Jamal VIII

PA 1.8

“Oh, wow!” Yue whispered, the Asian woman staring out over the windswept beach with awe. “I didn’t know the sea came all the way over here!”

“Most of the world is covered in water, actually,” Jamal smiled at her, digging his bare feet into the sand. “Or, well, I think so anyway. Actually, I might be wrong about that. But regardless, so long as there’s land, there’ll eventually be a coastline.”

“Haven’t ya been everywhere, Miss know-it-all?” Fei scoffed from Yue’s other side. “I remember you saying something like, ‘I’ve been everywhere from the Southern Swamps to the Northern Taiga!’ Was that a lie, perhaps? Did you lie to us, our good lady Yue?”

“That was then and this is now!” Yue hissed back, a dusting of pink on her cheeks. “I didn’t think the world extended so far beyond the mountains! If it did, I would have adjusted my experiences accordingly.”

“‘I’d hAvE aDjUstEd mY eXperIenCes AcOrdInGlY,’” Fei mockingly repeated, before jumping away with yelp as Yue took a swing at him.

Jamal looked away from his bickering friends, a small smile on his face as he turned back to the beach.

In truth, it wasn’t that impressive, even compared to the trashy beaches he remembered from his time in the American South. The sand was as much mud as sand, chunky and in piles everywhere. Weeds and bushes grew between the dunes, and in many places the forest extended all the way to the coast, trees breaking up the view of the ocean. It was an ugly, unmaintained mess of a beach.

But despite that, he felt there was a beauty in all of it, one that he’d never experienced before. There were no lifeguard towers here, no endless lawn chairs, no soda cans and plastic forks half-buried in the sand. There were no tourists or locals, no endless shops spreading along the coastline like a mold. There was just the sand, the sea, and the sky above. A natural beach, untouched by man.

It was an ugly beach. And because of that, he couldn’t help but find it beautiful.

“They’re sure going at it,” a scratchy voice spoke up from his side, causing Jamal to glance over at Ishi, the younger man, keeping an eye on their other friends. “Do you think that sand’ll come out easily?”

Jamal glanced back over at the other two, watching as Fei tackled Yue into the sand, kicking up sand and dirt as they wrestled on the ground.

“No,” Jamal chuckled dryly. “They’re going to be digging sand out of their clothes for weeks.”

“Heh…” Ishi tried to laugh, before trailing off, coughing lightly.

“You alright?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ishi waved him off. “Just a little sore today. It happens, you know?”

Jamal frowned, but let it go with a sigh. It had been a common problem, following his recovery from eating a poisonous fruit. A sore throat, harsh coughs, and the occasional phantom pains haunted Ishi in the days following his recovery. It wasn’t as bad now, but Jamal still couldn’t help but feel guilty every time he heard him coughing.

“…Anyway, do you think we should set up camp here?” Ishi asked. “I remember we stayed near the ocean back when I was young, but we never got to close. The elders always warned us about water spirits stealing us away in the night.”

“Water spirits…? I see, they were probably worrying about floods then. If that’s the case I agree with them. We shouldn’t camp on the beach, since the high tide will—”

They were suddenly cut off by a loud splash and a girly scream. Glancing back over at their squabbling friends, Jamal noted that Yue had somehow managed to pick Fei up and chuck him into the ocean.

As if realizing she was being watched, Yue turned back to look at them, a mortified look on her face when she noticed them staring at her. At least until Fei grabbed her leg, dragging her back down into the muddy sand with a yell of defiance.

Jamal and Ishi, wisely, decided to ignore that.

“…As I was saying, the high tide will come in and cover the beach in a bit. You see the darker sand there? That’s about where it will reach. But if there’s a storm or something it could get even further, so we want to keep some distance between us and the sand. We should set up behind the treeline, if nothing else.”

“Hm, but what about the water spirits? Aren’t you worried about them?”

Jamal blinked. It was only occasionally brought up, but it always threw him off when he remembered that his friends actually believed in things like gods and spirits.

“…We should be fine,” he told him after a moment. “So long as we don’t insult them or do anything to hurt them, they’ll probably leave us alone.”

“So… should we get those two out of the ocean, before they piss off the local spirits?”

The two of them turned back to the sea, just in time to see Fei wrap an arm around Yue’s neck, tossing them both backwards into the waves with a roar of triumph.

“…If they haven’t pissed off the spirits yet, nothing will.”

--

“All I’m saying is, I won.”

“Not on your life,” Yue hissed at Fei from where she was drying off by the fire, a half-eaten rabbit’s leg in her hands. “You gave up! How can you call that a win?”

It was late in the evening that their two friends returned from playing around on the beach. Now the three of them sat around the fire, eating foraged berries and leftover meat from yesterday. Despite having left just Ishi and him to set up camp, he couldn’t find it in himself to hold it against them.

“I didn’t give up, I merely got bored and left,” Fei smirked back at her, raising up an arm to show off his muscles. “Look at these badboys! Obviously I had strength to spare!”

“You…!”

Okay, maybe he’d hold it against them if they wouldn’t shut up.

“If y’all keep fighting I’m kicking you out,” Jamal told them dryly, sketching faces into the dirt with a stick. He lifted the stick up, motioning over to Ishi. “Some of us are already asleep, after all.”

Yue winced, looking bashful, while Fei just scoffed, falling back onto the ground.

“Of course, Jamal. We’ll be more careful.”

Fei opened his mouth, but a raised eyebrow from Jamal was all it took for it to close again. “Yeah, yeah.”

They fell into a comfortable silence after that, quietly sitting around the fire. Soon enough Fei’s breathing began to even out into snores, and Yue had curled up into a ball next to the fire.

As the sun began to set, Jamal got to his feet, stretching his arms over his head.

“Oh?” Yue hummed tiredly, glancing up from the flames. “Where are you going?”

“I’m just going down to the beach for a bit,” Jamal told her quietly, taking care not to wake the others. “I… I used to watch the sun set over the beach, back when I visited by grandmother’s house in Florida. It’s been… god, years since I last saw her. I guess… I was just feeling a bit nostalgic, tonight.”

“Ah,” Yue nodded, her eyes softening. “I understand. Have fun then. I’ll be waiting for your return.”

With a smile and a wave, Jamal left the forest to return to the beach.

Stepping onto the sandy beach, Jamal stared out over the ocean. The normally blue waves were painted with yellows and reds and oranges by the setting sun, which itself was a deep red dot sinking beneath the horizon. Every few seconds the calm waves crashed against the shore, the noise accompanied by the chittering of nocturnal insects who were just waking up. Taking a deep breath, he felt himself relax.

For a moment he simply stood there, immersed in the memory of better times.

“…Hey, Memaw,” he whispered softly. “I’m sorry I haven’t been able to visit lately. It’s just… things have been pretty crazy, over here. I’ve missed you, you know? I miss everyone else as well, but I just… I want you to know…”

Jamal sniffed, rubbing his watery eyes. “I love you all. And… and one day, we’ll see each other again. It’s a promise.”

He didn’t say another word after that, simply staring at the sunset, watching the sky as the sun slowly fell beneath the horizon.

With a deep, calming breath he turned around, ready to return to camp. However, before he could, he heard something. It was faint, almost overpowered by the splashing of the waves, but it almost sounded like… crying?

Jamal squinted, looking up and down the beach, trying to find what was making that noise. It wasn’t like there was anyone else here, so it was probably just some weird animal, right?

…Wait, no, there. Sitting on the sands, there was a child. A crying, sobbing child curled into a ball as they stared out over the waves, barely visible in the remaining light.

Unsure what to do, he stared at them for a second, before shaking his head. What kind of person would he be, if he just left them there? The least he could do was ask them what’s wrong.

“Hey, uh, kid,” he called out, jogging up to them. “Are you alright? Er, do you need me to help you find your parents? Is your tribe camped nearby? I don’t think I saw anyone, but…”

The child froze up at the sound of his voice, their whole body tensing up. They spun around, revealing dark skin and darker, frizzy hair. Their face, covered in tears and snot, was contorted into such fear at the sight of him that he froze on the spot.

“GO AWAY!” the child, who he could now see was a young girl, screamed, falling onto her back in the sands. “GO AWAY! LEAVE ME ALONE! PLEASE! I’M SORRY, PLEASE!”

Jamal couldn’t help but stand there, frozen as he watched this child scream and shout as they desperately crawled away from him. They kept crawling backwards, further and further away until the waves of the beach began lapping at her elbows. And still she continued crawling away.

Realizing that if she kept going she’d be underwater soon enough, Jamal shook himself from his stupor, running forward after the girl, whose sobbing and wailing only got louder the closer he got. Lunging into the water, he grabbed the girl’s waist, dragging her out from the ocean with a grunt of strength.

This didn’t stop the girl’s flailing. If anything, it got even worse, as she kicked and punched and bit her way into trying to get out of his arms.

Unfortunately for her, nothing a child could do would beat getting his intestines scrambled by a spear, so he held onto her easily.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” he soothed her, wincing as her sobs just got louder in volume. “I’m not going to hurt you. It’s okay, everything will be okay.”

Of course, by this point the screaming must have been loud enough for his friends to have heard, because Yue came dashing out of the woods from the direction of their camp, spear and shield in hand.

“Jamal!” she shouted, running up to him. “What’s going on? Is someone being attacked? Is that… is that a child?”

“Yes,” Jamal grunted, wincing as the girl’s nails dug into his arm, drawing four red lines across his skin. “Don’t worry, I don’t think we’re being attacked. Hey,” he turned back to the girl in his arms. He tried to calm her down by rubbing her back, but she was squirming too much for him to do anything else. “Hey, it’s alright. I’m not going to hurt you, I promise.”

The child cried harder.

“…Okay, but that doesn’t explain why you have a child? Is she okay? She’s… she’s still screaming. Why is she screaming?” she asked, taking a step away from the wailing child with a wince.

“Well you see, this is actually my secret love child, and this is just her revenge for the years of missed birthday gifts,” he told her dryly.

“…Really?”

Jamal gave her a deadpan look. “No, of course not!” he scoffed, before wincing as the girl bit his shoulder particularly hard. “I found her on the beach. She was crying when I got here, and panicked when she saw me. I was worried she’d get swept out to sea so I picked her up, but as you can see…”

Yue gave him a nod, before glancing warily at the screaming child. “Do you know how to get her to stop… you know…”

The girl kicked him again, coming uncomfortably close to a very dangerous spot, causing him to quickly readjust how he was holding her.

“…Okay, I’m going to put you down,” he told her as softly as he could, bringing the girl further away from the ocean. “I still want to make sure you’re okay, so I’m going to trust that you won’t run away, alright? I can’t help you if you keep on crying, okay?”

He put her down as gently as he could with her still hitting him, letting her feet touch the ground. The second they did, she tried to run, only to trip and fall face-first into the sand, where she proceeded to stay, sobbing.

“…Hey, um,” Jamal kneeled down, softly placing a hand on her back. “I know I asked this before, but are you alright? I’m not going to hurt you, you know. I just want to help.”

The girl raised her head, staring at him with wide, fearful eyes. “I… I don’t want to die! Please don’t kill me, I… I promise I…”

“Whoa, whoa, hey,” he soothed her. “I promise, I’m not going to kill you. Trust me, I’d have to be a pretty shi—uh, I’d have to be a bad person to try and hurt a little kid.”

“But you are… you…” she whimpered, crawling to her knees. “You’re one of us.”

Jamal blinked. “Us?”

“They said… they said we were chosen. By the gods. By the Thing. But the others, they… they killed him! Just because he was one of us!” she sobbed, curling in on herself. Instinctively, Jamal leaned over, pulling her into a hug. “And they were going to kill me too! But I… I ran away! I left my friend! He’s dead! I shouldn’t have left him! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please don’t… please…”

Jamal stared down at the girl with wide eyes, before slowly glancing down, down at a small bag tied around her waist, one he hadn’t thought much of a moment before.

Moving his hand, he slowly and carefully stuck a finger into the bag, pulling it open just enough to see what was inside.

There, protected by only a thin layer of dirty cloth, was a purple orb, glowing with a faint, ominous light.

He turned to look back up at the child in his arms, who didn’t look like they could be older than eight.

“Oh…” he whispered, pulling her into a hug. “Oh, kid, I’m so, so sorry…”

No child deserved this curse. No child deserved to be a God-King.

9,880 God-Kings Remain