The massage

   My back hurt a lot. It started to get on my nerves that every single morning, without fail, I woke up with every bone in my body aching as if I had been practicing some gymnastics routine while sleeping. I didn’t know if it was the mattress or if my sleep routine had somehow been disrupted. Whatever it was, I had to find a solution fast or my spine would be gravely affected and I would have to sleep on the floor. I would have wanted to change the mattress but that wasn’t really an option: I lived in a rented room and the owner might have an opinion about it. Besides, even if I could do it, I didn’t have the amount of money to allow myself to do such an investment. So the mattress, even if it was the wrong one, was not the answer to my problems.

 So I decided to do something for myself. My body was in pain and I needed to make it better, to be able to walk in the morning without feeling hundreds of knives penetrating my skin. So I decided to try some exercises before and after sleeping time but that wasn’t a very good idea. Not only because I had never done any exercise whatsoever, but also because they didn’t seem to be affecting my sleep. Sometimes I moved less during the night but I had the same back pain as always. I was grateful that hadn’t worked because it could be quite an annoyance to workout just before and after you sleep. I mean, those are the two worst moments of the day to do any physical activity, even if I had been willing to do so. There had to be a better idea, more suited to me.

 It came to my attention one day, while I was taking a walk around the neighborhood. I was new to the area so I wanted to know about all the restaurants, supermarkets and stores in general that operated around my building. Two streets over, I discovered a spa. The entrance was quite small and, thank God, there was a list of prices and procedures on the window, so I didn’t have to go in. They specialized in massaged, have all kinds of them. Maybe that was what I needed: someone to undo all the knots on my back so I could sleep better during the nights. And the price was not too high so if I started feeling in pain again, I could come back in a month or two. I was about to go in but something made me think it twice.

 I went back home and, like an obsessive person, I decided to know about all the types of massages so to know the best one for me. Many were Asian and I had read stories about massage parlors there. I doubted the spa I passed by was a place like that. Anyway, they were very complete and did want something that was rather aggressive. I wanted them to “rearrange”, if that’s possible, all my muscles and bones and make me be able to walk again without having to complain bout something. I then stopped obsessing about it and just assured myself I would go to the spa the next day.

 And I did. It was a Saturday so this time around there were two people in the waiting room, a very small space with two chairs. I had to wait standing up, which was kind of funny considering I had come because my body ached. Anyway, it was not a long wait. Each one of us was directed to different rooms and was asked to undress and put on a gown similar to the ones used in hospitals. Not that I had ever used one but I had seen those many times. The woman that had led me there also told me to lay down on the table, face down of course, and wait there for the masseuse. I did as I was told, leaving all my clothes in a neat pile ad tightening my gown a bit. I lay down in the table and just waited there for five, then ten minutes. I was a bit sleepy when, finally, the door flung open and a man’s voice greeted me.

 I said “Hi”, in almost inaudible register. I couldn’t see more than his legs, as I was on the table with my face on a hole, but I could see his yellow Crocs, moving from one side to the other. He was apparently feeling some form and stretching or so it seemed. He asked me how I felt. I told him my story with the bed and my sleeping “disorder”. He was listening carefully, his feet still all the time. He resumed his walking when I finished and just asked me which scent I liked better: cinnamon or oranges? I chose cinnamon, so he walked out of sight but by the sound I realized he used a lighter and suddenly the room smelled like my favorite type of cappuccino. He also put on some music and I had the weird feeling of being in a really strange blind date.

 Then he started, rather predictably, on my back. I could feel he had big hands or maybe they were just very well suited for this work. I have to say I relaxed immediately. He was using my flesh as clay and it felt really good. Besides, the music and the scent really helped to make the room feel less like a doctor’s office and more like a nice room in one’s house. I closed my eyes for a good while, as he worked on my whole back, moving up and own, and possibly helping himself with some oil. I could smell almonds. Then I realized I had thought I was going to have a woman massage therapist but maybe a man was more suited in my case because of the great pain I was in.

 Then he spoke and I just opened my eyes, as if I had slept with him. What an odd feeling… He asked me if the pain was only concentrated on my back or if the rest of the body hurt as well. I told him the pain was all over but that it was stronger on my back. I saw his Crocs moving and his ankles going up and down, as if he was exercising right there. Maybe he thought I was with my eyes closed. He then told me he was going to do a full massage, trying to liberate the tension from every muscle he thought might have been affected by many nights of bad sleep. He said it just like if he knew me and, frankly, I loved that. I closed my eyes and stood still again, waiting for him to continue.

 I gasped when he grabbed the knot I had made behind my back and released it easily, relieving my whole backside to him. For a moment I thought about standing up and going straight to the front desk to accuse him of sexual assault but then he started massaging my thighs and I realized he had needed to do that to continue the work. Anyway, been touched there wasn’t very common for me so it felt very strange but also very good. Apparently, there was a lot of tension there too. He did bot thighs, then calves and feet. He finished by ding my back and my shoulders and spraying some scent I couldn’t identify all over my body. I guessed it was something to do with aromatherapy. When he was finished, he just walked out and I didn’t have the chance to thank him.

 The following days were perfect. My back felt like new and the rest of my body too. I was even able to do some exercise without suffering and had learned how great it was to give myself a foot massage every so often, specially as I walked around so much. Sometimes I found myself trying to picture how my masseuse looked like but it was a very hard thing to do. I just had his voice, a little deep but not to much, his yellow Crocs and his small exercises while at work. It was almost impossible to create an accurate depiction of him in my mind and I just let it go when I realized he had done a great job and that had to be enough for my brain. Maybe if I went back there, I would see him.

 I eventually did come back but this time it was a woman who did the massage and I was too ashamed to ask for the man that had done the massage the last time. Maybe they would think I was obsessed or that I had a complaint of some kind. So I just kept it for myself. To be honest, the woman did a good job but I still felt the man’s hands and thought they had been created for the job. I was thinking about it too much. So just after the massage I decided to go to the market and just relax buying fruit. The place was very big but not really crowded. I decided to buy some apples and oranges. I committed the stupidity of grabbing an orange in the base of the pile, so others fell to the floor. I caught all except one.

 I went after the orange, walking slowly and crouching to see where it had gone. I finally saw it beneath a vegetable stand selling organic products so I just crawled and took it. When I did, I felt relieved. But soon, I felt a mix of emotions I still have no idea how to explain. There, just a meter away, there were two yellow Crocs, moving exactly like that time in the spa. I got out   of there and saw the man working in the organics products stand. Somehow, I felt I knew him so I just waved at him and said “Hi”. He turned to look at me and, surprisingly, he smiled. He waved back and walked towards me. Something happened there and I wanted to know what.

Bad holiday

   It had always been a mystery to her why so many men ran to help her when she needed something. They always did that and she guessed it was due to her looks but she had never done a proper effort to look good. She thought that made her a bit of a bitch, not realizing what she looked like. But the truth was she didn’t care and she sometimes thought the attention could get to be very annoying. In that moment, it was good because she had to come down from the boat to the beach, so she appreciates the two guys that helped her. She could have spared the looks that were more accurate for wolves than for men, but she didn’t say anything. She just kept on walking, her small purse on one hand and her hat in the other. They had been on an excursion near the island, watching the reef.

 Mia was having a holiday alone, far away from anyone she knew. She had always dreamed of visiting the French Polynesia so she had used practically all of her saving to come. The excursions and the food and most things were included in the price so she didn’t have to worry. The thing was she always made money even if she wasn’t doing anything. That’s because she had invented this kitchen utensil that many people were using now, so every month they paid her a part of the winnings and it was good money. She had made the invention one night, not drunk but almost. She always told another version of the story because it wasn’t really glamorous to talk about how much she vomited that night. So she changed the story to a simpler one and people loved her.

 Thanks to them, she was there: walking slowly through the beach, feeling the soft granules of sand on her feet. The sand her wasn’t coarse and annoying like in other beaches and Mia liked that because she had always loved the ocean but had rarely found places to fully enjoy it. When she was young, she used to love to pack all of her toys and the do a castle and make all her toys live there. Her parents and brother would help and it would be one of the best days of her life. But those trips were just a memory now. She thought she could ask her parents and brother to come with her to the beach one day, but they would probably say no. After all, they all had different lives now.

 She had to stop walking, as a tall-bronzed man blocked her path. She smiled at him and kept walking, passing by his right. The man had a stupid face and thought Mia would fall for him as soon as she had seen him in his swimwear but Mia hadn’t even notice. She didn’t wanted to talk to Hugo, who was one of the entertainers of the hotel and been asking her for a drink since she had arrived there. He was relentless and always asked for the same thing, during breakfast, lunch and dinner and in between too. It wasn’t that he was ugly or something because he was what most people would call “perfect”. But she just wasn’t interested.

 The truth was Mia had a lot on her mind. Many thought it was because of a man and that offended her deeply. When people thought she was just a thing to be used by someone else, she just got furious and, it a really bad mood, she would answer back and not in the best way possible. Mia knew she could be pretty destructive if she wanted so she was training herself to be more at ease, not to snap so easily. So when people thought she looked sad because of a man, she just smiled and moved on, not even acknowledging someone had talked. The truth was that she hadn’t been with a man in quite some time, not sexually nor sentimentally. She just felt she wasn’t ready for that and that it wasn’t really her priority in life but explaining that to so many people would have been exhausting.

 So every time Hugo came to her, she had said no. She would have said yes just to do something different, but she knew Hugo would take it as a triumph and would emphasize that aspect of the whole thing whenever they found themselves outside. And as the hotel was on a small island, she really didn’t wanted to be the one everyone looked and talked about. Soon, she realized she didn’t even need to say yes. The day after the excursion, she woke up later than usual, just wanting to use that day to be on the beach and read or something. She didn’t want to think, just rest a lot, as she suddenly felt extremely tired. As if she had pulled a truck in her dreams, with her teeth.

 She showered fast, put on her bikini and went down to the beach with some fruit she had grabbed from the breakfast buffet the previous morning. She put it in her purse along with a book and her cellphone, where she had tons of games if she ever got extremely bored like in that moment. Mia noticed something was wrong the moment she passed through the reception and did what she always like to do: greet the staff there. She waved her hand but no one responded, one woman even looking at her as if she had done the worst thing possible. She continued to the beach, wondering why the reaction but then she noticed more and more people stared at her and talked, not even interested in covering their mouths.

 Mia adjusted her hat and her purse and kept on going until she reached the beach. She found a lonely spot for her to lay down her towel and sit down. She was about to lie down to close her eyes and just sleep if she could but she was interrupted by the sound of a quarrel. She turned her head and realized it was a man and his wife. They were arguing really loudly and pushing each other, every sentence been louder than the one before. It was beginning to be really annoying so Mia took some headphones from her purse and connected them to her phone. Music would be welcomed during such an event.

 Music wasn’t heard for long. The fight got louder and then she noticed the woman coming to where she was. For a moment, she thought the woman just wanted to walk down the beach in a rage, far away from her husband. But no, the woman stopped right there where Mia was and started talking. Mia removed her headphones only to catch the word “slut”. She stood up and asked the woman if she needed help with something and then the woman just slapped her and went away. It wasn’t that it hurt as much as it was about feeling like shit. Mia felt every eye on her and that was even weirder when she still felt the slap and she saw the husband not doing anything, just standing there like and idiot.

 She went back to her towel, still massaging her cheek. She turned her head around to see if someone was still looking and they weren’t but some were laughing and obviously describing what had happened. Mia then felt really bad and about to cry, mainly because she felt she was alone but she fought her need to cry and decided just to lay down there and try to sleep. She would go to her room after that and just ask for her lunch to be delivered there. She did manage to rest for a while until two people from the management came to speak with her. They woke her up in the rudest way possible and asked her, more like demanded her, to join them in their office in the act.

 Mia walked right behind them, her towel on one arm, her hat on one hand and her purse on her shoulder. She felt her sandals filled with sand but she hadn’t had time to properly clean them. They walked past the reception again and then arrived to a door that they opened with a key only available to the staff. There were several offices behind that door, all with now windows, like in a bunker. They reached an empty one and asked her to sit down. She was there, they said without delay, because a woman staying at the hotel had denounced her as a threat to the peace of the people there. Mia was about to say she was also a guest there but they kept on talking, saying how seriously they took these allegations, citing how conservative people of the region were.

 Suddenly, Mia had a flashback to dozens of women with no tops of and a boat they called the “orgy yacht”. But she didn’t say anything about that. She just bore with them, as they said all they had to say. Finally, she was able to speak and said that if they expelled her they would be sued, as everything that had been said about her was a lie, probably invented by a man that felt bad because she wouldn’t say yes. She asked them to provide proof that she was as they thought she was. If they did she would leave and if not she would stay the week, would she had paid for. They just looked at each other and let her go.

 Some people still looked at her as if she was insane and a pervert. Others tried to apologize but she just stood up and went away. People were always too fast to pass judgment but they never really thought before acting. Mia stayed there the week she had paid and then just disappeared, leaving very late at night and preferring to sleep at the airport. She wanted the holidays to be done as soon as possible.

The Land of Always Sun

   The tribe of the Jaqqaras had one principal concept, one that governed their entire idea of religion, society and politics. It was a simple notion that, against all odds, had helped them survive wars, harsh weather and even almost total extinction. The tribe believed that a land nicknamed by them the Land of Always Sun, laid beyond the horizon and that it was a perfect place, where everything was just and possible. They had adored this place for centuries and would honor it at least once a day. It was the cornerstone of their belief system and many viewed it more important than their god, who was very similar to all the other gods of all other religions. The place was the one who got all the temples and all praising and the one people thought before going to bed.

 The Jaqqaras lived in a steep valley, not far from the ocean where they sailed to catch fish for the community. The thing was that the Jaqqaras where very territorial, even between themselves. Envy was always present and no one could give someone else a gift without upsetting someone in the village. This sounds like a very dire, even dangerous situation, but it was exactly like that. The tribe was not confrontational but rather passive, choosing the words before actually hurting someone physically. They just thought their world was flawed and that there was no point in trying to fix it because that proved impossible. They rather lived as they could and at night they would praise the Land of Always Sun, often by prayer but also with drawings and cultural demonstrations.

 People would gather once a week, often on Sundays, to celebrate what was traditionally called the Forever festival. It wasn’t a big thing because the Jaqqaras were not many and lacked manual skills but they would all gather in their main town’s square and would perform different pieces in honor of the Land of Always Sun. There were dances and poetry and reading of beautiful literature. The children showed their drawings and the elderly shared their experiences, often-incredible tales about how when they were young they thought they had seen the Promised Land. The elderly were actually very respected as it was thought that when a Jaqqara died, his soul would travel across the sea to the Land of Always Sun and live free and happy for the rest of Time.

 The Festival was actually the only happy time or uniting time in the life of the Jaqqara people. Nothing else made them feel fulfilled as human beings, not even love or any other feeling. If a person from another part of the world would visit them, they would think that the Jaqqara were just lazy people who would rather believe in a perfect world than make their own And there had been some that had tried to change their community for the better but all those attempts failed because they were seen as disrespectful towards the Land of Always Sun and that was practically heresy.

 Those who believed that perfect world could be achieved in their actual lifetimes were often expelled from the community, thrown out of the main valley and every possession linking them to the tribe would be taken away from them. It hadn’t been unheard of that someone had been expelled and it was always the worst for their families, because they had to stay behind with the shame of having someone in their family that did not believe in the most essential piece of their beliefs. It was always hard for them at first, both the family and the expelled, but the wounds always healed fast. The person outside would find what they were looking for and the family would forget about said person.

 It had to be noted that the Jaqqara people were practical and never complicated themselves with nonsense. They didn’t like their lives to be disturbed because they preferred to be thinking about how perfect to World Beyond was. Most of them believed every person had a chance there. They all had beautiful grand houses and beauty was the norm. In the Land of Always Sun, everyone always had enough food for the day and they didn’t have to struggle with fishing or hunting. Food would just be there for the taking. They would also have money to trade stuff and stuff to trade and every single thing they could ever want would be just there, waiting for them to grab them.

 Beauty was actually a big deal in the tribe and people who were considered beautiful were the ones who often had more power than the rest. As in any other tribe, there were chieftains but the Jaqqara didn’t think their god chose them or anything like that. They actually chose them in a voting based on their looks. Of course, not everyone had the same criteria when choosing who was the most beautiful man or woman but they were always happy with the results and no one had ever contested any of the winners. They chose a man and a woman that would rule together. They would have to marry and would have to end any prior marriages to rule the tribe. People viewed this as an honor and if someone had to separate because of it, they would do it gladly and without resentment.

 Another big belief of the Jaqqara was that there was no use in doing any big things in the world, meaning that exploring of their region or of the sea was pointless. They would build houses in the place they needed and that was it. Some were healers and learned that trade but there was not other thing people could actually decide to learn or to pursue. They were all villagers who went fishing in the morning and that took care of some crops in the afternoon. They had reserves in land to eat when the fish was bad or to accompany fish when the Festival came, when they would eat more and make a little less boring.

 That was all their life and most of them were happy about it. But one thing that always happened was suicide. Seeing their belief system, it came as no surprise that many people just killed themselves in order to get to the Land of Always Sun faster. They would do it because they thought it was just stupid to live this silly life if they could be having a grandiose one with all the food they could have and beauty and all the fun and happiness in the world. For those who did it, often in the woods or in a boat in the middle of the water, it made perfect sense and it felt to them that that was the real meaning of their belief. And the rest of the tribe had nothing to say about it because, for them, suicide was not something bad at all.

 Most agreed that it was a natural means of control of the population, so they didn’t really say much about it. What they did say was that people who killed themselves to get to the Land of Always Sun, were just taking a shortcut and that their god, and this was the only real function he had, would most likely decide to put them in a special part of the land where they would be less happy than other. Actually, a full life of living in this flawed world would give a person all validity to have every single thing they wanted in the other life. In few words, they had earned it. A person that committed suicide hadn’t earned it yet so they wouldn’t really get the same treatment. Nevertheless, it kept happening.

 The Jaqqara lived in such a remote region that hey were never discovered by anyone else and that also meant that no other person had contaminated their conception of the world. Although some believed the first people of the tribe had come in canoes from the southern part of the world, no one knew for sure and that most have been at least a thousand years ago so it didn’t make any difference to them. They had decided to believe in that land and many even thought it was all a lie. But it was their lie and it kept them going, it kept them from destroying everyone else and everything in their sight. Those beliefs made them feel less alone and less small in a word that seemed enormous, especially when they were fishing.

 They were not pacifists or warmongers. They had just decided to live together and do what was necessary to survive and just live like that, with no other worries or problems. They thought it was unnecessary to complicate things because the best life one could live was one that could be honored when they died and their god decided what kind of life they would have in the Land of Always Sun. Because that was their beacon, that was the lighthouse that lit their lives and made them who they were. The thought of a place where they could be with whoever they wanted, where they could eat as much and whatever they wanted and where they could be who they were, was just to powerful and too beautiful to ignore.

Crescent Moon Island

   The island was well known for being shaped like a crescent moon but it wasn’t a small island. Its geology was very different from one tip to the other. In the northern tip lived the Sunasi. They were tall with ashen skin and bright eyes. They inhabit the hills around the three volcanoes that had been dormant for about fifty years. The Sunasi were a warrior people, getting pride from their conquests and their killings. They held a larger territory than their neighbors and had sent explorer to many islands to the north. Some were handled as colonies and the Sunasi got to trade with other tribes as they held monopoly over cinnamon and clover, two spices the rest of the world seemed to crave.

 In the other side of the island lived a smaller tribe of very different people. They were called the Bonio but that wasn’t a name that they used to describe themselves. They had no name to call themselves because they did not consider that to be an important thing. They adored the god of the sea and lived of it, fishing daily and having small but efficient sea farms where they would grow a special seaweed that had a nice taste but also oysters, which grew very large. The women would carry on necklaces or on rings the pearls they found in the ocean and the men lived for their women, as they had a very special place for them in their mythology.

 The two peoples of Crescent Moon Island lived in peace. They knew about each other but they had agreed, without ever saying a word, to ignore one another and let them be. Funny enough, sometimes they looked at each other for long distances and the ones that were most interested were the children, as they had no understanding of the world. Any way, tip and tip were close enough to sometimes see people do things on the other side. But it was rare as the Sunasi only hunted in their southern shore and the Bonio never fished in the inner lagoon of the island.

Actually, by the mid-section of the island, there was a small area only populated by animals and palm trees. The Sunasi were closed but something had kept them from conquering more of the island. The Bonio, not interested in growing as a nation, had never had any weird encounters or things happen to then in the palm tree forest. The Sunasi that came back from explorations of that area, said they had seen red eyes float in front of them and that voices had talked to them inside their heads, telling them to go away and never come back.

The Sunasi elders thought this was another deity; one related to the ground that wanted to make sure that no one crossed a certain point of the island. Some had concluded that the gods had put two tribes in the island and had wanted to given them an equal chance at developing as a grand nation. So each one had received half of the island but only the Sunasi were interested in conquering and growing larger. Due to this occurrence, they decided early on to leave their neighbors alone, as they posed no threats.

 But then something unexpected happened. The Bonio had small boats to fish every day, all day. They never went to far but one particular day the wind was blowing hard and the ocean seemed angry. The fisherman returned to the island or at least tried to because of the boats had disappeared because of the storm. It had been carried far into the ocean, to the southeast, were they had no idea if there were fish or any other type of food. They were only three men and they were scared. They waited until the night fell and decided to follow the stars back to the island. The weather had changed to a more pleasant one and after some hours hope begun to settle in.

 That was until they saw what they saw. They were probably some one hundred kilometers from their home when they saw the largest fleet of vessels they had ever seen. There were very big and would probably be carrying thousands of people. Counting fast was easy and they counted twenty vessels, apparently anchored in that area. They tried to remain out of their sight but as they did they saw the canons in some boats and the men, bearded, very tall men walking on the ships. The Bonio men decided to use all of their strength with the oars in order to get home fast, and they did by next morning.

 Their wives and children came to hug and kissed them but they needed to speak to the elders first and with the priestess. The temple was a normal hut located farther towards the palm tree forest than any other Bonio house. The elders, two men and a woman, and the priestess, heard what the men had to say, that many ships were very near the island and could be there in less than a few hours. The fishermen urged the wise men to do something, as these explorer or warriors or whatever they were, came prepared with big guns and lots of people.

 The elders and the priestess asked them to leave, as they would consider what they had heard. The priestess began to do a potion that would enable her to see all that happened in the ocean and around it. The elders saw her dance and sing and drink her beverage. She said, in hoarse voice, that the Sunasi had conquered another small island to the northwest but that she saw something bigger. The god of the ocean was angry, as people had begun throwing things in it, polluting it with many things. The god knew these people came from a far away continent and they were seeking riches and land to conquer, as they were warriors but far more advanced than the Sunasi would ever be. And what was worst: they were coming. They didn’t know about the Bonio, the Sunasi or the island but they were coming.

When the elders came out of the temple, leaving the priestess to calm down after channeling all of that information, they decided to reunite all the people by the beach. They were about a hundred and they all heard the horrible news. But they also heard a bold proposal by one of the elders: a messenger should be sent to the Sunasi in order for the island to unite against the common enemy. A man in the crowd volunteered to go and talk to the Sunasi and make them realize what the danger was.

The next day, he traveled to their northern shore and crossed the lagoon by swimming. It wasn’t too long before he made it to the other side, where the sand of the beach was darker. He entered the forest and knew Sunasi warriors would be close enough. And just as he thought that, two bowmen fell from the trees in front of him, another from behind. They pointed at him with angry faces and were ready to shoot. But then he said the god of the ocean had a message and that he needed to speak with their elders. The Sunasi’s main god was the one in the volcanoes but ignoring a message from a god was not wise so they took him to the elders, where he explained the situation.

 The elders decided that the Bonio had a very honorable tribe and that they would let the man go back to his family. Then, something like an explosion came from the palm tree forest. As the main town of the Sunasi was on a hill, they could see the smoke emanating from the forest. It was the invaders who had arrived by bombing the forest, chopping hundreds of palm trees with one shot. That hurt the elders, as they knew that forest was sacred and now it was on fire. The Sunasi rapidly organized and asked the Bonio man to o back to his tribe and ask them to organize to attack the invaders. The idea was for the Bonio to attack by sea and the Sunasi by land. The Bonio were not very sophisticated but they would create a diversion to distract the invaders fleet.

 By the next day, in broad daylight, the first warriors of the Sunasi, arrived at the forest and massacred hundreds of invaders. Some wore armors but they were weak and overconfident. The Bonio then did their part, attacking the vessels with coconuts and harpoons. The also used their fishing nets to trap some of the men and then killed them. They took a couple of boats and then launched an attack with those towards the rest of the fleet.

 The battle was brutal and lasted for several days. The invaders were resilient and seemed to be coming in higher number than any of the men of Crescent Moon Island thought possible. But one by one, carefully and with cunning, the two tribes repelled the attack. Hundred, even thousands of corpses, now floated in the ocean or soiled the sacred forest, which had almost completely disappeared. Now, one could one from one shore to the other and not stumble upon a single palm tree. And then, the Sunasi starting praying as the red eyes and voices had come back. They had forgotten about this detail and they just left for their hills and homes, running away from the mess that the battle had left.

 But the Bonio were not affected and it was them who cleaned up, who put the invaders corpses in their remaining boats and burned them. They prayed for their souls and returned to their villages. The day after the battle had ended, a Bonio woman swam across the lagoon and left a gift for the Sunasi: a sculpture of the god of the volcanoes made with the armor of an invader.

 Their alliance had been sealed and Crescent Moon Island would grow stronger and prouder of their might and will to survive.