Francisco scratched at his beard with the tip of the scrimshaw knife as he gazed east. The rising glow of Tamanuiterā’s forehead peaked over the horizon. The wrecked remains of Francisco’s ship shadowed the reef where it had rested for so many years. Distracted, the blade scraped his skin, and the trickle of blood through his thick whiskers pulled his attention back to the task at hand.
The canoe.
“You expect too much of such a small thing, Sussy.”
Francisco smiled at Aio’s pet name for him. He put the bloodied knife back to work carving at the wood, but his eyes drifted over her beauty.
She looked out at the ship's wreckage. “That awful ship was for conquest and adventure, not for joy. Let yourself enjoy the hobby. Create something that can just be. Something that can bring joy.”
“Perhaps I, like that ship, was made for conquest and adventure, Aio, not joy.”
“You bring me joy.” She leaned over and kissed him gently. “Someday, maybe, you will find yours as well.”
“Maybe this canoe will bring blessings from Tangaroa.” Francisco tried to accept the island gods, so different from what he’d worshiped in Spain. Tangaroa, the Sea King, seemed like the most natural fit.
Aio crouched next to the canoe and ran her fingers over the carved designs. “Tangaroa already blesses us.”
Francisco eased out a contented sigh. Their girls played in the forested mounds at the edge of the beach. As ever, Hunapo climbed dangerously high, clambering to a precarious perch on a branch where she could watch her father work. From on high, she told one of her stories. Kiri, two years older but half as adventurous, looked up at her younger sister from a nearby bush, with wide-eyed horror, but purely enthralled.
“Don’t let them hurt themselves too badly,” Aio said through a smile. Another kiss, and she left, returning to the village to begin the day’s tasks.
Francisco continued working, letting all worry and thought vanish as he focused on the simple hobby. Time passed easily, and the distant giggles and gasps of his daughters faded into the background, merging with the wind and sea and soft carving sounds.
“Conquest and adventure, eh?” A pained whisper, coming from all around him and from nowhere. “Forgotten your mission?”
The air before him shimmered. It could have been a trick of the light. The sunrise beams reflecting off the calm Pacific waters. An illusion brought on by sun-glare and aging eyes. But it wasn’t. It was Georgio. Long-dead Georgio.
“I have not forgotten.”
“Yet you dawdle!” The ghostly face spat fury. His translucent body was shredded and battered, bloated by drowning, gnawed upon by sea life. But that face was of his closest friend, the man who had navigated the expedition so bravely until the fateful wreck.
Francisco sighed. “I remember the mission, dearest Georgio.”
“You remember the ghost of the mission, much as you see only the ghost of me. It fades from your memory.”
Francisco stood and flung the knife into the soft sand. “I remember! I am trapped, but I still remember!”
“So you say, but it fades.” The ghostly image of Francisco’s dear friend and navigator dissipated as the sun broke through low-lying clouds. “It fades…”
“I will not forget.” Francisco bent to pick up the knife. His back ached. Too many years stranded. Too old. Too frail. He carved. Until Tamanuiterā settled into shadows far behind him, he carved.
A whisper woke him. You stay because they trap you with their love. The voice was not Georgio. Not Aio. Not Kiri or Hunapo. It was a distorted hiss, like the corpse of a sea snake given unholy life. It was not from outside, but somehow from within his own head. I will remove that temptation for you.
Francisco sat up and shook his head. It was dusk. He didn’t remember falling asleep. He saw nobody. “Who’s there?”
I’m just a simple god who wants to help you. Call me Whiro.
Whiro? A chill shiver pierced the sensitive space at the back of Francisco’s neck. “God of the Dead. I’ve heard of you and your House of Death. Tales around the cooking fire.” Francisco didn’t add that those tales always ended in despair.
I sense your lack of trust. But I am the only one who can bring you what you truly want. Not this complacent life, but the life of adventure that you once led.
“I don’t need any help.“ Francisco looked around, listened. Long shadows stretched across the beach, but no frolicking little ones played within them. The wind and the waves whistled and rushed, but no giggling child voices joined them. “Where are my girls?”
The hissing voice embedded an evil smile. I will simply remove the temptation. The hiss faded away. ...remove the temptation...
Francisco leapt to his feet. “Hunapo!” he yelled. “Kiri!”
Only silence answered his calls. Silence, and a bitter chill. That could have been from fear, but as he stumbled across the beach, calling for his daughters, he realized it wasn’t only fear. There was something cold, an icy premonition that emanated from the forest shadows. But he could see nothing out of the ordinary.
Francisco licked a finger and held it up. He walked slowly in circles, feeling for the chill. Took a few steps, felt again. Triangulation. Georgio would be so proud of my navigational skills.
Carefully navigating through the trees and underbrush, he found the source of the chill. A boulder rested against the trunk of a bent kauri tree, and in the gap produced by their union a dark crevice led down into darkness. It was just large enough for a man of his size to squeeze in, or two small girls.
The tales of Whiro often spoke of his evil realm, his House of Death, where he lured unsuspecting mortals to their early demise. From within the crevice, a hissing voice laughed up at him. “Come join us, Francisco. Perhaps we can make a deal.”
Then that familiar friendly voice. “Come down, old friend. I found a way to help you escape your prison.”
Georgio.
Francisco sat down, slid his feet into the crevice, and pushed. He fell, far and fast, until he splashed into the deepest, coldest water he had suffered since the night of the shipwreck.
In the world above, a rogue wave tugged at the canoe, and pulled it out to sea.
Francisco gasped for air as he broke through the surface. He tried to yell for his girls, but coughed up a lungful of brackish water.
“Father!” Kiri’s whisper was quiet, but urgent. “I’m over here. Stay silent or they might hear you.”
The darkness and water in his eyes conspired to keep Francisco blinded, so he followed the sound of Kiri’s voice, swimming until his hands hit a jagged rocky shore. The rocks cut into his palms and knees as he crawled out of the water.
“Quick, before they find us!”
He stumbled towards Kiri. As his eyes adjusted, shadows came into view around him. He was standing amongst the mounds near the beach where he had been carving the canoe, but filtered through a nightmare. Stones, trees, bushes, and flowers dotted the rocky landscape, all twisted renditions of those from the island. The sounds of cheerful bird calls and crashing waves were here replaced by distant screams and deathly groans. Even the crisp sea air here smelled like decomposing fish and seaweed. Only his daughter looked the same, healthy, but terrified.
“Where’s Hunapo? What happened? We have to get out of here.”
“I couldn’t stop her, Father. She’s so fast, and she gets these ideas in her head…” Kiri’s words devolved into sobs.
Francisco knelt down beside her, oblivious to the pain from his shredded knees. “I know you did your best. Tell me what happened.”
By the time Kiri’s tearful story was done, Francisco knew a little, and didn’t know a lot more.
“So there were two scary looking people, and they took her into the forest…”
Kiri nodded.
“They told her they had a present for her in the village, and that I would be very proud of her.”
Kiri nodded.
“And they didn’t see you because a fish told you to hide.”
Kiri nodded.
Francisco closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His beautiful and flamboyant daughter was a prisoner of Whiro, the vile god of death. That villain was aided by his treacherous former friend and crewmate, Georgio. They were trapped, but there would be no escape until they were all together.
“We need to find Hunapo and save her. Then get out of here. Let’s go.”
They set off through the twisted hellscape towards what he hoped was the village.
Francisco and Kiri walked through a nightmare version of their idyllic island home. Everything felt familiar, enough that Francisco could follow the subtle hints of the path. Darkness enveloped them, as though midnight and dense clouds cloaked the entire island. Skittering sounds hinted at vile companions joining them on their journey, interrupted by distant moans and screams. The smell of decay and the taste of blood kissed at Francisco’s senses.
“They’re touching me,” Kiri said, leaning closely into her father’s side.
Invisible fingers brushed against them. Cobwebs and crawling insects picked at their exposed skin.
“Just ignore them. They can’t hurt us unless we let them.” Francisco was sure that was a lie.
A vicious snarl broke the silence behind them. Francisco spun, pushing Kiri behind him. Through the dense shadows, two twisted men approached them. Scars of disease and violence pockmarked their faces. Tattered rags dangled from their scrawny shoulders. They exposed dagger-like fangs and razor-sharp claws, prepared to tear him and Kiri to bloody shreds.
Well they weren’t going to get his daughter.
“Kiri, run! Find Hunapo and get to the beach!”
Francisco held up the scrimshaw knife in a fighting position, the tip of the blade threatening the creature to his right while he held his hand protectively towards the left. He just had to defend himself long enough for Kiri to escape. If he had to lose a hand, or his life, to do so then it would be a worthwhile sacrifice. As the sound of Kiri’s sprinting footsteps vanished down the path behind him, he prayed to his Spanish god and his Island gods. Whoever would answer. Save my little girls.
The twisted men approached, flanking as they got closer. Francisco was no stranger to violence, but the battles on the ship had been long ago, and he had been much younger. He shuffled backwards along the path, small steps to maintain balance, keeping the point of the knife angled threateningly. His eyes flicked back and forth as the beasts spread out to either side. His lips parted in a dark grin–triangulation had never been less fun. If they fully flanked him he wouldn’t have a chance.
He feinted to the left, enough to make that creature slow its pace, then hurled himself at the creature to his right. With his left arm he bludgeoned the creature arms down, feeling the filthy claws pierce and slash his forearm. A tendon near his elbow severed and numbness absorbed his left hand. But with the beast’s arms pressed down, its throat was exposed. Francisco plunged the knife home, piercing through its jugular and into the esophagus. It gargled a death growl and collapsed, crushed beneath Francisco’s weight.
Francisco tried to push himself up as he heard the rushed footsteps behind him, but his crippled left arm collapsed under his weight and he tumbled to his side, barely able to hold the knife up defensively as the creature leapt.
At least he had slowed them down. Maybe the girls would survive.
Your sacrifice was welcome. The voice echoed in his head, like the slithering voice of Whiro had, but this voice was different. It rumbled like the incoming tide. Crashed like the waves on rocks. It was the ocean-deep voice of Tangaroa, the Sea King. A small boon, to show my appreciation and facilitate future offerings.
As the twisted man-beast leapt upon Francisco, teeth and claws tearing at his chest and face, the scrimshaw knife exploded with the force of all seven seas. Waves of seawater slammed against the creature, flinging it back into the darkness.
A waterspout, a tornado sucking water from the ocean, plucked Francisco up like so much flotsam and spun him high into the air. Francisco held the knife handle with both hands as he spun around and around until he was nauseous. Icy saltwater pelted him, burning his bleeding wounds. His ears pounded with the roaring of waves and storms. He couldn’t focus. His vision swirled. The world was a blur around him with only the occasional glimpse of forest or path through the waves. Through flashes, he realized the waterspout was pulling him along the path, through the nightmare forest, towards the village.
Francisco had lost all sense of time and direction when, as suddenly as it had appeared, the waterspout collapsed. It ejected him onto a pile of dead, rotted plants. He landed hard and felt a rib or two crack. He tried to clutch his side with his useless left arm and groaned. He breathed a lungful of fiery pain. His vision blurred and he felt darkness overtaking him.
No. He couldn’t collapse. He couldn’t fail. He had to save his girls.
He carefully sat up, cradling his arm and taking small breaths to manage the pain in his side. It took a moment for his vision and spinning stomach to stabilize. He was in the village, in Aio’s immaculate garden behind their home. At least, a darkness-twisted version of that garden.
“So then I climbed the tree, and that let me get to the flower.” Hunapo’s voice brought a desperate smile to Francisco’s face. “I picked the flower, and the gecko was on the flower, so then he ran off the flower…” She was alive, and keeping someone entertained, or at least distracted, with her stories.
Francisco crept towards the house and peered through the doorway. Hunapo sat on a desiccated bundle of thatch and talked at the two people standing before her. Francisco tried to focus on one, but its form shimmered and faded into shadow. Whiro, if the stories were true. The other was easily recognizable–Georgio.
“Well, the gecko didn’t like that, so he bit the butterfly. Of course, a butterfly is no match for a gecko if you take flying out of consideration…”
How could he save Hunapo? And where was Kiri? And even if he saved both, what then? Then, in the shadowy back doorway to the house, he saw Kiri. She looked frantically at Hunapo, but what could she do? Nothing if Whiro or Georgio weren’t distracted.
Francisco strode into the room. “I want to make a deal.”
“They don’t need to die, old friend.” Georgio’s rotted face forced a smile. “Finish the mission. Return home with me and tell them what you found. Of this land ripe for plunder.”
In the shadows behind Georgio and the death god, Hunapo stared, wide eyed. She had stopped her storytelling upon seeing her father enter the room, and she stayed silent as Kiri tugged on her arm.
“The ship is wrecked, Navigator. There’s no way to return home.”
I can solve that simple problem. Moray eels slithered through Francisco’s ears as Whiro spoke. I merely need a living body to helm the ship, and I can bring it to life.
Francisco hated himself for considering the god’s words. For even giving them a second’s thought. But he did. Aio, the girls, yes, they brought him joy. But perhaps he was not made for joy, but for conquest and adventure.
“You must let my girl go, and you must not harm them after I leave.”
Of course. You have the promise of a god.
Georgio smiled.
Francisco frowned. Too easy a deal. “Why would you let my family live? Don’t you bask in the joy of death?”
A sense of violent ecstasy washed over Francisco. Imagine the death when your people learn of this island. Imagine the horror and destruction they will bring.
Of course. Aio and the girls would never be safe if he made this deal. He couldn’t have it both ways. He had to make a choice.
Francisco made a show of thinking. He pondered. He humphed. He hemmed. “It would be nice to finish the mission.” He paused some more. “I’ve oft hoped to return home. It has been so very long.” He watched from the corner of his eye as Hunapo and Kiri snuck out the back doorway and ran to the forest path, towards the sea.
“It’s a simple decision, old friend. Finish the mission, or they die.”
Then the soothing crashing wave voice of the Sea King entered Francisco’s mind. I sense your uncertainty. The rumbling ocean floated through him, calming and encouraging. You are blessed by me and I will protect you.
“Whiro, I do not accept the terms of your deal.” The shimmering shadow face erupted into rage and hate. Francisco turned, and ran.
The moray eels slithered into Francisco’s mind as he sprinted. I will slaughter you all!
But from all around him, the power of the ocean thundering upon rocky shores boomed into words. THIS MAN AND HIS FAMILY HAVE MY BLESSING, GOD OF DEATH.
Not while they’re in my domain, Sea Fool!
But the Sea God is powerful on an island. Francisco didn’t look back as he heard waves crashing behind him and the frustrated gurgling howls of Whiro and Georgio as they battled the Sea God’s power.
These frustrated howls and intrusive mental screams drove Francisco as he sprinted down the trail. Soon, he caught up with his girls. They sat in a canoe, which floated in the air a couple of feet above the ground. His canoe? The one he’d been carving for a year?
“Get in!” Kiri yelled with a certainty and bravery Francisco had never heard from the shy girl’s lips.
Francisco grabbed Hunapo and Kiri’s hands and lept into the canoe as it sailed out to the dark seas, out of the House of Death, and into the rising sun.
Tamanuiterā’s forehead peaked over the horizon. The shadows of the old shipwreck diminished as the waves tore at it, tugging it from its perch on the reefs and dragging it below the surface. A distant moan was the last he would hear of Georgio as the sinking ship pulled the navigator’s soul to its eternal rest.
The girls both lay nestled in the soft sand near the treeline, sleeping hard, and missed the whole spectacle.
Soft footsteps padded through the sand behind him.
“What are you looking at, Sussy?” Then she noticed the wounds and the blood. “Gods, Sussy! What happened? You’re hurt!”
Francisco turned from the ship and let his gaze settle fully on Aio. His left arm dangled useless and the cuts burned. His ribs were a throbbing drumbeat. But the pain was a distant thought as he looked upon Aio’s worried face and at the girls, sleeping peacefully.
“I was just distracted from my joy for a while.” He embraced Aio and kissed her dark hair. “But never again.”
–END
Author’s Note: I originally wrote this for the NYC Midnight short fiction contest where it got 5th place. The prompt was something about a hobby, a navigator, and a fantasy setting. Francisco de Hoces is a minor character in my novel DAYS GONE BY, and I wanted to investigate his origins a bit. I like how this short story turned out, and I like the insight it gave me into Francisco’s background and character. Although, when you meet him in DAYS GONE BY, he’s barely recognizable from the fairly happy and comprehensible man you meet in this story.
Copyright 2024 Abram Dress
Love this updated version!