by Robi, Carol
How unfair it must seem to all mankind that I was born the eldest prince, rich, into a powerful kingdom, handsome, and was deemed a great enough warrior by my peers so as to be appointed the musacha.
I jump out of my bed in the house my father had helped me build right after my initiation, about three dry summer seasons ago, and step from the inner room into the outer room where I stroke my fire alive, before stepping on out.
My father is also just stepping out of his house and we acknowledge each other by bowing our heads.
“Father, my king,” I call in greeting after my bow.
“Son, my prince,” father answers with a proud smile. Father loves me, that I know.
Ever since I was of reasoning age, I’ve set out to do nothing but make him proud. I knew he was a great man even at a young age. The whole kingdom loves him, and all warriors respect him. At just thirty sixth, he’s still a very active Bakoria warrior, a mura. He’s aging well too, his body fully toned, his limbs long and firm, and on our drills he runs just as fast as most young warriors. I knew the kind of man I wanted to be at the tender age of three, I wanted to be just like my father. I still do.
My father and I step out of our houses and head out to the animal shelter at the end of the kingstead. It’s there that we separate the animals, my father’s younger brothers joining us, and we take them to the keep behind the southern gate.
Helped by my two younger brothers, we clear out the cow dung from animal gooti and pile it into the pit where we keep all our manure to be used after the next planting season. We just harvested our crops about two new moons ago, and it shall be another new moon until we are to start preparing our farms in preparation for the long rains when we ought to start the planting of grains.
But until then, this is the vacationing season. With granaries filled with food, and not much to do other than the grazing of cattle in the morning, the afternoons are to be left for the pleasure of all unmarried warriors.
I’m especially happy today because it’s the day we shall first see the newly initiated maidens at the Pride Lake.
Oh Pride Lake! What great things have happened there. It’s by far the single Bakoria people’s tradition I love most, second only to child making. Whoever came up with those two items is my favourite person. There’s nothing as lovely as seeing young women just ripe and plum, at the height of their youth, playing in the waters and basking on Pride Lake’s beaches, or the numerous rocks around and in it.
My first couple seasons at Pride Lake I’d mostly spent in the water, trying to order my man down. I hope you know the man I’m talking about. He just wouldn’t listen though, not with all that array of bare breasts just standing up before you as a girl talks to you. I wouldn’t hear anything the girls said though, just whatever their breasts were saying to me, which tended to be something about wanting or needing to be touched.
It’s while I’m at the low end of the stream a little way from home to water the livestock, that my best friend, Chacha Renchoka, rides up to me on his exceptional stallion. A beast dark as night with striped feet and tail.
“Chacha, mura!” I call out happily upon seeing him.
“My prince, mura,” he answers me cheerfully, expertly jumping off his riding beast, leaving it to grazing and drinking water with the rest of the livestock I’m herding before he comes my way.
“You’re looking sharp!” I tell him, playfully shoving him by his shoulders as I take in his glossed self shone from oils. His braided hair, dyed red as is expected of all Bakoria warriors, is neatly pulled away from his face. The snake skin skirt around his waist appears new too, and his yet new shield made of zebra hide as is standard with our people is strapped across his back, while his shining long spear is held in hand. A Bakoria warrior is never too far from his spear and shield. My spear is in my hand at the moment, and my shield is strapped across my back. The two haven’t left my side since I was initiated into the class of warriors. When I sleep, I place the shield under my bed and my spear by my door, as do most warriors I know. I learnt the practice from the best, my father.
“Of course!” Chacha Renchoka answers me, running his hands through his perfectly braided hair, before rubbing his cleanly shaven chin and giving me one of those smiles he calls his girl-killer smiles.
I laugh again before interlocking my hands and placing them before my mouth and start whistling the particular tune my livestock know well.
When I’m done, the livestock are already following after me, I walk between them, slapping at the bellies of those walking too sluggishly slow as we make our way home.
“Is your sister coming?” Chach asks, whistling to his zorse and jumping astride it.
Not this with my sister again! I think, reaching to the nearest zorse, a carriage beast, but nevertheless jumping onto it to ride it, so that I can ride beside my friend as I hurdle the rest of the cattle and zorses together and lead them home.
“I don’t know,” I choose to tell him.
I honestly don’t know, but if I were to bet, I’d say no. Ever since father and mother stopped forcing her to go to the Pride Lake, she rarely does. Maybe just to be in the company of the warriors in her age group, as most of them enjoy her company. But then again, most of them are in love with her.
There’s something about a woman that can perfectly handle a spear, as well as a bow and arrows, is an excellent fighter and an even greater rider- that has most men stunned. Her presence causes enough stirring among the ranks of warriors. Like all other male warriors, she walks around with a short snakeskin skirt wrapped around her waist, and her shield strapped to her back. Her breasts are bare, even though she’s of maiden age. Maidens almost always have rings of necklaces to cover up their chests, however poorly the job might be done. The head of a cheetah, our kingdom’s spirit animal, tattoed onto her right breast as is expected of all warriors in our kingdom, is another matter that seems to make most just blatantly stare at her breasts. Those that aren’t attentive enough often get their noses broken, for Gati can sure pack a punch.
For most of my fellow warriors, I’d say they are just infatuated by her, intrigued by the idea of what she is and represents. Chacha, my best friend whom I love like a dear brother, is the only one stupid enough to have let himself fall in love with her. He’s in love with the one girl in the four brother kingdoms that no man can have. It is a sad matter indeed.
“She should. She’s still a maiden,” Chacha says quietly.
“She’s a warrior,” I correct him.
“A maiden warrior,” he rushes to say.
“Yes, a maiden warrior, promised to be my right hand,” I remind him firmly.
“She hasn’t taken the oath yet,” Chacha goes on to remind me, shouting over the mooing and neighing of the livestock as he helps me hasten their pace back to my home. We both want to be soon on our way to Pride Lake and see the newly initiated maidens from the four brother kingdoms.
“No, the oath hasn’t been taken yet,” I agree with him.
“Would you force her, to take it, should she, say she fall in love with me?”
Of course I’d never force my sister down a path she has no wishes going, but I also know my sister will never choose housework and childbearing over running a kingdom. It’s just not like Gati at all. Even if by some miracle Chacha was to win her heart, she’d never let the title go.
“Of course I’d never force her,” I reassure my friend, riding on ahead of the livestock as the animal keep behind the southern gates of my home is just ahead, and I need to lead them into it.
“I have a mother that could just as easily take up the role, when my time comes,” I rush on to add.
“In all honesty, tell me, do I have a chance?”
Chacha asks this while we stand to either side of the gates to the animal keep, helping to usher the animals in. I look at him over the broad backs of cattle and riding beasts, and I know he reads the pity in my eyes.
“She was born to rule, Chacha,” I tell him, fo
r what I hope will be the last time we are having this discussion. “Her name’s Gati, first daughter of the family. She was born to a king. She was born to lead. Had she been a boy, she’d be the crown prince. And you know, my dear friend, you know Gati and her ambitions. Can you seriously see her as the kind of woman to raise your little army of children, cook and clean your home?” I see the flash of doubt cross his face as he ponders on my words.
“Even though I’m sure she’s the only woman I’ll ever love, I’d ensure she has a co-wife. I’d marry a second wife to carry out all the home duties, so that she can keep being a warrior, a nyarmura..”
He goes on talking about all he’d do to make her happy, to keep her happy, if he ever got her, and I realize that his is a lost cause. My best friend is madly in love with my sister, and nothing, not even common sense, can save him from the malady.
I envy him, for the idea of having such a devoted passion for someone is enviable. But I also fear ever having to feel like that. I hope that I’m never privy to the clutching claws of being in love. I never want to sound silly and irrational like that. I can’t afford to, because of the position I hold.
When we’re done with the livestock, I rush to clean up myself, while Chacha goes to hunt for any girl in my home that can serve us some food.
I chuckle lightly to myself when I’m done cleaning up and oiling myself, as I see my two younger sisters rushing up beside him with calabashes of steaming honeyed porridge, roasted cassava and wild berries on the side.
My elder sister may not be in love with the Isamura’s son, but my younger ones often fought and argued with each other for his attention. He’s the most eligible bachelor in the kingdom after me, and being that they are my sisters and can’t have me, he’s the one they hope to trap into marriage.
I’d never allow it for him to marry one of them, for I know he is in love with Gati, and I do not want my younger sisters to set themselves for a life of disappointment and unrequited love. He knows better than to encourage them too, out of the respect we have for each other. He always makes sure not to flirt with them, other than pay them the necessary attention as they are princesses of the kingdom.
After we eat on the porch of my house, under the canopy of it’s roof that provides us with much needed shade from the hot midday sun directly above us, Chacha helps me with putting my hair in order, securing a golden clasp over the low ponytail to keep the braids in place, before we mount our riding beasts and set off in the direction of the pride lake.
We are met up by other young warriors of our kingdom on the way, and by the time we get to the lake, we are a large group of warriors.
There are already a large number of young unmarried Bakoria generation at the lake- swimming, making music, dancing, talking, flirting, basking under the harsh overhead sun.
Chacha and I look at each other with excited eyes as we dismount from our zorses. We then hurriedly take off our strapped sandals and the shields tied to our backs, and tie them to our beasts.
I bow to the greetings from other young warriors and maidens as we walk on ahead, having seen some of our peers playing a game on top of one of the massive rocks around the lake.
“My prince,” Muiya calls, a boy I grew up with, whom I also got initiated with, as is the case with the rest of my peers here. We call it a saro, those initiated together, belonging to the same age group. They are my saro members.
“Mura,” warrior, I answer his greeting respectfully, as I do the other fourteen around.
“We were just waiting for you,” Muiya goes on to tell me. “The Bairege newbies are the best so far.” I look to where he points and I must agree with him. Most of the girls look still too young, but even then they’ve begun growing into womanhood, as is evident from their busts and widening hips.
“Bairege women are always the best!” I confess.
“True, true!” My men agree solemnly.
The Bairege kingdom is one the other brother kingdoms revere, as it produces the most hardened of warriors. Their men are almost always slightly taller than other Bakoria men, and more built. They run faster, move faster, fighter better and smile least. Their women, though also taller than other Bakoria women, are almost always more beautiful, and without a doubt more skilled. Most of the best singers and dancers in the kingdom are from the other three kingdoms, but Bairege women are skilled in other useful arts like weaving, basketry, pottery, artistry, wine making, and can apparently work like oxen on a farm.
I know it’s true, as my mother was a Bairege princess and I’ve witnessed her expertise at these things. She’s not Bairege anymore, as we people of Bakoria believe that once a woman marries her husband, she renounces her family and her previous titles and takes up those of her husband. My mother is now a Nyabasi queen, by all laws of the land, and is never to term herself as being Bairege.
As is customary, I walk together with my peers, and we pay homage to the other warrior saros first, starting with those of our kingdom. That’s when I note that my sister is in attendance, and Chacha can barely contain his excitement at seeing her.
“Brother, my prince.”
“Sister, my princess,” I greet her. “I had no idea you were riding out here. We could have ridden together,” I tell her.
“I don’t ride with children,” she promptly says, causing the warriors in her saro to laugh. I chuckle too. She does not mean any harm by saying it. She just has a different kind of humour. Plus, she is a saro older than I am, so she’s justified in calling me a child. Atleast she is for now, as all I am is a prince. She’d never term me a child when I’m king.
“Fair enough,” I tell her chuckling, tapping her higher shoulder than mine lightly, before moving on with my men.
It’s a struggle to keep my eyes away from the girls prancing about, most of them having taken off their necklaces so as to swim in the waters, and as they walk past water droplets glisten on their breasts, amusement on their faces for they know the effect they have on us.
“Damn these women!” Mogesi, another warrior in my saro mutters, causing us all to chuckle under our breath as we move from one group of warriors to another to exchange our niceties.
We are all excited when the formalities are over, and we can finally jump into water. I for one know I need the cool water to help cool parts of me, especially when I see a bunch of Bakira girls that appear to be eighteen chase each other along the banks of the lake, before they suddenly all bump into each other when one of them abruptly stops, and then clumsily tumble together into the lake- arms, pliable thighs, breasts, behinds all flying into the water.
We swim for a while, enjoying the cool waters, before we are cool enough to get out and start mingling with the girls. As beautiful an array of women as there are, none of them seem to be catching my attention. Well, there is Matinde, the Bagumbe princess. She’s the most eligible, and I’m sure when the time is right, I shall have to propose to her, but I do not feel for her what I know Chacha feels for my sister. Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?
Muiya, Chacha and I break away from our saro, and walk on to meet the newly initiated maidens. Most of them are shy, being that their bodies are still those of children, and hide in the water most of the time. We therefore mostly waddle through the waters, moving from one group to the other, introducing ourselves and trying to remember their names, of which we do a poor job of.
Matinde comes up to me when there’s yet another group of newly initiated maidens to meet.
“Prince of Nyabasi,” she greets. Only the Nyabasi term me as my prince, the rest of the brother kingdoms stick to terming me as Prince of Nyabasi or prince Makena.
“Princess of Bagumbe,” I reciprocate her greeting, and wait as Chacha and Muiya greet her, and she answers by terming them as mura, as they are warriors and it’s the rightful greeting for warriors. The Bakoria people greet each other respectfully by stating their titles. It’s a very simple system.
“I see you were about to make my little sister’s acquitt
ance,” she says, moving over to wad the waters by my side.
“Was I?” I ask, my eyes sweeping over the girls waiting ahead of us, their eyes fixed expectantly at our group. None of those girls appear in any way royal-like as Matinde does, but I do meet with large light brown eyes that are unmistakably her sister’s. The royal family of the Bagumbe is known by their distinctively large light coloured eyes, that always seem bright because their eyes tend to be slightly wet, as though they are holding back tears.
The princess in question has not only her whole body under water, but also half of her face too, leaving out only the upper part from her nose. She’s also made sure to hide behind the other girls in her saro- not a very princessy character if you ask me. Her timidity directly contrasts the brazen character of her elder sisters.
“Other than her eyes, I wouldn’t have penned her for your sister,” I mumble low into Matinde’s ears, as we are soon upon them and they might hear me otherwise.
“Neither would I,” is Matinde’s prompt answer that elicits a chuckle from me. Matinde’s jokes are often borderline mean, which works well with my kind of humour.
We are soon upon them, wielding greetings from the group of young maidens. Too young for my liking, I note with disappointed. Despite their age though, most of them aren’t shy, even going as far as to flirt with us.
“Maybe you could show me to use a spear to fish one day,” one girl asks of Chacha, and I stifle a laugh as my friend looks helplessly at me.
“I’m a great learner,” the young girl of twelve or thereabout adds, edging closer to him in the water, giving him unmistakably suggestive eyes.
“I.. ummh..” Muiya, Matinde and I are failing at stifling our chuckles at the moment, but the girl doesn’t seem in any way offended or perturbed at our reaction, her eyes set on learning spear fishing from the son of the Nyabasi’s Isamura.
“I already promised.. ummh.. Princess Matinde to teach her,” Chacha finally says, moving away from the young girl’s attempts, while sending Matinde a pleading look to confirm the lie for him and help him out of this predicament. No young warrior wants to be the first to break a girl’s heart.
