Gumatang, 1521
The ships came at dawn.
Five of them. They journey across the sea like invaders sure of victory. Wooden ships taller than trees, pale sails blown by the wind. They didn't glide. They marched. The waves yielded before them.
Lira stood at the rocky edge of the shore, salt biting at her feet. she'd never anything so big. So sure of itself. A creature, maybe. A god. Or the beginning of the end.
Someone gasped behind her. Then a sound of footsteps. Children called for their mothers. Dogs barked at the horizon like the ships wronged them. The sky was clear, but this—this was storm enough.
She did not run. She counted the ships instead. Counted the sails. Counted the number of birds startled from the cliffs as if they, too, knew what was coming.
Behid her, the village was starting to wake. Smoke from each houses. Rice being cooked. The ordinary, the crumbling.
Her grandfather appeared beside her without a sound. Lakan Puro, wrapped in his woven red shawl, his face as creased as the dried leaves in the mortar he crushed every morning that is used to treat his wounds. He didn't look at her. He was only looking at the ocean.
"They've arrived," he said. Not in awe. Not in fear. Only with the finalityof a man watching an old story play out exactly as it had been told.
"The white birds," Lira murmured. "Just like the prophecy."
Lakan Puro remained silent.
The elders in the village gathered midday. Spears gripped tighter. Questions louder. The people wanted answers.
But what answer was there, when the strangers hadn't even stepped ashore?
When the ships just floated there, just far enough to make a mockery of their safety?
When their sails shone like fake halos?
Lira stood on the periphery, listening. Watching. Trying to believe this was still their land.
"Maybe they come in peace," one man said. "To trade, perhaps."
"Peace doesn't arrive wih five ships," another snapped. "Peace doesn't come dressed in white to blind you."
She turned to her granfather. "Will they take us?"
"No," he said. "We will give ourselves to them. One small compromise at a time."
That night, Lira didn't sleep.
The hut creaked like it knew. The walls inhaled smoke. Her brother Kayo snored beside her, kicking off his blanket. Dreaming, maybe, of adventure.
She stayed by the fire. She placed her mother's last tapestry in her lap. Gods in thread. Spirals for the rivers. Mountains were marked by shells sewn into the fabric. Bathala stitched in red. Mayari in silver. All of them still, silent. As if wating for something they couldn't stop.
"Tell me again," she said.
Lakan Puro stirred from his mat. "You already know it. I told you that already."
"Say it anyway."
He didn't look at her. Just spoke to the fire.
"When the white-winged birds land, they bring fire hidden under cloth. When they smile, you will forget your gods. When they kneel, they demand your soul. The end does not come with war. It comes with faith."
Kayo groaned and rolled over. "It's just ships. Maybe they got lost."
"Maybe we did," Lira muttered.
She ran her fingers across the tapestry. Over gods that didn't blink. Over names that wouldn't survive translation. Over myths that would soon become crimes.
What do you do when the end arrives smiling?
What if survival costs memory?
She whispered a name she couldn't remember learning. One that returned only in dreams. A boy under a tree, calling her name as if she'd forgotten it.
Outside, the sea had gone quiet.
And from far beyond the beach, the white ships waited. As if history were waiting for them to blink first.
The man they called Captain Alvarez stepped onto shore three days after the ships arrived.
He was sun-burned, silver-haired, wrapped in leather and steel. His crew reeked of salt, rust, and rot. They skin cracked from too much sea. Their words were sharp-edged, unintelligible. They made gestires with open palms, smiles that bared too many teeth.
The village prepared gifts. Basket of rice. Coconut wine. Dried fish. Mirror, and other artifacts made by the villagers. Symbol of hospitality, or perhaps an offering to keep gods at bay.
Lira watched through the slats of her family's hut. She did not step forward. Not when one foreigners handed her a string of glass beads, red and yellow and useless. Not when her cousin whispered, "Smile, Lara. He chose you."
Chose me? she thought. For what?
The elders debated in hushed tones. Trade. Alliance. Protection.
Protection from what? The strangers they were welcoming?
A week later, blood met wine. Not in war, but in ritual.
Captain Alvarez performed a blood compact with Rajah Humapan, a leader from a neighboring island. Lira watched from the sidelines as her own father, Datu Agno, did the same. A cut on the palm. Blood dripped into a shared cup. Wine, red and thick, raised to trembling lips.
She had never seen her father hesitate before drinking.
She realized then: their world wasn't ending. It was being rewritten. Word by word. Drop by drop.
On the hill above the cove, the strangers raised a wooden cross. Hammered it into the earth like a blade. Called it holy. Called it peace.
Lira's cousin leaned in close.
"You're to bge promised," she whispered. "To one of them."
The words did not register. Not at first.
"They say it will strengthen the allience."
Lira's breath caught. Her hands went still. The tapestry in her lap unraveled.
I haven't even met him.
Outside, the cross stood tall, casting shadows longer than its forms.
And beneath it, their naes began to vanish.