Isle of Tears (19 page)

Together they moved on until they reached a place beyond the swamp where it would be safe to harbour for the night. They had encountered other survivors on the way, all wearing the same stunned and dismayed expressions, and had passed Ahumai over to the care of her own people, and the body of the little boy to a woman who said she knew to whom he belonged.

Isla, Mere, Atarangi and the other Ngati Pono women spent
another night without sleep, going among the wounded and doing what they could to ease their pain. There was plenty of water now as they had camped beside a stream, but still little food except for a handful of eels, half a dozen speared kereru, and some karaka berries and pikopiko.

When the sun rose the next morning, two of the wounded had died. Niel was no worse, but neither was he any better. He still could not move his legs at all, and had shamed himself by soiling his trousers. Isla had shushed him as she’d removed them and cleaned him up, but he had fallen into a bitter silence by the time she had returned from washing the trousers in the stream. Frightened for Niel, and dismayed at what the future might hold for him, she asked Mere what she should do.

But Mere didn’t know. ‘I have seen it once or twice before, but those afflicted never walked again.’

‘Could we no’ try and take the shrapnel or whatever it is oot o’ his back? I’ve seen ye take a bullet oot before.’

‘Not from the backbone. I am told that once that has been damaged, nothing else can be done.’

Isla regarded Mere with a mixture of dread and disbelief. ‘But ye ken how tae fix everything else. Why can ye no’ fix this?’

‘Because I am not God, Isla!’ Mere snapped. ‘I am sorry, but I am not. You have already asked me this. If I could do something, do you not think that I would?’

Her eyes downcast, Isla remained silent. At last she asked, ‘The ones that ye saw, the ones who had the same sort o’ wound, how long did they live?’

Mere rubbed her hand over her face; her skin was pale with fatigue and there were purple shadows beneath her eyes. ‘One lived for five months, then died from some sort of sickness of the chest. The other … well, the other lived on for almost three years.’

Isla was horrified. ‘But how did he get aboot? Who looked after him?’

‘She. Her sisters cared for her. She had to be cleaned every day because of the … mess, her food was brought to her, and she was carried everywhere she needed to go. She became very angry, and in the end she lost her spirit.’

Isla dreaded the answer she might receive, but still she asked: ‘What did she die of, in the end?’

But Mere didn’t answer.

Niel, propped up against a tree, wouldn’t eat his portion of eel, turning his head away and clamping his mouth shut like a recalcitrant child.

When Isla had put the food aside, he demanded, ‘What does Mere say?’

‘What aboot?’ Isla replied, trying to keep her voice light.

‘Aboot ma fucking legs!’ Niel barked, striking his inert thighs with both fists.

‘I havenae talked tae her aboot it.’

‘Ye bloody have. I ken verra well ye have. Can they be fixed or no’?’ His eyes bored into hers. ‘Tell me, Isla. What did she say?’

‘Nothing!’

Niel gripped her sleeve. ‘Dinnae lie, Isla. I can always tell when you’re lying.’

Isla wrenched her arm away. He was in pain and frightened, she knew that, but he had no right to be cruel to her. ‘All right, I’ll tell ye! She said there’s nothing tae be done! All right? They cannae be fixed.’

An expression of bitter satisfaction settled on Niel’s face. ‘Then I’ll have tae fix it masel’.’

‘What d’ye mean?’

‘I said yesterday I’ll no’ live like this. I cannae move, I cannae hunt or fight. And I’ll certainly no’ be putting up wi’ shitting in ma breeks for the rest o’ ma life. Ye can forget that.’

Isla tried to swallow the dread burning in her throat. ‘I’ll look after ye, Niel. Ye ken that.’

‘Aye, and what sort o’ life will that be for ye, eh? Cooking ma food and wiping ma arse every morning? No’ tae mention what sort o’ life it would be for
me.’

‘What are ye going tae do, Niel?’ Isla took his cold hands and pressed them between hers. ‘Tell me, please.’

He looked away. ‘Finish it. Masel’.’

Isla jerked back as though he had struck her. ‘Oh, Niel, no, ye cannae do that!’

‘I can and I will,’ he said stubbornly, still refusing to meet her eyes.

But Isla saw the tremor in his hands as they rested now on his useless legs, and knew he was as frightened of the prospect of taking his own life as she was. Those who did so could never enter
the Kingdom of Heaven, and the corpse of a self-murderer could never be buried in the sanctity of a kirkyard, the soul condemned to wander the Earth afraid and alone for eternity.

He turned to her, tears pouring down his face now. ‘You do it, Isla. Please.’

Aghast, Isla scrambled away from him. ‘No, Niel, I willnae! And ye’ve no right tae ask me!’ She leapt to her feet and ran, ignoring Niel as he shouted after her, ‘Please help me, Isla!
Please!’

She ran through the camp, dodging startled people, and not even stopping when Tai called her name, and splashed across the stream into the bush beyond. She ran until she couldn’t hear the stream any more, then fell to her knees, covered her face with her hands and wept.

When she returned to the camp an hour later, Niel was dead from a single, precise blow to the back of his head. She screamed and screamed, and fought Tai as he tried to wrap her in his arms, kicking and biting and cursing and scratching at his face until she finally collapsed, delirious with grief.

Nobody would tell her who had given Niel what he wanted.

Nobody ever told her.

B
AY OF
P
LENTY
, A
PRIL

M
ere paled visibly, and the other Ngati Pono women began a low keening. A distraught Wira had just told them of a clash with British troops at Maketu, and that Te Arawa had declared as kupapa.

‘The twins,’ Isla whispered, feeling the blood drain from her face. ‘I have tae go tae them!’

‘You will not!’ Wira commanded. ‘Look beyond the parapets, girl. You will never get past Cameron’s army! I forbid it.’ Noting the tears that Isla was valiantly trying to hold back, his voice softened. ‘Do you not think I am also worried sick about what could be happening to our children? Of course I am, and if I could I would go to them straight away. But it is impossible. We are on the eve of battle. We must wait. Do you understand that?’

It was now late April, and Ngati Pono were at Tauranga, in the formidable and complex Gate Pa, newly built.

Isla closed her eyes and imagined herself slipping through the imperial lines, past the many hundreds of nervous and trigger-happy soldiers wide awake in anticipation of the next day’s battle. But how would she find her way to Maketu? She knew none of the tracks, and it was already dark. And what if the children had already been captured by the Arawa or by British soldiers? It must be known that they were Ngati Pono, whose hapu had fought throughout the Waikato against the Queen’s men. But how could she begin to rescue them on her own?

Very reluctantly, she met Wira’s gaze. ‘Aye, I will wait. But after the battle.…’

Wira patted her hand. ‘Ae. Wait until tomorrow at least. And remember, Pikaki is with them. She is old, but she is very…wise.’

Isla knew he meant ‘cunning’, and felt a fraction more at ease.

Isla sat with her head bowed, ignoring the drizzling rain trickling through her hair and down her neck. Before her stood two tohunga—a Christian minister and a priest of the Maori gods—leading Gate Pa’s occupants through prayers asking for immunity from injury and death, and, most important of all, defeat. Above them the war flag of Ngai Te Rangi, the people of Tauranga, flapped in a desultory manner in the wet wind.

A watery sun had just risen and Cameron’s army could be seen spread out on the slope before the pa, readying themselves for the coming battle.

The minister, standing on a pile of earth and wearing a surplice that made him look like a ghost, intoned: ‘May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of—’

Isla heard the first shell whistle in over the parapet and threw herself flat on the ground, but it struck the minister and exploded, blasting pieces of his body in all directions. Isla frantically wiped at the bloodied scraps that had speckled her and looked at Tai in horror.

‘Move!’ he barked, pulling her to her feet. ‘They are aiming at the flag.’

All around them people were scattering; some to the bunkers, but most to the rifle pits. The shells began to rain down then, and continued to do so until four o’clock that afternoon, when finally—mercifully—they stopped. The palisades had been reduced to rows of broken sticks, and the parapets pummelled into shapeless heaps of dirt. It was clear that Cameron was about to storm the pa: a heavy gun had been dragged to a position from which its fire was forcing the defenders inside to keep their heads down.

Isla lay on her belly in a depression in the parapet and watched as four columns—foot soldiers, and naval ratings with their cutlasses and pistols—lined up before the largest breach in the palisade. The signal came, and as they trotted through the gap Isla almost had to avert her eyes as they were instantly mown
down by a deafening fusillade of fire from the warriors in the rifle pits. Had Cameron thought they were all dead, inside the pa? She looked to the rear and saw that some of the defenders who had run out of the back of the pa had encountered soldiers lying in wait there, and had turned and rushed back in.

By now there seemed to be hundreds of Cameron’s men crowded into the fortifications, and both sides had resorted to vicious hand-to-hand fighting. The scene was chaotic and hopeless, and the soldiers and sailors must have realized that, because they soon fled back out through the palisade, leaving behind many dozens of their dead and wounded.

As stunned as everyone else, Isla slowly got to her feet and joined in the wild cheering as it became obvious that the Kingites had won the battle. Below her, among the low ferns covering the hill, imperial troops milled about in the growing dusk, looking bewildered and barely responding to the orders their officers barked. But the situation within the pa was also grim. Although there were far more British bodies on the ground than Maori, Isla could see that many of those who had been wounded or killed were rangatira—always a terrible blow. She made her way down to the bunkers, and, with Mere and the other women, began to minister to the Kingite wounded as best she could.

By the time night fell completely, some of the injured British soldiers had died. Isla wondered aloud if those who remained alive should be carried outside to their comrades, but no one trusted the imperial troops not to fire on them. It wasn’t, she was ashamed to admit even to herself, that she felt any particular concern for the
enemy wounded, but what if some were not as disabled as they appeared, and managed to wreak more havoc? Mere agreed with her, but when she mentioned this to Tai, he laughed.

‘You are becoming a hard woman, Isla McKinnon. A proper wahine toa.’

Isla wasn’t sure that she wanted to be viewed as a woman warrior, but an Englishman had murdered her mother and father, and others had been indirectly responsible for her brother’s death. What other perspective could she possibly have?

But someone, at least, was able to put aside their animosity and show concern for the enemy wounded. Heni Te Kiri Karamu, a half-caste woman who had fought alongside her brother, was methodically going among the injured imperial soldiers, her cartridge belt still around her waist, giving them water. She left, however, when the Kingites evacuated the pa, taking their wounded with them but leaving the imperial casualties to their own.

Outside, to the rear of the fortifications, they crept past the nervous British and melted into the night.

The next morning, Tai and Isla had a noisy and very public difference of opinion when it became clear that nothing was going to stop Isla from going after her brother and sister.

‘Wait!’ Tai urged, losing his temper. ‘Wait until the fighting is over here. Then I will come with you. We will take a taua. You cannot go by yourself.’

‘I can!’ Isla insisted. ‘And when
will
the fighting be finished
here, eh? It may be too late by then. They could be…’ She trailed off, not wanting to say it aloud. ‘And anyway, I’ll no’
be
by masel’, I’ll have Laddie wi’ me.’

Tai snorted in disgust. ‘A dog cannot fire a weapon!’

Several interested observers laughed at this.

‘No, but he can growl tae warn me, and he can bite and chase. And he’s loyal. He followed us all the way from Braeburn, ye ken!’

Tai did know—he’d heard the story of Laddie’s unfailing loyalty endless times before. ‘But it will not be the same as being with a party of armed warriors, will it?’

Isla stamped her foot so hard it hurt. ‘I dinnae
care
, Tai! I’m gonnae go and that’s that!’

‘At least take Mere with you.’

‘No! Mere and the other women need tae stay wi’ you! Otherwise who will tend tae the wounded?’

Tai stood, marched off a few feet, then turned to face her again. ‘I am your husband, Isla, and I will not let you go.’

Isla walked up and punched him on the arm. ‘I dinnae care if you’re King Tawhiao himself, I
will
go!’

The audience gave a low ‘oooh’.

Tai lifted his hand, then lowered it as Laddie growled.

‘See!’ Isla exclaimed. ‘He’ll protect me!’

‘A warrior with mana does not raise his hand to his own wife, nephew,’ Mere said reprovingly. It was not protocol to interfere in the business of a married couple, but she’d decided that enough was enough.

‘But she will not
listen!’
Tai replied, exasperated almost beyond endurance.

Mere said what everyone else could clearly see. ‘That is because her mind is made up. You will not change it.’

Tai turned to Wira. ‘You tell her, uncle. You are our rangatira.’

Wira’s eyes darted from Tai to the unyielding expression on Mere’s face, and back again. Because they had conferred rather energetically about it themselves during the night, albeit more privately than Tai and Isla, he knew that although Mere feared for Isla’s safety, she approved of Isla going to find the Ngati Pono children. She had argued that, of all of them, Isla had the best chance of getting through any imperial cordon around Maketu, because she was not Maori. And if the children had moved on, then she could follow them—she would be moving much faster and was therefore very likely to catch up with them. She was a very capable girl, Mere had reminded him, more than able to manage a weapon and look after herself. And that dog of hers could be very vicious if he thought his mistress was under threat; they had all seen that. So if she wanted to go after her kinfolk, well, who really had the right to stop her?

Wira held out his hands beseechingly. ‘What can I say, Tai? It is her choice, and she has made up her mind. And we all want to know that our women and children are safe.’

At this, there was a murmur of agreement from everyone else.

Tai cursed spectacularly, then stood with his hands on his hips,

his head down. Finally, knowing that he was beaten, he turned to Isla. ‘When do you want to go? But I want to make it clear that I still do not agree.’

Isla stroked his arm and looked up at him. ‘I ken ye dinnae, mo leannan, but I have tae go. Ye do understand that, aye?’

‘Ae, I do. But I will worry, Isla. I will worry from the moment you leave my sight.’

Isla felt tears pricking at her eyes. ‘I’ll take care o’ masel’, Tai, dinnae fret aboot that.’

There was a long silence as they stared into one another’s eyes, broken only by a watery sniff from Harapeta.

Then Mere clapped her hands. ‘Right! You will need food, and as much ammunition as you can carry.’

‘Will you take a musket?’ Tai asked.

‘No, a tupara, I think,’ Isla replied. ‘A musket’s too hard tae manage in the bush.’

Tai opened his mouth to remind her that the recoil from a double-barrelled shotgun always left her shoulder horribly bruised, if it didn’t knock her over completely, but closed it again. She would not listen to him and she would manage—he knew she would.

A little before she was ready to depart, Tai asked her to walk with him for a few minutes. He took her by the hand and led her away from the Ngati Pono camp and into the forest, until they came to a small glade.

He turned to Isla, took her in his arms and gazed down at her. ‘Promise me, please, Isla, that you will take care of yourself. I know how much you need to see Jean and Jamie again, especially after what has happened with Niel, but if anything were to happen to you, I…’ He trailed off. ‘I do not know what I would do, I really do not. My life would not be…well, I am not sure that I would want to live.’

Yes, you would, Isla thought. If anything happened to me, eventually you would learn to live with it, Tai, because everyone does. Everyone learns to live with the most awful losses, no matter how torn their hearts are to begin with.

But she didn’t say this. Instead, she said what he wanted to hear: ‘I’ll be all right, mo leannan, I will. I’ll no’ be gone long, and as soon as I find them and see that they’re safe, I’ll be back, ye’ll see.’

Tai nodded reluctantly and rubbed his cheek against her hair. Then he lifted her chin and kissed her, his lips soft at first but becoming more insistent.

Isla felt his growing erection press against her and tightened her arms around his neck, her tongue flicking between his lips and meeting his. She felt suddenly very aroused, consumed with the need to be as close to him as possible. He moved away from her to tug off his shirt and drop it on the ground, then embraced her again, his hands running over her shoulders and stroking her throat and neck. In a moment his hands had slipped down to her chest, and she felt a cool breeze as he opened the buttons of her blouse and slid it off her shoulders. The skin on her breasts,
still small and pert but traced now with faint silver marks from her pregnancy, goose-pimpled, but her nipples were already stiff with anticipation.

Tai cupped them in his hands and moaned softly before bending to lick the pale skin. Isla’s head went back in pleasure, and she felt the length of her hair as it swung against her bare shoulders and back. She unlaced her boots and toed them off, then slid one small foot up the back of Tai’s leg, feeling the muscles there bunched and quivering. Her hands ran across his solid chest and shoulders, then she tugged gently on his hair so that his head went back and she buried her mouth in the warmth of his neck, sniffing and licking his salty skin, hoping to imprint his taste on her tongue and his scent in her nostrils as deeply as she could.

She felt his hand fumbling at the buttons of his fly, then he picked her up and carried her across the glade to the trunk of a large puriri and pressed her against it. The old tree’s gnarled bark dug into her bare back, but she barely noticed as she lifted her legs and wrapped them around Tai’s waist. She gasped as he entered her, and tightened her arms around his neck as he began to thrust. There was little of the tenderness he usually demonstrated in his love-making, only the force of his urgency, but she went with him, feeling her own peak approaching as his rhythm increased and he began to groan. In little more than a minute he arched his back and gritted his teeth as he climaxed, and a moment later so did she, waves of intense pleasure radiating out from the point where their bodies were joined. Then just as quickly the strength drained from her limbs and she slumped, her face buried in his damp neck.

His own legs shaking from the force of his release, Tai stepped away from the puriri and gently lowered Isla to the ground. She staggered slightly and sat down, still breathing heavily, while he retrieved his shirt and handed it to her to wipe herself with. He fastened his trouser buttons, sat down beside her and theatrically blew out his cheeks.