Tracker point at the map and say, “If I was going from the Darklands to Kongor, then here, not far from Mitu to Dolingo, then I would have to ride through Wakadishu if I feel like to feed more, or just go straight south, to Nigiki. If they travel in reverse, and the last we heard of them was north of Nigiki, even north of the Kegere River, then they headed to—”
“Dolingo,” Mossi say as he press his finger on the map. “Dolingo.”
TWENTY-FIVE
She mount your horse and just take off, it seem,” Ikede say.
“Don’t fuss. She not going far,” I say.
He is still staring at his kora when I leave him, me envying that no matter how much Ikede cut himself off from his past, he can still look at it as one solid thing, unlike me. I know that is unfair, that he looking at just a symbol that mean more, and the weight of it still heavy, but at least when he look at his past he remember it. When I look at my past I remember somebody telling me about it, and I don’t know how much of what bloom in my head is memory or fancy. The Ogo, who take to sleeping on the roof, watch me leave. I follow the hoof trails, down the road for a bit before veering off into the rocky bush. Night, yes, but full darkness never come to these parts. The horse I see first. Jakwu, he barely twenty paces ahead, still in the dirt, but sitting up and dabbing a bruise on his knee. I know he hear me coming but he don’t bother to budge.
“Ingenious, bitch. Fucking ingenious.”
“Don’t pretend to know what that word mean,” I say.
“I would say I could kill you, but now we know that won’t be true.”
So about this spell I have that witch put on the girl. We speak my desire in an old north tongue, which I know Jakwu can’t speak, just in case he is alert and hearing. Is a binding spell, on the girl and on the rope that I fashion into an anklet because I know the girl love fashion. Jakwu don’t care about fashion, so he leave it on her ankle. I forget how far she can run, or ride, or swim, but if she go too far in the quick she will slam into an unseen wall only there for her. I burst out laughing at the thought, Jakwu on my horse, galloping away, only to smash into a barrier of air while the horse under him keep running. I still laughing when he jump up and make mad rush for me.
“Fucking jungle bitch!”
He still yelling and cursing when my wind (not wind) throw him up in the sky and leave him there, spinning head over heel. It come to my mind to raise him higher, so higher he go, confusing birds now below him. I tempt myself to throw him so high that frost form on his nose, but then I remember that is not his nose. Nearer to the ground, he is a mad cat trying to scratch.
“You can’t harm me,” I say.
“You see how that Ogo look at me? He will kill this body with just a finger fuck.”
“And where you go after that, Jakwu? A wandering spirit with no body, plenty creatures out there feed on the likes of you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Try it then. Also, the Ogo can’t touch her. She free from violation because I bind her from pain and pleasure. So try it, oh. Try to get fucked. Eh, try to fuck yourself and see what happen to your finger.”
I let go and he tumble. But he jump up on his legs, quick, also like a cat. He look ready to attack, but change his mind and stand, smoothing himself out.
“I know what ingenious mean.”
“It look like you do, after all.”
“So what you want?”
* * *
—
We come back in the early afternoon, for me to see the Tracker looking bothered, then hiding it as soon as he see me.
“Your girl called Sadogo simple,” he say.
“Then he should stop being simple,” I say. I got no feelings good or ill for the giant, but will not have this man with his two little hatchets start no fuss with me. “I have nothing against the giant, but maybe he leave Venin alone.”
“Don’t call him giant.”
I know we have nothing more to say, so I leave without nodding. Then he say, “Your old man, he was singing.”
“You lie.”
“Got no cause to lie, old woman. No fear neither.”
“The same man, who only this morning refuse to sing.”
“I know what I heard,” the Tracker say.
“He don’t sing in thirty years, maybe more, but he sing in front of you?”
“Truth, his back was to me.”
“A silent griot don’t just open his mouth.”
“Maybe you are the one he didn’t want to hear.”
“Maybe he was singing about you.” My words sting him, and he not swift enough to throw it off.
“Me. A nothing.”
“A griot never going explain a song, only repeat it, maybe with something new, otherwise he cheat you out of drawing your own meaning. Nothing about the King?”
“No.”
“Or the boy?”
“What you think?”
“Then he singing about love,” I say.
“Nobody loves no one,” Tracker say, and right there it come over me, immense sadness for this boy who don’t realize he still just a boy.
Ikede used to have a love. When Kwash Dara’s father realize he not going to catch every southern griot, that he not going to stop the song about kings, he hatch a new plan. Must be the Aesi who teach him that you don’t have to kill a man to destroy him. That’s when the wives and children start to float up in rivers with their head cut off.
The next morning he and I wake up to the Ogo weeping and Ikede dead on the ground. He throw himself off the roof. Me and Tracker hide the body, take his horse, and we all set off.
* * *
—
Dolingo. We get there at nightfall, a day and a half’s journey. Nobody notice the trees when right under them, not until I instruct them to look up. I pretend that the sight not new, but there is no way to come upon Dolingo and not lose your breath in wonder. Coming from south, we reach the three-prong Mkololo tree first. The tree of the great citadel center, halls of governments, and the palace of the Queen. A platform above us lower itself, and following the Tracker, everybody draw their weapons.
“Return your weapons. Dolingon can win a fight without a sword,” I say.
“What is this place?” Mossi say.
“Dolingo, it seem,” say the Tracker.
“I have never seen such magnificence. Do gods live here? Is this home of gods?” Mossi say.
“Is the home of white science and black math,” I say, but he furrow his brow more. The Ogo seem to have been here before, stepping onto the platform from before it reach the ground. Both Mossi and Tracker dismount as we rise but Jakwu stay on the horse. I look at Mossi’s face and see that never in his life he ever rise this high. He come from those lands where they believe in one god and that god live in the sky. The grinding of gears and wheels I remember, but the sight of rope I push out of my mind, trying to forget. They see it as I see it, the painting of the profile of the Queen with her royal gele on her head, covering six floors and still not done, which surprise me given this Queen. When the platform level, the Tracker have to nudge Mossi to move.
“This is Mkololo, the first tree and seat of the Queen,” Sadogo say just as that ghost voice drop on us saying the same thing.
“Sadogo, when you come upon this place?” I ask.
“Two years ago. Dolingons will pay big coin for fights.”
Fights. I couldn’t tell the last time I think about fights, much less see one. Much less fight.