Green and orange tentacles poked out from the basket Seng Nu was carrying into the kitchen station. “Lunch” she said, placing it down on the counter in front of Zaw who was still clearing away the remnants of breakfast.
Zaw turned around, his face beaming “Seng Nu! What have you got for me?” It was a genuine question, for he wasn’t entirely sure if the thing in her basket was a vegetable or some kind of exotic river creature.
Seng Nu took out one of the limbs, and the dangling roots confirmed it was a plant. She spoke in the clear and slow tones of a teacher. “Last week we made sour soup with the leaf from the...”
“...Tigerbite plant!” said Zaw, finishing her sentence “We made sour soup with it, but last night I made a tigerbite and red pea curry...”
“...And how did it taste?”
“Terrible, but the elephants enjoyed it at least.”
Seng Nu laughed.
Zaw was her first friend of her own age and for weeks and months she had been learning what that meant. She had approached the boundaries of friendship with caution at first, but quickly learned the give and take.
“This week we are not going to do sour, we are going to do...well go ahead have a taste” she took one of the green limb-like plants out of her basket and offered it to him.
Zaw looked at it suspiciously. “And you’ve eaten this before?”
Seng Nu sighed “Yes! I’m not trying to poison you, Everything I give you I have already eaten. If you find me dead in the forest then you’ll know that I gave my life for your cooking art.”
Zaw took a bite and almost immediately his tongue curled. “It’s bitter!” he said, spitting pieces of green flesh onto the counter.
“We need to cook it first” laughed Seng Nu.
“You offered it to me!”
“Yes, to cook, not eat raw!” Seng Nu picked the tentacle up and playfully slapped him on the head. She adopted the serious tone of a parent schooling a child.
“This plant, which I call greenray, is very bitter, but if you add just a little bit of it to a soup, it will give it an extra petal of flavour.”
“An extra petal of flavour? Sounds like something old man Kon would say.” said Zaw, still spitting bits of the bitter fruit from his mouth. “Next time tell me how I’m supposed to eat this before I take a huge bite! Why do you call it greenray?”
“Because no one has named it yet”
“I mean why the name...it doesn’t look like a ray of sunshine at all. It’s all furry and twisted, it looks more like a spider's arm.”
“You must have seen some giant spiders.”
“I suppose you’re right, no one would eat it if we called it spider arm, would they?”
Seng Nu grinned. “Sure, but you could have called your banana and spice curry rainbows and babysmiles and it wouldn’t have tasted any better.”
“You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?”
“I think My stomach has sympathy pains for those poor men you fed that too!”
For Zaw, tradition was like sailing down a river, or at least what he imagined sailing would be like. He was happy to let the current lead, but would stick a paddle in the water if it tried to take him somewhere he didn’t want to go. Sometimes he even sought out those unwelcome currents just because he liked the feeling of rowing against them. As a teenager he had painted his nails with charcoal just to revel in his mother's horrified look. And maybe that was why he thought that something more than friendship was possible with the girl with no clan who could kick down trees and make leaves float into her hand.
Seng Nu had begun chopping the greenray and looked over the canteen,
“What are they talking about?” said Seng Nu, motioned towards the tables where a group of men were hunched around a table. They seemed agitated and were in deep conversation.
“They are grumbling because the master is not giving them the annual rice gift.”
“They get it every year?”
“Only when the sale of timber has been good. This year was not a good year. Normally they would accept that, except that he’s managed to find funding for that.” Zaw pointed out across the camp towards the Master’s house. All the other men of the camp shared communal huts, but the Master, Dow Som, lived in a large two storey house, which had just been given an extension and a coat of paint. Its smooth surface gleamed so bright at midday that ducks would sometimes mistake it for a pond, and clatter against the roof before flying off in embarrassment.
Seng Nu went over to the men to collect their finished breakfast bowls.
“I’m sorry about the news,” she saidm her face frowning in sympathy.
“Thank you daughter” said Dai, one of the camp elders whose hair was grey, though he called it silver, and was so thin he no longer cared to tie it up but let it hang loose to his shoulders. He had worked at Buttersweet for almost twenty years riding Jaseik, the most senior elephant, who was perhaps the closest thing he had to family. Quite a few of the men here had no real families to speak of. Seng Nu knew that Dai and Kon had fought in a war years ago, but they never really talked about it, nor did they talk about their families much either. Neither of them had children despite their age.
The men in the camp had got used to Seng Nu being around, but for many of the younger ones, they had little reason to talk to a girl who was neither kin nor marriage prospect. Aside from Zaw, her closest confidants were Dai and Kon. Kon would often tell her stories of a past that she was never quite sure existed or not. Dai was just as friendly as Kon, but whereas Kon would ramble on for hours on any given subject, Dai seemed to choose his words carefully, as if he had a limited amount he could use each day. He spent a lot of time alone in his cabin, whittling away. Other men would carve small animal figurines or playing pieces. Seng Nu had once sat down to breakfast to find an exquisitely carved wooden flower by her bowl, a gift from Dai.
“Anyone can carve an elephant” he had said.
Dai and Kon recognised Seng Nu’s praxis. They both knew what it was like to watch men die from wounds and when they had seen the red stained sheets from Zaw’s bed being taken out to be cleaned, they struggled to believe that someone could have lost so much blood and recover. Seng Nu had done more for Zaw than just changing his bandages. Their long experience in the camp meant they also recognised that not even the most experienced of the oozies could have tamed an elephant like Pinkwetha as she had done.
Some of the other men on camp remembered Nor Nor, the old woman who had lived in the forest years ago and was rumoured to snap trees in half like twigs. They kept a respectable distance from Seng Nu. They didn’t want to get on her wrong side, but at the same time knew that if they were ever gored by an elephant or caught under falling timber that they would be glad if Seng Nu was there to heal them.
And everyone was grateful for her tutelage of Zaw in the kitchen.
“What have you got Zaw cooking for us today?” Said Dai.
“We’ve got some greenray” said Seng Nu. “but I’m making sure he’s cooking it first, so it’s not too bitter.” Dai
“Greenray? Who calls it that?” Said Kon.
“I do!” said Seng Nu.
“My grandmother used to collect it from the forest because no one ever sold it in the markets. She called it sungreen herself. I’ll be looking forward to tasting it for the first time since I was a young boy,” said Kon, making a show of licking his lips.
“At least there’s some good news for our plates today, if not our pockets.” said Dai, although his expression did not change.
“It’s not the money though is it?” Said Kon. “It’s the disrespect. We worked so hard this past season to get the timber in. I’ve been here for fifteen seasons and I know we had a good year. Yes, the prices in the City can change. But even just one extra leaf of jade would have been appreciated.”
Dai sighed. “There was no master in our grandfather’s day.”
A young oozie named Sut made a puzzled expression. “But Uncle, I thought that Buttersweet has been here for years and years, hasn’t it? If that’s the case, then how could your grandfather have come back here with no master. The Master would told him to get back to work”
“I told you there was no Master, young ‘un.”
The boy still seemed puzzled. In his mind he was trying to disentangle the concept of a master from the concept of Buttersweet camp. “Well if there was no master, who was the master?” he said and then instantly realised what he had said.”I mean who did the land belong to?”
“Now you’re asking the right questions” said Kon, but before he could explain, Sut had slammed his fist on the table “Why don’t we ask for, no better, demand, our jade gift!” He rose as spoke. There were nods around the table and the muttering and discontent got louder.
Like voles in the field as the shadow of a hawk passes over, the men suddenly became still. Seng Nu turned around to see Dow Som entering the dining area. He did not eat with the men, instead taking meals in his own house and he set his empty plates down on the table with a loud clatter. Around his mouth were flecks and spittles of food he had not bothered to wipe off.
“Why are you not at work yet?” he bellowed at the men, who were now looking at their hands in silence. It was easier to talk of standing up to the bosses when the boss wasn’t standing up in front of you. Now their minds turned to what they would do if Dow Som exiled them. The idea of demanding their annual gift had dried up like rice left on the fire too long.
“Come on, get out of here and get to work before the sun is hitting the tops of our heads.”
The men did not jump to their feet and race to the door, but got up slowly and calmly, as if they were in no rush at all. It was the mildest form of protest and the only thing they could do to salvage their pride after being silenced.
Kon and Dai stayed behind to finish their soup. Dow Som glanced at them and made a stifled clearance of his throat that turned into an undignified snort. He span on his heels and walked out, apparently satisfied that he managed to clear out most, if not all, of the kitchen. Neither Kon nor Dai acknowledged him.
“We’ll go in our time,” said Kon to the empty doorway.
Seng Nu sat down next to them. “Can you explain to me how things work here?”
“You want to be an oozie?” Said Kon
“No, it’s not that. I know how things work, I mean the men cut the trees down and the elephants pull them back here, and then they are pushed down the river. Then the people down the river…”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
“How do you know it’s people, Seng Nu? It could be monkeys. Rich monkeys who were thrown out of their forest abode and now live in castles made from our generous timber to build their houses.”
Dai snorted. “The important thing we give them isn’t the timber. It’s the time we spend collecting it.”
Seng Nu carried on. “Well those people, or whoever they are, they send us back jade which you can exchange for things like food and clothes. I understand that. Mostly. But I don’t understand why Gunthaw gets jade too. He doesn’t do anything!”
“Oh but he does do something. He uses his praxis.”
Anticipating Seng Nu’s puzzled frown, Kon leaned back and slapped his hands lightly on his knees, the sign that he was about to tell a story.
“You learned much of your praxis from Nor Nor, I dare say.”
Seng Nu nodded. She couldn’t see how Gunthaw had a praxis here though, what did he do?
“As you can see my own praxis is good at guessing connections.”
“Nor Nor was a smart woman,” said Dai.
“We saw how you saved Zaw, and we know you can whisper with animals and plants, command them to…”
“Not command,” said Seng Nu.
“Ask?” Said Kon
“Suggest?” Said Dai.
“Something like that”
“Your praxis is with the earth and its beings. Gunthaw’s praxis works with the unnatural. The camp, the very ground we are standing on…it’s not real”.
Seng Nu looked at the yellowish earth on the floor of the kitchen, it seemed real enough to her.
“Oh and the dust is real enough. As are the beams and this table,” the bowls shook as Kon slapped his hand down on the counter top. He reached down and plucked a small wispy plant from the ground. “What’s this?”
“A weed” said Dai, in a way that almost seemed rehearsed, as if they were actors in a well travelled troupe.
“What kind of weed?” returned Kon with a flourish
“Given the general pointy shape and the reddish inner leaves, it appears to be brockweed, friend.”
“Right, and so Seng Nu, if we were to go back, let's say one hundred years, to this very spot, and picked up this same weed, or something that looked very much like it, wouldn’t the people there also call it brockweed?
“They would,”
“Right, and …
“...if they spoke the same language as we do.”
Kon hesitated and a barely imperceptible frown appeared on his forehead. Dai smiled. This was a new interjection into the argument.
Kon thought things through for a moment “Well the language doesn’t matter. It’s not what they called it, but they, like us, would recognise this plant from its pointy leaves and reddish leaves. They would also know not to eat it..”
“Maybe not” said Seng Nu. “We don’t know plants are poison until someone tries them.”
Kon sighed.
“She’s got a point you know,” Said Dai, clearly enjoying the interruption.
Kon, rubbed his face in his hands as if he were washing it. “Forget the name or what they know about it, will you accept that the people from a hundred years ago would have shared the forest with plants like this and trees like these”, he moved his arms in a wide spiral towards the forest. “And” he said, directing his attention back to the table, “they would have also built tables like this and huts to sleep in just like we have now. In fact, I believe that this very table is a hundred years old.”
Seng Nu nodded.
“So for the most part they had a working timber camp just like this. But with one big difference. If you told them that the camp was owned by a man, they wouldn’t have understood what you were talking about.”
“Gunthaw’s praxis is that he created Buttersweet as an idea, a thing you can own just like the clothes on your back. He has convinced us all that Buttersweet camp is not just the soil and the buildings but a thing that he holds in hands that are also imaginary.”
“How are the hands imaginary?” asked Seng Nu.
Kon picked up his spoon from the table. “This is my spoon and as you can see it’s in my very real hands”
Zaw, who was listening in as he was clearing up the tables, called over. “It’s not your spoon, uncle, I hope you aren’t thinking of taking it with you today!”.
“It’s not my spoon, but what if I wanted to fight you for it?”
“An old man against a cripple?” Zaw laughed. “I’d say we’re fairly even.”
“Well, let’s say, for argument's sake, that we fought and I won the spoon for myself, and I carried it to my hut each night and punched anyone who tried to take it off me. And every day at breakfast and dinner you’d see me clutching the spoon tightly. ‘My spoon!’ That's what I’d say. My spoon! I’d even sleep with it in my fingers as I slept.” Kon hunched his back and closed his eyes, as if sleeping, with the spoon tightly locked in his fingers.
“Now this behaviour, of owning the spoon, might be rude, maybe strange, but it makes sense, right? Most people would agree that it would be my spoon. So when it comes to the land here…”
“Gunthaw doesn’t hold the land here in his hands like you with the spoon!” said Seng Nu.
“Yes!” said Kon. “He doesn’t hold it like a spoon, because he can’t. Not with his hands. But as we all agree that he owns Buttersweet…”
Dai wrinkled his nose. Kon glanced at him but continued. “...then what is he holding it with?”
The three of them sat listening to the wind coming in and the distant sounds of crows in far off treetops.
Seng Nu broke the silence first. “I don’t know what he’s holding it with.”
“I don’t either, not really.” Said Kon. “But he’s made us believe he is.”
“But he didn’t just conjure the hand, but the thing that it’s holding too. The big hand isn’t holding this place” Seng Nu knelt down and picked up a handful of dust and let it falls through her fingers. “It’s holding something else. It’s holding…” she scrunched her face up trying to think of how she could express the idea in her mind. “It’s not holding the real Buttersweet. It’s holding a Buttersweet made of smoke.”
Dai wrinkled his nose again in objection.
“He thinks I believe in ghosts” Said Kon smirking.
“Not ghosts.” Said Dai “I believe in things that we cannot see. I believe in happiness, in fear, in love. But I think you are thinking too much about this. Gunthaw owns the land not because he has made us believe in a land that isn’t there, but because he has a bloody big bloody sword that he swings about pretty hard.”
“Not anymore!” said Kon. “Gunthaw was a strong warrior. the strongest. But the wind blows through his bones these days just as it does to mine. I’m sure he can lift his old battle sword, but whether he can swing it is another story.”
“And that’s why he has kept a small army at his command. He’s the only person in the valleys that can call up fifty men to do his bidding. I don’t believe a man should own land. I believe this land belongs to us all. But I work here and Gunthaw takes a share of my jade. Because he has a sword and his men have swords too. Sharp ones. Arrows too.”
“But over time we start to forget this. The land becomes a thing of its own, separated from its origin as a spoil of war.”
“But even if we stopped believing in the hands that hold the land. He could still command his men to come and slaughter us..”
“Yes but the ghostly hands aren't just holding the land, but the men too.”
“But those hands aren’t imaginary,” said Dai. “We do not allow him to take our jade because we believe in things that are not there. The swords, bowman and archers that come to his command are real enough and you and I both know he would cut down anyone who tried to deny him his cut of the jade. He does not need to conjure imaginary places to do this.”
“I think we can both agree that if we ever wanted out of this, we would have to do more than just stop believing,” Said Kon.
“What are you lot talking about?” It was Dow Som, who, having nothing better to do had wandered over to berate the men. “I know you two old peapods are too weak to ride elephants these days, but there’s work to be done in the timber sheds cleaning the chains. So enough with the party.”
As slow as land turtles, Kon and Dai began to rise from their chairs and make their way out. Seng Nu felt a ripple of anger rising up in her stomach.
“You should be ashamed.” She said. “You tell everyone there’s no money but you’re able to find it when it comes to your house aren’t you?” She spoke with anger, but also with the quiet assured confidence she had been slowly gaining in the past few months since she had arrived.
Dow Som grimaced and rubbed his knuckles against his forehead in an attempt to simmer his temper. A season ago, when Gunthaw had told him to send the girl away and not to allow her to visit the camp, he had no strong like or dislike of her. As the months went on and it became clear that she would not leave, he had developed a growing hatred of the girl who disregarded rules like the birds ignored fences.
He was well aware of how silly it all must have appeared. One young girl who skipped in and out the camp and no one could stop her. Even if he ordered some of the men to carry her out, they would refuse, claiming either that her semi-wild elephant that she treated like a pet would attack them, or that she herself had some sort of power she could wield. Now she had not just disobeyed him, but was accusing him of stealing!
Dow Som had been just a boy when his sister Mai Pan married Gunthaw and during the war against the mountain tribes, he had fought sword in hand, next to his brother in law. Looking at his rotund body these days it was hard to imagine that once he had not only been slimmer, but had been a hero of the wars, who some said could best even Gunthaw in a duel.
The fortunes of both men changed after the war. Gunthaw became headman, narrowly beating Dow Som in the Blackstone vote. Soon after Gunthaw appointed Dow Som as apprentice to the Master of the timber camp. That first year, Dow Som spent most of his time in the camp office, learning how to write and keep records and tally up each log of timber that passed through the camp. He also had to note and check the details of each elephant that worked there, their age, their strength, their diet, illnesses and injuries, parents and children. Most importantly, he collected the money that arrived from the city and distributed it to the men and himself. After a few years he became the Camp Overseer, which brought a high salary and a place of his own to live in, where he had remained ever since, his diligence slipping away with each year. Separated from the village and the body of the camp, he had learnt to love two things: food and giving orders. He had not grown into it graciously.
“Get out of here you filthy orphan!” he shouted at Seng Nu, his temper boiling out and over the pot.
“Hey!” Zaw came walking out of the kitchen area, “Don’t talk to the lady like that”.
“So, you’ve decided to pet the puppy that follows you around” said Dow Som, who was now speaking more slowly and deliberately as he moved his words towards their destination. “Well you can take her with you, Zaw, because I want both of you out. Pack your things and leave. Both of you.”
“You nasty greedy old man.” It was Seng Nu. She felt herself beginning to lose control of her anger. Soon it would rise up and swallow her in a fury.
Dow Som, who was already at the limits of his temper, raised his hand towards her. It was a mistake he would regret for the rest of his life.
The wall of the cook station shattered into splinters and dust. There, framed by the morning sun that streamed bright through the gaping hole, was the silhouette of a beast.
Pinkwetha reared up on his back legs and let out a bone-chilling roar and there was little doubt from anyone who his anger was directed at.
Seng Nu, whose own growing rage had quickly dissolved, called out to him and Pinkwetha came down onto four legs, resting in the doorway while puffs of steam came out his nostrils in quick furious breaths. Everyone else in the room had backed against the walls.
Except Dow Som. He was already at the gate, his legs moving faster than they had for years as he ran out of the camp down the forest path towards the village.
It was after that, that things really changed.
///
“You’d better run!” Pinkwetha snorted in triumph as he watched the fat figure of Dow Som run out of the camp. He had known the Master since he was a calf, though respected him less than any other of the humans at Buttersweet. The human he most respected was the one he had known for the least time. He would protect her from anyone!
He watched as Zaw hugged Seng Nu. Were they a pairing now? He would have to ask Auntie Chyar. Or maybe Seng Nu would tell him. He could not speak the thorny language of humans any more than they could trumpet as he did. The men could make themselves understood with their munchy treats and occasionally with their pointy sticks, but Seng Nu was the only one who could really talk to him.
“Get the others and bring them here” she said. He did not know how she did it, because her mouth did not move, but he understood her as clearly as he would his own mother.
He scampered off into the forest, trumpeting an excited herald. Soon the other working elephants were trotting out from under the trees down the well-worn paths into the dusty ground at the centre of the camp. Auntie Chyar and Uncle Jhabow came first, together as usual. Then Old Tai, who was retired but moved quicker than his years. Uncle Jaseik followed him, nearing retirement, he was working half days now, but he was still the largest bull in the jungle and he made sure that his feet stamped louder than they needed to as he approached. His old nursery playmates Japhtu and his older brother Lekwai wandered in, with the swagger that new elephant workers adopted after a year in the jungle. Then there was Auntie Pi, Auntie Chosone and Uncle Powayoke. The oozies were still sitting on their backs, confused at their inability to coax them back to work, but secretly relishing a break themselves. Finally, Auntie Sama brought the children from the forest nursery, who bounded and bounced around her legs, wrestling each other with their trunks and pulling their playmates tails. each other’s tails. Uncle Jaseik walked over, his face a small cloud that threatened a burst of thunder. The children stopped as soon as they saw him.
The entire camp, men and elephants were now gathered in the centre of the camp. Pinkwetha wrapped his trunk gently around Seng Nu’s waist and lifted her up and onto his back.
She began to address the men of the camp from her high platform. She began quietly and nervously, her voice skittering from thought to thought like a mouse running between trees, but as she spoke it became louder and more solid until it was like listening to the voice of a thousand year banyan tree, or what Pinkwetha imagined a banyan tree would sound like. It was a game he played with himself on his forest trips. Willow trees spoke with faint shaky voices like whispers in the wind. Mango trees were like a storm of bells. Banana trees were delicious. No that wasn’t that a sound, that was a taste. Banana trees, they sounded like...
The cheering of the men brought him out of his reverie. The men had arrived with expressions of puzzled disbelief, especially as they learnt what had happened to Dow Som. But Seng Nu had captured that feeling of confusion and moulded it into something that was just as strong but more useful to the wellbeing of the men. Their faces now were animated, excited. On some of the men, joy was making an appearance.
Even the elephants were trumpting in excitement. “The master isn’t the master anymore” said Seng Nu.
The air was thick with rebellion.