Maliha

Tears glided down Maliha’s cheeks at the overwhelming feeling that filtered throughout her being as the Ishanu gifted her with its light. She could feel the threads of life that tied the tribe together, the same thread that had begun to wound itself around her soul like the coiling trees that made up this peaceful cocoon of ancestral ascendency. It was pulling her in. tying her to this place, to these people. the Ishanu called her.

She felt at peace. As if her life finally made sense.

She wanted to lay there forever. To fall to her stomach and rest her heart on the roots at the bed of the great tree. To press her heart into the earth and feel its vibrations travelling through her body.

She didn’t want to leave this utopia. This place where ancestors touched her shoulders and filled her being with so much knowledge and hope. She belonged here.

The thought reverberated in her mind, the world tuning out as nothing but her belonging in the Ishanu, filtered so strongly through her mind and flowed into her being.

A delicate smile parted her lips as she sat in prostration at the roots of the great tree. Her fingers spread as she felt the tiny movement gliding over her. Her hands shook as the energy strummed through the tips of fingers, kissing along her palm as the deep green beneath her fingers pulsed.

“Maliha”

Her name carried on the wind, whipping around her and ghosting over her skin.

"Maliha”

Maliha’s eyes glided closed as the call beckoned her and when they reopened her world had altered. She was alone in the Ishanu. It’s opulent lighting dancing around her as the great tree swayed and sung its aching tune around her. the bark shifting as the roots buried deep into the ground moved along the warm earth.

As Maliha’s eyes tilted up at the sunless sky a figure appeared before her.

She emerged from the tree.

Skin as dark as the sunless sky, hair as pale as the glimmering moon and lips as soft as the petal of a rose. With withered hands, the woman stepped before Maliha, her fingers dancing in the luminous light of the Ishanu.

Her aged body swayed to a tuneless song as she slowly as her approached Maliha. Up close Maliha could see all the fine lines that made up her withered face and spoke of her long life and wisdom.

Her delicate fingers touched Maliha’s cheek as she brought her face closer, tilting Maliha’s face as the elderly lady looked deeply into Maliha’s eyes. She did not say anything. For a long time, all she did was hold Maliha’s face and stare seemingly into Maliha. Her skin smelled of burning sage, incense and dirt. The damp and earthy scent of dirt, the type that came from the earth. She smelled like nature, of home and of peace, if peace had a scent.

The soothing smell wafted off of her skin and eased the elderly woman’s eyes began to glimmer with an incomprehensible emotion.

a stray tear glided down her face and onto Maliha’s cheeks as her dampened lips pressed to Maliha’s head. A soft chant whispered from her mouth and then as fast as she came, the elderly woman disappeared in a cloud of shimmering gold and opulent light.

Maliha released a sharp gasp as consciousness reclaimed her mind, yanking her from the calming trance she had been sucked into, and forcing her back into the world.

She could feel a small hand that rested on her shoulder, from who she did not know but her body was too weak and lethargic for her to move from her position of prostration at the bed of the great tree. Her mind still whirled but she could not visualize the world she had been in. it was both the same and yet so different from the place her body now lay anchored in.

“Maliha?” The questioning voice of Xiuri had Maliha’s body finally registering her brains desire and moving.

“Xiuri,” she muttered, her head felt heavy and her mouth felt dry, but she could not explain why.

At first the Ishanu had made her feel peaceful, as if she had been reborn with energy plentiful but now she felt as if her soul was being drained. As if there was a darkness that had sucked all the light from her being.

Xiuri’s mouth gaped open as she stared at Maliha in shock, confusion knitting her brows, the dark skin knitting together but before Maliha could question her friends shocked gasp, her attention was pulled elsewhere.

Her eyes were drawn away from her gaping friend, over her shoulder and to the bushes that marked the beginning of the secret entrance into the Ishanu.

Her nose wrinkled as the entrance to the Ishanu quivered with aggressive tremors. Maliha could clearly see the light energy pulsing, fissures of light striking at the entryway in hostile flashes of blinding white and green light.

“Xiuri, what is happening?”

Maliha couldn’t explain how, but she knew something was wrong and from the pensive look that lined her friends face it was clear to see that she was not alone. Xiuri was worried.

The light that gleaned from the Ishanu’s flora began to drain, the shining opulence dwindling as their glow filtered along the earths floor toward the entrance door. The open buds of the flora snapped shut as the light left their beings, critters scurrying and fluttering around the air in frustrated swarms.

They scattered from their homes and dived for the great tree that stood opulently behind Maliha. The great tree’s arms hanging wide open in a welcome embrace as all her creatures disappeared into her large leaves just as the flickering light at the entry pulsed one final wave.

The energy snapped and recoiled back into the tree.

Her ears rung. White noise strumming through her ears. She was disoriented, the world moving in slow motion as the remaining fissures of light fluttered above her head and then interspersed into the atmosphere.

Maliha stared unseeingly up into the dimly lit sky as the roots of the great tree wound themselves around her ankles. A large root pulsing beneath her back, growing and growing until the root stood tall and Maliha was forced to a kneeling position by its growing force. She staggered to her feet, hands shaking as she tried to centre her being.

Once she was steady on her own feet, the root sunk back into the earth in slumber. Leaving the Ishanu with no light but that of the paling sunlight and the few torches that the tribe members who had gathered their wits, had begun to be light.

“Maliha,” croaked Xiuri, her eyes full of tears as she staggered towards her.

“What was that?”

“I don’t- “

Xiuri’s words were cut off by the ear-piercing thwack of a drum cracking in the distance, causing Maliha’s head to snap to the side and take in the tribes riveted attention on the entry way.

The tribes unwavering attention to the entryway suddenly made sense as dark figures moved further into the flickering torch light.

There on the other side, behind Makula and the few elder members of the council, stood Tanzim. Her long hair flowing around her shoulders like flames of fire. The image of Tanzim fused with the flickering plumes of smoke that had plagued Maliha’s vivid dream. A dark cloud swirled around Tanzim, the Ishanu pulsing in anger and shock at the energy emitting from the woman. Maliha could clearly see the darkness that not only clung around the woman, but energy that had welded itself into Tanzim’s very being.

The council elders blessed the entryway with oil, ash and sage before stepping through the archway. The Ishanu welcomed them all but when Tanzim stepped through the entrance, the earth pulsed in anger. It was clear that the Ishanu had made its choice long before the trial had discussed anything.

The council made their way through the tribe in utter silence, no drums thudding in the background to announce them. The absence of the sound at struck a deep chord within Maliha. The sound of beating drums were an extension of this tribe, to be without that wholesome sound in the home of their ancestors felt wrong to Maliha. It wasn’t right, conveying how wrong this whole situation was.

Their feet bounded soundlessly in the springy earth until they stood before the great tree. Four men that she had failed to mention beforehand, came forward with a large wooden plank and a chair to which they sat at the foot of the tree.

Lightly pushing Xiuri and Maliha to the side. Xiuri whimpered behind Maliha, her body shrinking to almost half her side as she cowered in fear at the straight-faced males.

“Be easy.” Murmured Makalu, stepping away from the makeshift stage, around Maliha and to Xiuri. Her withered fingers glided over Xiuri’s deep scar that disfigured her face, with gentle strokes. Her amber eyes full of such grief and feeling for the whimpering woman.

She murmured something to Xiuri, her voice melodic as opposed to its usual withered tone. The soft humming sounds gradually soothed Xiuri, the woman’s body slowly unfurling from its cowering position until she was too tall for Makalu to touch any longer.

Her thin lips spread widely in a gentle smile as Makalu patted Xiuri’s shoulder and then turned to Maliha. Her head tilting sideways as she stared deeply, her eyes glazing over before her lashes flickered and her vision slipped.

Makalu’s bare feet padded on the floor as she stepped impossibly close to Maliha and looked up at the female, her amber eyes churning.

“Daharrosol a zeh y’unik.” She smiled, tapping beneath Maliha’s cheeks and motioning to her eyes.

Makalu’s grin spread wider when she saw the confusion that lined Maliha’s face, but Makalu did not stop to explain. Instead she stepped away from the two confused and docile females and made her way back to the lingering elders who stood in procession. as she walked past her and led the procession to the centre of the tree.

Xiuri moved closer to Maliha and whispered in her ear, translating to Maliha without her friend having to ask. There was a confidence in her words as she murmured, “Makalu said, gold is in your eye.”

Maliha’s lashes blinked rapidly as she tried to process the words, but they fell flat to her. They made no sense. Perhaps the words did not translate well into the common language and hence why the phrase seemed weird and unfinished. There had to be a meaning that Maliha was missing in the translation. There had to be.

“I don’t understand.” Huffed Maliha, her eyebrow’s knitting in confusion.

Xiuri’s teeth sunk into her lip as she tried to think of how best to explain what the phrase meant but the singular beat of a drum signalled the beginning of the trial bringing the slow chatter of the tribe to a complete halt.

Xiuri squeezed Maliha’s hand and quickly mouthed the words later before then turning to face the front and leaving Maliha to dwell on those words on the few moments before the trial begun.

Ujarak separated from the cluster of councilmen and women, with his broad shoulders back and his hair decorated with black and brown feathers tied in intricate patterns by thick brown rope. The dark feathers were such a contrast from the previous bright colours that he wore for the naming and welcoming ceremony of Namali and Kanu. Ujarak’s jaw was clenched tightly as he stepped onto the small makeshift wooden stage that had been carried in.

“Yahsolik.” He called his hand spread wide in greeting.

“Yahsolik,” the tribe called back but the difference in the tone was noticeable. There was no joviality or happiness that had been heard in their loving calls during the previous ceremony. No.

There were no hands clapping or arms waving as they greeted each other because everyone knew that something bad was happening. Something that had been absent amongst their tribe for quite some generations.

“I start by saying that as a tribe we try to emulate the first of our kind and to honour our ancestors by being loving, loyal and strong people.”

Heads nodded in agreement and hands thumped on chests at his words.

“Which is why it pains me to say that we are here today, to hear the trial of one of our members, who is accused of committing a heinous crime against another tribe member.”

There were no shocked gasps, no screeching wails of disbelief. There was nothing but tense silence as they avidly waited for Ujarak to begin the trial.

“As has always been our way since Solayka and Pathikyo, Zil shudsolik, guided this tribe, the council has deliberated and will begin their arguments to you. So, you, the people can form final judgement.”

His head nodded respectfully to each corner of the Ishanu, making sure each tribe member heard his opening sentence before he climbed off the dais and made his way to the wooden backless chair decorated in a sift cushion.

His eyes not once lingering on Maliha but somehow, she knew that Ujarak not only knew where she was in the crowd, but he was somehow watching her.

Yaniza stepped forward. The scowl upon her cocoa face made her wrinkled and scarred skin appear that much more frightening than it typically was. Her small lips were clenched tightly and her long braid wacked across her hip as she moved onto the dais

Her hands clenched along her stomach as her eyes cast down to the ground before snapping up to the crowd. The smug look that filtered into her eyes gave Maliah a moment of pause, her feet stumbling back into the tall body of Xiuri by the force of Yaniza’s stare.

Yaniza’s lips titled up cruelly in a sneer at Maliha before she composed her face and turned back to the tribe.

“I would first like to clarify that the crime that Tanzim, my loving daughter is being accused of was not commited against a tribe member.”

She smiled serenely, looking to Ujarak and then Maliha in glee as she proceeded to shove her proverbial sword into an already festering wound.

“No, the crime that my daughter is being accused of committing is towards and imposter, who has not only sneaked her way into our tribe and brought nothing but chaos, but she has also sought to antagonise my daughter by taking her Knar.”

The blood from Maliha’s face drained as she realized the ramifications of Yaniza’s words. Maliha was not tribe. No matter what she felt, or what she had done to contribute to the tribe, she was not a member and thus could Tanzim truly be tried if Maliha was found guilty of these things.

Her green eyes pooled with tears at the matching look of horror that Xiuri sent her way.

Yaniza had strategically placed her first blow. The foundations of Maliha’s conviction began to waiver under what she knew would be the first of many jabs that Yaniza took to her jugular throughout this trial.