Asimov's Science Fiction: February 2014 (15 page)

"Lij represents technology. Secret knowledge, tru, but money to be made, moreso. In the mean time, you play the blessed parents of the Messiah."

"I don't play the virgin well," Ninky said.

Desmond choked on his smoke. He waved off another hit.

"The Messiah,
His Imperial Majesty,
grows up before the people, rallying and inspiring them. The colonel offers to have Lij stay at the palace, heir apparent, all the while brainwashing him. Assuming he hasn't already done so."

"I don't think he has. Some part of him, whatever deep corner of him that remains unspoiled and decent, knew that for Lij to ring true, he had to be his own man at first." Desmond recalled the boy's gaze.

"It's a risky gambit."

"He's tightening his grip on power from all sides. Even if it fails and he doesn't win the heart of the people, his technology and military will garner him their loyalty."

"If you can't be loved, be feared. Lij represents a powerful symbol. In the right hands."

"Are we the right hands?" Desmond asked.

"You are. But you can't remain here. He's too young and it's too dangerous here."

"So we run?"

"I fear I am too much of a coward. Besides, they watch my every movement. However," Ninky stood up and walked toward the door, "a fly who knows how to avoid being swatted, an old fly..."

"Me old, but me nuh cold." Desmond smirked. "Watch your step, my dear, and walk good."

The sun glowed red, the waking dawn over the rain-soaked land. The loamy smell of earth filled the groves of palms. The hills were colors caught on a painter's brush: lilac, grey, and blue-green. An
abeng
blew its mournful wail in the distance. During the Maroon Wars it warned of a British marauding party. Now it signaled that the hunters drew near.

"I'm scared." For all of his aplomb and cool-headedness, Lij was still a boy. A boy woken in the still of the night to a hand over his mouth and a voice telling him to hush and trust.

"It's only a little bit further. Then we'll be safe," Desmond said.

"You promise?"

"I'd like to. I probably should. But I can't. I can promise I'll be by your side as long as I'm able."

Desmond worried that he sounded more like a lawyer trying to hedge than a paternal figure. But he wanted to be as honest, as realistic, as possible. His heart wanted to tell of promises broken, of men he loved dying in flames. Those were the world's life lessons.

"Where are we going?" Lij asked.

"To visit a friend. But we have to be careful. There are a lot of people, bad people, looking for us. But I know the Blue Mountains. Those soldiers will go round and round in circles, probably fall into the same pit traps that ambushed Albion Redcoats while we hide in back-o-water caves."

"Is he a good friend?"

"We're close as batty and bench."

The boy stared with those pale green eyes, large as an owl's. Desmond didn't have much of a plan beyond sneaking past the guards and evading patrols long enough to get to Country. Lij took his hand. The boy still trembled.

Desmond spent his life looking in, watching others live their lives. To the Maroon, he was
obroni,
an outsider, as were all of the brown people. Desmond had no place among his own, as they considered him "a man of the house." He couldn't tell them what he'd sacrificed for them. In the Cobena house, though high ranking, he was considered a servant. His family had Rastafari roots, but he had not joined, only been a sympathizer. And once the conservative Bobo Ashanti sect of the Rastafari assumed control, even non-member allies were considered outsiders. When Desmond examined his life with true eyes, he realized he was alone. He soldiered on anyway, knowing he'd find a place where he belonged and held that hope close.

"How about I tell you a Br'er 'Nansi story to pass the time? My mother used to tell me Br'er 'Nansi stories all the time when I was your age. I hated them. Thought she was just a silly old woman. I didn't know the power of stories then. Now I miss them. Would that make you feel better?"

Lij squeezed his hand.

"There was a mad witch who hated her name. Wherever she went, she never told anyone her true name. Names have power and she knew that her name was the source of her power. To say it would be her undoing."

"What was her name?" Lij asked.

"If I tell you, you have to keep it to yourself. You promise?"

"I promise." Lij smiled. It was the first time Desmond had seen the boy do so. In that moment all Desmond knew was that he wanted to keep him safe forever.

"It was Five. The witch ruled the land. Everyone was scared of her power. She cursed fields and the gungoo pea roots would shrivel. She cursed the goats and their meat would rot on their bones. Everyone put up with her madness, giving her anything to keep her happy. Everyone except Br'er 'Nansi."

Desmond pulled Lij low when a car neared. Its headlights skimmed over them. The bush limbs above them looked like interlaced fingers. He waited a few seconds after they could no longer hear it before they continued.

"Br'er 'Nansi was the craftiest of the animals. And he was old. He knew the true names of all the old ones, from Br'er Turtle to Old Hinge. He couldn't let his brethren tremble at the thought of the witch."

"That doesn't sound like Br'er 'Nansi," Lij said. "He's usually greedy. Selfish."

"Sometimes people change from one story to the next. Br'er 'Nansi went to the village of the witch, right up to her house and banged on her door. When she opened the door, he stood there holding an armful of bananas and weeping.

"Someone has stolen my bananas,
Br'er 'Nansi cried out.
I don't know how many the thief took.

"How many did you have?
the witch asked.

"I was told six, but I don't know how to count. Can you please help me?

"There are one, two, three, four, and the one in your hand.

"I don't know any number called 'the one in your hand,'
Br'er 'Nansi said.
Does it come before nine? Wait, do you mean Five? Five! What a lovely number, an even better name. Everyone should know it. Everyone should shout it, drag it from the shadows into the light where it can be known and no longer feared.

"The witch was angry. No one enjoyed having their secrets brought to light. She chased Br'er 'Nansi all through the hills, spitting her curses and threatening to kill him as soon as she found him. 'Nansi hid in a medicine bag around the neck of an obeah woman bound on a ship heading for the New World. Even though it was against his will, he didn't mind.

"My life is not my own,
Br'er 'Nansi said.
I will comfort my people wherever I find them."
"His life was not his own," Lij repeated. Desmond hated the death of innocence that came with understanding life.

Bamboo poles lined the front of a ramshackle house. White, green, and red flags fluttered from each of the poles signifying that a "science man" occupied the house.

Burglar bars girded every window. Corrugated metal formed the roof, its ridges trailing down to large buckets that collected rain run-off.

Country leaned his chair back against the wall, eyeing his dominoes with great suspicion. A tam covered his dreadlocks, which drew forward on his forehead every time he furrowed his brow. A lone lamp lit the porch. The other men huddled tight around the table studying his every movement. A smile crept across his face. He slapped a tile onto the table. Curse words spilled into the night. Country preened about in triumph, pausing when he glanced in Desmond's direction. They couldn't have been seen, Desmond knew this, but Country dismissed his guests. Once they had departed, he waved Desmond over.

"Come on out, you walk foot buckra." Country's languid drawl hid a welcoming smirk. "Who's the pickney?"

"That's... a long story. Colonel's people are looking for us."

"You'll be fine for now." Country studied Lij. Suddenly the man knelt, stopping short of genuflecting. "
When God comes, the sun will come out.
Come on."

The first time Desmond met Country, he was in
myal.
A spirit possessed him and he climbed a coconut tree upside down. He looked like Br'er 'Nansi himself atop a mound of eggs the way he hung from the tree. The final rite of becoming a Niyabingi was to receive the blessing of an obeah man. Country had hammered out an ancient staccato beat on goat skin during Desmond's ceremony. A Coromantee war dance rhythm, a prayer on a hand drum to bring destruction on their enemies.

Desmond ushered Lij inside, peeking out the door for unwanted eyes one last time before shutting it. The house was little more than planks of wood hammered into place. A lizard scurried along a brightly colored relief map of Africa. A five-pointed Judaic-Rastafarian Star of David marked the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. Next to the map were photographs of Haile Selassie and Marcus Garvey, a so-called Negro agitator from America. A half dozen brooms sat bundled in the corner. Sometimes Country sold them, symbols of the need to sweep out the filth of Babylon, for extra money for chiba. Otherwise, he maintained his vow of poverty. The Bobo Ashanti sect lived sparse and uncompromising lives.

"You hungry? I'm fixing enough to make belly bust." Country fussed about in his kitchen, frying plantains and boiling green bananas to accompany the tripe with garlic.

"Bananas? You know crop theft is punishable by flogging with a tamarind switch."

"Eat your jokes and starve, then. What's going on?" Country poured condensed milk into his instant coffee and drank in huge gulps as Desmond relayed the colonel's plan. He issued a sideways glance at the boy, unable to hide his fear and awe.

"You read me up?" Desmond asked when he finished his tale.

"Do not let the science fool you. I am foundated with Christ." Country rocked back in his chair while he thought. "The boy himself doesn't matter. The idea of him does." "So you believe the colonel's story?"

"That man is a ginnel. Utterly mendacious... a damn liard. Desperate to prove to himself that he was more than the little imp parading as a man trying to drive fear into people. Him is too hard aise, but..."

"But what?" Desmond asked.

"The boy is a steppin' razor. He too dangerous, like a walking blade."

"But he's my charge now. The gift of His Imperial Majesty was to allow me to recognize myself as a person. Like him, born, prepared, and guided for a purpose. This boy would be a pawn of Malcolm, used for his own ends until he was twisted into a 'mawga dog.' He deserves something better. A chance to be the man he was meant to be."

"Then free the boy, nuh? Don't let him be caught up in politricks."

"Can you get us to the coast? From there we can make our way to the United States. No one will think to look for us in the heart of the beast."

"I'll need gas money."

"Mawfa foot Rasta."

Desmond pressed a few nanny notes into his palm. Country flattened them on his knee, then held them to his eyelids for a moment.

"Money is eyesight." Country winked, then slipped the bills into his pocket. "I'm feeling a mite bit murderous."

"Good. That may come in handy."

Desmond found himself reaching for handholds that weren't there as Country's mechanical contraption careened along the curves of the road. The engine huffed, belching steam while cylinders clattered. A hot, oily smell came from the engine. Not built for creature comforts, the van was little more than a brass shell with a seat for Country. The rest was open space designed for hauling the equipment for his
passapassas.
It shuddered as he tailgated the vehicle in front of them like a frothing bully, honking and jerking the wheel back and forth.

Their clothes folded in neat piles within their knapsacks, Desmond and Lij dressed no different than any other laborer. They looked like they were on their way to one of Country's street parties except that he still toted his cane rather than a machete. Taking a back trail, they drove toward the Kingston megapolis, bypassing the Kings' houses of its outer boundaries.

Their destination was the Port Royal citadel at the seaward end. It was largely a historical site with the remains of a burned down slave quarters largely preserved. Pirates like Captain Henry Morgan once hid there. Now, its port was a higgler's domain.

Desmond hated the voyeurs such tourist traps attracted, but the busyness of the port worked to their advantage. They'd be able to buy passage on a waiting freight and if you had enough nanny notes, you could insure no questions were asked. The amount of people milling about also decreased the likelihood of being noticed. Even if they were, the colonel wouldn't chance so public an incident. He wouldn't want the reports of injured—or worse, killed—visitors to damage their tourist trade.

"Big you up nice. Make you ever ready for love." Street vendors cried out, peddling "front-end lifters," obeah "science" for the passing consumer. Their culture bought and sold as trinkets in the shadow of the old slave depot. With the instinct of a fox beset by hounds, Desmond had the unmistakable sensation of being watched. He scanned the crowd for any of the colonel's guard or anyone who took an inordinate interest in them. He waved an all clear to Country.

Country led them down a forgotten pathway overgrown with brush, the remains of the steps little more than a scree of pebbles. He said he knew of a back way into the port, bypassing the security check points. Desmond steadied himself as best he could, using his cane to guide his slide, for he slid more than walked, especially in his Spat boots. He slung his jacket over his other arm, to relieve his heat and sweep away intruding branches. Sweat ringed his shirt's collar and drenched his armpits.

"You make my job all the more easy, wayward travelers."

"Who's there?" Desmond asked. Country froze where he stood, scanning about for the source of the voice, but Lij inched to Desmond's side.

"One brief dance in the colonel's garden and I'm so quickly forgotten?" With a queer lilting resonance to his words, a man stepped out of the shadows. His severe, pinched face, under the high arch of his eyebrows, produced an unpleasant countenance. Desmond knew the gaunt figure had deceptive strength.