Black Leopard, Red Wolf

“Such an overpraised thing, a cock,” Mossi said. I don’t know if he was trying to make the room smile. Sogolon’s chest right above the heart was red. Ipundulu had tried to cut her chest open and rip out the heart, but she would have us watch her collapse on the ground before telling anyone that.

“See to your heart,” I said to her.

“My heart clear,” she said.

“It’s almost falling out of your chest.”

“It never cut deep.”

“Nothing seems to,” Mossi said.

At the foot of the tree, the buffalo waited with two horses. Everything I wanted to ask with my mouth I seemed to ask with my eye, for he nodded, snorted, and pointed to the horses. Jakwu mounted the first.

“Sogolon rides with you,” I said.

“I ride with no one,” he said, and galloped off.

Mossi came up behind me. “How far shall he ride?” he said.

“Before he sees he does not know the way? Not very far.”

“Sogolon.”

“She can ride on the buffalo’s back.”

“As you wish,” Mossi said.

I grabbed a piece of Mossi’s tunic and wiped his face. The blood had stopped running.

“It is but a scratch,” he said.

“A scratch from a monster with iron claws.”

“You called it something.”

“Give me this,” I said, and took one of his swords. I cut a hole at the fringe of his tunic and tore off a long strip of cloth. This cloth I wrapped around his head, tying it at the back.

“Sasabonsam.”

“That is not one of the names I remember from the old man’s house.”

“No. The Sasabonsam lived with his brother. They kill men from high up in the trees. His brother the flesh eater, him the bloodsucker.”

“World’s not short on trees. Why does he travel with this pack?”

“I killed his brother,” I said.

Two things. The Sasabonsam took a sword to his wing. He was carrying both the boy and Ipundulu, who must have been as heavy as him.

On the ground the two burning trees seemed hundreds upon hundreds of paces away, which they were. We were about to ride off when several of the Queen’s guard, ten and nine, maybe more, all on foot but in front of us, bid us to stop.

“Her Radiant Excellency said she never gave anyone leave.”

“Her Radiance has worse things to worry about than who takes leave of her radiant ass,” Mossi said, and rode right through them. They jumped out of the way when the buffalo brushed his front hoof in the dust.

“Such a shame to leave. This is a rebellion that brings me joy to see,” Mossi said.

“Until the slaves see they would rather the bondage they know than the freedom they do not,” I said.

“Remind me to pick this fight with you another time,” he said.

We rode all night. We passed where the old man lived but all that was left of his house was the smell of it. Nothing remained, not even the rubble of cracked mud and smashed bricks. Truly this made me worry that there had been no house and no man, but a dream of both. Since I alone noticed, I said nothing and we rode past the nothing in a blur. Jakwu tried to follow while being ahead, but pulled back three times. Even I had no memory of the way, unlike Mossi, who charged through the night. I just held on to his sides. Sogolon tried to sit upright on the buffalo as he ran almost as fast as the horses, but she almost fell off twice. We moved through the patch of the Mawana witches but only one broke through the ground to see us, and when she did, dove back down as if it were water.

Before sun chased night away, the boy left my nose. I jumped up. Sasabonsam had flown all the way to the gate and gone through. I knew. Mossi said something about my forehead punching the back of his neck, which made me pull back. He slowed the horse to a trot when we reached the dirt road. The door crackled, shifted the air around it, and gave off a hum, but was getting smaller. I could see the road to Kongor in yellow daylight.

“When they come—”

“The doors don’t open themselves, Sogolon. They have already gone through it. We are too late,” I said.

Sogolon rolled off the buffalo and fell. She tried to scream, but it came out a cough.

“You do this,” she said, pointing at me. “You was never fit, never ready, nothing in the face of them. None of you care. None of you see what the whole world going lose. First time in two years and you make them get away.”

“How, old woman?” Mossi said. “By being sold into slavery? That was your doing. We could have taken on all of Dolingo and saved the boy. Instead we wasted time saving you. Safe passage my sore ass. You put the whole fate of your mission on a queen more concerned with breeding with me than listening to you. That was all your doing.”

The gate was shrinking, large enough for a man, but not for the Ogo or the buffalo.

“Is going be days till one get to Kongor,” she said.

“Then you’d better cut a stick and walk,” Mossi said. “This is as far as we go.”

“The slaver will double the money. I promise it.”

“The slaver or the King sister? Or maybe the river jengu you pretend is a goddess?” I asked.

“It is only about the boy. You so fool you don’t see? It was only for the boy.”