by Marlon James
“What news on black wings?”
I knew I jumped. I knew he saw me.
“Nothing,” I said.
I grabbed the batch of papers and placed them on the table. The candles threw colour on them like weak sunlight.
“This is the house of Akum,” I said. “Rulers for over five hundred years, right up to Kwash Dara. His father is Netu, here. Above him, here, is Aduware the Cheetah King, who was third in line, when the crown prince died, and his brother banished. Then above him is Liongo the great, who ruled nearly seventy years. Who doesn’t know the great King Liongo? Then over here on this leaf, Liongo again and above him, Moki, his father, the boy King.”
“Turn the page.”
“I did. There’s nothing before.”
“You didn’t—”
“Look,” I said, pointing at the blank page. “Nothing is there.”
“But Moki is not the first Akum King, that would make the line about two hundred and fifty years old.”
“Two hundred and seventy.”
“Keep flipping,” Mossi said.
“Family map. Fasisi Kwash Dara. Akum. His seat of rule, his praise name, his king name, and his family.”
Three pages up, another family map someone drew in a darker blue. At the top of the page was Akum. At the bottom was Kwash Kagar, Moki’s father. But above him something curious, and above that even more curious.
“Is this a new line? An old one, I mean,” the prefect said.
“House of Akum up to Moki’s father. What do you notice?”
“Above Kagar is a line pointing to Tiefulu? That’s a woman’s name. His mother.”
“Beside hers.”
“Kwash Kong.”
“Now look above Kong.”
“Another woman, another sister. Tracker, no king is the son of a king.”
“Until Moki.”
“There are many kingdoms that follow the wife’s line, or the sister.”
“Not the North Kingdom. From Moki down, every king is the king’s oldest son, not his sister’s son. Grab these.”
I went back to the glyphs. He followed me over, looking at the maps, not at me.
“What did you say about kings and gods?” I said.
“I said nothing about kings and—”
“You tiresome in all your ways?”
He dropped the papers at my feet and grabbed the writs.
“A king is king by a queen, not a king,” he said.
“Give me that. Look at this writ.”
He bent over me. This was not the time to think of myrrh. He read, “‘That the house of kings return to the ways that had been decreed by the gods, and not this course which has corrupted the ways of kings for six generations. This is what we demand: that the king follow the natural order set by gods of sky and gods below the earth. Return to the purity of the line as set in the words of long-dead griots and forgotten tongues.’ This is what he wrote.”
“So the northern line of kings changed from king’s sister’s son to king’s son, six generations ago. These are facts for any that would look. No reason to murder an elder. And these writs, sure they call for a return to the old order, which some might say is mad, some might say is treason, but most will never go so far back in the line of kings to check,” I said.
“And what do you think will happen if they do?”
“Outrage maybe.”
He laughed. Such irritation.
“The times are the times, and people are people. Something so long ago? People will shrug it off like a smelly blanket,” he said.
“Something here is missing or—”
“What do you not tell me?” he said. His eyes narrowed in a wicked frown.
“You have seen what I see. I have told you what I know,” I said.
“What do you think?”
“I have no duty to tell you what I think.”
“Tell me anyway.”
He stooped down next to me and the papers. Those eyes of his. Popping bright in the near-dark.
“I think this is connected to that child. The one from Fumanguru’s house.”
“The one you think the murderers took with them?”
“They were not the ones who took the child. Before you ask how I know, just know I know. Someone I know claims she saved the child that night. Whoever sent assassins to Fumanguru must know somebody saved the child.”
“They wish to wash the world clean of him and mask their tracks.”
“That is what I thought. But too much has happened. There is no reason to kill Fumanguru, none other than they were after the child in the first place. It would be why so many people are still interested in such an old murder. I asked one who would know two days ago if he picked up any word on any man like Fumanguru. He told me two elders fucking a deaf girl said they had to find the writs, or it would be the death of someone. Maybe them. One was Belekun the Big. You should know I killed him,” I said.
“Oh?”
“Not before he tried to kill me. In Malakal. Had his men try to kill me as well.”
“A more stupid man has not been born, clearly. Continue, Tracker.”
“Anyway, the other was a whore named Ekoiye. He said let us talk in another place, so we went by tunnel to a roof. First he told me that many still go to the Fumanguru house. Including some of you.”
“Of course.”
“And others in your uniform.”
“I only went there twice. Alone.”
“There were others.”
“Not without my order.”
“He said—”
“You trust the good word of a prostitute over a man of justice?”
“You’re a man of order, not justice,” I said.
“Continue with your story.”
“No surprise you confuse the two.”
“Continue, I say.”
“He told me all who still go by the Fumanguru house—looking for what, he didn’t know. Then he tried to cast a spell on me with kohl dust dried in viper venom,” I said.
“And you live? One breath could have killed a horse. Or made you a zombi.”
“I know. I threw him off the roof.”
“The gods, Tracker. Is he dead too?”
“No. But you are right. He tried to make me a zombi, to drag me back to his room. Then he would release a pigeon to let someone know he has me. I released the pigeon myself. Trust me, prefect, it was not long before a man came to the room, with weapons, but I think he came to take me, not kill me.”
“Take you where? To who?”
“I killed him before I could find out. He was dressed as a prefect.”
“The trail of bodies you are leaving behind, Tracker. Soon the whole city will stink because of you.”
“I said he was dressed as a—”
“I heard what you said.”
“He didn’t leave a body. I will tell you more of that later. But this. When he died I saw something like black wings leave him.”
“Of course. What is a story without beautiful black wings? What has any of this to do with the boy?”
“I seek the boy. That is why I am here. A slaver hired me and some others, strangers to your city, to search for the boy. Together at first, but most have gone their own way. But others seek the boy. No, not hired by the slaver. I cannot tell if they follow us or are one step ahead of us. They have tried to kill us before.”
“Well you do not slack when it comes to killing, Tracker.”
“We were sent here for a reason. To see from where he was taken, yes, but more to see where they went.”
“Oh. There is still much you are not telling me. Like who is this they? Were there people who came to kill him, and people who came to save him? And if the people who came to save him then took him, what is that to you? W
ould he not be safer with them than with you?”
“The people who saved him lost him.”
“Of course. Maybe the same people sold him to witches.”
“No, but they trusted the wrong people. But there is this. I think I know who he is, this b—”
“This still follows no sense. I have a different idea.”
“You do.”
“Yes, I do.”
“The world awaits.”
“Your trusted Fumanguru was a part of the illicit arts, or trades. Makes no difference; both result in innocents sold, raped, or killed. He dug a hole for himself so deep and wide that he fell into it. It was a clean kill, a complete kill, all but the boy. As long as the boy is alive, all accounts are not settled. Those are the people after your boy.”
“A good argument. Except most do not know of the boy. Not even you until I told you.”
“What, then?”
“He was protecting the boy. Hiding him. He would have been but a baby back then. You should know that I know who this boy is. I have no proof, but when I do, he will be who I think he is. Until I do, what is this?”
I handed him the paper strip I took from the pigeon. He brought it right to his nose, then held it away from his face. “This is in the same style as the glyphs on the writ. It says, News of the boy, come now.”
“The prefect who tried to kill me had these things branded on his chest.”
“This?”
“Clearly not this. But characters in this style.”
“Do you—”
“No, I don’t remember. But Fumanguru uses their tongue.”
“Such a puzzle, Tracker. The more you tell me, the less I know.”
“Was that all? All of what Fumanguru wrote?”
He looked through the papers again. Two more smelled of soured milk. He traced each mark with his hand as I read them.
“It is instructions,” he said. “‘Take him to Mitu, to the guided hand of the one-eyed one, walk through Mweru and let it eat your trail.’ This is what it says.”
“No man comes back from the Mweru.”
“Is that true? Or what old wives say? This last of this text is unreadable to me.”
“Why would he send him there? He will be a man too,” I said.
“Who will be a man?”
“I was talking to myself.”
“No mothers taught you this was rude? You said you knew who he is, this child. Who is he?”
I looked at him.
“Then tell me who gives him chase and why.”
“That would be to tell you who he is.”
“Tracker, I cannot help you this way.”
“Who asked for your help?”
“Of course, the gods must smile at how far you have come on your own.”
“Listen. There have been three who hired me to find this child. A slaver, a river spirit, and a witch. Between them, they have told me five stories so far of who this child is.”
“Five lies to find him or save him?”
“Both. Neither.”
“They wish that you save him, but do not wish that you know who you save. Are you one to betray him?”
“I wondered how a prefect felt about men for hire.”
“No, you wondered how I feel about you.”
He started walking around the stacks, behind a wall of them. I could hear the slight drag of one foot, a limp that he masked well.
“But this is the hall of records, is it not?” he said.
“’Tis your city.”
“Who records the lives of kings?”
I turned and pointed behind the keeper’s desk. He would not return tonight, that was sure. The book was also leaves, sewn rough and uneven, and bound in a leather sleeve, dustier than the others. An account of Kwash Dara, up until that day. His name, in a line with his two brothers, and one sister. One brother married the daughter of the Queen of Dolingo, to build an alliance. One married the widow of a chieftain with little land, but great wealth in the grasslands. The oldest sister is listed first among the women, and here it said only that she gave over her life to serving Wapa, the goddess of earth, fertility, and women, after her husband, a prince from Juba, died at his own hand, taking also their children. The story says nothing of where she went, nothing of a mountain fortress.
“What of older kings? Kings of the ages before this one?” said Mossi.
“The griots. Even with the written word, the true mark of a king would have been men committing their story to memory, to recite it as in poetry, or when the people gather to hear praise of famous men. Here is my guess. Written accounts of kings began only with Kwash Netu’s age. The rest belong only in the voices of the griots. And there is the problem. The men who sing about the deeds of all kings are in the King’s employ.”
“Oh.”
“There are others. Griots whose record of the kings the King does not know. Men who wrote secret verses, men with songs that would get them executed, and the songs forbidden.”
“Who would they sing them to?”
“To themselves. Some men think truth only needs to be in service to truth.”
“Alas, dead men then.”
“Most. But there are two, maybe three whose songs go back a thousand years.”
“Do they claim to go back a thousand years as well?”
“Why do you limp?”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Oh, boy of such wayward fate. You know, Tracker, you have ventured very far in this, and not once have you even given things a whisper.”
“What things?”
“You speaking intrigue on who is still your King. Or that as prefect I am his servant.”
Much time had slipped since I looked at his sword. Engage the enemy first, that is how he would have it. But he turned his back to me and stood looking at a stack.
“Fumanguru produces this whatever you call it against the King, and because he was murdered, you figure him blameless. Cast your eyes on the world as we prefects do. You are about to ask what I mean. I mean thus. More times than not, whenever some deed most foul comes to a man’s door, it’s because he invited him in.”
“So every death comes to the victim who deserves it. You truly are a prefect.”
“What a wife you will make someone one day.”
I did not even bother to glare.
“So do as your superiors do and call the matter shut. Hear this. Since this is an open space where any may enter, and since I am not connected to any crime, be a good member of the Kongori chieftain army and be gone.”
“Now hold—”
“Is our business not done, prefect? There is a child you do not believe lives, a writ you think means nothing, about a king whom you serve and believe blameless, and not connected to a series of events that did not happen, or even if they did happen, meant nothing. All surrounding a man whose entire family was murdered because of some snake he took to his home thinking it a pet, only to have it bite him. Is that about all of it, prefect? It surprises me you’re still here. Make distance between us. Go ahead.”
“I will not be dismissed by you.”
“Oh fuck the gods! Then stay. I will leave.”
“You forget who has authority in this room,” he said, drawing his sword.
“You have authority over your own kind. Where are they, your black-and-blue zombi?”
He held his sword out straight and came at me. The zup sound shot between us and we jumped back as the spear lodged itself in the floor. Black with blue marks.
“One of yours,” I said.
“Shut your mouth!”
A quick light shone from above us, and only when the arrow lodged into a tower of books did we see the light was flame. A shadow in the window had shot a flaming arrow down at us. The fire r
ose from the floor and flicked a tail. It twisted left, then right, then left like a lizard seeing too many things to eat. The flame jumped on a stack, and fire burst from each book, one then another, then another, up and up. Three more arrows came through the windows. The fire halted me, tricked me into stopping to wonder how come an entire wall was raging in flames. A hand grabbed mine and pulled me out of the spell.
“Tracker! This way.”
Smoke burned my eyes and made me cough. I couldn’t remember if the Sangoma protected me from fire. Mossi pulled me along, cursing that I wasn’t moving faster. We dashed through an arch of flames right before they collapsed, and burning paper hit my heel. He jumped over a stack of books, went through a wall of smoke, and vanished. I looked back, almost slowed down to think of the fire’s speed, and jumped through the smoke. And landed almost on top of him.
“Stay to the ground. Less smoke. And they will see less of us when we come out.”
“They?”
“You think this is one man?”
This section of the hall had only smoke, but the fire was running out of food and hungrier than ever. It jumped from stack to stack, and ate through papyrus and leather. A tower fell and shot flames through the smoke wall at us. We scrambled. I could not remember where to find the door. He grabbed my robe and pulled me again. We ran right, between two walls of books, then left, then right, and then what felt like north but I did not know. Mossi’s hand still gripped my robe. The heat was close enough that the hair on my skin burned. We reached the door. Mossi swung it open and jumped back before four arrows hit the floor.
“How far can you throw those?”
I grabbed the ax. “Far enough.”
“Good. Judging from how these arrows lean, they are on the roof to the right.”
He ran back into the smoke and came out with two books burning. He nodded to window, then pointed at the door. Don’t give them a chance to grab new arrows. He threw the books out the window and four arrows cut through the wind, two hitting the window. I ran, dropped, and rolled out the door, then jumped up, ax in hand, and threw it. As the ax spun towards the archers it curved, slicing one man’s throat and lodging in the other’s temple. I jumped into the dark and out of the path of two arrows. More arrows kept coming, some with flame, some with poison, like rainfall until it stopped.
