A slight shift in the wind brought the smell of stew in Olisa’s direction and her lip curled in disgust, even while her stomach growled in hunger. The stomach was a disobedient organ, growling for food her mind would never let her eat. Even behind the rich smells of vegetables and broth, there was the rancid smell of bad meat and chemicals.
Still, her stomach grumbled, so she pulled out a wrapper of yam paste. The dark paste was rich with spices and she used her finger to take small, delicate mouthfuls. She ate slowly so that her stomach would feel full with less food, and so that she wouldn’t make any smacking noises that would give her away.
Another can sailed over the chairs and a raucous laugh broke the quiet in two. It was a drunken laugh, so Olisa knew they would not be hunting today. Today was, apparently, for drinking and eating and sitting around talking about hunting. Olisa gave a mental shrug and noted that this was the same for people everywhere, though not all people hunted the wrong way like these men would.
The hours passed in dreary boredom, the heat of the day rising and the sultry air sucking the last drop of moisture from Olisa’s mouth. The guides had quieted, the camp set-up now complete. There was little movement around the tents. Canvas flapped dully in the equally dull breeze and the men had finished their drinking for the moment.
All three of the hunters had settled back into reclined camp chairs under an awning. Olisa couldn’t see their faces from her vantage point, but they had the loose postures of sleeping men, hands dangling off the arms of their chairs, heads tilted to the sides. No sounds of laughter came from them and no more cans came flying from their little cluster of chairs.
The guides and porters, eleven of them in total, lounged at the other end of the camp in their own sort of social gathering. That’s the way it was with all the groups, the pampered foreigners with their cameras if they’re the good sort—or with their guns if they’re not—on one side of the camp, and the guides lounging amongst the boxes and crates on the other.
The only exception to the generally relaxed atmosphere was the porter left on watch. That one stood a little distance from the camp and surveyed the area around them for any intrusion, whether animal or human. Baboons weren’t shy about coming up and taking anything that struck their fancy and warthogs often wandered into camps, rooting about and making a mess. The noises they made would give them away so they weren’t a huge concern, but sometimes they could simply show up and, once inside, accidents could easily happen. And if the baboons and warthogs started up with their incessant arguing, well, that would just be mayhem.
The guard didn’t know it, but Olisa was well aware there were no baboons or warthogs or any animal of any size nearby. Even the smaller animals, once Olisa had touched the ground and painted the picture for them, were making their way into hiding places or out of the area if they could.
The porter who had sensed her, the one she thought of as the “stirring man,” sat with the others and appeared to have settled down. At least he was eating and the stiff lines of his shoulders had rounded a little, no hint of his previous wariness remaining.
Olisa had no such sense of relaxation, though she wished she could. Only vigilance could stop her from inadvertently letting the ripples flow out from her. She often did it in her sleep, some part of her mind seeking the reassurance of others within range. So for now, she sat uncomfortable and still in her hot patch of scant shade, keeping a careful watch not just on the camp, but also on herself.
Her Dibia called it “leaking” and said she would learn to control it with time, but if anything, it had grown worse. Only weeks ago she had been woken by the Dibia, her old hands rough on her shoulders and her fingers digging into the flesh on her upper arms.
Though others couldn’t see it most of the time—the eyes of most people simply passed over things that didn’t conform to what they believed they should see—some people grew sensitive to it. Like that porter, some people started to sense the pulse once exposed to it a few times. And once sensitive to its presence, they could sometimes even see it.
That night, the night of the Dibia’s rough waking, there was such a commotion that not even the blind could have missed it. Trickles of dust rained down from the woven roof, wooden cups bounced on their low shelves and the ripples on the dirt floor made it look more like one of the hot pools by the springs during a heavy rain. Exclamations had come from nearby huts as people woke in alarm. Added to that was the sound of running feet as those watching over the animals in the pens came to find out what was wrong.
Later, after she had settled the people back down, the Dibia told Olisa that it felt like an elephant had run through the village, the ground shook so. But then she had smiled, stroked her rough finger along Olisa’s cheek and said, “But only a small elephant.”
Olisa knew that whatever was happening to her was different from the Dibia’s skills. The old woman could help the hunters by telling them where they should seek game, tell them if there was an injured animal in a herd somewhere that should be taken. The Dibia could intercede between the animal world and the human one.
The Dibia also had the “balance” sense, an ability that Olisa was still struggling to comprehend. All life was in balance and knowing how to keep the balance between the hunted and the hunters, to know when to take and when not to and yet never interfere with the natural order of things, took more than just the ability to send the pulse out. It took common sense and an accepting of loss. Olisa still felt the pangs of loss in the animal world too strongly.
What she lacked in mature discernment, Olisa made up for in raw power. What the Dibia felt was always restricted to a distance close enough that a group of hunters could journey there, hunt and then return while there was still a little light in the sky. Not so far away, really.
Olisa was able to get details on animals for two or even three times that distance, though it was sometimes hard to tell. After all, unless whatever animal or group she contacted was near a landmark she recognized, she had no real way of knowing with any precision how far away they were. Once it got too far from the familiar lands around her, the distances just stopped making sense.
And the other things she could do were new and different, the ability to feel what came back from the animals with such detail, in particular. The Dibia tried to make light of it, make it seem like this was normal and expected, but Olisa could see the uneasy truth in her eyes.
Yet, there was no doubt that this expanded ability of hers was also very useful. She could—and had—kept the animals safe from the hunters. Many groups had walked away without their prized photos posed over a dead lion or the carefully smuggled head of some other animal they had no business killing.
The sun began its long slow descent in the sky and the light its shift to the mellow golden glow Olisa liked best. During the dry season the sky changed, no longer the blue or gray of the rainy season, but an almost yellow color. She liked the way the sun shone through it at the end of a day, like it was surrounded by a fuzzy mantle.
At long last, the guides began to stir, their afternoon rest over. Pots clanked and a pile of vegetables grew on a board, waiting their turn to be chopped. Olisa gave a little nod, satisfied there would be no hunting until tomorrow at the earliest. The tracker was busy working around the camp, so he wouldn’t be going out to find the best spots to hunt whatever animal this group sought. Certainly, he wouldn’t do his searching in the dark and it would probably be a whole day of watching whatever prey was chosen. And it would be one more day beyond that, more than likely, until the hunters went.
If she hurried, she could make it back to the village and speak with the Dibia, maybe even get some good hot food in her belly and a long drink of cool water. Even just to be able to enjoy a little time in front of the fire with the Dibia—her warm and sure presence an equal to the flame in providing comfort—would be worth the long run.
Scrambling backward—but quietly, so quietly—Olisa moved out of hearing range and then, still keeping low and
close to the brush, she shuffled out of sight. Over the small rise, when she finally felt it was safe to stand, she reached for the sky and stretched until it felt like her toes might leave the earth and her back might be actually growing longer.
It felt incredibly good to be standing upright, her legs straight and able to take full steps again after all that time crouched and quiet. Olisa gave a few experimental bounces. Her knees were a little stiff, but the discomfort was already fading. The Dibia always told her that she should enjoy her youth, that it would fade someday and she would wish again for the joys of a young body.
As Olisa rubbed the last lingering remnants of stiffness from her leg muscles, she wondered how she could be expected to enjoy this ache. And if she was meant to, then how much worse would it be when she was as old as the Dibia?
She surveyed the area, damping back the temptation to send a little pulse through the soles of her feet to assess her surroundings. But there was no need and she knew it. It was only the reassurance she wanted, so she refrained. All around her, she saw nothing other than the beautiful green of the post-rainy-season Yankari and the dark spots of birds wheeling against the yellow-blue sky. She began her long run home.
Two
The long mellow sunset had faded into purple twilight by the time she spotted the dim glow of firelight from her village. A few harsher, whiter lights blazed out of cracks in some of the larger huts and more leaked from the central meeting house where people congregated.
Olisa wasn’t fond of those lights. They burned her eyes and made it hard to sleep. But the little windmill-powered lights had made inroads even to her village, home to one of the most conservative of the tribes that had returned to the old ways after the wars and diseases had emptied so much of the land.
Keeping to tradition was something her people valued, and it had been in her Dibia’s youth—which must have been when the world was young considering she was so old she didn’t even know her age—that their group left the encroaching modern world behind to go back to the wildlife preserve.
The Dibia spoke of what that modern world was like and Olisa had seen for herself the way the visitors in the park lived. Their clothes, their strange chemical-like smells, the way their food smelled dead most of the time were all things that made her glad of her hut, the quiet warmth and laughter of her family and the safety of knowing all the people around her.
But Olisa also knew there was more to their move and the reasons behind it. The Dibia’s gift was seen as a sign, one that wasn’t understood in the outside world. And now, Olisa’s gift was manifesting in ways she knew the Dibia’s never had. The people in her village didn’t mention it and merely called her the Dibia’s Helper, which was also customary. Even her parents didn’t discuss it, though she had seen the pride in their faces well enough.
A shadow blotted out a bit of firelight and Olisa knew, even from a hundred feet away, that it was the Dibia waiting for her. She smiled and hurried along the final stretch, even though her legs were so tired they felt wobbly and her mouth was as dry as the dust on the ground.
The Dibia’s arm lifted as Olisa approached and she folded herself into her side. Olisa let her head press against the old woman’s bony ribs and felt the calm inside the Dibia roll out like waves, easing her aches and washing away her fatigue. They stood there in silence for a moment, the low humming whistle of ancient lungs pushing air out and then pulling air in almost like a purr against Olisa’s cheek.
She loved the Dibia, probably more than she loved her parents, maybe more than she loved anything. To be next to her like this made Olisa feel both more and less than she was. It made her feel like the little girl she was in her body and so wanted to remain in her mind. Yet it also validated the strange power that was growing in her by sharing space with the only other person she knew also gifted with it.
They stood there long enough for Olisa’s breathing to calm again, the Dibia’s hand stroking her dusty hair and neck with patient, loving strokes. Then the old woman gave her a pat and stepped away. Olisa sighed, grateful for having had the comfort and regretful that it was over. The Dibia handed Olisa a bowl filled with cool water and then all she wanted was to drink it down, forgetting everything else at the first touch of liquid to her parched lips.
As they settled into the Dibia’s hut, the smell of recently cooked food set Olisa’s stomach to rumbling again. This hut sat a little distant from the others, yet near enough that it could be easily watched over by those protecting the village livestock from hungry animals that might come in search of an easy meal.
It gave her a bit of privacy, because what was said in the Dibia’s hut wasn’t for everyone’s ears. Some things weren’t meant to be heard by anyone. That included the details of the pulse that the Dibia—and now Olisa—used to locate the animals.
Olisa ate her fill, the food still warm as if the cooking had been timed for her return, and drank more water than it felt like her skinny body should be able to hold. The Dibia watched her, a little smile on her face, and nibbled on a polite portion of her own so that Olisa wouldn’t eat alone. Eventually even Olisa’s perpetually hungry stomach was full and sloshing with water. She wiped a hand across her mouth and looked at the Dibia, waiting.
“So, they are hunting?” the old woman asked, though it wasn’t really a question.
Olisa nodded and said, “I don’t know what though. And one of the guides sensed me there.”
The Dibia dipped her head in a brief nod, her short hair thin enough at the crown that the dark brown of her scalp showed through the tight white curls. She sucked her lips in and out over her teeth in the manner she did when she thought deeply. Before she could answer, a polite inquiry from outside of the hut broke the silence and her concentration.
At the Dibia’s answer, a tall man in the prime of his life stepped into the hut, ducking his head under the low doorway as he did. He called the Dibia Grandmother but the Dibia said he was really the son of her grand-daughter. His children called her grandmother as well. At some point, Olisa reckoned that it didn’t matter anymore. She was grandmother to all of them in her way.
“Elephants,” he said and then looked from the Dibia to Olisa and back again. That was all he needed to say.
The Dibia nodded and said, “Thank you. They will be taken care of.”
He smiled a grateful smile and stepped out again without another word, leaving the aroma of sweat and the animals in their pens to linger behind him. After the sound of his footsteps on the dirt faded, the Dibia gave her a little gap-toothed smile and asked, “Would you like to?”
Olisa nodded eagerly and set her hands on the ground to either side of her crossed legs, so that her palms rested flat against the dirt. She only needed a finger or a toe or any other part of her body to make contact with the ground, but this was better, easier. The more of her that touched the ground, the smoother what she sent went out. And what she sent came out friendlier somehow when she had more hand surface against the ground. This was also something the Dibia assured her she would learn to control given time and practice.
The ripples spread around her in an easy circle, as if she had tossed a pebble into a calm body of water. When the glowing coals of the fire began to bounce and the ripples started tossing the dirt on the ground like tiny landslides, the Dibia murmured, “Easy. Just let it flow out. Don’t push it out. They’ll hear you.”
Olisa lifted her palms a little, leaving just her fingertips in the dirt, took in a long, slow breath and then let it out slowly, trying to match the trickle of whatever it was that came out of her fingers to the trickle of air. The dirt calmed, the ripples evened out, and the fire steadied once more. She let her palms touch the ground again. This time, the smooth pulse and calm remained.
Inside, it felt like a peculiar form of connectedness, deep in the belly, that made her content. This feeling was balanced against a sense of spreading herself thin, of losing something of the substance that made her body real. That part was unnerving, but ov
erall the experience was a happy one. Not happy in the giggling and laughing sort of way, but content, like when she was wrapped up in her Dibia’s arms to sleep on a night just cool enough to make the cuddling comfortable.
“Good girl,” the Dibia said, pleased with how quickly she had corrected herself. “Now, don’t just find them, talk to them.”
Olisa closed her eyes and nodded that she understood. She sent the wave out and it went too far, feeding her back the locations of animals all around her, even the birds and insect colonies. She pulled back, using her breaths as the gauge by which she measured, and focused in on the elephants nearby.
It was a family group of healthy elephants, happy with two growing babies and the surfeit of food available after a generous rainy season. They had been at the warm pools and were still feeling playful, their joints eased after relaxing in the water. They were feeling good as they ambled toward a good spot to rest for the night. Olisa smiled as the sensations washed over her.
The people place is here. Coming close will frighten our animals and people. Will you move away?
It wasn’t words so much as it was the meaning of words that she sent, and that was the part of the pulse that didn’t come naturally. Complex concepts like near and far, toward and away or anything that couldn’t be tied to a feeling were difficult to transmit. Often, they were the source of misunderstandings that took repeated—and frustrating—attempts to communicate. In this matter, the Dibia was entirely correct. It would take time to learn to do this detailed “distance speaking” that the old woman did almost without thought after so many decades of practice.
“That’s good, but picture them moving away, toward the flat area near where the picture people are,” the Dibia said, obviously listening in on the exchange. She meant for Olisa to guide them toward the safer area where the visitors to the park and the game wardens were. Hunters wouldn’t go after them there, not with so many potential eyes to see them.
The Powers That Be: A Superhero Collection Page 9
