by Layton Green
Lucky folded his arms and chuckled.
“Our business concerns you as well,” Nya said, “and it’s not a laughing matter.”
“May I ask what business of mine has brought such a lovely girl to my doorstep? Perhaps you are seeking work?”
Nya’s eyes narrowed. “The business of yours that brought us here,” she snapped, “is the kidnapping, perhaps murder, of a foreign dignitary. Not to mention numerous violations of the law I noticed in your deplorable excuse for an establishment.”
“If you were here to arrest me,” Lucky said, “there would be more men, and I would be arrested. I would not be looking at these two murungu and a woman. So let us find two more chairs, and you and your friend can join my discussion with Mr. Grey.”
“Perceptive. I’m not here to arrest you. My job is to oversee this man’s search for a missing United States diplomat. My ultimate employer—I think you know of who I speak—also has an interest in those who pose a potential threat to his regime, and he’s currently concerned about practitioners of a certain seditious Yoruba cult which he feels jeopardizes the authority of the ruling party in the villages. I believe everyone in this room understands the consequences of my employer’s disfavor.”
She stopped to canvas the room, resting her eyes on each and every member of Lucky’s entourage, saving her longest glare for Lucky. Lucky didn’t flinch, but his men cast uneasy glances at Nya and muttered to each other.
She’s good, Grey thought.
“The only reason you and your men are still alive,” she continued, “is because I have not yet given my report. If you’re disposed of prematurely, I fear Mr. Addison will never be found, and that will reflect on me. Tell me where he is. Upon his immediate release, and that of any others your cult might be holding, I will arrange for your deportation rather than your disappearance.”
Lucky’s men grew more agitated. Lucky tried to act unperturbed, but some of his supreme self-confidence had melted away. “You come into my club and falsely accuse me? Do you know who I am, and who I know? Do you know who is, as we speak, enjoying the pleasures of my establishment?”
“I assure you that whomever you may know, whomever you have bribed, they are not as powerful as who I know.”
“Are you sure about that, Ms. Mashumba?”
Nya smiled. “Are you?”
Lucky folded his arms. “I do not know who or what you know. But I will find out. I suggest you take your giant and your cub and leave before I change my mind. As for my discussion with Mr. Grey—it is no matter,” he said, winking at Grey. “He will remember our little chat and behave himself. If he does not, then he is not the clever man I took him for.”
Grey stood. Before he walked out, he leaned in towards Lucky. “We have unfinished business.”
“I do hope so,” Lucky murmured.
25
No one uttered a word on the short drive to the Meikles. When they arrived at Viktor’s suite Grey and Nya took a seat in the two great armchairs, and Professor Radek excused himself.
Grey opened and closed his hand. Nothing was broken, but he needed ice for the swelling. He grimaced and said nothing.
“What were you thinking going in there alone?” Nya said. “I told you to wait.”
“You were late.”
“I had pressing business.”
“More pressing than this?” Grey said.
“I apologize. But that’s no excuse to disobey my orders.”
“Your orders? I don’t work for you, Nya.”
“You do on this case. Grey-” she put her fingers to her temple and sighed—”Lucky is a very dangerous man.”
“If he’s so dangerous why didn’t you bring more men and take him in for questioning? I thought that’s why we were going?”
A spasm of frustration balled her features. “That’s why I was late.”
“I don’t get—” He cut himself off. “You couldn’t get any support, could you?”
“Lucky spoke the truth when he said he has powerful friends. I could bring him down for the disappearances, but I would need hard evidence. Very hard.”
“The Club isn’t hard enough?”
“We both know that’s not why we want him.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Grey muttered. “So you were bluffing back there?”
“Completely.”
“Do you think he’s the N’anga?”
“I doubt very strongly this man is the N’anga,” Viktor said, returning to the room with another chalice cupped in his hands. He offered Grey and Nya a drink.
Grey waved him off. “How can you be sure?”
“One is rarely sure about anything. But I expect our N’anga to be older, more arrogant even than Lucky—a man who’s become a god among his worshippers. He would never stoop so low as to manage a brothel.”
“Maybe it’s a front.”
“Possible. But doubtful.”
“Then we’re back where we started,” Grey said.
“Perhaps, perhaps not,” Viktor said. “Tell me what you witnessed at the ceremony. I wished to attend myself and experience it firsthand, but I had to fly to Cape Town on an urgent matter.”
A brief suspicion touched Grey, but he scoffed it away. Viktor had just been called in on this case, and the N’anga had been here for months. It was just that Viktor was so enigmatic, and all this talk of powerful personalities… Grey had to admit he could see Viktor standing behind one of those terrible masks, sweeping his arms across a circle of fog.
But the more likely explanation, Grey thought, was that after his urgent matter, Viktor had seen to the two empty bottles of absinthe Grey had noticed behind the door.
Viktor said little as Grey and Nya related the bizarre events from the ceremony. He pursed his lips at times, asked for clarifying details here and there, sipped his muse with crossed legs. As they finished he leaned back, his face both thoughtful and troubled.
Nya bent forward. “What do you make of it?”
“Some of it puzzles me. This sacrifice you described involving the goat, I’m familiar with. It’s a particularly cruel ritual, practiced only by the most experienced babalawos. It’s called the two hundred cuts.”
Nya shivered. “I’ve never seen anything like that.”
“You’re familiar with the term “scapegoat?” In traditional Juju, once a year the babalawo would perform the two hundred cuts on a goat in the village center. The villagers would gather and symbolically transfer their sins to the goat, which the babalawo would sacrifice to the Orisas to appease them for the transgressions of the villagers.”
“Sounds familiar,” Grey said.
“The similarities to Western religion end there. As we discussed, Juju has an enormous range of spells, rituals, and sacrifices designed to influence the spiritual world. Some of them deal with benign spiritual forces, but many serve to appease the malevolent ones, as they’re the ones most dangerous to humans.”
His expression turned grim. “This is where the theology of the Yoruba can lead to rather disturbing justifications for their sacrificial practices. The Yoruba believe the malevolent Orisas are appeased by acts of wickedness and evil. The more suffering involved in a ritual sacrifice, the more success it will have. Pain and blood are considered the most pleasing elements of ceremonies involving these Orisa.”
Grey tried to wrap his mind around the logic. It made a twisted sort of sense, he supposed, if one believed in it.
Grey had equal respect for the common man and woman in all cultures, and he was sure that if he lived in Nigeria he would have felt the same. Most people were just trying to get by the best they could.
Religion, however, was another matter.
“The two hundred cuts is one of the most demanding rituals in Juju. The priest expertly slices off pieces of flesh, until by the two hundredth cut the flesh has been stripped from much of the body. The sacrifice is kept conscious the entire time, and salts and oils are used on the exposed flesh to increase the pain quoti
ent. The ceremony ends when the babalawo slits the throat of the sacrifice. The sacrifice is sent to the Orisa in the most extreme agony imaginable.”
Grey remembered the flayed remains of the goat, and his stomach churned. He pushed the memory away.
Nya’s face contorted in revulsion. “It was the most horrific thing I’ve ever seen.”
“I warned you Juju has its dark side.”
Grey said, “What do you think they gave us at the end?”
“Likely palm wine laced with a hallucinogen or psychotropic. Babalawos are expert herbologists. I’m sure you’ve heard stories of zombies created by the pharmaceutical concoctions of Vodou priests? Such practices were developed ages ago by the Yoruba and Fong.”
Nya fingered her cross. “What are these babalawos capable of?”
“No one, at least outside of Yorubaland, really knows.”
Viktor swirled his drink, and Grey watched his face. But he wants to know, Grey thought.
“The ritual of the two hundred cuts, as terrible as it seems, is part of traditional Juju. The events you described after that… Do prdele! I wish I’d been able to accompany you.”
“Best guess?” Grey said.
“The captive was likely drugged, although that doesn’t explain the bizarre behavior once he entered the circle. And the disappearance—you’re sure he didn’t exit on the other side of the circle? If the fog was opaque as you say, how could you tell?”
“The circle was small compared to the larger circle where the N’anga was standing, maybe twenty feet in diameter as opposed to fifty,” Grey said. “I couldn’t see inside the smaller circle, but I could see the torches and the bodyguards on the other side, all the way around. He didn’t escape that way. I’m positive.”
“I was watching for that very thing,” Nya said. “No one except the captive entered the smaller circle, and no one came out.”
“Judging by the way the crowd reacted,” Grey said, “they didn’t think the captive left the circle either.”
Viktor gave a slow nod.
“When he was trapped in the circle,” Grey continued, “he was trying to leave and couldn’t. Like there was some sort of invisible barrier. I don’t know what the hell happened, but he wasn’t acting.”
Viktor stroked his chin. “The enclosed circle is for the protection of whoever is on the outside. Blood is used to help seal the circle with metaphysical energy, trapping the summoned entity. The only time I’ve heard of an animal or a human being placed inside the circle is when a sacrifice is being offered. Understand this is something from the pages of black magic, demonology, ancient Kabbalah—as far as I’m aware, it has no place in Juju. Perhaps the N’anga has expanded his repertoire.”
Everyone was quiet. Grey found this talk of circles and summoning rituals absurd, but still… something had happened at that ceremony.
Viktor jerked his head as if shaking off an unpleasant thought. “You mentioned chanting. First with the arrival of the N’anga, and again after the two hundred cuts.”
“They were chanting for the N’anga when he came in,” Nya said. “And later, after the… goat… they were chanting another word. I didn’t recognize it. I’m not even sure what language it was. It sounded like “Eh-shoo.’”
“That was it,” Grey said. “E-su.”
“Esu,” Viktor corrected in a soft voice.
“You know it?” Nya asked.
“It’s a name. A Yoruba name. One you won’t hear many Yoruba speak aloud.”
Grey frowned. “That’s a common theme in this religion.”
“In Juju names have power. N’anga is not the true name of this man, of course, just as Esu is not the true name of the entity to which it refers. But the Yoruba believe the utterance of a name—even a “second” name, so to speak—alerts those in tune with the spirit world. They avoid mentioning the names of babalawos or spiritual entities unless they want their attention.”
“All of this is so unreal,” Grey said. He put his hands behind his head and let out a slow breath. “But it’s like you said. These people believe in it. So Esu’s a name? Who is it?”
“Esu is one of the more powerful Orisa. Some believe the most powerful.”
“So that ceremony, and probably the one Addison attended, was some type of worship service,” Grey said. “For Esu.”
“Esu isn’t an Orisa that is worshipped in the traditional sense. Placate or appease would be more accurate. Chanting the name of an Orisa is considered a dangerous practice, reserved for those Orisas that are more favorably inclined towards mankind. I don’t know of any Yoruba rituals that call out the name of Esu.”
“Why not?” Nya asked. “How is Esu different from other Orisas?”
Viktor cradled his glass. “While many of the Orisa are believed to be capricious, Esu is… perhaps craven is the best term. The sacrifices he’s believed to desire, the depravity he demands—a theological description of the Yoruba concept of Esu would be a lengthy and irrelevant conversation. Simply put, Esu is the Orisa most synonymous with the Western concept of the Devil.”
26
“I think I’ll take you up on that drink,” Grey said. “Scotch, if you have it.”
Viktor fixed Grey a highball, and a spreading warmth eased his battered nerves. “I skipped the diplomatic sensitivity training on Yoruba devil worship,” Grey said, “so you’re going to have to fill me in.”
“You now have more first-hand knowledge than do I. But I’ll fill in what I can. Most practitioners of Juju, at one time or another, partake in a ritual involving Esu—to pacify him. It’s also common to find a statue of Esu in a doorway, or on a mantle, to frighten other evil spirits away.”
“I don’t think they were trying to pacify anyone,” Grey said.
“I believe you witnessed something else entirely. There are many different sects within Juju, each focused on worshipping a different Orisa, or an ancestor. It’s rather like Hinduism in that regard, to some extent Catholicism. The Esu cults are the worst, the most perverse and extreme. Thankfully, they are rare. Until today, I believed them to be only a rumor in the modern era.”
“And the man in the circle?” Nya asked. “What happened to him?”
Viktor opened his mouth, paused, then closed it. “I don’t yet know.”
“Why?” she said. “Why would anyone partake in such a monstrous practice?”
“You know the answer to that, Nya. For the same reasons other religious ceremonies, all over the earth, are held. To petition higher beings to fulfill the desires of man.”
“I don’t know how he pulled it off,” Grey said. “And I don’t really care. He’s just a man. I’m not saying he’s not dangerous—I’ve seen him handle a knife—but I’ll take my chances with the magic tricks.”
“Understand this—I do not deal in superstition, or rumor, or fantasy, except as concerns an effect, real or imagined, on practitioners. But as I said before, there are documented cases of babalawos performing acts that would be labeled as impossibilities by the Western world. There are two explanations for these phenomena. The first is that the victim believes so strongly in the powers of the babalawo that this belief, literally and seemingly miraculously, causes the babalawo’s “spell” to become a reality. An extreme example of psychosomatic affectation.”
“If I hadn’t seen the damn thing myself,” Grey said, “I’d be laughing right now.”
“I’m afraid there’s not much debate as to the occurrences themselves. And scientists have witnessed only a small portion of true Juju practice.”
“And the second explanation?” Nya asked.
Viktor shrugged. “One must account for all possibilities. The second explanation is that they’re real.”
“Harris is going to love this,” Grey muttered.
Nya hid her disconcertment well, but Grey could see a shadowing of her eyes, a twitch in her hand gestures. There was something else in her mannerisms Grey had been trying to pin down, something more ingrained than even he
r fear. He thought he glimpsed it now, struggling to break free, forcing its way to the pedestal of her emotions. He thought it determination, an adamantine resolve concerning this case.
“I’m not convinced Lucky isn’t the N’anga,” Nya said. “But I agree we should pursue all avenues. Professor, what do you suggest?”
“I’m not sure attending another ceremony is the wisest course at this juncture, now that he knows who you are. Not unless you’re prepared to arrest him.”
“Unfortunately I’ll need strong evidence—physical evidence—before I can convince my superiors to attend one of the ceremonies. If we can even find another one.”
“Then try to find where the N’anga lives, where he goes during the day. See if you can uncover a name, a residence, a haunt. Anything that might draw us closer.”
“Is it possible Addison was just a random sacrifice after all?” Grey said. “And is there a possibility he’s still alive?”
“If he still lives, he might wish he were dead. And no, I don’t think he was chosen at random. Addison is too connected, too risky—frankly, too white and American—to have been a random selection.”
“I’ve been searching for a link,” Grey said, “and Lucky is as far as I’ve gotten. There’s something to that angle, I just don’t know what.”
“Unless Lucky is the N’anga,” Viktor said, “I doubt he knows why Addison was chosen. We need to talk to someone who knows Juju better than I. This Doctor Fangwa you told me about—Nya, can you arrange another meeting?”
“I believe so.”
“Even better,” Grey said.
“We’ve been over this,” Nya said. “He has an alibi.”
“So he already has an alibi for the ceremony we attended?”
“I haven’t had a chance to ask him about Friday night.”
Grey snorted.
“Regardless, I’d like to speak with him,” Viktor said. “He may be our only insight into why Addison was taken.”