The Poison Eaters_ And Other Stories Part 6

Rosa frowned. "You really saw an enkanto enkanto? You're sure."

Tomasa had been a coward. Perspiration cooling on her neck, she thought of all the things she might have said. He'd caught her off guard. She hadn't expected him to have a soft smile, or to laugh, or even to exist in the first place. She looked at the tamarind sh.e.l.l in her hand and watched as her fingers crushed it. Bits of the pod stuck in the sticky brown fruit beneath. For all that she'd thought Eva was stupid around boys, she'd been the stupid one. "I'm sure," she said hollowly.

On her way up the stairs to bed, it occurred to Tomasa to wonder for the first time why an elf who could make a love spell with a few words would burn with thwarted desire. But then, in all of Rosa's stories the elves were wicked and strange-beings that cursed and blessed according to their whims. Maybe there was just no making sense of it.

The next day the priest came and said novenas. And after that, the albularyo albularyo sprinkled the white sheets of Eva's bed with herbs. Then the doctor came and gave her some pills. But by nightfall, Eva was no better. Her skin, which had been as brown as polished mahogany, was pale and dusty as that of a snake ready to shed. sprinkled the white sheets of Eva's bed with herbs. Then the doctor came and gave her some pills. But by nightfall, Eva was no better. Her skin, which had been as brown as polished mahogany, was pale and dusty as that of a snake ready to shed.

Tomasa called her father's cell phone and left a message, but she wasn't sure if he would get it. Out far enough in the provinces, getting a signal was chancy at best. Her mother's Hong Kong hotel was easier to reach. She left another message and went up to see her sister.

Eva's hair was damp with sweat and her eyes were fever-bright when Tomasa came to sit at the end of her bed. Candles and crucifixes littered the side table, along with a pot of strong and smelly herb tea.

Eva grabbed Tomasa's hand and clutched it hard enough to hurt.

"I heard what you did." Eva said with a cough. "Stay away from his G.o.dd.a.m.ned tree."

Tomasa grinned. "You should drink more of the tea. It's supposed to help."

Eva grimaced and made no move toward her cup. Maybe it tasted as bad as it smelled. "Look, I'm serious," she said.

"Tell me again how he cursed you," Tomasa said. "I'm serious, too."

Eva gave a weird little laugh. "I should have listened to Rosa's stories. Maybe if I'd read a couple less magazines . . . I don't know. I just thought he was a boy from the fields. I told him to mind his place and leave me alone."

"You didn't eat any of his fruit, right?" Tomasa asked suddenly.

"I had a little piece," Eva said, looking at the wall. "Before I knew he was there."

That was bad. Tomasa took a deep breath and tried to think of how to phrase her next question. "Do you . . . um . . . do you think he might have made you fall in love with him?"

"Are you crazy?" Eva blew her nose in a tissue. "Love him? Like him? He's not even human."

Tomasa forced herself to smile, but in her heart, she worried.

Rosa was sitting at a plastic table in the kitchen chunking up cubes of ginger while garlicky chicken simmered on the stove. Tomasa liked the kitchen. Unlike the rest of the house, it was small and dark. The floor was poured concrete instead of gleaming wood. A few herbs grew in rusted coffee cans along the windowsill and there was a strong odor of sugarcane vinegar. It was a kitchen to be useful in.

Tomasa sat down on a stool. "Tell me about elves."

Rosa looked up from her chopping, a cigarette dangling from her lips. She breathed smoke from her nose. "What do you want me to tell you?"

"Anything. Everything. Something that might help."

"They're fickle as cats and twice as cruel. You know the tales. They'll steal your heart if you let them and if you don't, they'll curse you for your good sense. They're night things-spirits-and don't care for the day. They don't like gold, either. It reminds them of the sun."

"I know all that," Tomasa said. "Tell me something I don't know."

Rosa shook her head. "I'm no mananambal mananambal-I only know the stories. His love will fade; he will forget your sister and she will get well again."

Tomasa pressed her lips into a thin line. "What if she doesn't?"

"It has only been two days. Be patient. Not even a cold would go away in that time."

Two days turned into three and then four. Their mother had changed her flight and was due home that Tuesday, but there was still no word from their father. By Sunday, Tomasa found that she couldn't wait anymore. She went to the shed and got a machete. She put her gold Santa Maria pendant on a chain and fastened it around her neck. Steeling herself, she walked to the tamarind tree, although her legs felt like lead and her stomach churned.

In the day, the tree looked frighteningly normal. Leafy green, sun-dappled, and buzzing with flies.

She hefted the machete. "Make Eva well."

The leaves rustled with the wind, but no elf appeared.

She swung the knife at the trunk of the tree. It stuck in the wood, knocking off a piece of bark, but her hand slid forward on the blade and the sharp steel slit open her palm. She let go of the machete and watched the shallow cut well with blood.

"You'll have to do better than that," she said, wiping her hand against her jeans. She worked the blade free from the trunk and hefted it to swing again.

But somehow her grip must have been loose, because the machete tumbled from her hands before she could complete the arc. It flew off into the brush by the stream.

Tomasa stomped off in the direction of where it had fallen, but she found no trace of it in the thick weeds. "Fine," she shouted at the tree. "Fine!"

"Aren't you afraid of me?" a voice said, and Eva whirled around. The elf was standing in the gra.s.s with the machete in his hand.

She found herself speechless again. If anything the daylight rendered him more alien looking. His eyes glittered and his hair seemed to move with a subtle wind as though he was underwater.

He took a step toward her, his feet keeping to the shadows. "I've heard it's very bad luck to cut down an enkanto's enkanto's tree." tree."

Tomasa thought of the gold pendant around her neck and stepped into a patch of sunlight. "Good thing for me that it's only a little chipped, then."

He snorted and for a moment he looked like he was going to smile. "What if I told you that whatever you do to the tree, you do to the spirit?"

"You look fine," she said, edging back to the bridge. He did. She was the one who was bleeding.

"You're either brave or stupid." He turned the blade in his hand and held it out to her, hilt first. She would have to step closer to him, into the shadows, to take it.

"Well, I'd pick stupid," she said. "But not that stupid." She walked quickly over the bridge, leaving him still holding the machete.

Her heart beat like a drum in her chest as she made her way home.

That night, lying in bed, Tomasa heard distant music. When she turned toward the window, a full moon looked down on her. Quickly, she dressed in the dark, careful to clasp her gold chain around her neck. Holding her shoes in one hand, she crept down the stairs, bare feet making only a soft slap on the wood.

She would find a mananambal mananambal to remove the to remove the enkanto's enkanto's curse. She would go to the night market herself. curse. She would go to the night market herself.

The graveyard was at the edge of town, where the electrical lines stopped running. The moonlight illuminated the distant rice fields where kerosene lamps flickered in Nipa huts. Cicadas called from the trees and beneath her feet, th.o.r.n.y touch-me-nots curled up with each step.

Close to the cemetery, the j.a.panese synth-pop was loud enough to recognize and she saw lights. Two men with machine guns slung over their shoulders stood near marble steps. A generator chugged away near the trees, long black cords connecting it to floodlights mounted on tombs. All across the graves a market had been set up, collapsible tables covered with cloth and wares, and people squatting among the stones.

From this distance, they didn't look like elves or witches or anything supernatural at all. Still, she didn't want to be rude. Unclasping the Santa Maria pendant from her neck, she put it in her mouth. She tasted the salt of her sweat and tried to find a place for it between her cheek and her tongue.

She wondered if the men with guns would stop her, but they let her pa.s.s without so much as a glance. A man on the edge of the tables played a little tune on a nose flute. He smiled at her and she tried to grin back, even though his teeth were unusually long and his smile seemed a touch too wide.

A few vendors squatting in front of baskets called to Tomasa as she pa.s.sed. Piles of golden mangos and papaya paled in the moonlight. Foul-smelling durians hung from a line. The eggplant and purple yams looked black and strange, while a heap of ginger root resembled misshapen dolls.

At another table, split carca.s.ses of goats were spread out like blankets. Inside a loose cage of bamboo, frogs hopped frantically. Nearby was a collection of eggs, some of which seemed too slender and leathery for chickens.

"What is that?" Tomasa asked.

" Snake balut balut," said the old woman behind the table. She spit red into the dirt and Tomasa told herself that the woman was only chewing betel nut. Lots of people chewed betel nut. There was nothing strange about it.

"Snake's tasty," the vendor went on. "Better than crow, but I have that, too."

Tomasa took two steps back from the table and then braced herself. She needed help and this woman was already speaking with her.

" I'm looking for a mananambal mananambal that can take an that can take an enkanto's enkanto's spell off my sister," she said. spell off my sister," she said.

The old woman grinned, showing crimson-stained teeth and pointed past the largest building. "Look for the man selling potions."

Tomasa set off in that direction. Outside an open tomb, men argued over prices in front of tables spread with guns. A woman with teeth as white as coconut meat smiled at Tomasa, one arm draped around a man, and her upper body hovering in the air. She had no lower body. Wet innards flashed from beneath a beaded s.h.i.+rt as she moved.

Tomasa rolled the golden pendant on her tongue, her hands shaking. No one else seemed to notice.

A line of women dressed in tight clothing leaned against the outside wall of the tomb. One had skin that was far too pale, while another had feet that were turned backwards. Some of them looked like girls Tomasa knew from town, but they stared blankly at her as she pa.s.sed. Tomasa shuddered and kept moving.

She pa.s.sed vendors selling horns and powders, narcotics and charms. There were candles rubbed with thick salves and small clay figurines wound with bits of hair. One man sat behind a table with several iron pots smoking over a small grill.

Steam rose from them, making the hot night hotter. Bunches of herbs and flowers littered the table, along with several empty Johnny Walker and Jim Beam bottles and a chipped, ceramic funnel.

The man looked up from ladling a solution into one of the empties. His longish hair was streaked with gray and when he smiled at her, she saw that one of his teeth had been replaced with gold.

" This one has a hundred herbs boiled in coconut oil," he said, pointing to one of the pots. "Haplas, will cure anything." He pointed to another. "And here, gayuma gayuma, for luck or love."

"Lolo," she said with a slight bob of her head. "I need something for my sister. An enkanto enkanto has fallen in love with her and she's sick." has fallen in love with her and she's sick."

" To break curses. Sumpa Sumpa, an antidote." He indicated a third pot.

"How much?" Tomasa asked, reaching for her pockets.

His grin widened. "Wouldn't you like to a.s.sure yourself that I'm the real thing?"

Tomasa stopped, unsure of herself. What was the right answer?

"What's that in your mouth?" he asked.

"Just a pit. I bought a plum," she lied.

"You shouldn't eat the fruit here," he said, extending his hand. "Here. Spit it out. Let me see."

Tomasa shook her head.

"Come on." He smiled. "If you don't trust me a little, how can you trust me to cure your sister?"

Tomasa hesitated, but she thought of Eva, flushed and pale. She spat the golden pendant into his palm.

He cackled, the sound dry in his throat. "You're more clever than I thought."

She didn't know if she should be pleased or not.

One of the mananambal's mananambal's fingers darted out to dot her forehead with oil. She felt wobbly. fingers darted out to dot her forehead with oil. She felt wobbly.

"What did you do?" she managed to ask. Her voice sounded thick and slow as smoke.

"You're a fine piece of flesh, even with that face. I'll get more than I could use in a thousand brews."

It sounded like nonsense to Tomasa. Her head had started to spin and all she wanted to do was sit down in the dirt and rest. But the gold-toothed man had her by the arm and was dragging her away from his table.

She stumbled along, knocking into a man in a wide straw hat who was running down the aisle of vendors. When he caught hold of her, she saw that his eyes were green as gra.s.s.

"You," she said, her voice syrup-slow. She stumbled and fell on her hands and knees. People were shouting at each other, but that wasn't so bad because at least no one was making her get up. Her necklace had fallen in the dirt beside her. She forced herself to close her hand over it.

The elf pushed the mananambal mananambal, saying something that she couldn't quite understand because all the words seemed to slur together. The old man shoved back and then, grabbing the enkanto enkanto's arm at the wrist, bit down with his golden tooth.

The elf gasped in pain and brought down his fist on the old man's head, knocking him backwards. The bitten arm hung limply from the elf's side.

Tomasa struggled to her feet, fighting off the thickness that threatened to overwhelm her. Something was wrong. The potion vender had done this to her. She narrowed her eyes at him.

The mananambal mananambal grinned, his tooth glinting in the floodlights. grinned, his tooth glinting in the floodlights.

"Come on," he said, reaching for her.

" Leave me alone," she managed to say, stumbling back. The enkanto enkanto caught her before she fell, supporting her with his good arm. caught her before she fell, supporting her with his good arm.

" Let her alone," said the enkanto enkanto, "or I will curse you blind, lame, and worse."

The old man laughed. "I'm a curse breaker, fool."

The elf grabbed one of the Jim Beam bottles from the table and slammed it down, so that he was holding a jagged gla.s.s neck. The elf smiled a very thin smile. "Then I won't bother with magic."

The old man went silent. Together, Tomasa and the elf stumbled out of the night market. Once the music had faded into the distance, they sank down beneath a balete tree.

"Why?" she asked, still a little light-headed.

He looked down and hesitated before he answered. "You're brave to go to the night market alone." He made a little laugh. "If something had happened to you, it would have been my fault."

"I thought I was just stupid," she said. She felt stupid. "Please, end this, let my sister get better."

"No," he said suddenly, standing up.