Black Leopard, Red Wolf

“Say this also happened. The little bitch screamed traitor and in the quick his men were upon me; meanwhile soldiers were still setting fire to children trapped in huts. Four soldiers came at me, and I fired four arrows between four sets of eyes. The little bitch tried to scream again but my fifth arrow went right through his throat. So it goes without telling you, Tracker, that I had to leave, under the cover of fire smoke. But then I wandered for days and days before I found that I was in the sand sea where nothing lives. Four days without water or food, I started to see a fat woman walking on clouds and lions walking on two legs, and a caravan that never touched the sand. Men from the caravan picked me up and threw me in the back.

“I woke up when a boy’s mother had him throw water in my face. The caravan dumped me at some doorstep in Wakadishu.”

“From the sand sea to Wakadishu takes moons, Leopard.”

“’Twas a fast caravan.”

“So now you’re a mercenary,” I said.

“Look at this leper accusing another leper of leprosy.”

“But I find men, not kill them.”

“Of course. It’s cow’s blood you’re always wiping from your helmet. Why do we war over words? Are you happy, Tracker?”

“I am content with much. This world never gives me anything, and yet I have everything I want.”

“Fool, not what I asked you.”

“Beasts look for happiness now? Be less the man and more the Leopard, if this is the man you are going to be.”

“Fuck the gods, Tracker, ’tis a simple question. The longest answer is but one word.”

“This affects your offer?”

“No.”

“Then there’s your answer. I am busy and better busy than bored, is that not so?”

“I’m waiting—”

“For what?”

“For you to say that sadness is not the absence of happiness, but the opposite of it.”

“Have I ever said that?”

“You say something close. And who does your heart belong to?”

“You told me once nobody loves no one.”

“I may have been young, and in love with my own cock.”

“Jakrari mada kairiwoni yoloba mada.”

“What use is that tongue to a cat?”

“Your cock is like a camel to you.”

I was starting to tell him things just to hear that cat laugh.

“I don’t trust people who take voyages without return; it gives them no stakes. I’ve been, let’s say, disappointed by men with nothing to lose,” he said.

“Are you happy?” I asked.

“You answer a question with a question?”

“Because here we are, whining like first wives of husbands who no longer want us. But then I’m a boy raised by no one and you pretend to be a man when it suits you, but there are many enchanted beasts that can talk. Whatever this offer is of yours, I’m liking it less and less.”

“My offer hasn’t left my lips, Tracker.”

“No, but you are doing some kind of test.”

“Forgive me, Tracker, but I have not seen you in moons upon moons.”

“And you are the one who sought me out, cat. And now you waste my time. Here’s coin for the raw boar. And extra for all the blood they left in for you.”

“It does me good to see you.”

“I was about to say the same, then you started wondering about my heart.”

“Oh brother, your heart I wonder about all the time. Worry too.”

“This too is part of it.”

“What?”

“Your fucking test.”

“Tracker, we are freeborn. I am drinking and eating with another. At least sit if you’re never going to eat.”

I got up to leave. I was a good few paces away from him when I said, “Send word for me when I have passed whatever test it was you were trying to give me.”

“You think you passed?”

“I passed when I came through the door. Or you wouldn’t have waited four days to call on me. You ever see a man who doesn’t know he’s unhappy, Leopard? Look for it in the scars on his woman’s face. Or in the excellence of his woodcraft and iron making, or in the masks he makes to wear himself because he forbids the world to see his own face. I am not happy, Leopard. But I am not unhappy that I know.”

“I have word of the children.”

He knew that would stop me.

“What? How?”

“I still trade with the Gangatom, Tracker.”

“Give me this word. Now.”

“Not yet. Trust me, your girl is fine, even if she still huffs and puffs and turns to blue smoke when she loses her temper, which is often. Have you seen them?”

“No, not ever.”

“Oh.”

“What is this oh?”

“A strange look on your face.”

“I have no strange look.”

“Tracker, you are nothing but strange looks. Nothing is ever hidden from your face, no matter how much you try to mask it. It’s how I can judge where your heart is with people. You are the world’s worst liar and the only face I trust.”

“I will hear of the children.”

“Of course. They—”

“Did none say I came to see them? Not one?”

“You just said you have not seen them. Not ever, this is what you said.”

“Not ever it might as well be, if they say they have not seen my face.”

“More strangeness, Tracker. The children are fat and smiling. The albino will soon be their best warrior.”

“And the girl?”

“I just told you about the girl.”

“Eat.”

“We have other matters to discuss, Tracker. Enough with nostalgia for now.”