“We have one word for that in the North. We call it nine,” the tall woman said.
She smiled; the date feeder scowled and said, “A boy child knocking on the door rapraprapraprap like he going to knock it down. They after me, they coming for me, save this boy child! he say. Save this boy child, save him, he said. Save me!”
The chained woman darted a look. “Sssssssssssssssave the chhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh,” she said.
“The little boy screaming and screaming, what could a mother do? A mother with four boys of her own. She open the door and the boy run in. He run right into a wall and fall back and wouldn’t stop moving till she close the door. Who is after you? Nooya ask. Is it your father you run from? Nooya ask. Your mother? Yes, mothers can be strict and fathers can be wicked, but the look in his eye, the fear in his eye was not for strong word or the switch. She reach to touch him and he stagger back so quick his head hit the side of a cupboard and he fall.
“The boy wouldn’t nod, the boy wouldn’t talk, only cry and eat and watch the door. Her four sons including Makhang and Saduk say, Who is the strange boy, Mother, and where did you find him? The boy will not play with them so they leave him alone. All he do is cry and eat. Nooya’s husband was working the salt pits and would not be back till morning. She finally get him to stop crying by promising him millet porridge in the morning with extra honey. That night, Makhang was asleep, Saduk was asleep, the other two boys were asleep, even Nooya was asleep, and she never sleeps until all her boys was under the one roof. Hear this now. One of them was not asleep. One of them get up from the mat, and answer the door though nobody knock. The boy. The boy go to the door that nobody was knocking. The boy open the door and he come in. A handsome man he was, long neck, hair black and white. The night hide his eyes. Thick lips and square jaw and white skin, like kaolin. Too tall for the room. He wrap himself in a white-and-black cloak. The boy point to rooms deep in the house. The handsome man go to room of boys first and kill the first son to the third son and the floor was wet from blood. The little boy watch. The handsome man wake the mother by strangling her throat. He lift her up above his head. The boy watch. He throw her to the ground, and she is crippled with pain and she whimpering and screaming and coughing and nobody hear. She watch when he bring out the fourth son, the smallest boy, the little dormouse, holding his sleepy head up. The mother trying to scream no, no, no, no, but the handsome man laugh and cut his throat. She screaming, and screaming and he drop the fourth son and move in for her. The boy watch.
“The father come home when the sun far up in the sky. He come home tired and hungry and know he have to go out again before the sun go down. He put down his hoe, put down his spear, take off his tunic, and leave his loincloth. Where is my food, woman? he say. Dinner should be here and breakfast too. The mother come out of her room. The mother naked. Her hair wild. The room air feel wet and the father say it smell like it going rain soon. He hear her coming to him and want to know where is breakfast and where are the children. She right behind him. The room go dark and light flashing in the room and he say, A storm coming? It was just bright with sun. He turns around and his wife is the one with the lightning flashing through her like it do now. He look down and see the fourth son dead on the floor. Her husband jump back and look up and she grab his head with both hands and break his neck. When the lightning fade inside, her head come back and she look around her house and see all of them dead, the four sons and the husband and she forget the boy and the handsome man because they both gone. Just she and the dead bodies and she think she kill them, and nothing prove her otherwise and the lightning flash up in her head and she go mad. She kill two men and break the legs of one before they catch her. And they lock her up in a dungeon for seven murders. Even though nobody believe that she could break the neck of a big man who work in the fields alone. In her cell, she try to kill herself every time she remember what really happen, because she rather believe she kill them herself than it was the little boy she let in that kill them all. But most times she don’t remember and just growl like a cheetah in a trap.”
“That was a long story,” the tall woman said. “Who was the man?”
“Who?”
“The tall white man. Who was he?”
“His name not remember by any griot.”
“What kind of magic did he leave in her why this happen?”
Light was starting to glow in the woman again. She shook every time it happened, as if she had fits.
“Nobody know,” the date feeder said.
“Somebody knows, just not you.”
She looked at the slaver.
“How did you get her out of prison?” she asked.
“It was not difficult,” the slaver said. “They been waiting long days to get rid of her. She scare even the men. Every day as soon as she wake she would say the master going east or west or south and run in that direction, right into the wall, or the iron gate—two time she break out a tooth. Then she will remember her family and go mad all over again. They sold me her for just one coin when I said I will sell her to a mistress. I have her here for when she going to have use.”
“Use? You’ve been standing in her shit, and the maggots of the dead dog she been eating.”
“You don’t understand a thing. The white man. He didn’t kill her, and what he do, he do it to others. Many a woman like her running loose in these lands and many a man too. Even some children and I hear a eunuch. From women he take everything so they have nothing, but nothing is something too big for any one woman to bear, so she search and she run and she look. Look at her. Even now she want to be with him, she will be near him and want nothing else, she will let him eat her, she will never let him go. She will never stop following. He be her opium now. Look at her.”
“I am looking.”
“If he shift south she run south to that window. If he change west, she switch and run until the chain pull her back by the neck.”
“He who?”
“Him.”
“This story of yours growing long in the teeth. And the boy?”
“What of the boy?”
“You know what I am asking, Your Excellence.”
The slaver said nothing. The tall woman looked at the chained woman again as she raised her head from filthy arms. It looked like the tall woman was smiling at her. The chained woman spat on her cheek. The tall woman struck her face so hard and so quick, the chained woman’s head slammed against the wall. The chain links clicked and clanged from being pulled hard then let loose.
“If this tale had wings it would have flown to the east by now,” she said. “You want to follow the trail of a lost boy? Start with those child-raping elders in Fasisi.”
“I want you to follow this boy, the one this woman see in the company of a white man. It’s him.”
“An old tale mothers use to scare children,” the tall woman said.
“Tell me true—why you doubt? You never see women like her before?”
“I have even killed a few.”
“People from Nigiki all the way to the Purple City talk about seeing a man white as clay, and a boy. And others as well. There are many accounts of them entering city gates, but nobody witness their departure,” the date feeder said. “We have—”
“Nothing. From a madwoman missing her dormouse. It is late,” the tall woman said.
I grabbed the Leopard’s hand, still hairy, still about to change, and nodded to the lower floor. We snuck down and hid in the empty room, looking out in the dark. We looked out as the tall woman went down the steps. Halfway she stopped and looked over to us, but the dark was so thick you could feel it on your skin.
“We will let you know what we decide tomorrow,” she said to the others.
The door closed behind her. The slaver and his date feeder followed soon after.
We should leave,” I said.
The Leopard turned to go upstairs.
“Cat!”
I grabbed his hand.
“I will free this poor woman.”
“The same woman with lightning coursing through her? The woman eating from dog carcass?”
“That is no animal.”
“Fuck the gods, cat, you wish to quarrel now? Cut this notion loose. Ask the slaver about the woman when we see him. Besides, you were fine with chains on women only a night ago.”
“That is different. Those were slaves. This is a prisoner.”
“All slaves are prisoners. We go.”
“Free her I will, and you will not stop me.”
“I am not stopping you.”
“Who calls?” she said.
The woman had heard us.
“Could these be my boys? My lovely noise of boys? You gone so long, and still I didn’t make any millet porridge.”
The Leopard made a step and I grabbed his hand again. He pushed me away. She saw him and ran back to her corner.
“Peace. Peace be with you. Peace,” the Leopard said over and over.