Dolingon people, with skin past black into blue. Most of them standing and holding on to a post in this caravan. Men mostly, in robes and caps, carrying books and scrolls. None of them a white scientist. Some talking to each other, not arguing, for they seem to agree on everything, but most just standing and thinking deep things. A wind push the caravan to sway, but I am the only one who jump. I grab for the post but grip the arm of a man who look at me like he will wash it as soon as we reach where I don’t know. And this caravan, fat like inside the Chipfalambula, but windows running down both sides, like a gallery for plants that only the rich in Marabanga have. I couldn’t see them but I feel them, wheels on top moving along these great ropes, big caterpillars crawling through sky. And even from this view Dolingo look like it is still growing, house on top of house on top of house again, all the way past clouds into sky. Cogs and gears pull us into the hub, an open area round like the sun, with a thatch roof and pillars made of gold.
“This is Mungunga, the heart,” say a voice with no speaker, a voice that hover in space, and I am the only one who think it strange. At the center of the heart, big wheels connecting to small wheels, connecting to big wheels again. All of it in the mysterious Dolingon magic of making thing push and pull themselves. From Mungunga, caravans come and go, but my knees buckle at the thought of another trip, which perplex me, since I am no stranger to sky. Is not the fear of flying but of falling that grip you, say the voice that sound like me. You should fall and land in a field of spears that stab you and fuck your life out, say another voice that I don’t know. The voice make me stagger, but I still go. Outside of the hub was a long walkway of cut stone road, with wide chairs for anyone to sit, and fountains that I only see in Fasisi but bigger, statues of creatures looking like Bunshi spurting water out of their mouths and nipples. I stop at another platform, which turn out to be another dock with a loud voice coming from no one saying, Court common. A slow old cart pass by, followed by a swift new chariot with two riders. Mungunga must be in the center, because from there I can see everywhere. These are indeed the trees of gods and giants, though I never hear any story of giants living in the North. The court common is a series of grand halls, stacked like an arrangement of goods at a market, and from here I could see pillars and columns and wide-open spaces full of people. And other halls that look like storehouses, or yards for the clearing of foreign goods. It is behind Mungunga that make me gasp. Far enough that I can see most of the tree, though the bottom yet hide in mist. But near the top the grand trunk split in three, and sitting on the two horns are two full districts, or towns, maybe even small cities.
On the right, they replace the trunk with fort walls, or maybe they build around it. But the fort wall rise high, and behind the wall rise higher. Castles, one could call them, with floors numbering past five to six, seven, even eight. On the fifth floor a platform hanging off that jolt me when it start to lower itself down with thick ropes. Behind those castles and rising higher are roads, and bridges, and more waterways, and townhomes that ride high instead of spread wide, higher than the people-dwelling obelisks in Omororo. So many people about, walking, talking, sitting among others, off by his or her own, that I wonder who in this city do any labor, not just slave labor, but any labor. So many long gowns, no armor, no tunics, no gele, no agbada, no skirts, no breeches, no bare breasts, no bare feet.
On the left branch, the Queen’s enclosure, I was sure of it. I know enough to know when a place with one hundred roofs is the residence of just one ruler. A courtyard, yes, and filled with many palaces, but a place for the rulers and who the rulers wish to see. Purple, red, and gold. One caravan going back and forth, which I don’t need to see to know that it is packed with guards. I circle back around the hub and take a caravan heading north. The air have the scorch that lightning leave behind, but I don’t remember a storm. This is Mkora, the great twin legs, the voice say. My legs are moving faster than my thoughts, they skip over to another caravan about to leave. This is Mwaliganza, the hub of the ever flowing right hand river, say the voice. And a river is what we land in the middle of, this hub right in the center, both banks made of brick, so more of a canal than a river. Every roof was near the same height, so this is where the common folk live. Though so far I still don’t know what is common for Dolingo. But this is where I finally see them, people doing the things city people do. Donkey carts with nobody driving the donkeys, the same for the mule carts. Tall men riding tall horses, stout women pushing carts, fruit sellers off in a section with their legs spread wide around baskets. Men like the men in other districts, in robes and caps, with scrolls and books. Silk mongers, fruit mongers, trinket sellers, men and women buying silk, fruits, and trinkets. And everywhere: ropes creaking from pulling hard, cogs squeaking, a giant waterwheel crackling. The caravan to the next tree say it is going to Mupongoro. I look around and see nothing new to discover. I am right by the bank of the canal with a guard noticing me, when I see why. Everything look the same, not the buildings or the colors, but the thinking behind them.
Choose which breast I chop off first, say a voice that don’t sound like me. I shake it off. No, stab into the sweetest part of her neck, the part that will make blood burst like a fountain, say another. Seize her mind, control her feet, and let them take us to the house of her kin so we can choose which girl to rape, another voice say. Is that what excite you, girl? How you take to a man wearing nothing but himself?
Remember they don’t always come with words, I say to myself. I say it again and again until the guard hear me and turn around. I am seeing nothing, but the nothing grab my neck and try to push me to the ground. You passing so many days as my wife’s little pet that you forget that whoring is what you do. I push and slap and kick and try to free my right hand because a hand is pinning my left, even though there is no hand. Nsibidi. Cruel letters. Write them on air if you cannot mark them on the ground, that is what the woman say. I try to draw just one letter. Just one.
* * *
—
So the Moon Witch just plunge into the river like she drowning herself?”
I am in different room, with the Nnimnim woman standing over me.
“Where this is?”
“Mupongoro. Far west. Unless you want to go back to sleeping with white scientist watching you.”
“No. And I didn’t plunge into no river. He push me in.”
“He who?”
“You know who.”
“This one announce himself?”
“I look like I waiting for no introduction? And your ukara ngbe cloth don’t work a damn.”
“By itself, no. Is that what you waiting for, girl, the one trick to blow all of this away? If such magic coming, it don’t come yet.”
“Then what is the damn use?”
“They have to work together. And not everything work the same way with everybody. It depends on the woman. It also depend on that woman’s will or desire.”
“You think I don’t have enough will? You think I desire anything else?”
“I don’t know what you think. I only know what I know.”
“What a fucking bush bitch answer.”
“Then get other counsel, if the bush too lowly for you. Go on then, Sogolon the Wise.”
“What if I go back through the same door?”
“What? That nasty white man didn’t tell you? No, Moon Witch. You can’t go backwards. You go through that gate as much as you want, though most only do it once. But you can’t go backwards until you been through all the doors. And nobody know for sure how many, so nobody really know when you done.”