CHAPTER 19
The Redland

The kowasa was out of sight for most of the way to Naki. Three times it disproved Nasomi’s guess that it had finally left her alone. The first time, it jumped from behind a bush ahead of the riders, chasing after a rodent, disappeared again. When Nasomi and Wakani rode through an avenue of trees, the kowasa fell from a branch and offered her a dark purple fleshy fruit, fixing its gaze on her until she took a bite. Up it went into the trees, out of sight again, and Nasomi threw the fruit away. It had a sharp sour taste, and she wasn’t in a mood for potential illness. As they went down a winding path overlooking a long bamboo fence, out the kowasa came again, all tentacles wagging and eyes wide in delight. It jumped onto Nasomi’s horse and gave her a translucent stone with grimy blue grains inside it.

“Are you sure about this thing, My Lady?” Wakani asked. He still held the ax at the ready.

“He would have followed us anyway. It is good to know he’s on our side.”

“He?”

“I’ve decided it’s a he. I want to give him a name. Maybe Kanguya.”

“You want to call it Kanguya? The most celebrated name of our kingdom? The one who fought against the kowasa?”

“It’s the only name I can think of.”

“My Lady, anything but that. What will people think?”

“We’re not in Nari.” She said to the kowasa. It wagged its yes tentacle.

There was significant traffic of people going the other way by then, skin and clothes stained black from the myama ore they conveyed in their carts. They stared wide-eyed at the kowasa, pointing and whispering among themselves, and Nasomi was surprised when Kanguya didn’t rush into hiding. He knows we’re not in Nari, she thought.

The road forked left toward the mine, and further on to Naki village. At first glimpse, besides the bamboo fence, Nasomi could not tell this village apart from Mishi. The architecture was the same, a forest of houses built from bamboo. The people were not accommodating, though. Six men in dark grey robes rushed at them, bearing spears.

“State your business,” one of them said, as a crowd gathered behind the soldiers.

“We want a woman who came by here, traveling with two hyenas and a man,” Nasomi replied.

The crowd parted and a young beautiful woman in a brown and orange flowing gown rushed through. She had rings on all her fingers, and her hair flowed in thick long braids. “What do they want?” she demanded. Her bitterness belied her beauty.

“They want the Bride,” the leading spearman replied.

“Well, she’s not here!” the young woman. “What do you people want from us?”

“I don’t understand your question. We are only passing through, trying to track—”

“First it was an ugly bride with hyenas, now you with a kowasa. We know strange when we see it. You won’t find us to be docile people if you’re bringing an army to attack us.”

“I am Nasomi Sapato, from Nari, a First Naki by clan. I am your tribesmate—”

“Ha! You think that means anything here?”

“Just show us which way the Bride went, My Chief,” Wakani cut in, “and we will leave you alone.”

“It’s My Queen for you. Strange and rude, all you from the city,” the young woman said, folding her arms. She indicated east with her head. “She went that way, to the Redland. Off you go!”

The people cheered as Nasomi and Wakani went on.

“What a paranoid group of people,” Wakani muttered. He put his ax away when Kanguya jumped down and dashed ahead until he was out of sight.

Nasomi expected to come into the Redland within a short time but they rode on and on through thin woods. At a creek, Wakani watered the horses and refilled his and Nasomi’s water pouches. They circumvented a marsh. Wakani used twigs and the sun’s position to keep them going in their intended direction.

It was nigh sunset when the land became rocky and ochre, with surprisingly verdure shrubs and bushes. Baobab trees, tall and wide and sagely white, scattered across the land. They spotted a hut next to a tree, headed toward it and found themselves moving through a dotted settlement. Some of the baobab trees had been hewn through to make dwellings.

“It will soon be dark,” Nasomi said, “and I feel a dream coming. We must take a rest here.”

Wakani sighed in relief. “I thought you would say to keep on riding.”

Well, they just couldn’t keep on going without the guidance of a telling dream. She had been whispering Majen phrases to herself throughout the journey and had a strong tugging sensation in her belly. They stopped by a homestead of four red huts, spoke to a man and his wife. Nasomi showed them two golden coins, saying she would pay for a night’s accommodation.

“Silver and gold and copper mean little to us unless we have travelers passing by to buy things off from,” the man said. He took the coins anyway.

A hut was offered. It was warm inside despite its shabby looks. She and Wakani were given shredded blankets to be used as bed and coverings. Wakani set his as far from hers as the room could allow, looking uncomfortable about the arrangement.

Nasomi laughed. “It is well, Wakani. At least you’re close enough to protect me if somebody thinks of attacking me in the night.”

He smiled shyly, placed his ax at the edge of his sleeping spot. They were invited outside, around a firelight, to eat a supper of a hard cornmeal and a sour vegetable Nasomi had not eaten before.

“It’s the leaves of the baobab tree,” the woman of the homestead said. The man asked for some stories from Nari. Wakani obliged him, telling the tale of how Kanguya the first king built the first curve of the wall even as he fought a battle against the Sofaza people.

Nasomi asked if they had seen an old witch pass by.

“She came here,” the man said. “Her hyenas scared the little children of the village. ‘Who among you is the most powerful wizard?’ says she. And when Aghere walks toward her, she says, ‘Make me beautiful again.’ But Aghere shakes his head and says he’s a powerful man, but not enough to grant her what she wants. He points her to the mighty tree and says, ‘There’s your most powerful wizard.’ She gets all angry, and black smoke is coming off her, and we start to run away from her. ‘Are you jesting with me?’ she says.

“Aghere stands there and says he’s no man to mock anyone. He points to the tree, says, ‘It will give you all you desire. If you are worthy. If you are patient to hear its whispers.’ She walks to it, slow, slow. Like she’s putting her hand on fire, slow, slow, she touches the tree. And we’re all watching, craning our necks forward. And then she touches it.” He burst out laughing. “Nothing. Nothing happens. Her hand is there for a long time. She turns around, angry she looks so ugly. Uglier than before. I’ve never seen anyone so embarrassed. The whole village laughs at her, even her manservant laughs at her. And the hyenas. She shouts, ‘You’re worthless. The whole lot of you!’ and she storms away. That was how she went.”

“So, there’s nothing special about the tree?” Wakani asked.

“Every baobab tree is special. They are not called Trees of Life for nothing. For thousands of years, we have dwelled among them, and they give us food, water, shelter, medicine, rope. And they tell us everything we need to know about the world. When six leaves fell from this tree” — he pointed at a tree silhouetted in the moonlight — “I knew I would have six guests today. And there you came, you, your horses and the kowasa.”

“Ha!” Wakani teased. “That makes only five.”

“The trees don’t lie. Women conceive when they drink of its waters, men grow the courage to face evil spirits when they eat of its fruit. When a leaf falls, we get a visitor, or someone somewhere learns a great lesson. When a tree falls, we know that an entire people have fallen. Maybe because they have refused to listen to wisdom, they have mistreated their women, they have become evil, or they have taken to fighting amongst themselves.”

“Not that I don’t want to believe you, but when was the last time a tree fell?” Wakani said.

“If you have time for a long detour, come with me tomorrow a few miles from here. We can be there by noon. There’s a leaning tree, held by the last of its roots. I can tell you that in the next five new moons, it will be on the ground.”

“We have no time for detours,” Nasomi said. She yawned. “Excuse me, I am in need of much sleep.”

She went to the hut, and she said a prayer for her husband and children as she lay on the hard floor. Sleep came easily, and she slipped into a telling dream:

She was in the kitchen of her house. It was quiet and empty. The door was wide open, broken at one hinge. A form appeared at the door: a hooded man. He stepped in, looked around, made a sound of deep thinking. Kaan, the mage, moved as though he floated rather than walked. When she drew closer — and he didn’t show any signs of perceiving her — she heard him muttering strings of Majen.

He moved from room to room, having a quick glance, touching nothing. Then he went back to the kitchen. He knelt, sniffed, tossed some myama dust onto the floor, watched it burst into golden lines. He made the same sound of thinking. “Mhmm.”

Nasomi entered his mind. It was a realm of wonder. She had never really thought minds could be actual disparate things, having been in the minds of others through these dreams: Reema, the hyena sorcerers, Tambo’s mother. The mage’s mind amazed her. It was full of shapes she hadn’t seen before but somehow could recognize, sounds she had never put together but were part of her daily life.

Kaan’s mind was playful, yet mature, shaped by years and years of dedication, of breaking apart every truth and making new truths. When he stood and looked around, he did it in noncommittal sweeps, yet the information he took in was vast: the layout of the furniture and how it had determined the movements of the people that lived here; the pattern of dust settlement, how air moved through the house; he saw connections between the dust and the dulling lights from the firestone lamps on the walls. That was strange, how he made links between things that could never be more so different. He saw and connected, judged, judged his judgments, made guesses, stacked guesses in a part of his mind the way Nasomi would stack folded clothes.

He saw traces of magic in the myama trails, some sort of a reconstruction of the events that had taken place here. “This is a magic not filled by hate,” he said to himself, drawing conclusions from stacks in other parts of his mind. What passed into his memory were hundreds of situations where people used spell magic out of jealousy, fury, and hate. Those emotions gave the magic they used evil twisted potent, and most times were detrimental to the user as much as the victim.

“This is a magic fueled by love,” he said to himself. “A love so deep. That is why we couldn’t detect it.” It surprised him, having never seen or heard the like before. It was something he needed to go and discuss with Thorro.

He walked out of the house, regretting that it was too late to help the woman who had come to the Mage Council for help.

Nasomi awoke, a tear flowing into her ear. She held back the weeping, fell into a normal sleep inundated by a series of dreams involving tall trees, blue monkeys and a young angry queen who axed down people she didn’t like.

A shout woke her up. Someone was shaking her shoulders. She screamed when she saw a dark shape with red eyes above her. The thing pressed her down. She heard Wakani shout, “My Lady!” and something flew in the air. The ax passed right through the daemon without hurting it and embedded into the wall.

“Stop, stop! It’s me!” cried the daemon. “It’s me, Nin! From Mishi. Quit being so dramatic!”

“Nin?” shouted Wakani. “How is it you’re here?”

Nasomi got used to the darkness and saw it was indeed Nin. No, it was more like Nin’s form came together to show he was a man. His eyes were red like rubies, when before in Mishi, Nasomi could have sworn they had been a deep brown. He put something in her hand. “Here’s the potion you wanted, from the mages.” It was a leather pouch. “The witch is nearby, you must hurry.”

Wakani came to touch Nin to make sure he was real.

“How did you get this?” Nasomi asked. Her heart had settled its thumping and she stood up.

“Will explain everything if we ever meet again. Arrrgh!” He touched his head.

“Why are your eyes red?” Wakani asked. “How did you get here?”

“I found her, your witch, tried to get close. But she felt me, Nasomi! She felt me, way before I was upon her. She did something to me, gave me a terrible headache. I would have died, I tell you, if I didn’t sip some of the potion. I will be fine. Just need some time to heal.”

He stood up. Wakani moved away from him, watching him with trepidation. “She’s going to Mifirhana, the witch. I couldn’t subdue her. I can’t help you anymore, she did something… she almost killed me. I wish you luck, Nasomi. I wish you luck.”

“How did you find...?”

“You don’t want to ask too many questions about me.” He put his finger to his lips. “Not a word about this. Not a word.” He parted the curtain at the door and stepped outside.

Nasomi and Wakani rushed out after him, but he was nowhere to be seen. The pouch was real in her hand, so all this had actually happened. But Nin had vanished.

Wakani touched the back of his head with both hands, shaking his head vigorously. “Just two days away from my usual life, and the world is a place of mystery and wonder.”