The Kadaitcha Curse Read online

Chapter 13

  Arunta had a restless sleep but was awoken by the screeching of a lone cockatoo in the tree above him. He looked up and smiled broadly. “Thank you, my friend,” he called. With another screech the bird flew off.

  As the first rays of the sun gave hope to a new day, Arunta and Yuka reached the foot of the great mountain. The white bird had woken them early and while it was still dark they had eaten some berries and damper, drunk some water, hoisted their bag straps around their necks and set out with determined stride. Now they looked up at what lay before them.

  Two days, Yuka reckoned, would see them to his childhood home. “How happy they will be to see me,” he said.

  The climb was not steep, but it was difficult none the less. The only tracks were from wallabies but these were good enough. One obstacle was the thorny lantana bush that seemed to reach out to them as they passed. The track was also wet and slippery in parts. Yuka lost his footing many times and with each fall he grew weaker. So that he could help his father, Arunta had to lighten his own load. Tucker, he decided, would be easy to find on this mountain. So he discarded what damper and fruit remained in his bag and found a good place to hide the spear that Burnum had entrusted to him. He took Yuka’s bag and put it over his own shoulder so all he carried now was a little water and the clay from which he would make the paint needed for the burial ceremony. And all Yuka carried was the fur cloak so beautifully and carefully cut and stitched by Kira. Even so, with every step, Arunta could see the pain in his father’s face.

  “Will you tell me again the story of your name?” Arunta asked. The midday sun, though filtered by the forest trees, was still warm.

  “We will have a little water,” replied Yuka. “Then I will speak as we walk.”

  Arunta helped his father drink. The sounds of the day were different to those of the night. Birds flew overhead in the trees. Lizards rustled through the undergrowth. Insects maintained a steady chorus. Stream water trickled and splashed over rocks. But amid all this, Arunta could not shake off the sense of another presence; not a spiritual one, but something physical, something, he thought, that seemed to have been following them. They had both decided that the animal they had seen in the distance two days previously was not Kalu. She would have caught up with them by now.

  They resumed their walk and, slowly and painfully, over half a day, Yuka told Arunta the story of his name:

  On the morning I was born, the sky was filled with a big noise as countless white birds descended on the trees surrounding our camp. It was unusual, I learned when I was older, for these birds to be seen so high in the mountain. My parents saw it as a lucky omen and claimed the bird as the totem and protector of their newborn son. They named me Arunta which, in our language, means white bird. We were very happy growing up. But my childhood finished on the day of my initiation as a man of the tribe. It was very painful but I was marked with the sign of the bombola – two lines down the middle of my back then joining together as one. These lines are the two rivers that run together near my home and give life to the Tree of Spirits and to the people who live beneath it. This was the mark of every man in our tribe.

  Unlike some other tribes on the mountain, we enjoyed a peaceful life. We had no desire to fight but only to hunt and talk and share food. But as I have told you, I grew restless. Although there were many white birds to be seen on the day of my birth, I only saw such a bird one time. That was the day I wandered too far from my home and encountered the angry hunters from the other side of the mountain. As I was fishing in the lake, the call of the bird drew me away from my work of catching some dinner for my family. I dropped my fishing spear and followed the bird which seemed to have one injured wing. It flew awkwardly from one tree to the next where it would stop a while. I imagined that it was waiting for me to catch up, but I knew that it was just weak from its injury and needed to rest often.

  After a while I lost sight of the bird. I kept going forward and soon came to a clearing in forest where I saw two hunters who were strangers to me. I hid behind a bush not wanting to be seen. I watched them from a short distance and as they stopped and looked upwards I saw their tribal markings. Their initiation scars were like none I had seen. Each of them had the serpent burned into his chest. In our tribe the serpent was a sign of nothing good. It was a sign of death and evil. I had heard stories, but I had never seen with my own eyes men marked in this way. One of them pointed to where the white bird was perched. It was high above them but not too high to be out of the reach of a hunter with a strong arm. One of them picked up a stone and threw the rock up into the branches.

  I was angry to see them making sport of trying to kill an injured animal. I was even angrier because this bird was my totem. Although I had not seen this bird as I grew from childhood into manhood, I knew that it had watched over me from a height too great to be seen. And now it needed my protection.

  The stone thrown by the hunter hit the bird on its already injured wing and it fell from the branch to the ground. The other hunter picked it up and was about to strike it against the tree. I jumped out from my hiding place and shouted at them. They were surprised and for a short while they just stared over at me. I shouted again to make them drop the bird. “It is injured!” I called out to them. “There is no reason to make its suffering worse.”

  With this, the hunter who had felled the bird picked up his spear and drew his arm back. I had no weapon of my own so I turned to run. I had only gone a few paces when I felt the point of his spear bury deep into my shoulder. I fell to the ground and looked back to see them running towards me. Then I felt another sharp pain, almost as bad as the first. My father had arrived. He pulled the spear from my back and shouted at the hunters to leave. They stopped in their tracks, but only for a moment. One of them laughed. “Run away, old man,” shouted the one who still held a weapon, “or would you like to try catching my spear with your belly.” Without hesitating, my father raised the spear and threw it at the hunter. His aim was straight and true. The spear found the hunter’s heart. The last thing I remember of that day was the white bird dropping from the hand of the hunter and flapping helplessly, but silently in the grass.

  When I awoke the next morning I was back with my family. As I tried to sit up from my bed of grass I felt the pain in my back. My mother had put medicine on my wound which felt moist and hot. My head was full of fog but I could hear angry voices. I struggled to my feet and made my way to the edge of the camp where strangers were demanding that my father offer himself and me to their spears. They threatened that if we did not, then there would be war. I have already told you of the big magic of the kadaitcha man and of my decision to leave the tribe.

  Although I was very sad to leave my family on the mountain I was happy to see in the trees above me the white bird. Its wing was still weak but it went safely and surely from tree to tree and guided me to the bottom of the mountain. I never saw it again.

  I wandered for many days and the mountain that had been my home grew smaller and smaller behind me. I found some food but little water and I grew weak and sick. The pain in my shoulder was like a hot coal burning into the centre of my body. Each time I fell I thought only of the need to put a great distance between me and the mountain. Only in this way could I feel that my family would be safe. It was because I had wandered from my home my family was in danger. Now it was only by leaving my home that I could protect them.

  But the day did come when I was unable to lift myself after falling. I do not know how long I lay there but when I came out of my dreamless sleep I was lying in a bed of cool soft grass and a woman, with the help of a young girl, was bathing my wound. There were other strangers, both men and women, talking, sharpening weapons, grinding seeds and doing all the familiar things that would fill the days of my own family. I slowly grew stronger and after a time this tribe became accustomed to me living amongst them. Although much of their language was close to that of my own tribe there were still many words to learn. When I had recovered to
my full strength I asked to join their men on a hunting trip.

  This led to much secret talk among the elders. I could not, they decided, join them as a tribal hunter unless I had been initiated into their tribe. And I could not, they also decided, be marked with the sign of their tribe because I had come to them as a stranger and one day may leave again. Then the woman who had brought me back to good health spoke up.

  “He has already been initiated into his birth tribe. We can all see the scars on his back; the mark of the bombola where the two rivers flow down from higher ground to join as one. He has suffered much to protect his family. We cannot make him suffer again.”

  But the elders stood firm. “He cannot bear the mark of another tribe if he is to live and hunt with us,” said one.

  “He cannot be marked as one of us because he was not born one of us,” proclaimed another.

  Then the woman who had cared for me stepped forward. This woman was Mirrin, your grandmother. “So, if he must be marked, then mark him with the sign of my totem, the sign of Mirrin. Then no one can say that he does not belong with us.”

  I was expecting to hear the men refuse this but to my surprise they laughed and nodded. It was, they agreed, a good suggestion. Even Mirrin’s daughter, the young, pretty Kira, who had helped to apply so much good medicine to my back, seemed to think it was both agreeable and funny.

  The following day the ceremony took place. Although it was very painful I was no longer weak. Mirrin and her daughter had done a good job as healers and the spear wound was well mended. After the ceremony Kira again put cooling medicine on the burn marks that the elders had made on my back. Only after some days of putting up with the laughter of the men did I ask her why they had thought her mother’s suggestion funny.

  “Oh,” she explained, “my mother’s totem is the spirit that gives rain to our earth, the storm cloud. It now sits on your back above the mark of the two rivers. Together they give the impression of a tree. And the scar from your spear wound looks a little like a bird in flight.”

  “Oh, then it is no wonder that the men are laughing at me behind my back.”

  “They will quickly tire of laughing when they see what a good hunter you are.” Then she added, “You should also know that the elders have made one more decision.”

  “I hope it does not mean more hot stones burning any part of my body.”

  “No, it does not. They have decided that you will now be called Yuka. In our language it means tree.”

  And that is how I have been known ever since. Your mother and I received no argument from the elders when you were born and we named you Arunta, the name given to me by my own father.”

  Arunta was pleased. The telling of the story had taken Yuka’s mind off the pain of the walk. But now he could walk no farther.

  “Rest here,” said Arunta. “I will gather some food.”

  The mountain track had become steep and narrow but this place where they had chosen to rest a while was a little wider and flatter. To the left was the wall of a steep cliff that, Arunta was sure, no man could climb. To the right was a small clearing that ended with a fall that no man could survive. Yuka sat with his back against the cliff face, looking out over the precipice into the distance. Within a few moments he had fallen asleep. Arunta walked a little farther along the track where a small, fruitless fig tree grew precariously close to the edge. He walked carefully towards it and started digging around its roots collecting grubs. Mixed with some wild figs that he had collected as they walked that day, these little wrigglers would be easy for Yuka to swallow.

  The meal preparations were suddenly interrupted by a painful scream. Dropping the handful of grubs he had collected, Arunta sprinted back to his father.