His eyes were red and his head a little heavy. Maiki did not want to get out of his hammock.

   Usually, he would come out to breathe the morning air as soon as the darkness faded with the first rays of light that filtered through the trees. But that morning was different.

   He watched his wife Arika as she was roasting the first bananas collected from theirs rosas. That small plot of land required constant work, but the sweetness of the fruits was a reward for every effort.

   “When are we going hunting, dad?” a little voice from under the hammock asked. The question was immediately followed by a little arrow pricking dad’s buttocks. Laughing, the little scoundrel ran away, showing off his new toys.

   “Today no one goes hunting, my son,” his father answered faintly, while watching him getting further. In fact, he had never taken him hunting, he was still too young. But that day he was not going either.

   “What? Today you have to go hunting! And you have to hunt something big!” his wife said, handing him a roasted banana.

   “No hunting today, wife. It’s not a good day” he replied bluntly, sitting up and grabbing the banana.

   He did not want to add anything else.

   “Father,” the eldest son, Dada, started speaking as he approached the hammock with a large bow and some sharp wooden arrows in his hands, “we have to go hunting. It’s been a long time since we’ve got a monkey or a boar. They expect us to bring them something different from the same old little birds full of feathers and with no flesh!”

   “So that’s how they call them now?” Maiki did not want to look angry, so he smiled when his son’s brother-in-law, Pashu joined them, while lazily stretching his arm to grab another banana from the tray laying on the ground, near the fire.

   “I prepared the poisoned arrows,” said Pashu with firm voice. “Today we are going hunt a monkey.”

   “Today no one is going to hunt anything”, Maiki repeated, hoping that his authority would spare him the bother to explain that statement. The puzzled look of Pashu and the annoyed one of Dada convinced him to add what he had said a little earlier to his wife: “It’s not a good day for hunting.” And who better than him knew which days were good and which inauspicious!

   “Then it’s the right day that they start looking for other relatives to feed!” the son exclaimed, visibly irritated. Maiki knew that the duties towards relatives were important and had to be respected.

   However, deliberately ignoring the allusion, he began to look with interest at his wife who was coming back with a piece of beiju in her hand. Their bread was good – insipid like all their food, but he learned to appreciate it. In that moment, his only desire was to devour that little piece of dried bread. But his wife handed it to her son who immediately gave it a bit while still staring at his father.

   “I had a vision,” Maiki said, sighing. He waited for his wife to move away, so she could not hear him. Although he did not really believe it was inappropriate, he had learned that it was better not to ignore the superstitions of his people. Women were not supposed to listen to certain things.

   “I can trust you,” he added solemnly, but almost insecure of the sincerity of his own words. “The hekuras appeared in my dream to warn me. The spirits of the forest showed me the river where you want to go hunting. It was calm, calmer than usual, and the forest was silent. That place was hiding something evil.”

   He paused to check that the two young men were paying enough attention to his words, then went on, still whispering: “I saw a jaguar cub sneaking out of the bushes to get closer and closer to the river. The mother was not there, so, pushed by my curiosity, I stayed there and stared at him. Under the water, however, there was movement. The little jaguar just wanted to quench its thirst, but it was in danger. At the very moment that its nose touched the water, a crocodile jumped out of the river and bit its head. Then, with a few quick movements, it swallowed the cub almost completely. Out of his mouth, I could only see its small tail still wriggling.”

   Maiki’s gaze became absent. Like he had just realized how serious the situation actually was. Those present remained silent for a few more moments. Everyone knew that the dreams of the shamans were nothing to joke about.

   “Father, who do you think is trying to harm you?” his son asked, frowning. He knew that the jaguar was the rishi of his father, the animal of his alter ego.

   “I don’t want to accuse anyone without being sure, but I think I know who it could be,” Maiki replied, still lost in thought.

   Pashu, in spite of his usual self-control, seemed pretty upset. A dream like that could only predict death.

   Maiki’s death.