Michael Vey 3 ~ Battle of the Ampere Read Free Page B

smiled. “Thank you.”
    “Bu yung, sye.” She took my hand and led me out to the center of the village, where there was a large fire blazing. The natives looked at us as we arrived, their faces lit by the flickering flames. They weresitting around the fire on mats woven from palm leaves. There were many more women than men, and I guessed that the warriors were out patrolling the jungle.
    I sat down on a mat next to the young woman, who looked very happy, her face blanketed with a contented smile.
    “It’s a pretty night,” I said.
    She didn’t speak.
    “I can’t believe that you fixed my foot. Doctors in America can’t fix a foot that fast.”
    She looked over at me, her eyes gazing deeply into mine.
    “Hey, glow boy. She doesn’t speak English.”
    I turned around to see Tessa walking up to us. At her approach the young woman frowned, then quietly stood and walked away. In the shadow outside of the fire, I could see Tessa’s faint glow, which was comforting to me. My own glow increased as she got nearer. She sat down next to me.
    “What’s going on here?” I asked.
    “It’s a funeral dinner. That’s why the women are wearing those red and purple beads.”
    “A funeral dinner? Who died?”
    Tessa gave me a funny smile. “We did.”
    I stared at her. “They’re going to kill us?”
    She laughed. “No, glowworm. When someone leaves that they won’t see again, they consider them dead.”
    “That’s . . . creepy.”
    “It’s their custom. I mean, it’s not like Americans don’t have weird customs—like, carving faces into pumpkins and putting candles in them. Or hanging lights on Christmas trees. How weird is that?”
    “I never thought about it that way.”
    “That’s because it’s what you’re raised with. Same with them. Unfortunately, their customs won’t be around much longer.”
    “Why is that?”
    “The Amacarra are going extinct,” she said. “There used to be thousands of them. Now this is all that’s left. There are more old people than young. Soon they will be down to less than a dozen people.”
    “Why are they going extinct?”
    “Same reason the American Indians did,” she said. “Disease. The shrinking forest. The modern world.”
    The young woman returned and handed me a stone bowl filled with a yellow substance, mashed like potatoes.
    “Wo gei ni chr, ke aide.”
    I didn’t know what she said but thanked her. She left us again.
    Tessa asked, “Do you like Meihwa?”
    I looked down at my bowl. “I don’t know. I’ve never tried it.”
    Tessa burst out laughing. “No, Meihwa is the girl who’s been taking care of you.”
    I looked up at her. “Oh, sorry. She seems nice. She mostly just looks at me and laughs.”
    Tessa grinned. “Of course. She’s only twelve. And she thinks you’re cute.”
    “How do you know that?”
    “Because she calls you henkeai. ”
    I looked at her blankly. “Yeah, I’ve heard that. What does it mean?”
    “It means she thinks you’re cute.”
    I wasn’t sure what to say to that. “She’s cute too.”
    Tessa smiled. “If we were sticking around, the chief would probably marry her to you.”
    “She’s only twelve.”
    “The Amacarra marry young.”
    “Then it’s a good thing I’m not sticking around,” I said.
    “Good thing,” Tessa repeated.
    I changed the subject. “So what’s in the bowl?”
    “Mashed bananas,” she said.
    “Bananas,” I said. “Then it’s good for our electricity.”
    “Yes. But I don’t think the Amacarra know that. It’s just what they eat.”
    I picked out a piece of something white and fibrous from the fruit. “This isn’t banana.”
    She took the piece from me and put it in her mouth. “It’s piranha.”
    “Piranha?”
    “Yeah.”
    “What does it taste like?”
    She looked at me with a wry smile. “Chicken, of course. Just be glad it’s not the yasyegump .”
    “What’s that?”
    “Squashed termite larvae.”
    “They eat that?”
    “Sometimes,” Tessa said. “It