Blooming in the Wild (21 page)

Shouting echoed, from a long way away. The earth shook under her—no, that was her body shaking, her teeth chattering, heart pounding so hard she opened her mouth to scream as terror swallowed her whole.

A woman composed of dark fire, edged in the dark red glitter of flame, rose from the ground before her, her terrible eyes burning into Bella’s and her mouth opening to devour her whole. She spoke, and her words were like thunder, rattling Bella’s bones and the foundations of the islands. “
E ala mai, ho’omalu!
Rise, warrior. Rise…or die.”

And around her, the trees approached, reaching out with their sharp limbs and razor-tipped leaves, ready to devour whatever the goddess left of her. No longer her friends, they waited, horrid predators.

Bella jerked onto her back, straining, choking, as her heart tried to burst and her brain spun and burned until she was exhausted, and fell back, her head flopping dully to one side.

Someone kicked her, a sharp toe in her ribs. That hated voice echoed over her, through her.

“Look at you now, Miss Ho’omalu. Not so pretty now, are you? Rolling in the dirt like a common addict.”

But Bella ignored her as, through her lashes, she saw more strange things. The forest around her was moving. Murmurs drowned out Camille’s voice.

“
Rise, little sister. E ala mai, ho’omalu. Rise, warrior wahine.”

Her eyes widened. The fiery woman beckoned, her burning eyes fastened on Bella, no longer threatening but commanding. And yes, those were people stepping out of the threatening trees, emerging from them like shadows. Hawaiians, shimmering out of the hard-edged brilliance that now illuminated the forest, large and dark, dressed in simple kapa-cloth skirts, their long, dark hair caught back with plaited crowns. Their liquid eyes, her eyes, were fastened on her, and they too beckoned to her, urging her to her feet.

Bella rolled over, moving drunkenly, escaping another kick from those sharp toes, and wobbled to her hands and knees, her wondering eyes fastened on the old ones, who waited.

“I see you,” she mumbled. “I hear you.”

“
E ala mai, ho’omalu,”
they called, more sternly now.
“You must call your forest.”

Bella closed her eyes and sucked in a deep, shuddering breath.

As she did so, something wondrous happened. Power flowed into her. She opened her eyes and took another breath, watching as golden streamers flew through the air like pollen on the wind, into her mouth and nose. Yes, the power of her forest was coming into her.

“‘Oe mâkaukau,”
the forest people told her.
“You are ready. Take the kupua and use it, wahine. Use it to save us all.”

Save them all. Bella focused her gaze and saw Joel staring at her, his beloved face contorted with fear for her. She smiled at him, her love and reassurance in her eyes.

And then she pushed herself to her feet, wavering a little as she found her feet. The power was almost more than she could contain. She gazed down wonderingly at her hands, watching the strands that swayed from her fingertips as she moved them, almost more than she could resist. She wanted to cast them indiscriminately, play with them, create havoc, chaos.

Camille Helman smiled her shark’s smile, and sauntered closer. “My, you’re tougher than I thought. Having a nice trip, Bella?”

Bella focused on her, frowning as she remembered. Yes, this puny haole woman was at the epicenter of this foul storm. How best to deal with her.

Bella turned and mirrored Camille’s movements, prowling gracefully, so that they moved in a circle. Only Bella was now stalking the other woman, her confidence growing as the other Hawaiians faded, and she felt their power come into her with each breath she took.

“I? I am fine,” she said, her voice at once deeper and softer than her usual tones. It echoed around the clearing, and she watched with satisfaction as the men clustered around the edges stared at her. “But
you—
you are going to be very sorry, haole spider. Sorry that you brought your drugs and your foul web to my island.”

Camille laughed, and Baldy laughed with her.

Bella laughed too, a soft, terrible sound. She reached up with the golden strands of power, found another vine, a young green one, and brought it flying down through the air with a sharp gesture. Crouching, Baldy stepped back, the barrel of his gun rising.

Camille turned, her laughter dying in her throat as the vine slashed around Li’s feet and dragged the unconscious man high into the air, dangling him like a fly in a spider’s web from the tallest tree in the small area.

As he swung through the air, he woke and struggled wildly, screaming in a horrible, choked voice. His face was suffused with blood, his eyes wild.

Bella’s laughter rippled through the hot, still air like leaves rippling in the wind. Turning back to the group now watching in various stages of horror, she focused on the nearest gunman. “You,” she said. “You are next.”

He stumbled backward, shaking his head, his mouth working.

Bella held up her hands before her, dreamily watching the gold streamers pour from them. “You sought to kill me,” she said to Camille. “To maim me. But you have given me a gift. Your drug has made me stronger, brought my powers from behind my inhibitions and fears.”

She held up her arms, and with a rushing murmur of sound, blossoms began to fly down from the forest, filling the air with drifts of color and bloom. As Camille and her men gaped, and even Cassie lifted her head from the sand to squint, the flowers settled around Bella, wreathing her head with a bouffant crown of blossom and her neck with a lei, her wrists with bracelets of blooms.

“You see?” She tipped back her head, the wonder of it pouring through her. “I am Ho’omalu. And I reign here. You do not.”

“Kill her!” Camille shrieked. “Enough. Kill her.”

A sharp burst of gunfire blasted through the clearing. Icy-hot pain shot through Bella’s right arm, but she shook it off like the sting of a wasp. She must get the innocent ones out of the way.

Bella waved her hand, and the palm fronds under Cassie tugged her down the beach, out of the way.

Then she turned toward Joel, ready to sweep him to safety. But Baldy’s weapon swept away from Joel, the black mouth appearing over Joel’s shoulder, pointed at her. Joel moved like lightning. With a roar, he knocked the gun aside just as it went off, bullets spraying from the short barrel. Ice bit through Bella again, this time her thigh. She swayed, sucking in a deep breath to draw the power in and fight off the pain that burned now, tearing at her with gnashing teeth.

The black man leapt, and Joel went down, his long legs flying out from under him.

Bella hit Baldy with a blinding gust of blossoms and branches, making him stumble backward, weapon silent.

Gunfire rang out again, this time from behind Bella. A hole in the center of his forehead, Baldy sprawled backward, falling over Joel and his struggling opponent, and Bella struck him with another blast of branches, this time knocking him into the water.

Rolling over, Joel punched his opponent, and the man went limp, arms and legs sprawled on the sand.

“Bella! You’re hit.” Joel leapt to his feet, his gaze on Bella. But a fifth burst of gunfire rattled through the clearing. Joel jerked, and then fell to one knee, his eyes wide with shock, mouth opening as he lifted a hand to his side.

“
No.
” Bella’s voice thundered through the air. She slashed her hands toward the gunman who had just emerged from the raft, the slender bartender from the yacht. He screamed as two vines slashed down and wrapped around him, dragging him up into the trees with Li.

“You!” Bella turned on Camille, who crouched in the center of it all, watching in panic as her men fell. “You dare to touch my
kane nohea
. Now you’ll die.”

“No—no, I’m not done here,” Camille cried. She turned, searching wildly for her men.

Another burst of gunfire blasted from behind Bella, and Camille screamed, clutching her arm. Blood seeped from her fingers. “Kill her,” Camille shrieked again.

She turned toward the trees as two Hawaiians emerged from the trail, weapons at the ready. Eddy and Kobe eyed Bella and the destruction around her with wide eyes.

“You see,” Camille to Bella cried over the wind. “You’ll die here and take your powers with you. And then I’ll go after the rest of your family. Kill her!”

Kobe raised his weapon, but Eddy backed away, shaking his head.

Bella ignored the gun pointed at her. She cast one look of grief back at Joel, who lay on the lava, his face white, bright blood staining his shirt and the ground underneath him. He was gone, gone.

“So, it shall be as you wish. But you…” she told Camille. “You will share my fate, as Na’alele shared the fate of her betrothed.”

And then she stretched up her arms to bring the forest down around her. “Arise, Pele,” she called, her voice soaring above the forest and into the mountain waiting above. “Arise, mother of Hawaii, and destroy your enemies!”

A great roar of sound built around them as the forest came to life. The trees and foliage strained at their foundations to free themselves and come to her.

The ground shook. A great fig toppled, crashing to the earth and burying Eddy under it. Vines lashed through the air.

Gunfire rattled again. Kobe jerked backward, hit, but his weapon fired as he fell. Icy-hot projectiles slapped at Bella, striking her in the side. She wavered and then kept her feet, bringing up her hand to point at Camille, who shrank back in fear, finally recognizing Bella’s power as the forest shuddered up from its foundations.

“Die,” Bella said. “Die, and all your schemes for my Hawaii with you.”

Camille opened her mouth, but red blossoms sprouted on her white jacket. She wavered and then fell to the rocks, her eyes going blank. Leaves and branches, bits of dead blossoms showered down on her body.

Bella turned to find another man behind her, weapon in his hands. But she knew this one. Through the streamers of gold whipping around her, from her, she focused what was left of her concentration on him.

Frank threw down his weapon. His face was white with shock, but he faced Bella, his hands outstretched in entreaty. “
U’oki
,” he shouted. “Stop this, Bella.”

Bella shook her head, tears spilling from her eyes as she looked over at Joel’s prone form on the beach. “
Nô ho‘i lohi
,” she mumbled. “Too late.”

As hot blood pulsed from her wounds, she turned and staggered through the storm to her lover’s body. Her grief howled, and with it the furor of flying vegetation around her. Dropping to her knees beside Joel, she pulled him into her arms and bent her head to lay her cheek on his. She pressed her cheek to the ugly wound in his side and wept, her grief feeding the storm.

Until slowly, the rhythmic chanting of voices that she knew and recognized edged out the chaos from her fevered consciousness, and she fell into blessed darkness.

To Do: In the event of the tour guide’s illness or indisposition, she must rely on her employers to take charge
.

Homu Ho’omalu leaned forward, staring through the helicopter’s windshield at Na’alele, rapidly approaching below.

“Hurry,” he urged his son. “Ah, Pele,
pôpili
kia weliweli.
Something terrible has happened.”

They’d realized something was wrong when the phone silence from Na’alele outlasted the storm, but all of them had been in Honolulu for the presentation of one of Daniel’s sculptures to the state of Hawaii. They’d been at the airport when Daro had called, worried about Bella, who hadn’t called back and apparently had turned her phone off.

Claire and Melia had both checked their messages and found Bella had texted them, as well, and they couldn’t reply. Frank wasn’t answering calls either.

The party wasn’t due back until late afternoon, but Homu, David and Daniel had all felt the same gathering unease, and the decision was made to return to Nawea. They found Hilo waiting for them at the Kona airport, his usually merry face somber, sharing their premonition.

The Ho’omalus knew Bella as the best friend of their sons’ bride and brideto-be. They had welcomed her but only discovered she was one of them when her mother confessed as much while here on the island. Now, she was their cousin Daro’s daughter, and a Ho’omalu. And she was in some kind of trouble; Homu could feel it, as could his sons.

The closer they got to home, the more restless David and Daniel became, and Claire, Melia and Tina picked up on it. Melia, her emotions turbulent with her pregnancy, dissolved into tears. Claire clutched Daniel’s arm and demanded to be allowed to come with him to rescue her friend.

With a scowl, he refused. “No, tita. I told you there would be times when I’d have to go, and you’d have to wait. This is one of them.”

“Bring Bella back to us,” Melia pleaded.

David bent to kiss her, but his face was grave. “I’ll do my best,
ku’u ipo
, sweetheart.”

Tina stood beside Homu. “I am coming with you this time,” she told him. “To chant with you, and to be there for her.”

He nodded, knowing that it was the right thing for her to do.

And now they rode together to save one of their own.

“What is it?” Daro leaned forward from the back seat, his face lined with worry. “Do you see her?”

“Hold on, we’re almost in sight,” David said calmly, though his handsome face was pale under his golden tan. “Au’e,” he breathed as the chopper banked around the last turn, and they saw the hurricane of vegetation below.

“Land somewhere,” Homu demanded.

“I can’t.” David shook his head. “If I try to get close, the branches and plants flying around will tangle in the rotors. If I land too far away, we’ll never make it.”

“There’s David and Hilo,” Tina called from the seat behind her husband.

Below, a large turquoise cigarette boat roared through the waves toward Na’alele, flying across the water, white spray flying out behind it.

“Look at that.” David pointed, and they all looked down to see the large yacht just off shore. “It’s the Helmans’ yacht.”

Tina gasped. “What are those
kepolos,
devils doing here? I thought they were all dead.”

Homu stared at the sleek craft, dread tightening in his chest. They’d all thought so. But now it seemed at least one of their enemy was still alive.

“Very well,” he said. “We must begin the chant from here.” He looked over at David as the small helicopter bucked and slid sideways. “Can you hold it?”

David nodded grimly. “But we’ve got to hold
her
.”

“My Nani,” Daro groaned, his voice shaking. “Oh, what have they done to her?”

“I don’t know,” Homu admitted. “I can feel her power, stronger than I would have believed possible.”

“She is very strong,” Tina agreed. “Unnaturally so.”

“David? Pop?” Daniel’s deep, rough voice crackled through their headphones. “What in hell is going on? Looks like a storm going on down here— all on land. And that’s the Helman yacht out there.”

“We’ve seen it. I don’t know what is happening. Bella has obviously inherited our powers—my powers,” Homu said grimly. “And she is out of control.”

“What can we do?” Daro demanded.

“Chant—
now!”
roared a new voice through the radio. Hilo, Homu’s brother, rode in the boat with Daniel. “We must summon the old ones and raise Pele herself if we need to.”

“And fast,” David added. “The winds are getting worse.” The helicopter bucked sideways again, and he held on to the controls, bringing the craft around in a sliding circle above the boat, while the storm raged on shore, trees beginning to slide down the mountain.

Homu held up his hands, and then in a strong voice, he called out in Hawaiian. His wife, his sons and his brother joined in, and together, Pele’s guardians began to chant.

Over the throb of the helicopter rotors, over the roar of Daniel’s boat, over the pound of the surf, and the crashing of trees and lash of vines below, their voices rang out, strong and true, in the ancient rhythms they had learned from their ancestors.

Homu felt rather than heard the voices of the old ones joining them, echoing in a low murmur that was the heartbeat of Pele’s island. Together, his ohana circled the erratic pulse of power flaring from Na’alele and soothed it, surrounding it with steady reassurance.

And slowly, slowly the storm that one small woman had raised began to subside. Trees slid back to the earth, groaning as they fell on the lava rent by their roots being ripped away. Vines draped, foliage and plants settled, leaves fell and blossoms drifted slowly down, scattered like a benediction on the bodies of those who had fallen at Na’alele.

“Here comes the Coast Guard,” Daro said, his voice shaking. “And a police chopper.” He turned to Tina, who sat on the shore side of the cabin. “My Nani — can you see her?”

“I see her,” Tina said. “She is there—in the clearing.”

“Is that Frank she’s holding?” David asked.

Homu shook his head. “Don’t think so.” Rage and sorrow gripped him. His old friend was down there somewhere and might be dead, another victim of the Helmans. And the red staining Bella’s slight body and that of the man she held could only be one thing—blood.

David held the chopper steady. They all gazed down at the little bay and the devastation there. He waved at the pilot of the police chopper, who nodded back and then gestured.

“He’s ordering us to back off,” David said, already turning away from the island.

“We can’t leave,” Daro groaned.

“We’re not,” David said. “We’re headed down—right there.”

Homu stared at the huge, empty barge that was nosing westward around the curve of the island, pushed by a tugboat, smokestacks steaming. “Is that one of Billy Eyke’s barges?”

“’Ae,” David returned laconically, but as Homu turned to stare at him, his son allowed himself a small smile.

Homu patted David on the arm. “Not even gonna ask.”

“Oh, my,” Tina said faintly. “We’re going to land on that?”

“Okay, Mama?” David asked.

“’Ae,” his mother answered stoutly. “We must get down there to Daro’s daughter. Just tell me when we’ve landed, because I’m going to shut my eyes now.”

Daniel Ho’omalu nosed his long boat carefully into the small bay, grimacing as the side scraped on the reef. “Gonna play hell getting out of here,” he muttered to his uncle Hilo, who stood beside him, scanning the beach with narrowed eyes.

“’Ae. Look at Frank’s boat. Something wrong with her.”

Daniel looked at the catamaran bumping listlessly against the shore. “She’s swamped. See Frank anywhere?”

“No. Don’t see any sign of life. ” Hilo levered himself over the side of the boat and waded in the hip-deep water to the narrow prow, grabbing the ring and pulling the boat up alongside the catamaran as Daniel pushed the control to raise the prop safely away from the bottom.

He glowered at the rubberized dinghy pulled up on the shore. He knew it all too well. It was from the Helman yacht, and Daniel had seen it in Kailua Harbor only last month.

As his boat bumped onto the sand, he quickly turned off the ignition and then reached into the side compartment, taking out a snub-nose Ruger, which he held in his hand as he levered himself over the side of the boat. Even from down here, he could see bodies—lots of them.

The throb of a new chopper grew louder, and he looked back to see a police helicopter coming low and fast from the west. A Coast Guard cutter appeared at the same moment, already slowing outside the reef.

Daniel waved at them—everyone knew his boat on this side of the island. Then he turned and waded out onto the beach, scanning with a warrior’s eye for movement from any of the strangers littering the beach and the lava shelves of the small area. A slender blonde wahine lay on the beach, but as Daniel bent to find a pulse on the side of her throat, he found she was breathing, merely unconscious. The only wound on her was a shallow cut on her throat.

He straightened. It looked as if a tropical storm had come through, uprooting trees, ripping bushes and vines free and flinging them
kâpulu,
all about. The stench of death lay over the scene like a foul miasma. Daniel grimaced in horror and pity.

“There she is.” Hilo strode up onto the shore, clambered over a fallen fig tree and disappeared. His pistol at the ready, Daniel followed.

Garbed in full native finery of blooms over a brief bikini, an unconscious Bella lay draped over a tall, tanned man in dirty shorts. At first, Daniel thought she was dead. There was blood everywhere.

When Hilo turned her gently onto her back, Daniel gave a grunt of dismay at the ugly holes in her side, one bare thigh, and one slender arm.

He was already shoving the Ruger in the back of his waistband. He knelt beside Bella, checking for a pulse. He found one, thank God.

“Blood still flows,” Hilo said. “This means her heart still beats. She’s alive!”

“I’ve got her,” Daniel said fiercely, already laying his huge hands on the worst of the wounds in her side. He closed his eyes, her white face burned in his mind. “Chant with me, my ohana, my ancestors,” he demanded. “Heal our little sister.”

He clenched his teeth against the burn as power arced through him into her still body, but to his shock, it zinged back to him from her. He sucked in a breath. “The power is still strong in her.”

“I will help you,” Hilo said urgently. “We can’t let them take her to a hospital. They’ll notice something strange.
‘Olu’olu
, quickly now.” He laid his big paws on her wounded thigh, and Daniel closed his hand around her arm.

The power arced again, burning Daniel’s palm as if he’d grabbed a live wire. But he held on until Homu nodded, and sank back on his heels, his dark face wet with sweat.

Daniel gathered Bella into his arms, her head lolling into the crook of his neck, her face pale beneath her golden tan and the smears of blood. Claire’s friend, his cousin, a Ho’omalu.

She seemed too light and her skin too pale for mere unconsciousness. He sniffed, and his blood ran cold and then hot with fury at the bitter herbal scent that clung to her.

“They dosed her with something,” he ground out. “Drugs.” He and Hilo stared at each other.

“Au’e, this is why she raised such a storm,” Hilo breathed.

If so, they would need to chant much more to heal her. “She’s somewhere else, outside her body.”

“With Pele.”

Daniel hoped so, because his little cousin needed more help than he could give her. She needed their patroness and the power of the Creator who watched over them all.

The blood smeared on her face, her hands and flowers was not all hers; some came from a bullet wound in the man’s side.

Hilo grunted in sympathy. “Hey, this da celebrity they hired, Joe something.” One of the good guys, then, and from the way Bella was draped over him, she’d been trying to protect him.

“Joel Girand. Have time to help him out before they get here?” Daniel asked, glancing over his shoulder at the Coast Guard boat nosing into the small harbor.

“I’ll do what I can.” His uncle laid his big, calloused brown hand on Girand’s side, slipped the other underneath him and grimaced. “Bad exit wound.”

He closed his eyes, and his wide jaw clenched. Daniel could feel the power arc through him and into the wounded man.

“’Bout time you showed up,” said a hoarse voice from the other side of a clump of fallen palms.

Daniel looked up, joy and relief breaking out in a smile. “Frank!”

Their friend walked slowly around the root wads of the palms. He was leaning on a stick, and he looked like hell. But he was alive and apparently uninjured, except for the filthy bandanna wrapped around his head.

Frank sat heavily down on a rock beside Hilo and his patient. “Something terrible happened here,” he said, looking at Bella and then at Daniel. “Maybe it’s time you folks explained a few things to me.”

Daniel nodded solemnly. “’Ae,” he promised.

“She gonna be okay?” Frank asked. “That woman forced her to drink her drugs, or watch Joel murdered, right in front of her.”

“We’ll heal her,” Daniel swore. They had to, or break the hearts of so many people—Daro, Melia, Bella’s mother Grace, and Daniel’s own sweetheart, Claire.

Frank nodded and then looked down at the man lying beside Hilo. “He gonna live? He’s a good guy. And he and Bella—”

“Ho’omalu,” said a new voice from behind Daniel. “Can one of you mokes explain what the hell happened here?”

The three of them looked around. The captain of the Coast Guard cutter, a friendly acquaintance of Hilo and Daniel, stood on the sand, two of his crew behind him. They were all looking around the camp with their eyes wide under their regulation ball caps.

Frank cleared his throat. “I was here,” he said. “I can tell you exactly what happened. That woman over there…” He pointed to a slender, white-clad form lying in the sand, one arm out-flung, eyes staring sightlessly. A litter of dead leaves and blossoms nearly covered her bloodstained body. “…tried to murder all of us. Her name is Camille Helman, and she’s from da Helman ohana, out of California.”