Ty stomped his legs into the cooling sand, feeling stronger than he ever had in his entire life. He flexed every muscle and tendon, building the strength deep down and hardening his sun bronzed body. The newly finished tatou snaked around the scars embedded in his calf, the ink entombing the mauve wounds as a reminder of his power and survival.

A reminder of the etetal.

His journey.

He was ending that path tonight, he could feel it with every breath in his lungs and every wave crashing in his ears. The sea rolled in, each crest a musical note of its infinite power and plenty. He listened to the tide’s never ending push and pull, watching the sun embalm the shifting horizon.

Tonight he would let go of his past.

Tonight he would be born again from the sands and the currents.

His opponent stood at the other end of the beach, barring his teeth and flexing his own tatou that spread over his shoulder and crawled up his neck and jaw. His dark ropelike hair was tied back into a Mohawk and his muscles rippled under his tanned skin. Fires of hatred and brutality burned in his pitch black eyes.

Ty bent his knees and spread his arms, taking his stance. He let out an aggressive, short bark, a feral sound of challenge.
He was ready.

His opponent did the same, his body twitching like a jaguar waiting to be released onto its prey.

“Emoj mottan jidik,” Ty called. It is almost finished.

The other snarled, saying nothing.
The ball of fire sunk below the ocean, setting the horizon ablaze with ember and dying illumination.
The torches were lit.
War drums softly beat through the twilight.

The people surrounded Ty and his enemy, humming lowly. Children watched with wide eyes and the elders with cloudy, squinted ones scared by a lifetime of looking out over the glaring ocean.

The irooj emerged from his hut, his huge, dark frame adorned in bright streaks of red and white. His feathered and ornate headdress sat upon ropelike pitch black strands of hair, reflecting his status as the most powerful and wisest person there,.

The drum’s rhythm climbed, growing louder, the tribespeople’s hums becoming deeper.
He looked once to Ty and once to the other, solemnly nodding at each.

Tonight he would lose two sons, regardless whose blood was spilled.

He pointed to a dark spot in the jungle and the last torch was lit, revealing the young woman who silently sat with flowers and grasses weaved through her long, dark, silky hair. Golden paint swam around her intelligent, black, almond shaped eyes, dived across her young, beautiful lips, and spilled down her body in a shower of sparks – the torchlight set her aflame. She wore a grass skirt and a blank face, choosing to show no emotion.

The humming started to drown out the waves, the drums taking a more frantic, feral pace.

Ty met her eyes.

She was the whole reason he was here.

The only reason he was alive.

The reason why he was about to take a life or lose his own.
He looked to the horizon once more and closed his eyes, filling his lungs with the air that the ancestors had breathed thousands of years of ago. They weren’t his linage by blood, but by faith, and that was all that mattered.

The humming turned into an all-consuming roar, the drums now reverberating across the entire island. Ty felt the people’s power resonating through the ember filled air, their harmony of voices becoming one with his own.

The irooj raised his fist into the firelight.
Sudden silence strangled the crashing shore and screeching gulls.

Ty opened his bright green eyes and pulled his long, sea sprayed, golden blonde hair back, bracing himself for what he was about to do.

Tonight he walked his own path.

Tonight he became a son of the sea and a warrior of his people.

He roared, a throat tearing, nerve igniting howl breaking out from deep within and long ago that could only mean one thing – the sand was to be stained with warm ruby and the tides pooled with dark maroon.

He raised his weapon without another word, and charged his opponent.