very least, she had made an effort, crazy and futile though it might be, to answer Arnie’s call.

“I hope you like your presents, Arnie,” Hoki said.

The sun hurled itself into the sky like a fireball, drenching the sea the colour of blood. From the unholy Sea of White Feathers arose a loud screaming, cawing, hissing and squealing as the seabird squadrons greet-ed the dawn. Beaks open and wings flapping, they turned black eyes to the island fortress. Three figures appeared on the ramparts: Karuhiruhi, chieftain of seashags; Karoro, his co-conspirator and leader of the black-backed gulls; and Kawanatanga, the leader of the seabirds from the future. Immediately, the cry went up. “Kawanatanga! Karuhiruhi! Karoro! Kawanatanga!”

That’s when Kawanatanga made a big mistake. Presumptuously he stepped forward in front of his ancestor, Karuhiruhi, to receive the acclaim. “This is a fine day to go hunting,” he began, “but not for fish. Rather, it is the flocks of manu whenua that will fill our ovens tonight.”

A thunderous cheer arose from the sea. But just as Kawanatanga was about to resume he heard Karuhiruhi hissing angrily at him. “Step back, Kawanatanga, I command you to step back.” The old bird was quivering with rage, his eyes red and enormous with anger. “You are usurping my position. You may be chief in your world, but in this world I am the chief. It is I and Karoro who lead this army, not you.”

Kawanatanga tried to make light of it. “Our first argument, venerable ancestor?”

Karuhiruhi pushed past him and took the leadership back. “My descendant, Kawanatanga, has forgotten that the youngest born, even though an important person, must be subordinate to his elder.” Then he smiled forgivingly. “On one matter, however, he is right: tonight the ovens will be filled and the flesh that we taste will be birds of the land.”

The seabirds cheered louder than ever, and it was a balm to Karuhiruhi’s wounded vanity. He saw that Areta had come to the dais with his baby son in her arms. He picked up his son and lifted him high above his head. “My brothers, we fight again to overturn the Great Division,” Karuhiruhi continued. “We fight for the new generation, so that they will grow up enjoying the freedom we will surely win for them this day. This time we have the blessing of the Lord Tane, who has sent my descendant Kawanatanga to ensure our victory —”

Karuhiruhi returned his son to Areta. He motioned Kawanatanga forward. He had a magnanimous smile on his face, but his eyes were still angry.

“Bow down before me, mokopuna,” he whispered. “Do it now, so that all can see your allegiance to me. I command you to do it.”

Command? For a fleeting moment Kawanatanga felt murderous rage. How dare Karuhiruhi put him in this position of subservience. Then cold reason flooded his mind. It was imperative to show a united front. Success against the landbirds depended on it. Slowly, Kawanatanga sank to his knees, swallowing his pride as the acclamation mounted — not for him but for Karuhiruhi. Triumphant, Karuhiruhi patted Kawanatanga’s shoulders.

“Waiho ra kia tu takitahi ana nga whetu o te rangi. Let it be one star alone that stands above the others in the sky,” Karuhiruhi said.

Meanwhile, Arnie had been very busy. He had established the frontline of the manu whenua at the seaward end of Manu Valley. The command post, however, was at Chieftain Kawau’s lagoon, deep in the heart of the valley. There, he was trying to convince the Council of War that rather than wait for the war to begin they should go out and meet the advancing enemy.