Island's End Read Free

my mind?
    Lah-ame lays his hands on my head. The warmth of his touch comforts me.
    Questions roll off my tongue. “How far away do the strangers live? Why did they come here this morning? What magic helps their boats go so fast?”
    “The strangers have more things than we can imagine. Huts made of stone. Boats that fly across the ocean and the sky. I was once as young as you are now and just as fascinated by the strangers’ magic.” Lah-ame pauses. “But we have magic of our own. I found my way into a world that is more beautiful than theirs.”
    “You mean the Otherworld?”
    He nods.
    “Can we only travel there in dreams, Lah-ame?”
    Lah-ame taps at the side of his head and the feathers in his headband sway. “The Otherworld is inside us and all around us. We may enter it while we are awake as well as when we sleep.”
    He points at the water. “Look there, Uido. Tell me what you see.”
    “I see waves chasing each other,” I say.
    “Look deeper, Uido.”
    Wondering what Lah-ame wants me to see, I gaze at the bright ocean. It glares back, making my eyes water. But I see nothing unusual.
    “Uido, last night, in your dream, you saw with your eyes closed. Try that again.”
    He rests both his hands on the top of my head again. They grow heavy, weighing down my thoughts until I feel like I am falling asleep on my feet. Slowly, my mind becomes as calm as a pool of water on a still day.
    Lah-ame’s voice is gentle. “Follow your spirit across the ocean as far as you can.”
    I am still not sure what he wants me to do, but I imagine my spirit as a circle of light, floating farther and farther away from our island. Suddenly, an image enters my mind of a person standing on a beach. At first the picture is murky but it sharpens as I concentrate. As the vision brightens, my skin tingles and my spirit fills with the same awe as when I dream of the Otherworld.
    “I see a beach four times as long as ours!” I say. “I hear the rattling leaves of a coconut palm. A man is standing under the tree and holding his arms out in welcome.”
    When I finish speaking, the image grows dim. I open my eyes.
    He pats my hand. His touch feels as reassuring as Danna’s. “I was born on the island you saw, Uido. And the man is my friend.”
    “Your friend?” I know Lah-ame and the other elders in our tribe were born on another island and that they came here to get away from the strangers. But I do not remember Lah-ame ever saying he had a friend among them. “How could I see him from so far away?”
    “The spirits have chosen you to be their messenger because your own spirit has the power to travel deep into the Otherworld. Perhaps you will become the next oko-jumu . Would you like to be the tribe’s spiritual guide one day? Do you wish to become my apprentice?”

4

    L ah-ame’s question astonishes me.
    “Learn the ways of an oko-jumu?” I whisper. “Me?”
    “It is not easy to train as a spiritual guide,” Lah-ame continues. “For every ten men who try, nine of them fail.”
    “But—but”—I stutter, hardly daring to imagine I could someday lead the tribe as Lah-ame now does—“I am a girl.”
    “Do you not remember the stories I have told about Nimi-waye, Riela-waye, Cormila-waye and Chanelewadiwaye? Those women oko-jumu were also girls once.”
    “But have you known any woman who became a spiritual guide, Lah-ame?” I ask.
    “It is rare,” Lah-ame admits. “Still, there is no reason why a girl should find it harder to train in the way of the oko-jumu than a boy.”
    My breath quickens with excitement. “I want to learn everything about the Otherworld.”
    Lah-ame runs his gnarled fingers over the medicine bag that hangs from his bark belt. “No one can teach you everything. Myself least of all. I only know enough to guide you, if you truly wish to learn.”
    “I do, Lah-ame.”
    “This is not a choice to make lightly.”
    “I feel so alive whenever my spirit dreams of the Otherworld. Even seeing