Chapter Four – Iron and Bone
The morning after the sickness, the camp was restless. Word of the pale man who vomited black water had spread to every hut in Cebu. Some claimed the boy who fell ill was cursed by foreign gods; others whispered it was the sea itself, punishing those who feasted with strangers.
Tuyok sharpened his kampilan in silence, oiling the long blade until it shone in the dawn light. He had used it in countless skirmishes, its weight familiar in his hands, its edge strong enough to cleave shield and bone. Beside him rested his kalasag, its surface painted with the red spirals of his clan. These were weapons of the land—born from wood, fire, and iron smelted by their own forges.
Balangaw sat nearby, fletching arrows. "We will not fall easily," he said, forcing cheer into his voice. "Our kampilan against their hooks, our arrows against their thunder-sticks. Let them come."
But Tuyok's mind lingered on the night before. The way the pale man had twisted on the ground, barnacles sprouting from his flesh, and how the child's veins had blackened like roots sinking into earth. He had seen battle-wounds, fever, and poison before. This was none of those. This was something older.
Later that day, Lapu-Lapu gathered his men. His presence was steady, his voice firm as he spoke:
"The pale men bring weapons that spit fire, and armor that resists even the sharpest kampilan. But we are not weak. The sea has given us strength before, and the ancestors guide our hands. We will show them Mactan does not bow."
The warriors roared their approval, raising spears and shields. But even in their voices, Tuyok heard unease.
When the meeting ended, he found the babaylan waiting for him. She carried bundles of herbs—guava leaves, ginger root, and betel nut. "The pale ones heal with smoke and bitter drink," she muttered, "but their gods demand a price. We heal with earth and blood, calling our ancestors to drive out sickness. Yet even now, the whispers are distant."
She pressed a charm of bone and shell into Tuyok's hand. "Keep this close. The sea watches you."
That night, Tuyok dreamed again.
He stood knee-deep in the surf, his kampilan in his grip. The blade's edge gleamed, but barnacles crawled across its surface, blooming like teeth. When he swung it, the sound was not steel but a scream, as if the sea itself howled through the metal. Behind him rose the ships of the strangers, their sails dripping with black water, their crosses warped into hooks.
He woke gasping, the charm clenched in his fist.
At dawn, while patrolling the beach with Balangaw, they found a shard of steel half-buried in sand—part of a foreigner's blade, broken in the struggle of the night before. Tuyok lifted it, curious. The edge gleamed pale, sharper than anything forged on Mactan. Yet as the sun struck it, drops of black water seeped from the crack, dripping into the sand.
Balangaw recoiled. "It bleeds…"
Tuyok hurled it into the waves. The sea swallowed it eagerly.
"Remember this," Tuyok said quietly, his eyes fixed on the horizon where Magellan's ships loomed. "The sickness is not only in their blood. It is in their steel. It is in their gods. The sea twists all it touches."
Balangaw frowned. "And what of us, cousin? We touch the sea every day."
Tuyok had no answer.
Only the whispers of the tide, growing louder, as if amused.