Convergence

Author’s Notes: This story concludes the While the Gods Slumber series, my first series ever! To those that have been patiently following…Thank you! I’d love to hear your thoughts and comments!

Going forward, demons, as inherently intersex beings, will be identified with the quasi-neopronouns xhe, xhim, xhis. This usage will be explained and formally introduced in future editions of Descent and the stories that follow.

City of Morore, Kingdom of Morore. Year 3125, Month of Sowing

Whisper sipped from her bowl of spicy dika nut soup. She gazed out from the roof terrace, only half listening while her enforcer gave his report. The month of Sowing, just after the seasonal rains, was her favorite time of year. Cool air and the sun’s glow played upon her skin like a pair of jealous lovers.

Her house was only three stories high, just one among several mud-brick homes huddled together within the Upper City walls of Morore. Squat, drum-shaped towers of the noble clans and the royal palace dominated the northern sky. South, east, and west, she could see the Lower City, and clear to the horizon.

The mesa that the Upper City occupied was both pedestal and prison. It raised wealthy traders and noble clansmen that lived upon it over the Lower City below. But its walls and height prevented easy access to the people, the river, and the granaries below. At least, access for most. Whisper and her informants crossed that barrier at will.

In the shadow of the Upper City lay the two great arteries of the kingdom. The Brassbelt Road rolled along from east to west, lined with rows of baobabs – stout pillars with stunted green crowns. That road gave birth to the lesser streets that ran south through the city. Along the west side of the mesa, the ribbon of the Big Mongoose River gleamed in the midday sun, crossing the Brassbelt and winding its way into the southern hills.

Life teemed upon these arteries. Markets for every item under the sun thrived on the patches of bare red earth along the Brassbelt. Sandal makers, tailors and trading houses opened their shops on the road and streets, shaded by stubby date palms. South of the Brassbelt, clusters of granaries stood like sun-soaked soldiers under their thatched straw roofs. The complex of the powerful Casters’ Guild, a veritable castle and the home of the brass-crafters, hugged the river just south of the bridge where the road and river met. Barges and ferries floated on the river, piled high with passengers and goods from the forested north.

In the distance, a perimeter of pale, rune-marked obelisks marked the edge of the city – the ancestral wards that kept demons away.

Well, most of the demons.

From this height, Whisper could just make out the people in the Lower City, those tiny dabs of color, the unknowing subjects of her Court of Secrets. They told a thousand thousand stories to each other. One day, she would know them all.

“The kids say Stick has been picking pockets again,” Miko went on, ever dutiful with Court business. “Almost got grabbed by the city wardens.”

“Let him sleep in the gutters for a few days,” Whisper said.

She could hear some of the children on the first floor below taunting each other. They were her drongos, little birds with eyes and ears who told her everything that happened in the narrow lanes of the Upper City. The wardens couldn’t keep them outside of the walls. But if the kids were caught sleeping in the streets they’d be thrown out. If they were caught stealing, they’d be hanged.

Whisper fed the waifs, housed them, and put them to work. They begged, they lied, they spied, and they reported back. But they did not steal. This was her home. She was respectable now.

“If Stick wants to thieve, he can do it outside the walls,” Whisper said, taking another sip. The peppery soup was thick with ground nuts, greens, okra and goat meat. She nodded praise to the girl, Marble, who tended the pot. The girl waited politely out of earshot, in case Whisper asked for more. “If he does it again,” she said softly to Miko, “have Adder take care of it.”

She trusted Adder to show more restraint than Miko. Whisper had few limits, but hurting children was among them.

Miko nodded with a grim expression. “As you say.”

“No word on Kuya?”

The enforcer shook his head. “We haven’t found a body, at least.”

Just like Mother, Kuya was an intulo, one of that scaly demonic species that lived in Morore’s underworld. Kuya lurked among the whores and entertainers who plied their trades along the Brassbelt.

People seemed to be disappearing all over the city these days.

Whisper downed the rest of the soup. “What’s going on in the palace?”

“No more news. No one seems to know where the prince is. If they do, it’s a closely held secret.”

And I do love a closely held secret.

Whisper signaled to Marble to take the empty bowl.

The heir to King Yende’s throne was a notorious philanderer. His conquests had already made him quite a few enemies. Had he gotten himself into trouble with one of them, or run off with a new lover? It had been two days now since Prince Kandu had been seen.

“Now,” Whisper said, watching the girl, with a pair of mitts, take the pot down the stairs to share a morning meal with the other kids. “Why is Ranthaman San here?”

Miko shrugged broad shoulders. Whisper’s enforcer was quite enticing in that loose, sleeveless tunic that bared python-like arms. He was the outwardly intimidating one of her pair of guards, like a giant muscled hyrax. When he climaxed, his eyes would flutter like moth’s wings, and he tended to seize her head in a grip like a vise. Somehow, it made him that much more enticing.

Whisper’s carnal hunger was like an old friend. Sometimes it betrayed her, and sometimes she hated it. But it was always present. Without it, she would not be her.

“I think he’s here about something to do with the Thandi,” said Miko.

Whisper scowled. They were almost enough to kill her mood. “Bring him up,” she said.

He left her alone on the terrace. When he returned, he led the House San trader.

Whisper had never met the man in person, but she knew of him. Ranthaman wore light robes of cinnabar over flowing pants. His hair and his goatee were perfectly sculpted; not a hair out of place.

The enforcer stepped away to give them privacy, leaning against the parapet wall to take in the morning city streets. The merchant joined her where she reclined under her pergola.

“Ancestors bless,” he said. His Nubic was quite smooth. An unpracticed ear might have mistaken it for his first tongue. He spent many months out of the year in the Kingdoms. “Whisper?”

She nodded and gestured. “Sit.”

The trader took the reclining chair across from hers, the one Miko had occupied. Like the enforcer, he remained sitting upright. “This is more public than I expected.”

Whisper toyed with a curly twist of her hair, enjoying the slight tug on her scalp. She stretched out long, slender legs, like a snake uncoiling its length. Her legs were mostly unencumbered by the spare, dun-colored gown that was her only garment.

She was too skinny, by her own tastes. As a girl, she had lusted after the curvy, painted whores that flaunted themselves along the Brassbelt. But no matter how much palm butter sauce she scarfed down, she couldn’t seem to lose her slim appearance.

Mother’s fault.

“I am not a thief, Ranthaman. I am a trader, just as you are, and I work in the daylight. But I trade in well-told tales, not bolts of linen.”

The Ikanjan merchant smiled. “A secret is less weighty than gold, and far more precious,” he recited.

“…To the right buyer,” Whisper finished. “My favorite Nubic proverb. You have heard of the Courts of Morore?”

“Gangs of thieves, you mean?”

“Just so. This is my Court. The Court of Secrets. What do you want to know?”

Ranthaman San lowered his voice. “It is rumored there is a coven of Thandi witches in Morore,” he said. “I wish to meet with them.”

Whisper’s eyebrow perked in interest. “Information is costly when there is great risk involved,” she said. “Tell me why you seek them, perhaps we can more easily settle upon a price.”

“I cannot say why. But I am prepared to offer a reasonable amount of coin, as well as the goodwill of the Great House San of Ikanje.”

That goodwill was no small matter. Like whores, traders made ideal informants. And yet…

Whisper grinned. “Let’s discuss ‘reasonable amounts of coin’.”

Once they had agreed upon a price, Ranthaman left. Miko turned around, his back to the parapet wall, pursing his lips in thought.

Whisper slid off of her chair and joined him at the wall, tasting the sweet breeze that wafted above the city stink. In the narrow street below, a kola nut peddler hawked his wares, rolling a pushcart. He shooed away two barefoot boys who begged him for a taste.

A few moments later, Ranthaman walked out the door below, accompanied by a woman in a long tunic and trousers, as tall as he was.

“Who is that?” Whisper asked.

“She arrived with him. A maid, probably.”

Whisper watched as the two spoke to each other, walking side by side.

“A maid? With a back so straight she could be one of Yende’s palace guards?” Whisper snorted. “You need to hone your skills of observation.”

“She’s got one too many scars to be the wife of a man like Ranthaman,” Miko said. “Or a lover.”

“Interesting.”

After the Ikanjan pair had passed, the two boys peered up at Whisper. She gave a sharp nod. The boys drifted along after the merchant and his companion. Her drongos were resourceful, highly skilled shadows. They knew how to work as a team, and they had networks of beggars and other informants in both the Upper and Lower City.

Finding the Thandi and arranging a meeting would not be difficult. Getting involved with the coven without becoming entangled in their latest plot… that would be more difficult. Mother feared the Scarred Women, as other demons did. For good reason.

Something about the combination of events didn’t sit well with Whisper. Royal heirs didn’t normally go missing, and respectable merchants didn’t seek out Thandi covens.

Her fingers snaked idly into the waistband of Miko’s trousers as she watched Ranthaman and his female companion go. She licked her lips as she felt Miko’s length swell, warm in her hand.

The House San trader’s price had been a good one. Secrets were more precious than gold, and much more intriguing.

She turned back to Miko, fingers deftly working at his drawstring. “Set something up with the Thandi.” Whisper sank down before him, her back against the brick of the parapet. His trousers dropped, pooled at his feet.

“…Later,” she added.

**

On a bright morning two days later, Miko brought the Thandi emissary to the terrace while Whisper played vu’ela with the girl, Marble.

Marble reminded Whisper of herself as a child. The boyish waif was observant and quick to learn, so Whisper taught her a game of strategy.

If one believed the storytellers, vu’ela was nearly as old as the First Woman, played in every land in the known world. The simple game required only a double row of cups, a sack full of pebbles, the ability to think many steps ahead and seize opportunities when they came.

When Whisper saw who Miko led up to the roof terrace, she nearly dropped her pebbles.

She glared at the enforcer. The open-faced innocence he showed her might have even been genuine.

You and I shall have to have a talk, Miko.

The Thandi woman lacked the tattooed scars that many of her heritage had, and for good reason. Bayati was an agent. She was the public-facing front for an arcane and powerful clan of women.

Prominent cheekbones graced a leaner and harsher face than Bayati had had two years before, but one just as beautiful. Her shoulders and arms were sculpted as well, laid bare by the wrap dress she wore. Her pouty, down-turned lips still seemed to invite kisses. Whisper pushed the game board towards Marble, and gestured for the waif to leave. The same for Miko. Bayati was dangerous. Of that there could be no doubt.

But there was an art to dealing with dangerous people, and it started by knowing what they desired.

Bayati waited until they were alone on the roof. She ducked under the pergola. “You’ve moved up in the world,” she said, surveying the roof and the city beyond. “Living atop the mesa now. Last time I saw you, you were in a Brassbelt brothel. What is this place… an orphans’ den?”

Whisper ignored the jab. “I thought you were dead. Where have you been the last two years? If you were in the city, I would have known.”

Bayati shrugged. She sat down in the chair, her gaze like smoldering ash. “I was on a quest, to fetch something of value.”

“Did you find it?”

“I did. What did you call me here for?”

Bayati’s scent was a subtle mix of hibiscus tinged with fresh grass. It brought memories rushing back. Memories Whisper didn’t want to let go of just yet. Her hunger was like an eager hound, but she reined it in. “Someone is looking for you, for your coven,” she said.

“May the gods disappoint them.”

“House San of Ikanje wants to meet with you,” Whisper caught the flicker of surprise, the slight widening of the eyes. The calculation as Bayati’s gaze slid away.

“Arrange the meeting,” the Thandi woman said.

Whisper nodded, but Bayati made no move to leave.

Ah. There is more. Something she wants.

“Do you have any wine?” Bayati asked.

Whisper smiled and reached down beside her wicker chair to a clay jar. She pulled the wood stopper and handed it over.

Bayati glanced at her, tilted her head. She took a swig. She nodded her appreciation and passed it back. They’d shared quite a bit of marula wine together, when they were something resembling lovers. This jar was tart, with a hint of nuttiness.

Bayati peered up at the nearest drum-shaped tower, the immense dwelling of a Vong Clan trader. “Anyone could look down on us,” she noted.

“There is nothing to see, except me having conversations.”

“I know you better than that,” Bayati countered. “There is much more to see.” She laid back on the wicker recliner, closing her eyes for a moment. “I mocked your success before. But you do look more comfortable now, here in your Court of Secrets. You are no longer a thief pretending to be a whore. You have grown. I respect that.”

“I am legitimate. I observe. I tell people what I observe. They pay me. There is no law against that.” Whisper watched the other woman carefully.

Wherever Bayati had been, it had changed her. On the outside she was tough as leather, but on the inside…

“And that’s what you want most, Whisper? To live in the Upper City, amongst the nobles? To be invited to the palace?”

“I enjoy not being chased by city wardens and rival Courts.” And cabals of Scarred Women, Whisper might have added.

“You may still find yourself unsafe,” Bayati said, taking another swig. “Laws change. Rulers fall.”

“All true, but things of real value will always be traded.” Whisper drew up her legs to cross them on the chair, baring them to the thigh. “You know what I miss?” she asked. The fruity bite of the wine lingered on her tongue.

Bayati waited, her gaze dark and expectant.

In Bayati’s expression, Whisper glimpsed a memory of who they’d once been. The emotion there couldn’t pass for warmth or tenderness, but might be called desire. Bayati was an actor, one as fine as any entertainer on stage during the Festival of the Bursting Belt. She had mastered concealment of her true self. Beneath that façade, the woman was terrified that anyone should know her feelings.

“What was that song? The Ironsmith’s Wife.” Whisper remembered. “I loved when you sung it for me.”

“It is call and response. It is made to be sung in a group.”

“Not when you sing it.”

Bayati smiled. “You want me to sing?”

“‘Want’ is such a feeble word. I crave it, Bayati.”

The Thandi woman was silent for a while. Then she began to sing. Her voice was like a finely tuned harp. The notes soared like an eagle, hung there on the updrafts until they lifted your soul in their talons.

Listening to Bayati sing used to make Whisper cry.

The ballad was in Swaga, a language spoken far to the south, and in the coven. The Thandi woman had once explained that it told the story of an aging man whose wife journeyed to a neighboring town to visit family, but never returned. Every night he would watch stars wheel across the sky as he waited for her, wondering whether he would be with her again in life or in death.

But it didn’t matter much to Whisper what the words meant.

As the song came to an end, Whisper rose fluidly from her chair and walked to the corner of the pergola. She drew a linen curtain that stretched around the north side of the structure, blocking off the view from the north-side towers.

Bayati watched her, with hooded eyes. “Now I understand the orphans. You always had a soft heart,” she said.

Whisper dropped smoothly beside her, kneeling on the reclining chair. Bayati wasn’t submissive, not at all. But she yielded before aggression, like a pack hunter. It explained her loyalty to the coven. She obeyed her betters to a fault. And if you could get past the woman’s armor, she would crumble like un-mortared bricks.

Then she would truly sing.

“A soft heart helps understand others better. It helps to feel what they feel.” Whisper ran a finger up the other woman’s slender arm, feather-light. “Their pain. Their fear. Their desire.”

“You don’t know what I feel.”

“I know that your quest changed you. I know that you long for me.” She bent over Bayati, her face so close she could see the tiny flecks of distress in the woman’s eyes. “No, it is not me you long for… It is the past. You regret something you’ve-”

“Don’t,” Bayati said, voice strained. “I didn’t come for this.”

“Who said this is about what you want?” Whisper dipped her head until her lips almost touched Bayati’s skin. She could taste the heat rising from it. “I don’t care if you don’t want me. It’s been years, and I hunger for you.”

Bayati lunged upward, her mouth closing over Whisper’s. Whisper savored the salt and wine taste. Bayati’s lips were just as plump and soft as ever, her tongue as clever. As eager as Whisper was for more, she stretched atop Bayati slowly, and settled into the embrace.

As their tongues dueled and hands roamed, the city carried on without them. The murmur and cry of the markets, the distant roar of Casters’ furnaces firing up to work iron and copper, and the bellows of elephants and buffalos carrying their burdens sounded below.

Whisper ran a hand between the bottom halves of Bayati’s dress, up over a firm thigh, then to her waist, deft fingers undoing the linen tie of the garment. Part of her wanted to straddle the Thandi woman, to press her down under lips and tongue, and savor this feeling of knowing her.

But Bayati was right. This moment was not about the two of them, not about rekindling whatever it was that they had.

Whisper sat up. She opened the halves of the dress, baring Bayati’s well-toned torso and upturned breasts. There was hardly any fat on the woman. Whatever she’d been doing on her quest, it had been active. Guessing from those shoulders and forearms, it had involved either hard labor, or weapons.

“I know what you are doing,” Bayati said, huskily.

Whisper bent again, traced a line down the woman’s throat, between her breasts. She nuzzled Bayati’s flat belly, tasting her. Lower, to the scrap of a loincloth the woman wore. Whisper felt the heat of Bayati’s yoni through the fabric, drank in the musk like the aroma of her next meal.

The bouquet was a heady one, of sweat and sweet hibiscus, and something decidedly not feminine. Whisper’s keen senses recognized it right away.

“And I know what you’ve been doing,” Whisper replied. She hooked her fingers in the string of the scrap and pulled it off strong legs, wresting an involuntary gasp from Bayati.

Bayati’s yoni nested in a bed of tight, trimmed curls. Her thighs spread at the lightest touch of Whisper’s fingers. The woman’s breath was weighted with anticipation. Whisper ran a fingertip up the plump line of Bayati’s slit. A thread of silvery dew clung to her finger as she brought it to her own lips.

Whisper dipped her head between Bayati’s thighs, kissing her way up to their heated juncture. She no longer used her fingers there. She didn’t want to waste a drop. Instead her hands wandered upward, while her tongue teased apart Bayati’s moist outer lips.

She nibbled and tugged at the inner and outer petals of Bayati’s flower until it was pink and blooming. By this time, Bayati was beginning to writhe beneath her. Whisper’s fingers tugged at stiff nipples, causing the other woman to moan with need.

Whisper plunged her tongue into Bayati’s slick channel. Her taste was deliciously familiar, even though two years had passed. Her honey flowed out, along with the thicker, saltier seed of a man.

Yes. I know what you’ve been doing.

Whisper loved cum, no matter whence it came. Most of all, she loved bush-butter sap – that mix of male and female, pouring forth from a woman who trembled as much as Bayati did just now. It was nothing like the safu that hung from trees in Falancha that was also called bush-butter. This bush-butter filled Whisper with power. It fed her demonic hunger. It brought her to life.

So she fed, while Bayati gasped, that armor beginning to crack. After a time, Whisper lifted her wet face. She spun and straddled Bayati’s prone form. Then she bent her head again, so that now she could finger the Thandi’s gaping yoni and clenched ass, while her tongue teased the little nerve-filled pearl at the top of the cleft. She felt Bayati convulse, surrendering beneath her. Then Whisper continued to feed, delighted to feel Bayati’s hands on her hips and tongue on her own shaven yoni.

Then she felt something else. Something cool and smooth that slowly eased into her and onto her at the same time. She knew from memory what it was. A polished piece of black stone that Bayati must have stashed in her dress. Slender and hard, it was like a Lake Kongo crab claw, with the dactyl that probed her much longer than the one that curled over her most sensitive organ.

As Whisper licked down the length of Bayati’s cleft, she felt the stone stretch her until it seemed like she was held in its delightful grip.

Oh gods. Whisper remembered what came next.

Bayati sang again. One note, sonorous and low, a note that made Whisper’s bones shake. The stone toy inside her pulsed in response, like the skin of a drum.

This was wicked Thandi magic, and Whisper loved it. The toy caressed her, inside and out. It was all she could do to concentrate on curling a finger up inside Bayati and licking at her plump little organ. The stone’s thrum began as simple pleasure, but it would very quickly turn Whisper’s mind to mush.

Bayati gasped beneath her. Whisper’s eyes rolled up in her head. With her last bit of will, she tapped and tongued until the woman underneath her opened up like floodgates on the Hibiscus Canal. Nectar spurted into Whisper’s mouth, moments before she herself dissolved into the morning sun.

When she regained her senses, a wet spot darkened the tiles of the rooftop, and a mixture of fluids dripped from the chair. Bayati lay panting on her side, and Whisper stood up to stretch her legs. She wiped her face and licked her fingers clean. The sun was high in the sky, and just like the sun, Whisper brimmed with power.

She looked at the rune-etched stone in Bayati’s limp hand. She longed to lick it clean too. “I need one of those,” she said.

“I want you to find someone,” Bayati replied in a small voice.

Ah. So this was it. Whatever inner turmoil the Thandi woman was suffering through, this was at the heart of it. This was the reason she had stayed for wine and song.

“I’m listening,” Whisper said, basking in the open air. She felt the tiniest vibrations still thrumming inside her.

Bayati gathered her legs beneath her and sat up. “A woman, younger than us, who speaks the melodic tongue of the Sung Valley, and enough trade-Kan to get by. She carries a staff, and with it in her hands she is close to invincible. An herb-witch by craft, she wears revealing garb, and is quite beautiful. She travels with a spearman, also from the Sung Valley, and an albino woman from Ikanje State. By now, they are here in Morore, somewhere.”

“What are you willing to pay?” Whisper asked.

Bayati was silent for so long that Whisper turned to look at her. The Thandi woman pulled her dress closed. “I ask a favor. One you will not regret granting me.”

Whisper paced a few steps, hoping to conceal the lingering shakiness of her legs. “Perhaps you are confused by what just happened. I don’t do favors, Bayati.”

“I am not confused,” Bayati said. Now she looked up with pleading eyes. “The coven seeks this woman. When they find her, there will be blood. People that I care about will die. But if I find her first… if you help me, lives may be saved.”

“I don’t do favors.”

“By all the damned sleeping gods!” Bayati swore. “You think you can just go on hoarding secrets and no one will give a damn? I’ll wager you’re already on someone’s kill list. You need the Thandi as your friends. If you do this for me, if you help bring this woman to heel, the coven… I… will not forget it.”

Whisper pursed her lips in thought. Bayati knew this foreign woman she spoke of well, perhaps even cared for her. “This herb-witch… she is what you’ve been doing for the past two years, isn’t she?”

Bayati swore under her breath. “Will you find her, yes or no?”

Whisper sighed. She heard the children shouting, playing below. She had people to protect as well.

Certainly there was more to this than Bayati would say. She was a soldier, in her own way. She would do nothing she believed disloyal to the coven. A foreign power wanted to treat with the Thandi, who themselves sought out another foreigner. The coven was always plotting, but perhaps now they were plotting something bigger than usual. Perhaps there were bigger secrets here than usual.

“What is her name?” Whisper asked.

Bayati stood up. She tied her dress closed, and told Whisper the name.

Later, when Bayati was gone, Whisper gazed down on the street, where colorfully dressed kitchen maids gathered in twos and threes in the shade to eat their midday meal. Miko sidled up next to her.

“You don’t want her followed?” he asked.

It was too dangerous to have Bayati shadowed. One didn’t toy with the Thandi. Whatever it was the coven was hiding would have to be discovered another way.

“Why didn’t you tell me it was Bayati you were bringing up?”

She felt the massive enforcer shrug. “I thought it would be a nice surprise.”

“I hate gods-damned surprises,” Whisper snarled. “You should know that about me, if nothing else. Put her in touch with Ranthaman.”

She’d had two days to shadow Ranthaman, and the results had been interesting. One would have expected a merchant of his stature to spend most of his time in Upper City, rubbing shoulders with all the tightly clenched snoots in the palace. But he and his female friend had spent much of their time in Lower City, outside the walls. Whisper’s drongos had reported that both days Ranthaman’s mysterious companion had journeyed out to the countryside, where she spoke with a group of rough-looking salt traders.

Which is odd.

What did Ranthaman San want with the Thandi? It might have something to do with the coven’s latest plotting. If Whisper were to find out what that was, a more personal approach would be necessary.

Perhaps this was even important enough to pay a visit to Mother.

Still flush with vitality from her encounter with Bayati, Whisper felt she could take on the world.

“Go get Adder,” she said. “We have work to do.”

**

The next morning, Whisper and Adder went to see Mother. The northern part of Morore east of the river and Upper City mesa was rugged and rocky, with more goats than people. It was home to stubborn farmers, and mad priests who worshiped ancestors too obscure for even Whisper to know. Though uncultivated, it was within the city’s ancestral wards. Whisper had spent years within its black-barked woods and golden grass.

Adder walked beside her, as impeccable as always, in an ivory tunic that hung to their knees and slender trousers beneath that. The tunic was cut to their breastbone, revealing smooth, hairless brown skin. A fashionable, wide brimmed sun hat shaded narrow eyes and cheekbones that cut like a knife.

Whisper had known Adder since they were too young, working in Brassbelt brothels. Adder was the only one she would entrust with the location of Mother’s hut.

But now that they had visited Mother, Whisper felt more confused than ever. Why did Mother have to be an oracle?

“I hate gods-damned riddles,” Whisper grumbled, as they cut through the sparse wood, headed back to the city proper.

Adder chuckled. “Think about what Mother said. ‘He that spurned his child shall lose another, fates of kingdoms cross. Forgotten hero now redeemed, ancient eras lost.’ If we’re talking about kingdoms’ fates, who might be losing a child?”

Whisper sighed, exasperated already. “King Yende. But he didn’t spurn a child.”

“Maybe he spurned Kandu.”

Whisper kept an eye open for shadows nearby, but she was confident they were alone amongst the rocky bluffs and boulder-strewn woods where she had played as a child.

“Then he’ll lose another of his children. Or in the past he spurned another of his children and will lose Kandu. Great. And the rest of the riddle is as clear as river mud.”

“It isn’t,” Adder said. “To reject your own child is a crime before the Ancestors. The whole prophecy sounds like justice is coming for some wrong of the past.”

“Humans and their Ancestors,” Whisper scoffed. “Why can’t we all just move on?”

The stench told Whisper they were nearing two large tanneries that occupied the edge of the woods, where animal skins soaked in vats of filth to be turned into leather.

“We’ll figure it out,” Adder insisted.

“It does suggest that something big is on the horizon.”

“Does it make you wish we were back at the Seedy Melon? Blissfully ignorant of forgotten heroes and ancient eras?” the enforcer asked.

Whisper’s mouth curled into a grin. “You and I were the best whores ever. But no, I’d rather be ruling the Court of Secrets.”

The two passed between the walls of the tanneries, sandals crunching on the rugged path. Soon they were at the crowded Brassbelt, standing under the tarnished statue of Tazukwa, a Yamwali hero of Chide from before the Impi War. They passed an old storyteller under the trees, trading away his secrets for the price of a beer. They cut across the road and north on one of the streets that led to the huge farms south of the city.

‘I was not a good whore,” Adder admitted. “A good whore has to be able to put up with bad sex, and worse. I would never go back.”

If Whisper had struggled as a half-demon in a human city, Adder had had it worse, as an assigned male who sometimes identified as female. Men who traveled the Brassbelt could be cruel. Whisper and Adder had bonded over their need for secrecy, and their will to survive.

“Then it is decided,” Whisper said. “We’re not going back to whoring. Instead we’ll grab prophecy by its balls, and see what shakes loose.”

They squeezed through a shoulder-to-shoulder market for furs and leathers and continued south. Whisper had informants who worked as farmhands. They should certainly know about any unusual new salt traders in the area. After that, she would visit Chupo. He was always happy to see her.

**

Whisper crouched in Chupo’s hovel. There was hardly enough room in the dim shanty for one person, let alone two. Worse, it smelled like the charcoal Chupo spent his days hauling around town, from Casting Guild furnaces to the ovens of farmers’ wives. Not that charcoal was a foul smell. It reminded Whisper of Mother. Chupo’s own odor was much stronger, and it was mixed with the qat leaf he also liked to smoke.

One could learn so much by venturing out and talking to people like Chupo, who knew the denizens of their part of the city better than kin. Most of that knowledge might seem useless to others. But to a hoarder of secrets like Whisper, every tidbit of information had value. What Chupo had observed about the mysterious salt traders seemed quite precious.

“Definitely an eyeball crew,” Chupo said. “I mean, most farmers just go to the Brassbelt to buy their salt. These traders are selling a little salt, sure…” he fingered the fringe of a beard on his chin, “but they’re more interested in keeping an eye on someone.”

Whisper suspected the same. She and Adder had walked by the stall the salt traders had set up in a dusty plaza on the southern edge of Morore. The men moved more like soldiers than traders, and their dialect sounded as if they hadn’t been long in the Kingdoms. The area they’d occupied was an open plaza for nearby farmers.

“You think they’re planning a heist?” she asked. “Who are they keeping an eye on, out there on the ass-end of the city?”

Chupo eyed Whisper’s slender legs, folded under her dress. He seemed to not have heard her question.

“Concentrate, Chupo. Who are they watching?”

His gaze slid up to meet hers. His eyes refocused. “My guess is it’s a group they’re after. There’s at least eight of them, which seems like way too large an eyeball crew for one or even two targets. A few of them tending the stall, a few of them asleep in their hut, and the others out trailing targets.”

“It’s the targets that I’m interested in.”

“I think I’ve seen two of them. But only because… I mean, you couldn’t miss these two.” He leered at her.

Whisper sighed. “Come on, man. I pay you by the month, not by the word.”

“Well, one was an albino woman. All covered up against the sun. The other… I mean, she wasn’t covered at all, if you know what I mean.”

Whisper nodded, hiding her little burst of delight. “Did the second one carry a staff?”

“Yeah. Taller than me.”

“And what did these women do?”

“I mean, that’s the weird bit. They just went to the Brassbelt and plopped down in front of Kapa the storyteller. The pale woman was like a little girl with a piece of honeycomb, as excited as she was to hear Kapa drone on. You know how he is.”

“Excellent, Chupo. Forget the salt traders. I want you to find those women for me.” She got up to leave, even though she still had to stoop under the grass ceiling. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

Chupo leaned forward. “About that pay by month-”

As if she carried coin on her, or much of anything else besides a thin dress. Whisper waved him off. “Talk to Miko. Tell him I said to increase it this month.”

“But-”

Whisper slapped aside the flap of the hovel and ducked outside, into fresh air and sunlight.

Adder leaned against a low brick wall next to Chupo’s handcarts, waiting. The enforcer looked bored. At a glance from Whisper, they joined her. She put on her own wicker hat and the two walked down the alley, past other hovels and towards the road.

“That took long enough,” Adder said. “I was beginning to wonder if you were in there sucking his popo.”

“I’m not that desperate,” Whisper muttered. “Not today, anyway.”

Adder snorted. “I’ve never known anyone with an appetite like yours. Even among the whores. Especially among the whores.”

So it appeared that Ranthaman San was eyeballing the same foreign woman the Thandi were looking for. That meant that the Thandi would have this Zhura as soon as Whisper arranged the meeting with San.

Whoever this woman was, something momentous was brewing. Threads converging, like the river and the road coming together. Whisper could feel it. She needed to know more.

Miko will have to delay that meeting.

They emerged onto the road. It was broad and dusty, lined with thorn acacias and the brick-walled compounds of crafters and merchants, woodworkers, tailors, and oilpressers. Herb-witches to birth babies and priests to name them. Markets to trade vegetables and chickens. This was one of the streets that farmers walked, from the countryside into the central part of the city, and north to the Brassbelt, where everything in the world could be bought or sold.

The road was sparsely trafficked now. It was late enough in the day that laborers like Chupo were headed home, and families gathered for evening meals.

This was good, because she and Adder could speak freely.

“You may think your outlaw days are behind you,” Adder said softly, “but the people who work for you are still thugs and thieves.”

Their mood seemed to have changed. “What are you saying?”

Adder stopped and turned to her. “You trust too much.”

As she frowned at Adder, she spotted someone lingering in the street, beyond the enforcer. She probably should have noticed before, but the mystery they were trying to unravel had distracted her.

“We have a shadow,” she realized.

Adder nodded. “It took you long enough to notice. Who would be shadowing us?”

Whisper began walking again, and Adder did the same. “No one else knew we were out here… except Miko.”

“Ah.”

“Can I trust you, Adder?”

They looked at her sidelong, lips curling into half a smile. Adder’s gaze dropped to the juncture of her thighs. “You know you have nothing I want,” they quipped. “Besides your friendship.”

“You’re right. I shouldn’t have to ask,” she said. “Listen. I’m guessing whoever is shadowing us will stick with me. Go on home. Keep an eye on Miko until I get back.”

“Are you sure you don’t need me here? Are you even armed?”

Whisper grinned. “You wouldn’t believe the bush-butter sap I had yesterday morning. Right now I could beat most men with my bare hands, and outrun all of them. There’s just one shadow. I can handle it.”

Adder snorted, but the humor had drained from their eyes, leaving only dark intensity of concern. “I’ll see you soon, Whisper.”

Whisper nodded, and watched her friend continue on towards the Brassbelt Road and the mesa beyond. As she guessed, the shadow didn’t follow Adder. It still lingered behind, just at the corner of Whisper’s vision. Without looking directly, she couldn’t make out gender. Just a loose wrap over pants, and a face shaded by the brim of a knob-topped hat.

Whoever it was, they weren’t very skilled. Whisper was embarrassed that she hadn’t noticed them earlier.

Well, she would find out who it was. The sun was just above the horizon. It would be dusk soon.

Whisper browsed some of the printed fabric still on display outside a tailor’s wall, noting her surroundings. Zam the moneylender’s compound was right across the street. Beyond it were dozens of squat granaries. They stood about four paces high, twice the height of a man. That labyrinth would be an ideal place to lose a shadow – or confront one.

The granaries were a custom that began during the Impi War. The wealthy, living behind their walls atop mesas, had been petrified that they would starve if the city was besieged or if part of the Brassbelt fell into enemy hands. So they built hundreds of granaries around the city, filled with jars of millet and sorghum flour. Moneylenders often managed the storehouses, buying and selling shares of them, trading the food for coin.

After the war, even common folk bought into the granaries. A farmer might buy two jars in a granary, and sell one when there was a drought, or he needed quick coin. They served as counting-houses for honest folk; a way to save a bit of coin against hard times.

Whisper nodded at the tailor and crossed the road. She passed through the alley beside the moneylender’s, and vaulted over a low wall. The granaries were built of mud brick, round and topped with dome-shaped roofs of grass or clay tile. Each structure was built atop a platform to discourage rodents, allowing a hands-width of space between its floor and the ground beneath.

Whisper grinned to herself as she saw her shadow enter the alley, and she slipped amongst the spool-shaped storehouses. She decided to put some distance between her and her pursuer and then loop around to confront them. Swiftly, she trotted down the aisle of granaries. Just ahead, the sun dipped beneath the horizon. Whisper turned down a row to her left, and stopped.

Just a few granaries ahead, a woman blocked the path. Her hair was bound up in a headwrap, her arms and shoulders bared by a plain wrapped dress. Whisper’s attention focused on two details, however: Tiny ritual scars that darkened the flesh on her neck and shoulders, spotting her like a leopard. And the kirri she held at her side – a long, slender club topped by a knob of heavy wood that looked like a nasty bit of work.

“I don’t want to mess up that pretty whore head,” the Thandi woman said. “Be kind to yourself and come nicely.”

Whisper rolled her eyes. She glanced back the way she’d come. Her shadow was there, taking off the hat to reveal a woman’s face and tumble of dark braids. Behind Whisper, a third Thandi stepped out of the shadows.

Whisper darted in the one direction that remained, back towards the west. She didn’t like this. She was being forced into a trap. As the thought crossed her mind, she saw something, not ten paces ahead, that made her gasp.

It was a head taller than her and broad, though the thick muscle and ruff of fur on the back of its neck gave it a hunched appearance. It wore pieces of leather armor on a powerful humanoid body. A mask of hide barely concealed its hyenoid face. A bajari.

A demon.

Of course there were clandestine demons in the city, like Mother. But the hyena-like bajari were anything but clandestine. They were brutes. Whisper might be able to stand up to one or two Thandi, but this…

Without a second thought, Whisper sprang up, fingers hooking on rough ledges between the bricks on the granary beside her. She kicked off her sandals, finding purchase with her toes. In two breaths, she climbed atop the thatched roof. Her hat slipped off. Her black tresses spilled free. She vaulted over the pathway to the next granary, and then to another.

A woman climbed up to the roof ahead of her. Whisper didn’t stop. She leapt to the same bit of thatch and clung. Her adversary was stocky, full lips twisted into a sneer and a curve of scars adorning her collarbone like a choker. Whisper ducked under the swing of the kirri club and shoved the other woman off the roof.

She saw movement on the ground below. It was getting difficult to see in the shaded passages between the storehouses. As she jumped to the next granary, something clipped her foot. She landed off-balance on the clay tiles, knocking some loose and scrabbling for a grip. Unable to cling, she slid off the roof’s far side, dress rucking up around her thighs. She landed on the balls of her feet. Keeping to the shadows, she scooted around another granary. Whisper crouched there, listening, back up against the rough brick.

Nine hells. How many of them are there?

In the shadows, it was difficult to tell where they were. She was like a fish in a net that was tightening around her.

“Whisper,” said a voice like gravel. It was the bajari, only a couple of granaries away. “I am Bouda. Bayati has told me so much about you. You and I will have fun together.”

Whisper slunk away from the voice, slipping around another granary. Hiding would not work for long. The bajari would be able to track her scent. She heard the voices of the Scarred Women now, calling to one another, as they tightened the cordon.

Godsdamned Bayati. Whisper remembered Adder’s advice. Miko and Adder were the only ones who knew she was out here, the only ones who could have helped spring this trap.

“I will finally put that hungry mouth of yours to good use,” the bajari taunted, drawing closer. “And that yoni of yours to an even better use.”

Suddenly Whisper realized why Bayati’s flavor had been so familiar that previous morning. It was because of the man the Thandi agent had recently rutted.

Miko. You backstabbing pile of dung…

“But I don’t much care for the name Whisper,” Bouda went on. The demon was nearing the granary corner now, claws scraping along the brick wall. “I think Whimper suits a breeding slave better.”

Whisper’s hand groped beneath and behind her, into the crevice underneath the granary. She had a talent for getting in and out of tight spaces.

If Miko had betrayed her, the Thandi wouldn’t have had to shadow her all day. They could comb every part of the city she had gone to for her secrets.

They could find Mother.

Trembling fingers felt through the thin linen of her dress to the serpent-shaped stud that pierced her left nipple. The huff of the bajari‘s breath was just a few steps away.

Miko. The gods-damned Thandi. All of them. They are going to pay.

Biting back fear and anger, Whisper uttered a single word. Her dress crumpled, to the ground, empty.

She slithered into the darkened crevice under the granary.

Chapter 1

Zhura lay on her belly, basking in the warmth of the evening sun and Keya’s soft strokes upon the curve of her back.

“So the last king of Chide from Malindi Clan was Queen Yamou’s great great granduncle. And since Yamou married your father, his heir will be her son,” Keya said. Her excitement was as plain as it was incomprehensible. “This is all so fascinating! And fortunate for you.”

Zhura closed her eyes. She was pleasantly full from the supper Lila had prepared, a stew with greens and okra. Though this wasn’t the Sung Valley, some of Zhura’s home foods were common here. She had missed okra, the way it jelled in the mouth and lent its silkiness to a stew.

The hibiscus oil Keya massaged into Zhura’s skin had a fragrance both subtle and intoxicating. With Keya’s help, the herb-witch had re-braided her own hair, and the plaits still held their freshly oiled scent.

“Of course,” Zhura said, dragging her mind back to the conversation. “Fascinating.”

“Nubic right of succession is matrilineal. But women do not rule.”

“Yes, that is very fortunate.”

“Don’t you see? You were worried that your father’s wife might see you as a threat to her children. But by law, you have no birthright at all. Yende’s by-blows, though he is king, have no claim to the throne. So you need not fear.”

Zhura scoffed. “By-blows?”

She twisted around. Keya lifted herself so that the herb-witch could roll onto her back and face her lover. Then Keya eased down again, straddling Zhura.

Unlike Zhura, who’d doffed her brief skirt and halter, the priestess was mostly covered, with a brown and cream wrap that hung over her shoulders and upper legs, and a raffia straw hat that shaded her pallid skin. Unbound golden braids had grown down past her shoulders. The woman seemed to enjoy constantly brushing the locks away from her face.

They lay upon mats under a shelter of grass thatch upheld by a frame of cut boughs. Lila had prettied the shelters up with a border of rocks for seating, fresh sprigs of lemon bush and mint leaves to keep ants and mosquitoes away. Ngo, Musa and the former maidservant occupied a neighboring shelter. Both structures were in the center of a vast finger millet field ringed by sparse-looking trees with red seed pods.

The farmer who owned the field provided these shelters for his farmhands. While the field was fallow, he was content to lend it to Zhura and her friends for a copper bit each day and occasional game meat Ngo and Musa brought in. As a result, the five companions enjoyed privacy, access to a well, and the protection of the city’s ancestral wards.

In the week since they’d arrived in the city where her father was king, Zhura had accompanied Keya to the Brassbelt to listen to more roadside storytellers than Zhura could remember. The priestess seemed to have a limitless appetite for the lore of this place. If they didn’t spend all their coin buying millet beer for gossipy old tale-weavers, they certainly would lose it replacing the very rare vellum and ink Keya scrawled notes upon.

“Do I really need to meet my father at all?” Zhura asked. “Even if there is no danger from the queen, the Thandi are here. Every time we go into the city, we risk you being identified.” She reached up, her hands slipping under Keya’s wrap and caressing her belly. “We have a sixth person to keep safe now.”

In fact, the last six weeks had been something close to idyllic, especially since the rains had stopped. They’d followed the Brassbelt Road through the Nubic Kingdoms of Samucha and Chide, earning coin by hunting and foraging for herbs. In Samucha, they’d been treated like local heroes for tracking and capturing a gang of bandits that had been extorting farmers.

Pregnant women Zhura had treated back in her home village of Boma had looked upon the fostered herb-witch with pity, contempt or suspicion. How different it was to care for a lover, especially one as affectionate as Keya. The priestess seemed healthy after her first two months of pregnancy. She reacted well to herbs, rubdowns, and frequent rutting.

Ngo, Musa and Lila had also become fast friends. The men had an instant respect for one another. Lila, who had already been rutting Musa when they’d met in the border town of Binga, had wasted no time seducing Ngo. She’d basked in the attentions of two men. The little maid’s muffled cries of pleasure were frequent background noise in their camp.

For a time, Zhura had been able to forget her fears about what would happen when they arrived in Morore. Now that time had come to an end.

“I was a selfish fool to even come here,” Zhura said. “We could have stayed in Kitu. There were good people there.”

“There is nothing more sacred than to know your Ancestors, Zhura. To know where you came from, and why.”

“What if I was just a ‘by-blow’?” It pained her to even give shape to the words. “What if the ‘why’ was just a casual rut for Anathe and Yende?”

“I can tell you stories about your mother. But Yende fathered you, and he knew her. Why did she leave you to him, if it was just casual? Why did Yende give you to such a good man to raise if he didn’t care? Meaning brought you into this world, Zhura. Don’t walk away from it when you’ve come so far.”

Zhura sniffed, feeling tears well up. She couldn’t have shared this with anyone but the priestess. “Thank you,” she whispered.

Keya pursed her lips in thought. “You’re right, though. We shouldn’t risk me being seen along the Brassbelt anymore. What we need is a plan for you to reach King Yende. Discreetly.”

Ngo suggested Zhura simply go to the palace and request an audience with the king. He said there was once a thriving group of Sung warriors for hire in the kingdom. Like Zhura’s father, and Ngo himself, they’d ventured south from the forest, seeking their fortunes. A few elders still got drunk in the boarder and chophouses along the Brassbelt, and they swore Yende was an honest man.

If it weren’t for the Thandi, Zhura might have gone to the palace alone. But she was loathe to leave the others without her protection. Keya couldn’t blend in if her life depended upon it. Because of Bayati’s treachery, the Thandi knew that finding Keya would lead them to Zhura. And yet, if Keya went to the palace, she would surely be identified as an Ikanjan fugitive.

The priestess ran her oiled fingers up Zhura’s side, stroking the herb-witch’s bare skin. They brushed over Zhura’s nipples, along her collarbone and neck. Keya pushed the brim of her hat up. She bent to kiss her lover, gently, on the eyelids.

“We will need every ally we can get,” she said.

Zhura suppressed a sigh. “You mean Blossom.”

Keya sat up again. She grabbed Zhura’s hands and guided them up under the wrap, eyes twinkling with mischievous heat. “I mean Blossom.”

They did have consecrated wards now, each of them. Keya had blessed bangles of brass for herself and the others as they traveled through the Nubic Kingdoms. They were all safe from direct harm by Blossom, or most any other demon.

The priestess’s breasts felt fuller and heavier than they had weeks ago. Her nipples had already stiffened. She moaned as Zhura tweaked the little nubs.

“Only if the others agree,” the herb-witch said.

Keya closed her eyes, nodding slightly as Zhura caressed her under the wrap.

“Come,” Zhura said, somewhat reluctantly. “Let’s ask them.”

They stood and ducked out of the shelter. The other shelter was only a few paces away.

Musa squatted, naked, outside of it, rubbing himself down with shea butter. The grass under the wiry hunter was still wet from his recent bathing.

Ngo lay atop Lila under the roof of the shelter. Their lips were locked together, her feet curling up over his hips and butt as they gently rutted.

“It looks as if you’ve been left out,” Zhura said to Musa. At a nod from him, she bent to help the hunter, scooping some of the shea butter from the jar and rubbing a thin layer on his back. She drank in the clean, nutty scent of him.

He shrugged, taut muscles rippling along his shoulder blades. “They’ve been playing their guessing game again. He won.”

Lila was intensely curious. Zhura had overheard her peppering the men with questions about their backgrounds. Musa wasn’t the wagering type though, and he rarely shared.

Keya eyed the entwined couple with interest. “What happens when Lila wins?”

“Usually the same thing, Lady,” said Musa.

Keya giggled. At the sound of her laughter, the two stopped nuzzling each other and looked up.

“We invite Musa,” Lila pouted. “But he believes I can only handle one at a time.”

Keya raised a pointed finger. “I happen to know that is untrue.”

Ngo pecked the former maidservant on the lips. He lifted his sleek, dark body off of her. “I know this look,” he said. “Zhura wishes a group talk.”

“I don’t want to interrupt,” Zhura said. She could have spent much more time rubbing Musa down, though he didn’t need it.

“Maybe we can join them later,” Keya whispered to her lover, not very quietly. She cleared her throat. “It’s about Blossom.”

They all sat around the edge of the shelter. The sun dipped below the horizon. Other than Keya, none of them wore more than a loincloth and their bangles.

“If we ask a favor from the demon, xhe will demand something in return,” said Lila, with an expression that seemed hopeful.

“What is to stop Blossom from simply running away?” Ngo asked.

“I have xhis summoning stone,” said the priestess. “Xhe cannot escape the city wards without the stone. Xhe also greatly fears the Thandi. Blossom will not want to remain alone in Morore, where the coven is strong. Xhe needs us.”

“So we enlist Blossom’s aid while I go to the palace,” Zhura said. “The demon helps protect all of you.”

Zhura would have preferred that they kept a watch at all times, but they had grown lax on the farmer’s land, where there were only rarely wild animals and no passersby. With her gone, they would need Blossom’s help as a sentry. “In exchange, we offer to release the demon? With its stone? How do we know it won’t enslave the locals?”

“I have a plan that might prevent that,” said Keya.

“I would breed with Blossom,” Lila offered. “To sweeten the pot.”

“That’s not the plan,” Keya said.

Ngo glanced at the maid with keen interest. “Do we all get to watch? Or perhaps participate?”

“The plan is not to offer Lila as a breeder!” Keya insisted.

“Summon the beast,” Musa said, gruffly. “There is no threat to us to negotiate. If Blossom does not agree to your plan, then banish xhim.”

“I agree,” said Zhura. “But understand that this demon can be extremely seductive, even without touching you physically. If you swallow enough of its seed or its nectar, Blossom will enslave you. Keep your water gourds close to you.”

Keya looked at each of them in turn, until they signaled their assent. Then she went back to the other shelter to retrieve the summoning stone from her satchel.

Ngo, still naked and seated next to an equally naked Lila, turned to her. “Would you really rut Blossom in front of us?”

“Would that excite you?” she teased. “To see the demon pump me full of xhis seed?” Her hand slipped into Ngo’s lap. She whispered in his ear.

Zhura scoffed. “Ngo, you would rut Blossom in front of us. You are the only one of us who has never been close to the demon.”

Musa nodded his agreement. “The creature’s scent is intoxicating, and xhe considers all humans to be thralls.”

Keya returned, with the polished wooden phallus in hand. Carven vines twisted around the shaft like thick veins on a popo. She sat down next to Musa, placing him between her and Zhura.

Across the little circle, Lila swung around so that she was on all fours, her hands propped on Ngo’s thighs. She murmured to him, her words too low to be heard. But he grinned, and the effect on his already glistening cock was obvious. Lila dipped her head, continuing to tease him. She wagged her pert little ass at the others. The lips of her yoni were still dark and swollen.

“That looks like another invitation,” Keya observed.

Lila turned her head. “I want to be filled from both ends,” she moaned.

Musa shifted uncomfortably. His cock was beginning to swell, an umber serpent waking from its sleep.

Zhura whispered in his ear. “I can say from experience that there is nothing quite like being rutted by a man while you take another in your mouth. Knowing that you are the center of two men’s attention. Being filled and pleasured while you please others. It would be a great gift to grant her wish.”

Musa rubbed his sparse beard. He stood up and approached Lila. He caressed her slick seam with his fingers. Then he bent to lick her, his nose in the cleft of her wiggling ass.

“Ah. That’s a good man,” Zhura observed.

Keya scooted closer to her lover. She set the summoning stone on the mats. “Now I feel left out,” she complained.

“You are such a trouble-maker,” scolded Zhura. She gestured at the lustful scene before them. “Does this happen everywhere you go?”

Keya gaped. “Me? What did I do?”

Zhura seized the priestess, and tossed her hat away. “I don’t know, but I love you for it.” She drew Keya into a tender kiss. The priestess still tasted of grassy, slightly sweet lemon bush tea. Their tongues entwined as they listened to the soft moans of the others.

“Make me come, princess,” Zhura whispered.

Keya nodded eagerly. She slid down, between Zhura’s breasts, down her belly. She burrowed her nose into the damp fabric of Zhura’s loincloth.

Musa kneeled behind Lila. He guided his stiff length into her from behind. She moaned in response as he found his mark. The hunter placed his hands on her waist, holding her steady against his slow thrusts. Lila gasped, but Ngo held her head down, a hand in her spiky, short hair.

Zhura tossed her head back as Keya tugged her loincloth down her hips and off. The priestess was such a pleaser. Zhura remembered the first time they had been together, when they had been possessed by the Ancestors Mama Nyah and Papa Yaz. Zhura had rutted Keya until the priestess couldn’t stand up straight, yet she still went down on Zhura like a starving woman. If Zhura hadn’t brought Keya out of her frenzy, they might never have escaped that haunted hill.

Zhura held Keya’s head against her yoni, sliding down so that she could lay flat on the mats. The priestess played Zhura’s little organ like an instrument. Licking up and down her slit, teasing the nether lips. Spreading Zhura open with fingers to delve hungrily inside. Spearing Zhura’s weeping channel with her tongue. Nibbling once more on her little pearl, until Zhura felt on the verge of an orgasm. Then Keya eased off, so she could take Zhura down that blissful path all over again.

Lila’s muffled wails continued. Zhura could hear just how wet she was, as Musa plunged into her, as flesh slapped together. The sweet sounds abated, and Zhura was dimly aware of the men switching positions. Ngo took his place behind Lila. Musa sighed with pleasure as the maid eagerly took him into her mouth.

Keya finally took mercy on Zhura, licking her to an orgasm that was prolonged by deft jabs of the priestess’s tongue. Zhura clutched her lover’s braids, riding out the convulsions of her climax.

Once she recovered, she scooted back, knowing that if she didn’t Keya would have kept the sweet torture going. “Why in hells are you still wearing that?” Zhura pulled the wrap over the priestess’s head and off.

The herb-witch could see that Ngo was trembling, more erratic in his thrusts, gasping each time he slammed into Lila’s eager yoni. Zhura slid a hand along the top of his firm ass cheeks. She leaned her head against his rocking hip.

“Feed me,” she urged. Her fingers ran down the crack of his ass, until they grazed his roiling balls and her thumb teased his pucker.

Ngo cried out. He pulled out of Lila with a wet sucking sound, and plunged his cock into Zhura’s open mouth. An instant later, her palate flooded with his hot seed. She continued to fondle him as he pulsed into her mouth. She gulped it down and then sucked out a few drops more, savoring his and Lila’s pungent saltiness.

Zhura held Ngo there, jerking in her grasp, until he was spent. As he sprawled on the mat, she saw that Keya had joined her former maid on all fours, sucking off Musa. The hunter, eyes shut, groaned with pleasure.

While the two women played with his bobbing cock, Zhura pressed a finger to her lover’s slit. The priestess was damp, but not near wet enough. Zhura licked a finger, her saliva still thick with Ngo’s seed. Then she reached under and began to diddle Keya’s little pearl.

Keya moaned as she sucked Musa’s balls. Soon her yoni was drooling nicely. Zhura pushed two wet fingers into Keya’s cleft, finding her inner spot. The priestess began to groan. Zhura rubbed. She rubbed faster and faster, until her hand was a blur in the flickering firelight. As Keya neared her climax, Zhura’s fingertips tapped on the little bundle of nerves in the priestess’s core. Keya gasped. Her juices spurted out over the mat and Zhura’s hand.

Zhura licked her hand and Keya’s thighs clean, feeling a rush of new strength. She heard the hunter cry out in his native Kut tongue. When Zhura finished between Keya’s thighs, the priestess turned around. A streak of white seed adorned her forehead. Zhura held her lover and licked that off too.

Sated, Zhura and Keya sat down together. The priestess nodded her permission as Ngo picked up the summoning stone. Lila turned over on her back, her head between Musa’s feet. Zhura regarded at each of them, four people she had come to love, and felt bound to protect as best she could.

“No,” she said. “Not yet.”

They all looked at her.

Something inside Zhura told her to wait. To savor this moment with trusted companions, flush with the feeling of arcane power. A test was coming, but later. For now, she only wanted to be with her friends.

“Not yet, Ngo. We can summon Blossom tomorrow.”

“But I wanted to come again,” Lila pouted.

Zhura gazed hungrily at the little maid’s gaping wet slit.

“Then allow me,” she said. Zhura slid away from Keya and between Lila’s spreading thighs.

**

The next day, Zhura and Keya stayed in camp, washing mats and clothing, while the men ventured beyond the ancestral wards, out into the southern hills. Their hunting was the group’s only steady source of coin. Lila walked to a nearby market to trade roots and herbs for millet dough and a bit of salt for the evening meal. Apparently, the maid had discovered a group of salt traders who understood Ikanjan, and she enjoyed flirting with them.

Brimming with vigor from the night before, Zhura bent over her own work, scrubbing clothing over a washboard and a pot of water. Even on their adventures, life had the same rhythms as it had back in the village of Boma.

She still agonized over her reluctance to summon Blossom. Once the group had help from Blossom, she could leave them. She could go to the palace on her own. Even if it took days to see her father, the others would be relatively safe.

She could only hope that she wouldn’t be thrown into a cell as a fraud claiming royal blood.

“My Lady!” Lila cried. The distraught woman rushed along the path towards them, basket clutched atop her head. “My Lady!”

“What is it?” Keya said.

Zhura set down her washboard. She picked up her staff, and stepped out towards Lila. The maid, in tears, fled past Zhura. Beyond, the herb-witch saw two people approaching, walking casually through the field.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s… it’s…” Lila stuttered, dropping her basket.

“Ranthaman San,” Zhura said in shock, recognizing one of the pair. She heard Keya’s gasp.

“…it’s Jinai.” Lila finished. “You must hide, Lady Keya.”

“I think it is too late for that,” Keya said.

The priestess came slowly to stand by Zhura’s side. The herb-witch scanned their surroundings, wary of an ambush. She saw no sign of anyone else, other than farmhands planting in the distant fields.

Ranthaman wore his curved sword at his hip. Keya’s former lover appeared unarmed, but Keya had told Zhura enough to know that Jinai was dangerous. She was tall, angular and dark, hair tied into a small topknot, with waves of kinky hair flowing to the sides of her scalp.

So this is Jinai.

“Zhura,” Ranthaman beamed. He was as flawlessly dressed and groomed as always. Like Jinai, he wore the fluid, light robes of the Ikanjan people. “I had not expected to meet you in Morore.” His gaze slid to Keya. “My Lady, you are said to have died back in Namu. It seems the Ancestors have doubly blessed us.”

“So it seems.”

Ranthaman was the only one smiling. Jinai’s burning stare lingered on Keya, and then turned to a frank appraisal of Zhura.

The merchant showed his open hands. “May we talk?”

Zhura glanced at Keya. They both nodded.

“Whatever you flee from in Namu, it is not my concern. I believe you to be an honorable woman, Zhura. I owe you my life. And I am aware that certain members of my House can be… single-minded,” he said.

“Then what brings you here?” asked Zhura.

“Jinai, newly retained by House San, recognized Lady Keya on the Brassbelt a few days ago,” he replied.

“That seems unlikely,” Keya said, quietly.

“You are quite recognizable, my Lady,” Ranthaman said.

“Only to a few, without my mask. Jinai would not have been on the Brassbelt if she was not looking for me.”

“I knew you didn’t die on Silmani Point,” Jinai said. “I didn’t come here to find that out.”

“She speaks the truth. I have not hired Jinai simply to track down her former employer.”

“Then what brings you here?” asked Zhura, again.

“Gratitude,” said Ranthaman. He regarded their crude camp. “I have a comfortable home in the Upper City. I have contacts among the traders and nobles here. I offer help to a friend.”

“Your offer is a gracious one,” Zhura said. “We will discuss it with our companions when they return. Where can we reach you?”

“I run a boarder house on the Brassbelt to hire caravaners. It is called the Blue Buffalo, just across from the statue of King Yende. You may ask for me there. We will share marula wine, like the Nubic people do, and speak of our travels.”

He bowed his head slightly to leave. But Jinai remained still, focused on Keya.

“Did you find the adventure you craved?” Jinai asked.

Keya, uncharacteristically silent, only nodded.

“Are you happy?”

“I am,” Keya said. “I …am sorry for what I said to you, in front of my brother. I was horribly unfair to you.”

The merchant had turned away to afford the pair privacy. Zhura found that she could not.

“You did what you had to, in order to escape,” said Jinai.

“Just so.”

“And you are free of the demon?” Jinai asked, eyeing Zhura, and the bangles at their wrists.

“I am.”

“Take care of yourself, Keya. There are great challenges ahead.”

Keya’s eyes narrowed, though they shone with emotion. “Thank you, Jinai. For more than I can say,” Keya whispered. A tear rolled down her cheek.

The priestess raised her voice, loud enough for Ranthaman to hear. “Barasa wants summoning stones. The only working stones he knows of are Blossom’s and those the Thandi have. Since both could be found in Morore… that’s the real reason you are here.”

Ranthaman smiled. “Barasa does not rule House San,” he said. “And I have been trading here in Morore for many years.” He beckoned to Jinai, and they walked away.

Zhura frowned, wondering what she had just seen. What was Ranthaman hiding? And was Jinai trying to give Keya a warning?

She looked to Keya. But the priestess, sobbing, turned away.

In the evening, when the men returned from hunting and trading a carcass for vegetables, the five companions gathered again.

“I am sorry, Lady Keya. I should not have let Jinai see me,” Lila said, not for the first time.

“I don’t think it was you she saw first, Lila.” Keya said. “I think they already knew we were here.”

“Ranthaman is clearly hiding something,” Ngo said. “Even if Jinai saw you along the Brassbelt, did they trail you out here to the edge of Morore without us knowing?”

“What does Ranthaman gain by hiring her?” Zhura asked. She stared at the coals of their fire, watching sparks rise against the rosy twilit sky.

“I am sure that it was Jinai who convinced Barasa that I was still alive. Whether Ranthaman admits it or not, she is here because they want something from me. From us.”

“Our problems seem to be stacking, one atop the other,” Zhura grumbled.

“We should all go to the palace with you,” Keya said. “We must stay together now.”

“What about you?”

“Ranthaman already knows I am here. The secret is out. If, as he says, he is uninterested in dragging me back to face charges of witchcraft, why would King Yende hold me?”

Zhura looked to each of the others. Each one nodded in turn.

Keya smiled, placing a hand on Zhura’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about me. A palace is my natural habitat.”

At this hour, the gates to the palace and the Upper City would be closed. “It is settled then. Tonight we keep a watch, and tomorrow we go to see my father,” Zhura said. “All of us.”

Chapter 2

At bright dawn, the five companions ventured up the main road, north towards the Brassbelt that ran through the kingdom from east to west, and the Upper City that loomed it all. Morore had awakened to a new day, with women carrying water atop their heads, men hauling goods to market, and shopkeepers opening their gates for business.

Everything the companions owned, they brought with them. Zhura, Lila and Ngo carried large baskets – Ngo’s strapped to his back. Keya was swathed in layers of wraps and a hat that covered all but her face and hands. She chatted with Ngo and Lila, eager to share all of the lore she’d learned in the company of storytellers.

“Namu is a much larger city, but haphazard in the way it is built. Whoever planned Morore was very wise. Except for the parts in the north that are barren and rocky, it is shaped like a wheel, with these main streets as the spokes, leading from the mesa in the center to the fertile farmland on the edges. The Brassbelt and the river converge at the heart of the city. Zhura, this is the same river that runs by your home village of Boma, but here it is called the Big Mongoose…”

Zhura nodded absently, noting that only she and Musa seemed to care about possible threats. She felt as if she’d never been in a city so large before, though of course she had. At any moment, the herb-witch expected agile Thandi women to leap out of the alleys… or to be surrounded by a host of green-plumed askari from House San. A sea of granaries, each the size and shape of tiny round huts, crowded behind the shops. They seemed a likely place for concealment, and Zhura eyed them carefully as they passed.

“The only drawback to the planning of Morore is that the mesa has no natural water source or space to store food. So the nobles live in perpetual fear of being besieged and cut off from food and water,” Keya went on. “That’s the story behind all the granaries.”

As the street began to fill with more traffic, Zhura’s creeping unease began to subside. Palm oil pressers and moneylenders were already doing a brisk trade, with customers already crowding around their gates. As the companions approached the Brassbelt, the road only became more crowded.

“Those walled-in buildings over there house the furnaces of the Casting Guild,” Keya said, pointing towards the river. “They are the masters of brass-crafting. And plazas like these,” she nodded at the teeming market grounds on either side of the street, “are where they celebrate the Festival of the Bursting Belt… only two months from now, all throughout the Kingdoms.”

Zhura hoped to be gone from the Kingdoms in two months.

At the broad dirt road called the Brassbelt, the companions waited while a caravan of elephants, buffalo and drovers with bead-adorned hair plodded by. Baobabs with painted trunks lined the road. The Upper City soared above, a mountain of umber brick and sandstone red. The squat towers of the clans reached even higher, atop the center of the mesa.

“Malindi is the ruling clan,” Keya went on. “But Vong and Busara clans are also quite powerful. The Vong once ruled the kingdom, when it was part of Chide. Then Yende, called the hero of the Battle of Bandiri Slopes, forged a new kingdom, Morore, out of Chide. Yamwali Clan overthrew the Vong in what remained of Chide. So now, a generation later, it is rumored that the Vong seek to win back everything they lost. Isn’t it all fascinating?”

They followed the Brassbelt for only a few minutes before they reached the ramp that led up the steep cliff of the mesa. The five companions joined a colorful stream of supplicants and laborers that ascended towards the open Road Gate, passing wealthy shoppers and traders coming down.

The ramp’s surface was rough beneath Zhura’s sandals, pebbled as it was with pieces of brick and stone. She guessed that without the cobbling, the incline would be nearly impassable during heavy rains.

Zhura swooned then, as if struck by a wave from the sea. A cry rang out, as clear as the blue sky, from the distant edge of the city.

“Did you hear that?” Zhura regained her balance, but she still felt unsteady. She turned back to Keya.

But Keya wasn’t there. None of Zhura’s friends were there.

**

An army waited on the Brassbelt. The sky over the city was the angry hue of steel.

A column of elephants, armored with face plates and iron trim, stood rumbling along the road, stretching at least two hundred paces to the east. These were not the mild, tamable elephants of the forest, but the giant tuskers of the savanna, their shoulders twice the height of a tall man.

The elephants carried light howdahs on their backs, but no riders. Men and women stood alongside the beasts, hundreds of them, bearing light spears and bows, jugs of water and baskets of food.

Anathe strode up the ramp with her followers, lissome and strong like she was.

Waiting for her at the Road Gate was a throng of Nubic dignitaries and mercenary leaders. The former wore brass jewelry and robes trimmed with gold thread. The latter were the bare-chested, painted men of the northern forests. Even they looked wide-eyed upon Anathe, in her brief skirt and halter, at her long limbs adorned with Thandi scars in sinuous patterns. For she was like nothing they’d never seen.

**

“Are you well?” Keya asked, frowning with concern. She and Ngo held Zhura’s arms. Someone had set her basket on the ground.

“I had a daydream,” Zhura said, dizzily. “I’m all right.”

Their stopping had slowed traffic. Red-plumed guards stared at them from beside the great wooden doors and atop the outer wall.

Recovering, Zhura picked up her basket and set it atop her head again. “Let’s go,” she said.

Inside the city walls, the stream of people thinned, but it continued down a cobbled street so narrow it felt like a tunnel. Blocky buildings crowded, three and four stories high on either side. Zhura was reminded of the tight corridors of the burial mound on the Night of the Forgotten. Even in the densest forest, she’d never felt so confined.

What had she just experienced? Despite what she told Keya, she had never had daydreams before.

She had imagined herself as Anathe. But it hadn’t felt like imagination.

Keya came alongside her. “This is…” the priestess marveled. She clutched her hat, craning her neck to see the heights of the towers.

“…Fascinating?”

“I’ve never seen a place so tightly packed. It’s smaller than Gold City, but thousands of people must live here, piled atop one another,” Keya said.

“To see who can live on the highest hill,” Zhura muttered. “This is just like Namu.”

Keya leaned against her affectionately as they walked. “Perhaps,” she said. “But this is part of your history. You must have been born near here. Perhaps, as an infant, you were carried along this very street.”

The street led to a curtain wall with a bronze double gate. Elephant’s heads were carved into the metal.

“This is the palace gate,” Ngo said.

More red plumed guards waited there, questioning everyone who sought to enter.

“Why are you here?” one of the guards asked Zhura, at the head of their group.

“To see King Yende. I am his kin.”

The guard waved them into an enclosure before another bronze gate. When the gatehouse was full of about twenty applicants, the outer gate was closed and the inner doors opened into the royal palace of Morore.

A large courtyard lay beyond the gatehouse, dominated by a massive, drum-shaped tower on the far end that must have been the central part of the palace. Smaller buildings of red stone surrounded the tower.

More guards ushered the visitors through the courtyard, which was busy with the comings and goings of washerwomen, porters and other laborers. The trumpets of elephants sounded from a high stable along the courtyard wall.

They passed through another gate, to a smaller courtyard along the western wall of the palace. This one was packed with people.

“Wait here,” the guards ordered.

The companions pushed through the crowd to a corner where they could set down their burdens. The enclosure reeked of stale people and fresh animals. Here was a farmer with a wicker crate full of chickens. There was a troupe of entertainers wearing masks like demons. Beyond were two men arguing, ready to come to blows but for their friends holding them apart. Zhura saw priests in red paint, women nursing infants, and noble youths in fine dress. All here to see King Yende, apparently.

Musa squatted in a corner, relaxed, and closed his eyes. Ngo and Lila sat upon the baskets and began to play their guessing game.

“We could be here all day,” Zhura said. And the next day.

Keya nodded. “Someone will come,” she said with unjustified optimism. “What happened to you on the ramp?”

Zhura shook her head in confusion. “I saw Anathe. On that same ramp, leading her elephants, and meeting with the Nubic war leaders.” She paused. “No, I didn’t see her. I was her. For an instant.”

“She speaks to you! You are very close to her now. You risked yourself to come here, to learn more about her. You walk upon the same earth she walked upon. Anathe is more than just your ancestor, Zhura. She is an Ancestor of the city. Morore would not have become what it is without her.”

That made sense. The Ancestors could bless their faithful with visions. A vision of the past, to show Zhura she was on the right path.

She glanced down to see Ngo and Lila nibbling at each other’s lips.

“Who won?” Keya asked them.

“No one yet,” Ngo murmured. “We’re just bored.”

It was nearly an hour before a gray-bearded man in an indigo tunic came through the courtyard, speaking briefly with each group. By that time, it had become even more crowded. Eventually, he arrived in the companions’ corner.

“I am the King’s Speaker.” He eyed them. “What do you want?”

Zhura hesitated, unsure of how much to say.

“Tell him, Zhura,” Keya whispered.

“I am King Yende’s daughter.”

The grizzled man’s mouth twisted sourly. “That is quite the jest. You don’t even look like her.”

“I was born before he was married. Raised by his friend in the Sung Valley.”

The man sighed. “The King is in no mood for fantastic tales, especially regarding his children. The punishment for bearing false witness is hard labor. Be off.”

Zhura was not about to back down now. Not after all of this. “It is the truth. I can prove it.”

“How?”

“I have something King Yende gave to me.”

The Speaker studied her, then her companions. “Wait here,” he said, and continued forging through the crowd.

“As if we were about to do something other than wait here,” Ngo complained.

Another hour must have passed before the guard was back. “Come with me.” As they all jumped up, he showed them the palm of a hand. “No. Just her,” he added. “Leave all weapons behind.”

Keya took her hand. Ngo rubbed her back in support.

“We’ll be waiting,” the priestess said.

The guard shoved a path through the crowd. He led Zhura through an iron gate. Then through a long narrow passageway, a door, and up a broad flight of steps in the interior of one of the palace buildings.

The walls were covered in a smooth russet finish that contained flecks of what appeared to be brass. Zhura and her escort entered a small hall, where people in gaily colored clothing gathered around a shallow pool. The ceiling above the pool had only a brass grating that allowed the midday sun to play upon the walls and shine upon potted palms. Red-smocked servants flitted about with bowls of kola nuts and mango slices, and cups of marula wine.

At the end of that hall was a gleaming double door. Plumed guards opened them, and Zhura was ushered into what she knew was King Yende’s court.

The great hall was dark by comparison with the sunlit waiting room. A ring of lamps around the walls and high on the vaulted ceilings provided the only lighting. But the bright dresses and tunics of the nobles that stood along both sides seemed to glow as well. As in the waiting room, reds, greens and blues were most plentiful. In the center of the court were three thrones of polished wood.

The throne on the left was empty. The throne on the right was occupied by a slight woman with a shrewd gaze, in a brilliant crimson dress that flared at her shoulders and wrists. She could only have been Queen Yamou.

In the center sat Yende, his chin in his hand. He was short and stocky, shaven, with a tunic of copper and violet. A simple brass circlet sat upon his dark brow.

Zhura had seen him just a few hours before. Yende was one of the northern adventurers who greeted Anathe on the ramp to the Road Gate, twenty years ago.

The herb-witch approached the center of the hall, and stood before the thrones. She’d never been close to a king before, and was unsure what to do. Kneel? Call him by a title?

She’d long ago lost any shame about her midriff- and leg-baring garb. But every gaze in this room seemed to undress her. To pick her apart and judge her, piece by piece.

“You claim to be the king’s daughter,” Queen Yamou said.

“I am.”

“Why have you come here now?” asked the queen.

Yende made a dismissive sound. “Let’s see your proof.”

Zhura untied the sanjuskin wrap from around her waist. She held up the darkly iridescent material.

The king’s face betrayed no reaction. “Where did you come upon that?”

“It was given to me by the finest ironsmith in Boma,” Zhura said, swallowing the knot that welled up in her breast. “A man who raised me as his daughter, and who called you friend.”

Yende stared at the tiles on the floor for an uncomfortably long time. He glanced at the queen. “Everyone out,” he ordered. “Court is done this day.”

The nobles immediately began to protest, some loudly. Guards slowly drove everyone from the room, Zhura among them. They poured into the pool chamber.

“It would appear that you are the king’s eldest,” a deep voice behind her said.

Zhura turned to see a barrel-chested man, fat and powerful. Dark curly hair poked from the vee of his blue silken tunic. His hair was shaven along the sides of his head, with just a puff of kinky, brown-capped hair atop his head to match his beard and sideburns. His forearms gleamed with brass rings. Even in the press of the crowd, his scent was distinct, a mellow hibiscus with a salty bite.

He smiled. “Perhaps you will be less of a disappointment than his eldest son.”

“What has happened to the prince?” Zhura asked.

“Ancestors bless. I am Emmi, a humble Caster,” the man said. “Prince Kandu has vanished. Most likely with a lover. The man’s affairs have always been the gossip of the city.”

“I am Zhura,” she said, though she guessed that he already knew. News seemed to travel quickly.

She wondered what she was supposed to do now. Then she saw the king’s Speaker, the gray-beard who had first questioned her, pushing through the crowd.

“You are to come with me,” the Speaker said to her.

Zhura nodded a farewell to Emmi and followed the man through yet another door, into a dimly lit corridor. The hallway opened onto a garden enclosed by other walls of the palace. The Speaker remained in the doorway, gesturing for her to enter the garden.

“He awaits you.”

Zhura ventured along the path of hard-packed earth, cobbled with smooth round stones. Buttress roots snaked across it. Conifers and orchids she recognized from the Sung Valley grew along the path. There were also local trees, like the marula fruit tree and spindly miombos. The garden was so dense she could have become lost in it.

Yende waited alone, by a small pond that shimmered with flitting silver fish. Except for the gray hairs and the paunch, the king looked much as he had in her vision of twenty years ago. Heavy brow, hawkish features, and a bush of kinky hair. For an instant, she felt that she knew every year that had passed since he’d been that young man in his prime at the Road Gate. That confidence buoyed her strength. Somehow, Zhura knew him, even though she couldn’t possibly have.

“Tell me of my friend in Boma,” the king said, his gaze pensive.

“Menga raised me as his own, with his two sons. He was widowed when we were yet young. He was a good father to me. As steady as the iron he smelted, but able to bend just the same.” She smiled at the old proverb, and noticed that Yende smiled as well. “He had me apprenticed to the Boma herb-witch. He never told me about you… until the Thandi came for me, during the month of Praise last year.”

“Menga was always the most sensible of us,” he said, wistful. “He went home to make babies while the rest of us stayed here, to drink and dream.” But his expression darkened as he fastened on to what she said. “That was fifteen months ago that you left.”

“Yes.”

“Does Menga still live?”

“I believe so,” Zhura said. “On his advice, I fled, along with friends – Menga’s oldest son and that son’s wife – to Namu.”

“The Thandi,” Yende scowled. “After the war, I thought them my allies. They were refugees of the thrice-damned Sizwe, by all the Ancestors. But then I heard rumors about them. They sought to bring back the Age of the Clover Princes, when demons ruled the Kingdoms. A few years later the witches tried to carve out a piece of my kingdom in the northern hills, just as I had carved out a piece of Chide. They have always been an elusive thorn in my side, one I could never quite pluck.”

He sighed. “Why did you come here?”

“I didn’t want to. I feared you would think I wanted something from you. I didn’t want to endanger my friends. But…I…” her voice broke.

“This is where you came from.”

“Yes.”

There was so much else to say. But that was the heart of it.

“Well. Your friends are safe here. They may stay in the palace for so long as you choose.” The king hesitated. “I should like to know what sort of daughter I have sired. This is a fraught time, but none of us chose it.”

“I don’t want to be a burden.”

“You are my child,” Yende said. “Our bond is sacred. It is never a burden.”

Chapter 3

“Seven Fathers!” Keya sighed. “Zhura, you don’t know how good this feels!”

Using tongs, the priestess plucked a fire-baked stone from the tile floor and placed it in the water. Then she sat, sloshing back in the wooden tub. “For the first time in months, I feel thoroughly clean.”

Zhura reclined naked on their bed, a wicker frame with linen sheets. From her vantage point, she could see the generous swell of Keya’s breasts above the steaming surface of the water. “I had a bath just before you,” she chuckled. “I know how it feels.”

“Do you know all it takes to bring water up here? They stable elephants in the palace, and make daily runs to the river to carry jugs back up. Each load replenishes a vast reservoir under the palace, with enough to last the Upper City seven days or more. The whole system is run by a group of craftsmen called Water Keepers.” The priestess sighed again, bathwater splashing. “I love the Water Keepers right now.”

It felt refreshing, to be sure. The air was thick with vapor and coconut oil Keya had rubbed into the herb-witch’s skin. Zhura admired their chamber once again; the striped antelope pelts upon the wall, the potted broad-leafs, the bowl of dried fruit, and the balcony that overlooked the dark wilds in the northeast of the city.

It was the end of their first full day in the palace.

Zhura had had a short time to speak with Yende in the morning. Most of the remainder of day had been spent washing and tending to her friends. Ngo, Musa and Lila shared a chamber next to theirs. The Sung warrior already seemed to have made friends among the court nobles. With the mystical skills of a palace servant, Lila had managed to procure good food and a pair of discarded dresses for her former mistress.

And yet, at best, this was only a small respite from Zhura’s worries. The Thandi remained at large, and she was certain they knew exactly where she was. And Zhura did not feel… herself.

She thought back to her conversation that morning with the king. “Fire and blood,” Zhura said, absently. “Yende said that I was born of fire and blood.”

“It was a fearful time,” Keya said from the tub. “Even though the war with the Sizwe was won, Nubic kings were falling to their own internal rivalries. Yende himself was forging a rebellious alliance with Malindi Clan. I would wager that now that he is older, he feels more obligation. Even regret,” the priestess said. “There is no higher duty; no more weighty responsibility.”

“How do you know all of this?” Zhura asked, though she could guess the answer.

“I read about it in Amankar’s writings, and those of Nuru Mwangi, a Magister who traveled the length of the Brassbelt more recently.” Keya sighed with pleasure, a sound that delighted Zhura. “Our fathers were not dissimilar. The intrigues and conflicts between the Houses of Namu are not so different.”

Yende hadn’t known about Zhura’s existence until she was given to him by what remained of Anathe’s followers. It seemed that there had been a rebellion within the small group of adherents, one that began with her murder.

At the time, Yende saw himself as a warrior and a builder. He feared for Zhura’s life. Even if he might keep her alive, he couldn’t hope to give her a happy childhood.

Indeed, events that had occurred in the past few days seemed to underscore the uncertainty in Yende’s court. Not only had the heir disappeared, but there was trouble on the eastern border with Chide. Rumors told of fighting in that kingdom. Trade from Chide on the Brassbelt had come to a halt. Yende had sent out runners to send his soldiers based in the north and south of Morore to its eastern border.

Zhura set her worries aside. She longed for the priestess’s touch, but she did not want to disturb Keya’s solace. Instead, she rolled over, so that she could stare out upon the balcony’s open vista. Stars had just begun to twinkle above.

Keya had taught her how to pray. So Zhura did, whispering a soft prayer.

Are you out there, Mother?

The night breeze seemed to whisper a response.

The stars winked at Zhura, and suddenly the herb-witch was looking up at them from a very different place.

**

She walked a shallow sandstone ravine dotted with gnarled miombo trees. Her army camped along the canyon. There were nearly eight hundred men and women, though most were not fighters. Most fed, watered and cared for the five dozen war elephants that gathered in a herd at the center of the ravine, where there was a trickle of a stream. The beasts rumbled and roared in affectionate greeting as she passed by.

Mandepha was waiting for her just beyond the herd. The Thandi ritual scars that coiled around Mande’s arms were visible in the flickering light of the campfires. She’d tied her braids into ziggurats, piled atop her scalp.

“I didn’t believe we could do it,” Mande said. “But you were right.”

“The Ancestors smile upon us,” Anathe replied.

Anathe hadn’t believed it either, although she would never admit it. They’d marched right through Sizwe territory. It hadn’t been easy to hide sixty elephants. Fast-moving impi armies could have easily run hers down.

Then they’d marched through Samucha and into Chide to the city of Morore, making alliances and gaining a few more followers along the way. They’d occupied a defensible position in front of the Sizwe offensive and even convinced battle-worn, quarrelsome Nubic and mercenary armies to join them.

The two women walked up the slope of the ravine, to where the sentries perched. Anathe spoke a few words to each, whether in Nyan or Tsholo or Trade Kan, making sure each man and woman was well fed and in good spirits.

“In Morore, there are many more Scarred Women like us. Refugees like us.” Mande said in a low voice. “We could join with them.”

“If they want to crush the Sizwe, they can join us,” Anathe replied.

Anathe was not a refugee. Her mother had raised her deep in the bush, and on the open savanna, beyond the clutches of the Empire. Anathe had never known her father, a man of unbridled courage who had given his life to free Anathe’s mother from her coven in Swaga. In the end, even that coven must have fallen, or been driven into hiding by the Sizwe.

Defeating the Empire would bring justice to all of the peoples that had suffered under its rule. There was nothing more important.

Tswe reclined in the bowl-shaped, pelt-lined outcropping of rock where the three of them slept. The kukuru demon’s barkbush scent reminded Anathe of the rich sap of the thorn trees she climbed as a girl. Her mother’s demon servant had been with Anathe since she was a girl. When Nandi died, Anathe shattered the demon’s summoning stone, freeing xhim forever. Xhe had remained by her side ever since – not as a lover, but as a protector and teacher.

Tswe’s natural power to commune with beasts far surpassed Nandi’s abilities, and xhe had honed that talent in Anathe. She could move even an elephant with a single thought or a gesture.

Mande kneeled on the pelts beside the massive, furred kukuru. She took xhis long head in her hands and kissed him deeply. The beaded ornaments that hung from xhis pointed ears and spiraled horns clicked softly. Tswe had various lovers in Anathe’s army, men and women. But Mande was his favorite.

Anathe watched them kiss, feeling a gradual hunger of her own. She had always respected Tswe’s vow not to lay with her. Anathe’s mother had been xhis lover. Out of loyalty to her, xhe would not rut her child, he said.

“Tell me what the scouts found,” she asked.

Tswe broke off the kiss, but xhis tawny hands played along the curves of Mande’s breasts. The Thandi woman gasped.

“With the canyon stream, we can easily hold here for more than a week. We will have all the water and fodder we need.” Tswe’s deep voice was like the rumble of a storm on the horizon.

Mande pulled her halter over her head, freeing teardrop-shaped breasts. She bent to kiss Tswe again. Xhis hands stole up and under her wrap skirt, even as she dropped down to straddle xhis powerful chest.

Anathe watched their dance, the slow rhythm of their bodies as they kissed. These were her tribe, and they came from every people of the region. Anathe’s followers were Nyan and Tsholo, Kao and Nubic – all displaced by the Empire. Except Mande, all of the peoples she had encountered had first thought her to be some sort of barbarian witch. But she had brought them together, joined them in a common struggle against the spreading poisons of conquest and slavery.

Tswe lifted Mande as if she weighed no more than a child. The kukuru resembled a combination of a human and a sable antelope, huge and graceful. Xhe lay her on her back and nearly obscured her from view, buttocks flexing as xhe ground against her. Xhis length swelled between her eagerly spreading thighs.

Anathe shifted slightly, flushed with heat at the sight and sound of them.

Like a stone dropped in the center of a pool, the wave of the Empire’s disruption had swept through faraway lands. It displaced more than just the peoples of the region. As herders and farmers migrated, they settled new pastures and croplands. They killed off predators to protect their herds, and killed off grazers to protect their land. When she was a child, wild beasts had often been Anathe’s only friends. No one else could hear them the way she could. No one else could help them.

Together, the peoples of her army, the elephants, and the Nubic defenders could stop the Sizwe advance. The head of the Sizwe spear was aimed towards Morore, but Anathe would cut the spearhead cleanly off.

She stripped off her brief skirt, and the loincloth beneath that. She rounded the lovers. As Tswe reared above the prone woman, Anathe bent over Mande and let the other woman’s lips brush against hers, her gasps and shudders running through Anathe like a storm season flood. While their tongues dueled, Anathe’s hands roamed, tweaking Mande’s nipples as the kukuru began to rut her.

When Anathe withdrew from the kiss, Mande’s lips remained parted, hungry, her eyes unfocused. Anathe imagined those lips upon her sex as she thrust two fingers over her throbbing pearl and down into her own sopping folds. She threw her head back.

Stars blurred above her. The rhythm of the rutting couple pulsed within her like a second heartbeat. Plans and strategies dissolved in the feverish rush, leaving behind a single spark of determination.

Together, we will prevail.

Anathe’s climax subsided, but Mande and Tswe continued to rut with increasing fervor. She needed to find her own partners for the night.

Naked, with the taste of lust fresh on her lips, Anathe rose. She padded through the dark rocks to the other campfires, to celebrate with her army.