She feel it bubbling under her skin and quiet herself with a long breath.
“And now you’re running away to a place where the women are even more fond of whips than your father. Or mother. So you run to be rid of him?”
“I run to be rid of the man he want me to marry.”
“You’re even wilder than I thought. Why would a maid run from marriage? The pain you must be causing your parents. Does a girl wearing skins and furs not know what she is for? Dowry, is it? Did they struggle to meet it?”
“You ask plenty question.”
“Better I know. Because who I don’t, I kill.”
“Even a girl running away?” she ask but all he do is smile. “You already tell them to kill me,” Sogolon say.
“I did. I did. A scout saw smoke in the direction of Mantha, so we rode for four days. A day past, we saw what might be the source of the smoke. Do you know what I speak of?”
“No.”
“What is your name?”
“Chibundu.”
“Chibundu, next time think more careful about what you say as truth, and what you say as lie. For your neck’s sake. There is nothing left of this caravan, nothing that the hyenas left behind, anyway. And here comes you, first soul we find in many a day, and you’re walking away from it.”
“I don’t see nothing.”
“Only one road, girl, no matter where you veered off, judging by those bruises. And every trail lead back to the road. That was to make sure that women fleeing to be nuns didn’t lose their way and die.”
“I don’t see nothing.”
“We can see the blood on your little half cloak.”
“I don’t cause nothing.”
“Didn’t say you caused. I said I saw. I didn’t even have to ask. Tell me news that is truly news. Like why were you there, and what befall you?”
“Traders. That is what they do.”
“Did. Not you?”
“I is a trader’s slave, not a trader.”
“Why you didn’t say that before?”
“I not being a slave again.”
“I see it now. Whatever bad tidings hit them was good tidings for you. And what tidings, eh? We found wagon wheels but no wagon, horse reins but no horse, women’s fingers but no woman. My scout says he takes this road two times a year, sometimes three. And he remembers no lake bed without a lake. Such a perfect bed, like a god sat down on one perfect ass cheek. On this you have no news?”
“I . . . I . . . It knock me out. Whatever it was. I don’t remember nothing but people screaming and then waking up.”
“And you, the only survivor. What blessed sleep. I know what this is.”
“You know?”
“A merciful god has taken your memory. How else can you not remember? And who would want to remember this? All you recall is being someone’s slave. Rest safe, girl. Under Fasisi law no person can be enslaved twice.”
“Sangomin.”
“What?”
“I remember my master shout Sangomin.”
“Why would the Sangomin attack some traders?”
“Because they wicked and murder for sport.”
Keme burst out laughing, enraging Sogolon, who shut her eyes tight to hide it.
“Sangomas give us the muti, girl. Of the field to bind us to spirits, of the beast to give us all the courage of lions. The Sangomin is why none of us have defect or illness, why none of us have lost our minds. Every warrior among us wear the muti on their face, or chest, or arm. Here is a secret, some even rub it on their cock. What you say is almost blasphemy—or somebody bewitched you.”
“None of this was witch.”
“You accounting for all kind of witch? What about the ones half woman, half viper? The ones washing in the blood of the dead? The ones living under the ground? There are as many witches as there are stones in a pond, girl.”
“I didn’t see no witch.”
“They also didn’t see you, or you’d be a rattling corpse. Where is your master heading?”
“You say this road go only one place.”
“Mantha? Nuns make trade now?”
“Ask the trader. Slave don’t know master’s business.”
“When they sound as smart as you? One thing you certainly don’t sound like is a slave. We leave tomorrow. Some of these men have unease lying with dead kings for too long.”
“Dead kings?”
“How long you sleep here?”
“Some days.”
“Days alone? And you are untouched? Unspoiled?”
What a question to ask a woman, she think but don’t say. “Yes,” she reply. She don’t mention the night beast.
“Uncanny for such a place. This is the necropolis of kings, girl. Dead kings and princes from long before the Akum dynasty are buried here. The Giant Kings going back a thousand summers, back when leopards had the tusks, and elephants the spots. When man was taller than that tree. Look behind you,” he say, pointing at the same three she hid between. “The middle one is Kamak the Wicked, the right is Barka the Good.”
“The third?”
“Not even old men know.”
“Marshal, stop looking for a second wife,” he say as he approach. He, the naked marshal. He probably thinking he shut up Keme, but who he really quiet is Sogolon, who ready to ask him what a slave sound like, not because she care about his answer because fuck the gods and fuck him too, but to curse him for thinking a slave is a slave because they are stupid or ignorant, and not because they ill-starred, or conquered, or under wicked bondage of people like his King. Or maybe even him as soon as he can buy one.
“Even you can do better than someone smelling of beast skin,” he say. Sogolon look around for who he must be speaking of and come right back to herself. She know this one too, but no name coming to her.
“Marshal, every man wearing a piece of beast skin somewhere. The strap around your helmet, for one.”
“Not like her,” he say, walking away.
“A care for the marshal,” Keme say to her. “How would you feel if he is wearing your mother’s skin?”
Sogolon miss the meaning until the marshal appear again in her view, as he stand by the fire, fall to his knees, then to the ground to rise as a lion. Jump is what her heart do, for it could be Beremu or the other lion who become her friend, but she don’t recognize the man, and the other lion she is sure is no shapeshifter. Both spark the same sight in her memory. Lions in the Red Army, which mean that Kwash Moki find a use for them after all. But that is court business, and now she is annoyed at herself for thinking of royal things, as if she belong there. A change in policy, how strange a turn of words, the kind of words she can’t imagine ever saying again. And for why, there is nobody to say them to. Wake up early, girl, will yourself, say a voice in her head that sound like her. Wake up and leave this place before them. Nobody here will miss you if you go. Wake up early.
A cold splash of water to her face and Sogolon wake up. Shocked and blurry, she didn’t see who throw the water. But then men are tossing water on fire and men gathering up to head out. At the front Keme and the marshals already on horses, ready to go.
“You’re on the horse tied to the marshal’s horse,” Keme say.
“I going to Mantha.”
“No, you going to Fasisi.”