Black Leopard, Red Wolf (Dark Star Trilogy)

THIRTEEN

Truly, it was foolish to say I found the boy. I found that he was far away. The Ogo, on hearing my news, grabbed his torch and dashed off to his left, then right, then went into the children’s dwelling, and yanked up so many rugs that a cloud of dust rose up and made itself known, even in the dark.

“The boy is nearly three moons away,” I said.

“What does that mean?” he said. He was still lifting rugs and waving his torch.

“About as far as the East from the West.”

He threw down the rugs and the gust blew out the torch.

“Well at least coming all this way served a purpose,” he said.

“I wonder what purpose it served Sogolon,” I mumbled.

“What?”

I forgot that Ogos had sharp ears. She was here before and not that long ago, perhaps even last night. Back in Fumanguru’s room, among the fallen books and ripped papers, her smell came on most strong. I made one step into the room and stopped. The smell came to me at once, and from every side. Shea butter mixed with charcoal, used on the face and skin to become one with the dark.

“We go out, Sadogo.”

He turned to head to the back wall.

“No, through the front door. It’s already open.”

We cut through the bush and walked right into a group of armed men. Sadogo pulled back, surprised, but I was not. They wore skin dye to blend with night black. I heard the crunch and scrape of the Ogo squeezing his iron knuckles. Ten and five of them standing in a half-moon, lake-blue turbans on their heads, lake-blue veils covering all but eye and nose. A sash the same blue across chest and back, black tunic and breeches underneath. And with spear, bow, spear, bow, spear, bow, and on and on, till the last one, carrying a sword on his left, sheathed, like mine. I held on to my sword but did not pull it out. Sadogo stepped once and knocked an archer out of his way, sending him and the arrow flying. The men turned to him in a blink, pulling back bows and ready to hurl spears. The man with the sword was not dressed as they. He wore a red cape over his right shoulder and under his left, flapping in the wind and slapping the ground. A tunic with the chest open that stopped right above his thighs and tied at the waist with a leather belt that held his sword. He waved them down, but watched me the whole time. Sadogo stood in position, waiting for a fight.

“You look certain we’re not going to kill you,” the swordsman said.

“Mine is not the death I worry about,” I said.

The swordsman glared at us. “I am Mossi, third prefect of the Kongori chieftain army.”

“We took nothing,” I said.

“Such a sword could not be yours. Not when I saw it three nights before.”

“You waiting for anyone, or just us?”

“Leave questions to me and answers to yourself.”

He came in closer until he was right in front of me. He was tall but shorter than me, his eyes almost reached mine, and his face was hidden in black dye. Gourd helmet with an iron stitch running in the middle, though the sun was gone and it was cool. A thin silver necklace, lost in chest bush. Head shaped sharp like an arrowpoint, nose hawk-like, thick lips that curved up as if he was smiling, and eyes so clear I could see them in the dark. Rings in both ears.

“Tell me when you see something that pleases you,” he said.

“That sword is not Kongori,” I said.

“No. It belonged to a slaver from the land of the eastern light. Caught him kidnapping free women to sell as slaves. Wouldn’t part with it without parting with his hand, so …”

“You are the second sword thief I have met.”

“Steal from a thief and the gods smile. What is your name?”

“Tracker.”

“Not your mother’s favorite, then.”

He was close enough for me to feel his breath.

“There’s a devil living in your eye,” he said.

He reached for it with his finger and I flinched.

“Or did he punch you one night?” He pointed at Sadogo.

“Not a devil. A wolf,” I said.

“So when the moon bares herself do you howl at it?”

I said nothing, but watched his men. He pointed at Sadogo, who still tensed his arms, waiting to strike.

“Is he an Ogo?”

“Try to kill him and find out.”

“Nevertheless, this conversation continues at the fort. That way.” He pointed east.

“Is that the fort no prisoner leaves? What if we choose not to go?”

“Then this talk between us, sweet and easy, becomes difficult.”

“We’ll kill at least seven of your men.”

“And my men are very generous with their spears. I can lose seven. Can you lose one? This is not an arrest. I prefer talk where streets don’t listen. Do we understand each other?”

The fort was in the Nimbe quarter near the east bank of the river, with a view of the imperial docks. We went down steps into a room made out of stone and mortar. Two chairs and a table. Candles on the table, which surprised me—candles were not cheap anywhere. I was sitting long enough for a cramp to shock my left leg. I stood up when the Prefect came in. He had washed his face. Black hair that when long would be loose and curly, but thin like the hair of a horse. Hair I have not seen since I was lost in the sand sea. And skin light as dried clay. Men who followed the eastern light looked like this, or men who bought slaves, gold, and civet, but slaves the most. His eyes made sense to me now, and his lips, which looked thicker now but still thinner than anybody else’s in these lands. I could already think of how Ku women and Gangatom women would be horrified at a man looking like this. They would have tied him down and baked him until his skin was the right dark. Legs like the Leopard’s, thick with muscle, as if he fought in a war. Kongori sun made his legs darker. I could tell when he pulled his tunic up higher, past where they were before, high enough to show how light the rest of his legs were and how black his loincloth. He pulled the fabric out of his belt and it fell this time below his knee.

“Expecting a jinn to seat you?” He sat on the table.

“Did a pigeon tell you I was coming?” I asked.

“No.”

“Did you—”

“I am the one to ask the questions.”

“So I am the one to be charged with robbery.”

“That mouth again, ’tis like a loose bowel. I can plug it.”

I glared at him quiet. He smiled.

“Brilliant answer,” he said.

“I said nothing.”

“Your best answer yet. But no. No robbery, since you would be the thief’s fool. But murder is untaken.”

“Kongori jokes. Still the worst in the empire.”

“As I’m not Kongori you should be of more laughter. As for these murders.”

“You cannot kill the dead.”

“Your friend the Ogo already confessed to killing twenty in just as many lands, and shows no sign he will stop.”

I sighed loud. “He was an executioner. He knows not what he speaks,” I said.

“He certainly knows much about killing.”

He looked older than he did in the dark. Or maybe bigger. I really wanted to see his sword.

“Why did you come to Fumanguru’s house tonight?” I asked.

“Perhaps I am heedless. People with blood on their hands tend to wash it where they shed it.”

“That is the most foolish thing I have ever heard.”

“You cast a foolish hand, moving in masquerade and climbing over thornbush yet expecting none to take note.”

“I track lost people.”

“We found them all.”

“You did not find one.”

“Fumanguru had one wife and six boys. They are all accounted for. I counted them. Then we sent for an elder who has since moved to Malakal. Belekun was his name. He confirmed all eight were blood.”

“How soon after did he move?” I asked.

“One, two moons.”

“Did he find the writ?”

“The what?”

“Something he was looking for.”

“How do you know the elder was looking for anything?”

“You are not the only one with big, fat friends, prefect.”

“Do you itch, Tracker?”

“What?”

“Itch. You scratched your chest seven times now. I would guess you are those river types who shun clothes. Luala Luala, or Gangatom?”

“Ku.”

“Even worse. Yet you say writ as if you know what it is. You might have even been looking for it.”

He sat back down on the stool, looked at me, and laughed. I could not remember anyone, man, woman, beast, or spirit who irritated me so. Not even Leopard’s boy.

“Basu Fumanguru. How many enemies had he in this city?” I asked.

“You forget I am the one to ask questions.”

“Not any wise ones. I think you should jump to that time of the night when you torture me for the answers you want.”

“Sit down. Now.”

“I could—”

“You could, had you your little weapons. I will not ask again.”

I sat back down.

He walked around me five times before he stopped and sat down again, pulling his stool next to me.

“Let us not talk of murder. Do you even know which part of the city you were in? You would have been detained merely for casting strange looks. So what took you to the house? A three-year-old murder or something you knew would still be there, untouched, even unspoilt? I will tell you what I know of Basu Fumanguru. He was loved by the people. Every man knows of his clashes with the King. Every woman knows of his clashes with his fellow elders. They killed him for some other reason.”

“They?” I asked.

“What happened to those bodies could not have been by one man, if done by man at all, and not some beast bewitched.”

He looked at me so long and so quiet that I opened my mouth, not to speak, just to look as if I was going to.

“I have something to show you,” he said.

He left the room. I heard flies. I wondered how they questioned the Ogo, or if they just left him alone to unspool how many he has killed in as many years. And what about me? Was all this the Ogudu, or did the forest itself leave something in me, waiting to strike? Something other than a reminder of my loneliness? Also this. What a strange thought to be had right here, when a prefect is trying to trap me into whatever charge he long thought to make up.

He walked back in and threw something at me so quick that I caught it before I knew what it was. Black and stuffed soft with feathers, wrapped in the same aso oke cloth that I had shoved into this curtain I was wearing. I was ready this time when it came, everything that came with a smell I now knew.

“A doll,” he said.

“I know what it is.”

“We found it three years ago near the body of the youngest boy.”

“A boy can play with dolls.”

“No child in Kongor would have been given one. Kongori think it’s training children in the way of worshipping idols—a terrible sin.”

“And yet every house has statues.”

“They just like statues. But this doll belonged to no one in that house.”

“Fumanguru was not Kongori.”

“An elder would have respected their traditions.”

“Maybe the doll belonged to the killer.”

“The killer is one year old?”

“What are you saying?”

“I am saying there was one more child in that house. Maybe whoever killed the family came for the child. Or something else, much more wild,” he said.

“That does sound wild. The child, a poor relation?”

“We spoke to all family.”

“So did Belekun the Big. Maybe you asked questions together?”

“Are you saying the elders are doing their own investigation?”

“I say you and I are not the only ones who went messing around dead Fumanguru’s house. Whatever they sought, I don’t think they found it. This is not feeling like an interrogation anymore, prefect.”

“It stopped being so when we entered the room, Tracker. And I told you my name is Mossi. Now do you want to tell me how you just appeared in this city? There’s no record of your entry, and Kongor is nothing if not a place of records.”

“I came through a door.”

He stared at me, then laughed. “I will remember to ask next time I see you.”

“You will see me again?”

“Time is but a boy, sir Tracker. You are free to go.”

I walked to the door.

“The Ogo as well. We have run out of words to describe his killings.”

He smiled. He had rolled up his tunic right above his thigh—better for running, and battle.

“I have a question,” I said.

“Only one now?”

I wish he were not so eager to show me he is quick-witted. Few things I hated more than to have a sentence cut off by somebody throwing wit. Again, something about him, not offensive but more irritating than a cut underfoot.

“Why do Seven Wings assemble? Here. Now,” I asked.

“Because they cannot be seen in Fasisi.”

“What?”

“Because they would raise suspicion in Fasisi.”

“That is not an answer.”

“Not the answer you want, so here is another. They await instructions from the King.”

“Why?”

“Wherever you came from, have they no news there?”

“Not what you are about to tell me.”

“You seem sure I’m about to tell you. There is no news. But rumors of war, there have been for moons now. No, not war, occupation. Have you not heard this, Tracker? The mad King in the South has gone mad again. After ten and five years of sense, his head is again taken by devils. Last moon he sent four thousand men to the borders of Kalindar and Wakadishu. The South King mobilizes an army, the North King mobilizes mercenaries. As we say in Kongor: We cannot find the body, but we smell the stench. But alas, war or no, people still steal. People still lie. People still kill. And my work is never done. Go get your Ogo. Until we meet again. You can give me the story of your single dim eye.”

I left this man to go irritate someone else.

I did not want to confront the Leopard. Nor did I want to see Sogolon before I could unravel whatever secret she was weaving. I looked at the Ogo and thought of a time, perhaps soon, when I would need a person to hear me pull the darkness out of my own heart. Besides, neither of us knew the way back to the man’s place and there were too many homes in this city that smelled like his. The Ogo’s mouth was still trembling with killings to confess, words to say, a curse to rinse from his skin. The route had many trees and only two houses, one with faint flickering light. I saw a rock up ahead and, when we got to it, sat down.

“Ogo, tell me of your killings,” I said.

He spoke, shouted, whispered, yelled, screamed, laughed, and cried all night. The next morning, when there was light to see our walk home, the Leopard and Fumeli were gone.