Shaka the Great (50 page)

“Of this you can be sure?” asks the Induna.

Both Hafa and the unumzane nod.

“General, Nduna, will you be able to help us?” asks the headman. It's Mgobozi who wears the blue crane feather, and is the Shadow of Shaka here, and it is he who answers this question that is also a plea. “We will,” he says. “Have no fear of that! And if we cannot make the vanishing man reappear we can at least make those who have appeared since his passing, very like dung appearing after a herd of cattle … we can make them vanish!”

The river has narrowed to the width of three hunting spears, but it remains deep and fast-flowing. Incema and eelgrass grow along its soggy banks, making access to the water difficult. Philani leads the udibi to a small inlet where the current curves in a slight detour, like a brief aside that soon rejoins the main cacophony. Further in, however, the depth decreases, so that for the most part the inlet is comprised of stagnant pools little more than puddles surrounded by dark brown mud peppered with hundreds of tiny holes, and fringed with a mat of glasswort samphire, a segmented perennial that resembles flattened millipedes.

And Philani stands there, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Is this the place?” asks the udibi.

“Yes, but …”

“But?”

“But it was there!” says Philani.

“What was?” asks the boy.

“The body.”

The udibi stiffens. He can't have heard right? “The
what
?”

“Body,” hisses Philani.

“A body? Of a human?”

“Yes. One such as you.”

“Me?” asks the udibi, wondering what sets himself apart.

But Philani simply means that the body belonged to a youth close to the udibi's age. “One in your ntanga,” he explains.

“And it's … ?”

“There!”

The udibi frowns. Philani seems to be pointing at a spot near where the inlet becomes a bed of eelgrass. Or is he pointing at the reeds? Or to a spot within the eelgrass? Or … ?

“He was there yesterday. In the shallow water.” An anxious look. “You must believe me. I wanted you to see, because of the Cat Man's story. About the little sister who was fed to the river. And then here, yesterday, I found …”

A body, swept into the inlet. The boy's eyes scan the mud, its cracked, flaking, brown scabs a shade darker than his own skin. He scans the sluggish, sickly water.

“I wanted to show you, but now it's gone.”

“I believe you,” says the udibi, more to calm Philani than anything else.

“The Cat Man's story—it's true!”

The river has taken him, taken this boy, and what if its hunger has not been sated? Who will be next?

“The King broods, Mother.”

“I know.”

“What I had hoped would be a lesson to our enemies, leading to a lasting peace, has turned out to be but a respite.”

“Such is the way of this land, Daughter.”

“I know.” Pampata sighs. “And I know it was foolish to even wish they might see the folly of trying to challenge us, after Zwide was vanquished.”

“Folly is right,” says Nandi, “but you weren't foolish. They might be our enemies, and some might even see them as beasts fit only for slaughter, but you and I see mothers and wives, and it's not foolish to want to see them spared the pain of losing their loved ones. No, it is their leaders who are foolish!”

“And our women, Mother? Do they not also stand to lose sons and lovers? Their tears will join the river, and all tears are alike, are they not?”

Nandi sighs, for Pampata is right. Rhetoric is all very well, and has its place under the ibandla tree or on the eve of the battle, but one must face facts as well—and sooner rather than later.

“My son is concerned because the emissaries he sent to Ngoza have not yet returned?”

Pampata nods. “They should have got back by now.”

Face facts: Shaka's position remains far from secure. Ironically, his success against the Ndwandwes has made his position even more perilous. Viewed in the context of the ongoing jostling for power within the region, Shaka's defeat of Zwide was akin to an ambush: coming out of nowhere and startling everyone.

Now no one will underestimate the Zulus to that degree again. Shaka is still viewed as an upstart, and few doubt that his impis can be crushed,
but now his enemies have a clearer idea of his tactics, a greater respect for the discipline that drives his army. There will be no more such ambushes. Not if they can help it.

Now they are working at setting their own traps. Witness the way the Qwabes have smiled at Shaka, while busy weaving an alliance with Ngoza, ruler of the Thembus.

But, right now, Shaka's mind is pointed westward. He still seems to think he can bring Ngoza into his kraal, or at least see what the Thembu chief is willing to offer in exchange for his intestines being allowed to remain inside their stomach cavity.

And although Nandi can't understand her son's reasoning here, she's not surprised that Shaka is in one of his moods. The fact that the emissaries are overdue is not a good sign, for you can be sure they haven't been detained while swilling beer in Ngoza's capital in celebration of a new alliance.

Situated about two kilometers from the village, the homestead comprises five huts arranged in a V-shape, with the dwelling of the head of the family at the apex. The other huts belong to his four wives and his daughters. Storage huts and the homes of his unmarried sons lie to the rear of the compound. The homestead is encircled by a fence made of poles lashed together, and the cattle kraal is situated in the front, itself encircled by a hedge of thornbushes.

On the day he disappeared, Sitheku had come here bringing with him the bull his father had promised Bubula. He had also used the opportunity to visit with Bubula's eldest daughter, Nomona. It wasn't that he had any designs on her, rather it's just the way he was. He fancied himself as the isoka, or sweetheart, every maiden longed for; and if they spurned his advances, they were simply playing hard to get. Not for him uqume, ipopomo or the other potions that lovesick youths sometimes had recourse to. His words were all he needed. Watched over by Nomona's mother, Sitheku had chatted and flirted with the girl until she had been obliged to return to her chores.

“And when he left, he went that way?” asks the Induna, pointing his iklwa toward the main trail.

“He went the same way he came,” agrees Bubula. “I saw that for myself, for I came to ask him to thank his father once more, on my behalf.”

It's the day after they had arrived and interrupted the Smelling Out. It's also about the same time in the afternoon that Sitheku disappeared, and the Induna's now retracing the youth's steps.

After leaving Bubula's kraal, Sitheku was spotted by a woman and her two children. She had noticed nothing strange about him.

Then there were the three herdboys letting their cattle drink as Sitheku passed through the ford. They are sure it was him, and the Induna's inclined to believe them.

The Induna lowers himself on to his heels. Resting his right hand on a convenient rock, he leans forward and scoops up some water from the stream with his left hand. He swallows, stands up.

Perhaps it was not where he was coming from, but where he was going to that's important
, he tells himself.

“Or perhaps it was something along the way, Master.”

The Induna wheels round. Those words were spoken with his udibi's voice, and for a moment he had forgotten that the boy isn't with him … This boy who is no longer a boy, and who won't be with him for much longer.

To shrug off such thoughts, the Induna tastes those words again.
Something along the way.

A chance meeting … ? Someone Sitheku didn't expect to see … ? It's certainly something to consider.

But here is Magema, accompanied by two Fasimbas.

He's standing at the point where the path leaves the main trail. It runs down the shallow slope, then through the knee-high grass of a strip of flat land—a natural meadow of sorts—before entering the grove of tamboti trees on the opposite side. Its ultimate destination is the village. The main trail also leads to the village, but this path is used as a short cut by those who live on the southern edge of the settlement.

As the Induna and Mgobozi found, after walking this stretch several times this morning, there's an optical illusion here. The clump of bushes, where the two friends sheltered to share some snuff, lies in the center of the meadow and the path passes through these same bushes. But the bushes are located in a deep, elongated donga. Standing where the path leaves the main trail, you can't see that there's a fold in the land. For the path itself adds to the illusion. The place where it drops into the donga and the spot where it emerges on the other side are directly in line—at least from the vantage point of anyone standing at the spot where the path joins the main track. That means
the donga itself is invisible, and therefore the path seems to travel in a straight line through the bushes.

So, if you're watching from here, anyone walking along the path will suddenly drop out of sight. Look away at the right time, and it'll be as if they've just vanished.

“I have walked here every day of my life and never noticed that,” says Magema, after the Induna has had one of the Fasimbas run along the path to demonstrate how a “vanishing” could take place.

“But, Nduna,” he adds, “are you saying someone might have been hiding in those bushes, and attacked Sitheku after we went our separate ways?”

“What say
you
? Could that have happened?”

“Hai, we were sitting right there, so I'm sure we would have spotted anyone else hiding in the bushes.”

The Induna nods.

“Could it be that the sangomas are right, Nduna? Is witchcraft at work here?”

Both men find themselves gazing in the direction of the village, where the crippled sangoma waits, fuming, under Mgobozi's watchful eye. He's no Nobela—imagine her earthworm lips pursed and sucking, trees bent horizontal, leaves, branches torn off, sand and stones, and legs and arms flailing, fingers trying to dig into rock, all being pulled back into the hurricane whistle of her call—but old fears die hard. He's no Nobela, but he stands for the same things she did; claiming to have received a Calling, and therefore a rank and an authority from beyond the realm of mortals. Those like Mgobozi might laugh, and speak of a “rank authority,” but many more will be haunted by a niggling thought, the late night what-if, for who's to say Shaka isn't wrong. What if the sangomas really are the ones who speak for the ancestors, the ones who endure while kings come and go? What if they genuinely see—and know—more?

As though seeking to dismiss such thoughts, the Induna sends Magema, and the two Fasimbas accompanying him, to go and wait by the tangle of red bushwillows, just where the two friends had shared snuff.

Hafa has been asked to wait a little way down the path, out of earshot. Now, at the Induna's signal, he rejoins the warrior.

Yes, he says, the trail is straight, and therefore he could see Magema long before the youth spotted him.

He saw Magema come up the bank. Saw him wave, then heard him shout. Saw the ear-tugging. Saw that dismissive wave. Saw him turn back.

And then he was right next to Magema, and Magema was staring at him, his eyes wide, his mouth open …

After he had calmed the youngster, they went to where Magema had said Sitheku had been standing. As the Induna knows, their search proved fruitless.

After thanking Hafa, and saying he can return to the village, the Induna stands a while, staring down the main track, then gazing down the path Sitheku had been proceeding on.

Looking down the main track, where Hafa can be seen walking away from him, then switching his attention to the path, where Magema and the soldiers stand just beyond the bushes in the donga.