Griots

by Charles R. Saunders

  Shivering in the flat pale light of a dust-choked day.

  No sign of the beast. Not even a tail-swish in the swamp grass.

  I agonied myself over the rocks and through the reeds towards the swamp.

  And lapped.

  And stood up on new bones, solid as pyrite.

  All I had to do was close my eyes to see my brother, a hundred brothers, ten thousand of them for ten thousand years in ten thousand lands, and me sealing each one in a pyrite coffin, and if even one escaped, carving him like a pig and scattering the pieces so far from each other no Throne-girl, no words-of-power, no ujatiu could ever sew them back together.

  All I had to do was walk. Walk out there and find my wife and set my life in motion till I was the master of the world.

  Changeling

  By

  Carole McDonnell

  Lacking beauty, regal will, or imperious bearing, Iyoke the third daughter of Queen Mizaka, was mocked as a cuckoo’s egg. Fat and squat, with a round face that smiled too lovingly on everyone, she was deemed a child of some lowly warrior of peasant stock. However, Queen Mizaka’s virtue was renowned throughout all the kingdom of Tentuke, and Iyoke was kind and good-natured. So mockery and rumors faded, although they did not entirely die away.

  The time came for Queen Mizaka’s three daughters to be married, and for Iyoke Prince Hans was chosen. His was a lowly northern kingdom – distant and small, and he was the least of his father’s sons. Marriages were also arranged for the other princesses as well. Sembele the beauty—the eldest and whose beauty even the sun blushed to look upon—was betrothed to Crown Prince Jaejoong of the large eastern kingdom. The middle daughter was Nunu. Not as beautiful as her older sister, nor yet as ugly as the youngest, she was nevertheless a princess. Quiet and reserved, with skin the color of rich earth, she wore her plaited hair like a wreathed crown upon her head. She was promised to Prince Biodun third in line to rule a large southern kingdom. Portraits were exchanged –letters too. Iyoke waited through Winter rains for Spring sun to arrive. Not the world’s sun, the soul of the universe, but Hans, her sun, the sun of her heart.

  Life renewed itself and Spring flowers bloomed. But love played with hearts. Prince Hans arrived with pomp and retinue, his hair fairer and wilder, his eyes bluer, his smile sweeter than Iyoke had ever imagined. In the palace’s richly embroidered ebony halls, he gathered love as farmers gather windfall. He gathered Sembele’s love. And because Sembele was beautiful, her hair falling in thick braided rivulets along her shoulders, her skin black as the night, he returned her love to her and cast Iyoke’s aside.

  Iyoke removed her silken gown and replaced it with the hemp tunic of the common people. All day, many days, she wept in her chambers.

  “Plain, I am,” she told the wind. “And not like Sembele, lithe, graceful, and regal. “A changeling, they say, of peasant stock with no royal forbears. Yet, Hans loved my simple heart once. See here, his letters. In portrait, he saw my lumpish forms. Yet even then, his gentle words helped bind our souls together. Yet this very soul he saw not when he arrived and his eyes looked on this body. With no painter’s skill to aid me, my ugliness turned his love away. Companion Wind, tell my sister, ‘Sembele, Dark Beauty, you who are so beautiful, you who have the love of great princes, and can choose from many great and powerful princes, return Iyoke’s only love to her.”

  The wind brought the message to Sembele but returned to Iyoke with no answer.

  Meanwhile, Prince Jaejoong—Prince Jaejoong more beautiful than all the men and women of all the kingdoms of the world—understood the power of love. Rejection had no power to wound his heart, but the insult irked his father. The old king called his allies together. Trade was disrupted, imported goods refused, exports ceased. Queen Mizaka sent appeasing gifts. King Wung Li relented, and the cast-off prince was called from foreign shores. Prince Jaejoong was ordered to attend the wedding of his former betrothed that all the world would know King Wung Li could both punish and forgive.

  At Sembele’s marriage: scarlets and velvets. Silks, satins and linens. Pearl-decked pillows, alabaster jars of spices and perfumes sent by princes from distant lands. After a marriage feast of seven days, Sembele set sail for her husband’s kingdom, her sisters, and her royal parents accompanying her, there to fulfill another seven days of feasting.

  The waves roiling, the stars in their height dancing, Jaejoong and Iyoke both being cast off, Prince Jaejoong found Iyoke at the prow of the ship. “Still weeping?” he asked. How joyous and bright of eye he was! “Your tears will overwhelm the sea. Let your sister have Hans’ love.” He indicated the rolling waves all about. “So strong is Love, as strong as death. Such love your sister has for Hans—I have no doubt it would uphold us if we chose to dance upon the seas.”

  Iyoke turned her tear-stained face to his. She smiled but said nothing.

  “I will tell you a secret.” The Crown Prince laughed then leaned low to whisper in her ear. “The people of Hans’ country are a proud people. Passionless, and indifferent. Haughty above all other peoples. Believing they have all good things, they are content, desirous of nothing. Among such arrogant and cold people, how could such a one as you live? But there, Sembele will thrive. Like a vine transplanted to its true and native soil.”

  The wind blew his long black hair wildly across his face, but Iyoke glanced at the roiling sea, silent.

  “Something more,” he continued. “I loved a servant girl in my father’s palace. One whose kind heart was as lovely as yours. For this crime, the king sent me to live in Hans’ country, that I might forget my love for a common girl. He hastened to betrothed me to your sister, Sembele, a princess I would have gladly loved for her portrait soon adorned my chambers. I wrote her, but she answered me not one word. From shyness or pride, I did not know.”

  “Sembele finds letters tedious,” Iyoke said, and turned her face from the sea to the smiling prince then toward the festive wedding songs. “She believes that words and eyes must meet at the same time.”

  “Ah!” The prince grinned, then winked. “Perhaps she should have said so. My heart would not have hurt as much as it did. It would not have waited in vain, or I would’ve fought the winter winds and the tides of the Cape, arriving in haste at her side.”

  “Indeed,” Iyoke said, “much would have been different if you had hastened.”

  “Perhaps. And yet, even so, I found joy at that time of desolation.”

  Iyoke looked into his eyes and wrinkled her brow. “Did you?” she asked, sadly.

  “The couriers brought letters to Hans from you. That good prince is a man of action not of words. I feared you would be as hurt as I was, a voice sent on the wind searching for a response. Therefore, I asked Hans to give me permission to answer your letters.”

  “And what did I write of?” she asked him.

  “Of hearts, of beauty, of stones, and twigs. You wrote of whatever took your fancy. Without pretense, without guile. So, lacking in purposeful charm, they were charm in perfect essence.”

  Iyoke broke into tears, joy and sorrow intermixed. She looked back toward the cabin of the ship where Hans danced with his new bride. “So, it was you I loved?” she asked Jaejoong.

  “And I who loved you,” he answered. “Iyoke, we two cast-off ones have each other. Do we not already know each other’s hearts?”

  So, to the surprise and joy of all, Jaejoong Crown Prince of the far eastern lands—a kingdom quite large, and greatly feared—married Queen Mizaka’s ugly changeling daughter.

  For Iyoke’s marriage: scarlets and velvets. Silks, satins and linens. Pearl-decked pillows, alabaster jars of spices and perfumes! But more: For Iyoke and Jaejoong, princes bowed, processions of princes from distant lands. For them, a feast of one-hundred-and-eighty-days. For them, not one but eighty ships to attend the future Queen Iyoke and all the royal family, guards, servants, and courtiers, to her new home in the east.

  Unaccustomed to such honor, Iyoke fled to her room. To be the praised and ad
mired center of everyone’s world troubled her. In the marriage chamber she stayed, away from all eyes but her husband. Only to Jaejoong would she speak.

  “My husband,” she said. “All this love and honor! To be the respected center of such joy, the praised word on everyone’s tongue, to have my family bow to me – I am unaccustomed to it.”

  Jaejoong laid his head between her naked breasts. “A new task has been given you,” he said, smiling up at her. He stroked her braids which hung about her shoulder. “To receive such blessings as if they’re your due. Pretend as I do.” He burst out laughing. “It is the way of kings.” The next morning, she put on royalty and ventured out again.

  Feast followed feast, and with each passing ceremony, Iyoke’s royal family was made to bow even lower before her. It hurt the new princess that her family should be made to bow before her. But she was no longer Iyoke the changeling princess of the southern kingdom: she was the wife of the Crown Prince of the great eastern lands. Pomp was not her desire, but pomp was her due.

  After many days, the time came for Queen Mizake and her family to depart. At the imperial table, Sembele spoke. She straightened her back and inhaled deeply. “That mother should be compelled to bow to you!” she said. “That my eyes should be open to see this!”

  “It is not my will.” Iyoke squeezed her husband’s hand, trembled at her sister’s anger. “The people will it so.”

  Her husband corrected his love, turned his eyes to behold his wife’s face. “Your own people, the people of the eastern lands, will it so.”

  “A people that would have been my people,” Sembele said under her breath.

  “My love”—Prince Hans sat at his wife’s left.—“Am I not enough?”

  “Enough,” she said, fuming. “But not your kingdom.”

  Hans stood up, bowed to those at the table and walked outside. Nunu also rose. The King of the eastern lands clasped his hands called for more wine and Queen Mizake kept on eating.

  “My sister, Iyoke”—Nunu extended her hand.—“come and wonder at your kingdom with me.”

  Iyoke stood up, bowed to her new royal parent who smiled upon her, bowed to her mother Queen Mizake. Slowly she let loose her husband’s hand.

  This is what Nunu said as they walked the ship, chrysanthemums and lilies to be transplanted in the royal gardens swaying near their feet. “For one year, I’ve been married to Prince Biodun.”

  “A blessing, Sister,” Iyoke answered.

  “I was not as lovely as Sembele,” Nunu continued, “and the wealth of our kingdom did not hang upon my back, arms, ankles, and neck. But I was a princess so a husband was easily found.”

  “True words, Sister,” Iyoke peered into the mental distance at the land that had never quite been her native home.

  “Biodun is a handsome, affable man,” Nunu said. “His black skin is velvet as the night. His eyes shine with wisdom. His lips utter wit. True, he is proud, but he is third in line to rule a great southern kingdom.”

  “You are truly blessed, My Sister,” Nunu said, her eyes shining with happiness for her sister.

  But tears fell from Nunu’s eyes. She spoke slowly. “Blessed, but not loved.”

  Iyoke hugged her sister. “He will learn to love you yet, Sister. Your kindness and shrewdness will make it so.”

  “Perhaps he will love me for those few charms I have. If love comes, it comes. But in whatever state I am, I have learned to be satisfied. Biodun is allowed a harem. Limitless. As many as the stars if he wishes. Doubtless he will find many lovelier than I who will rejoice his heart and perhaps will apportion less and less of his heart to me as the years go by. But you and I are quite armed against being unloved. Our father and mother have taught us well, have they not?”

  “They have, Sister.”

  Although her sister spoke bitter words, Iyoke could not help but see the wisdom in them. Both Nunu and Iyoke had lived in the shadow of their well-favored, much-honored sister. Their spirits had not been honed to praise, or their souls to expecting greatness. Iyoke turned her inward gaze from her ancestors’ homeland toward the open sea. Home, her new home, awaited her. There, perhaps, she would be loved. But if her new people did not love her, that hardly mattered: Jaejoong loved her.

  “Still, a princess is a princess,” Nunu continued. “Unloved though she may have been. Therefore, I have told Biodun to remember from whom I am descended—great queens, noble kings. Moreover, I am his first wife. It is understood—come what may, whoever he may love—I am always to be his chief wife.”

  “Not a small thing.” Iyoke pulled her silken mantle across her shoulder against the wildly-blowing southern wind.

  “And if fortune blesses Biodun by killing his older brother—”

  “My sister! No!” Iyoke shouted. “It cannot be.”

  Nunu raised an eyebrow. “Can it not? My husband is evil, My Sister.”

  “But do not match his evil, Sister.” Her worried frown became a burst of laughter that sounded like ripples in a pond. “And yet I do not believe you could ever match his evil. Others, perhaps, allow evil to taint them. But your soul is too pure to be tainted thus. Indeed, I believe you would do all you can to prevent his evil if you had the choice.”

  “All I can, but no more,” Nunu answered. “For I will not give my life to protect another. Even if I am as noble as you say, don’t the most noble learn at last to protect themselves?”

  “I have heard it said, Sister.”

  Nunu hugged her sister’s shoulder. “Do not fear. I will be quite safe. I have lived too long among intrigue to be taken by surprise. And while our mother is yet alive, how shall he kill me? The kingdom of Tentuke is his near neighbor and all mother’s allies surround him. No, My Sister, I shall be quite safe. So, yes, it appears that I will become chief queen of his land.” Now, Nunu also laughed. “And you are to become a queen of a great land, yourself. Therefore, forget our sister’s jealousy and think on future love and future greatness. There are lands which honor us, even if our own people treat us ill.” She turned toward the imperial cabin where the nuptial festivities continued. Through the doors, Iyoke could see robed performers celebrating her love story in dance. “Let us look ahead at future joys and future loves, for that is all we have. I only warn you. Beware! The time will come when this mother of ours dies. And then, beware. For our sister will then be queen of her own land. And if she remains unchanged, this raging of hers will grow. And before a sister’s jealousy, who is able to stand?”

  #

  Long, long, Queen Mizaka lived. And while she lived, the sisters remained at peace with each other. Hans’ little country was as small as ever. His father the king still reigned, but that mattered little. Sembele was wife of a third son and would never become queen. In the southern kingdom, after several extraordinarily sudden deaths in the line of succession, Biodun became king and Nunu, chief wife, became Queen. In Iyoke’s kingdom, the old king grew old but still reigned and Prince Jaejoong and his princess lived in the winter palace on the edge of the great salt sea. They had one sorrow only: In their twenty years together, Iyoke had borne only daughters. It was not like Tentuke where queens had ruled freely and equally with men. Several times, the lords of the imperial palace suggested Jaejoong take a concubine. He did not. Instead, the prince betrothed his eldest daughter to the son of his younger brother. Thus, he forfeited his kingdom for love of his wife.

  At last, news came to the eastern kingdom that Queen Mizaka lay dying. Trembling, grieving, Iyoke prepared her heart. Throughout her marriage, she had exiled herself from her homeland. When she thought of the south country, she remembered only the belittling voiceless scorn of her kinsmen and their mocking jibes about being a changeling. But she now cast aside her fear and she and Prince Jaejoong set sail. When she arrived at her native land, her people bowed low to greet her.

  The queen lay in her golden chamber dying, the royal ebony staff in her hand. She spoke to her three daughters, all three having rushed to her side. “My husband
awaits me in the sky realm. This staff weighs heavy in hands and now I pass it and all it represents to the one who will rule my kingdom.”

  “Oh mother,” her daughters said, “Oh mother, do not die.”

  “Death comes to all,” the queen answered. “Iyoke, my youngest, you are happy. When you were young, I feared the kingdom might become yours. You would have ruled with equity, but you do not love your people. Nor they you. Stay, then, in the far eastern lands, you and your daughters. This is not the land for you.”

  Iyoke bowed. She did not say: Mother, I have loved our people. Queen Mizake would not have believed her. She only wept and said, “Great Queen, Dear Mother, do not die.”

  “Die I must.” Queen Mizake turned her eyes to her second daughter. “Nunu, your kingdom is near at hand. A stone’s throw. And you have daughters and sons. In your husband’s kingdom, men rule. Rather, boys with little knowledge and even fewer morals rule. I had thought to give my nation to you, for one of your daughters. But I fear all your children have acquired your husband’s ways. Like their father’s fathers, they will war among themselves, leaving you no offspring. No offspring, I said. For your boys will kill each other. And your daughters will learn the power of poisons. It is the way of their father’s people.”

  Nunu straightened her back, looked askance at her dying mother. “I will remember your words, Mother,” she said. “But let not a curse upon my children be the last words on your lips.”

  The queen smiled half to herself then spoke to Sembele, her favored daughter. “Dear Daughter, Great Princess Sembele, you are married to the least of princes in the least of lands. It is not the life I had planned for you. To you should have come greater honor, greater tribute. But you rejected my warnings and clung to the boy. And you added stupidity to stupidity by envying Iyoke although the choice was yours. Yet, you are my beloved daughter, my dearest joy. A large kingdom you desire, therefore a large kingdom you will have. Live here among your own people—you, Prince Hans, and your children. Let the past rest. My kingdom – your native land—is not as great as you could have had if you had chosen Jaejoong, but it is not small, either.”