by Marlon James
Oh, you have nothing to say. You will push me no further.
Yes, it is as you say, I was in Mitu for four years and five moons. Four years from when we left the boy in the Mweru. I was there when this rumor of war turned into a real war. What happened there is something you can ask the gods. Ask them why your South has not been winning this war, but neither the North.
The child is dead. There is nothing else to know. Otherwise, ask the child.
Oh you have nothing left to ask? Is this where we part?
What is this? Who comes in this room?
No, I do not know this man. I have never seen his back or his face.
Don’t ask me if I recognize you. I do not know you.
And you, inquisitor, you give him a seat. Yes, I can see he is a griot. Do you think he brought the kora to sell it? Why would this be the time for praise song?
It is a griot with a song about me.
There are no songs about me.
Yes, I know what I said before, I was the one who said it. That was a boast—who am I that I would be in any song? Which griot makes a song before you pay them? Fine, let him sing; it is nothing to me. Nothing he sings I will know. So sing.
Thunder god mystic brother
blessed with tongue, and the gift of kora.
It is I, Ikede, son of Akede,
I was the griot that lived in the monkeybread tree.
I been walking many days and many nights, when across it I come,
the tree near a river
I climb up and hear the parrot, and the crow, and the baboon
I hear children
laughing, screaming, fighting, making gods hush
and there up top lie a man on a rug.
What kind of man is this?
not like any man in Weme Witu, Omororo, or even Mitu.
And he said,
are you looking for beauty?
I said I think I found it
And hark, the man laugh and he say
the women of Mitu find me so ugly,
when I take the children to the markets they say
Look at that ugly family, look at those wretched beasts,
but that one khita, ngoombu, haamba he have hair like a horse.
But I say, beautiful wise bountiful women
plump in bosom and wide in smile
I am not a zombi, I am pretty like kaolin clay
and they laugh so hard, they give me doro beer and play in my hair
and I tell you, in none of these things I find any offense.
And I say to him
This tree, do you live in it?
He say, There is no you, only we and we are a strange house.
Stay with us as long as you wish.
When I climb through a hole and sit in the spot
I see he coming, bringing back meat
I say, Who is the man so sour with the eye of a wolf?
Who curse him so?
But children little, children big, children who is but air
run down the tree and stampede him
and don’t care that he cursing would scare the owl.
And they jump up on him and sit on his head, and rest under his arm
And I thinking these children have big feelings for this man,
and the sour face gone.
And the Wolf Eye climb up the top and stop when he see me,
and keep climbing.
And when he reach the top, he see the other man,
and they put lips together, and open their mouths,
I know.
The one with the wolf eye, he is the one
who says, The night is getting old, why are you not sleeping?
The sun is in the sky, why are you not waking?
Food is ready
when are you going to eat it?
Did the gods curse me and make me a mother?
No he blessed me and made you my wife,
the one called Mossi say,
and the children laugh, and the Wolf Eye scowl
And scowl, and scowl, and scowl into a laugh.
I was there, I see it.
And I see it when they chase all the children out and say go,
go to the river now,
and stay ’til the sun start to shift
And when they all gone, they think I gone too
For Mossi speak the Wolf Eye own tongue
Se ge yi ye do bo, he say
Se ge yi ye do bo
Let us love each other
For they two, they grab each other and kiss lip
then kiss tongue,
then kiss neck and nipple
and lower.
And one was the woman, and one was the man,
and both was the woman, and both was the man,
and neither was neither.
And the Wolf Eye, he rest his head in Mossi lap.
Mossi, he be rubbing the Wolf Eye’s chest.
They just stay there looking at each other,
eye studying eye.
Face at rest
maybe they sharing a dream.
One day Wolf Eye call them all together.
Children, he say, come out from the river
and present yourselves
you not raised by the jackal or the hyena.
And each child present me his name,
but their names I have all forgotten.
This is what Wolf Eye say.
He say, Mossi I am Ku,
and a Ku man can only be one kind of man
and Mossi said to him, How are you not a man
what do I grab between the legs
Mossi make joke
Wolf Eye not making joke.
He say
I been running, I been hiding, I been looking for
something that I don’t know, but I know I looking for it
And I don’t know, but every Ku find it
but there is blood between me and the Ku
and I could never go back.
So he call the Gangatom
And the Gangatom chief say, Nobody ever wait so long,
I’ve been waiting all my life, Wolf Eye say.
And Wolf Eye pull his tunic and say,
Look at me, look where there is woman,
And when I cut it off I will be a man
and Mossi he catch a fright, for he think if this is what make him love him,
But Wolf Eye say, Everything between me and you,
eastern man, is not down there, but up here,
he say and point to his heart.
And the chief say,
What you asking for not old,
what you asking for new.
You is Ku
and you have no father.
In this way you enrage the gods.
Says the Wolf Eye:
The ceremony to become a man
is in praise of the gods, and so
how could any god be mad.
So Wolf Eye,
The Gangatom prick the cow and spill the blood
in a bowl
Wolf Eye drink one then two
he drink and wipe his mouth.
The next day come,
For him to jump the bulls.
They line them up, twenty strong
plus ten more for he take too late to be a man
You have to run on the backs of bulls and you cannot fall,
For if you fall, the gods laugh
So Wolf Eye,
He naked in oil and shea butter.
Then praise the gods, he run
&
nbsp; bull back to bull back, one two three four
five six seven more.
And the people cheer and rejoice
The elder say all these moons you in the in-between place
and there is no shame,
but middle is nowhere.
But some of the elders, they say
he not coming from the enki paata.
He not been wandering for four moons
as a boy supposed to do before he become man
where on him be the mark that he kill the great lion?
And the chief, he say, Look on him
and you see the mark of him killing lion and everything else.
So the elders, they sit quiet, though some still grumble,
and the chief, he say to Wolf Eye
You never wander for four moons
So stay for four nights
in the open and with the cows, sleep in grass, stand on dirt.
And on the five morning
they come for him
and they bathe him from the bucket, with an ax head in it
to cool the water
And now as be the custom, the men say,
big man fitting in boy skin
to become a man, but look he is a fool.
As be the custom, the men say,
look at him little boy kehkeh, it not ready to be a man yet.
He can’t work a woman koo, better he dig an anthole.
As be the custom, the men say.
Is that why you have husband and not a wife?
Is you the wife?
Strength now, Wolf Eye. Anger is weakness.
So in come the cutter ready for the event
sharp with one knife
the Wolf Eye, he have no mother,
so the chief wife, she be the mother.
She send ox hide for him to sit on
and that way not shame the gods.
They lead him, yes they lead him
past the cattle kraal
past the houses of great elder
up to a little hill where on top is a hut
and he say
Kick the knife, and we will kill you.
Run from the knife
And we disown you
The grand cutter, he take chalk and mark a line
from forehead to nose.
The grand cutter, he take milk and pour all over the Wolf Eye.
The grand cutter, he grab the slain and pull, and pull
he say, One cut!
Kick the knife and we will kill you.
Run from the knife and we will disown you.
He say, One cut!
And the Wolf Eye, he grab the cutter arm
and he say, No.
Listen to me, he say No.
The man in the mountain and the women in the river
hear a whisper that drop like thunder
and everybody quiet.
The Wolf Eye say, The sum of my days
is all about cutting the woman out
Cut her out of me
cut her out of my mother
cut her out of all who walk and carry the world
And he look down at him maleness
crowned at the top by femaleness
and say
What in this make wrong,
how is this not the will of the gods
and if it’s not the will of the gods
then it is the will of me
he look at Mossi and say
You tell me I cut all woman out
from my mother to whoever pass the house
when it is I who leave my mother
and I who would now cut away my own self
and with this he get up
and with this he leave the knife
and he walk away
and the people silent for he still a fierce man
But Mossi trouble him more
Soon as they come back to the tree
this he say,
Stop thinking you have peace
you know what I mean
and Wolf Eye say he don’t know. So stop
and Mossi say, Why tell me stop if you don’t know
And in this way Mossi nag Tracker
And nag and nag and boy he nag
and Tracker raise his hand to strike Mossi
and Mossi say, Nobody has ever loved you finer
but lay that hand on me and you will see it cut off
and shoved in your mouth.
Fine, Tracker say, I will go
just to stop you from being the cockatoo.
And the day come when he turn to go
And he stagger, and he fall, and he say
Come with me or I will fall in the bush
And Mossi go, and the children go
and even me go for Tracker say, Don’t act as if you
don’t belong to this house
And in this way
Tracker and his kin set off for his mother
What a sight we must be in Juba!
But that is not the story
For Tracker stagger ten times before we get to the gate.
And Mossi hold him up ten times strong
So they get to the door
and a girl open the door who look like him
that is what me and Mossi think
And she don’t say nothing, but she let them in
and jump out of the way when the Ball Boy
roll through, and the Giraffe Boy had to duck
and in a blue room
she sit
looking old and weak but her eyes look young
When did he die? Tracker ask.
When a grandfather was supposed to die, she say.
And he look at her like he have something to say
And his mouth quiver like he have something to say
And Mossi start to move we out of the room
like he have something to say
But Tracker stagger again and this time he fall
And she stoop down and touch his cheek
One of your eyes didn’t come from me, she say
and what come out his mouth was a wail
And he wail for his mother
And he wail for his mother
And night come for day
And day come for night
And still he wail.
Hear me now,
I stay in the monkeybread tree ten and nine moons.
The day I was leaving the children cry,
and Mossi hang his head down low
and even the Wolf Eye said, But why do you leave your home?
But a man like me, we are like the beast,
we must roam,
or we die.
Listen to me now.
The day before I leave,
A black Leopard come to the tree.
Stop him.
Stop him now. Stop him or I will find a way to end everything this very night. And then you will know nothing about how anything ended.
I will tell you what happened next.
I will tell you everything.
6
DEATH WOLF
Mun be kini wuyi a lo bwa.
—
TWENTY-THREE
I want it known that you made me do this. I want to see it written in a tongue that I recognize. Show me. I will not speak until you show me. How will you write it? Will you note what I said, or just say, The prisoner said this? Stop talking about truth—I fed you truth all along, but as I said before, what you want is stor
y. I have given you many, but I will give you a final one. Then you can talk to her and send us to burn.
In this story I see her. She walked like somebody was following her.
Why do you stop me?
Did you not hear the griot?
The Leopard came to visit me and seduced me with talk of adventure. Of course he was all cunning—he is a leopard. And I went with him to find a fat and stupid man who sold gold and salt and smelled of chicken shit, who had vanished. But he had not vanished. Fuck the gods, inquisitor, which story do you wish to hear? No I will not tell you both. Look at me.
I will not tell you both.
So.
She walked as people who think they are followed walk. Looking ahead when she reached the mouth of each lane, looking behind when she reached the foot of it. Slipping from shadow to shadow, as she moved down a still street. Floating overhead the raw burn of opium, and flowing on the ground, the overspill of shit water. She tripped and grabbed her cargo tight, ready to brace for the fall rather than let it go. The sky had a ceiling in this place, a hundred paces high in some parts, with holes burrowed through to let in the white light of the sun and the silver light of the moon. She stooped below a torch beside a door, shifted underneath, stood up again, and scraped her back along the wall like a crab, to the corner.
The Malangika. The tunnel city, somewhere west of the Blood Swamp but east of Wakadishu, about three hundred paces below the ground and as big as a third of Fasisi. Hundreds of years ago, before people wrote accounts, the first people from above had a quarrel with the gods of sky over rain, and the gods of earth gave them this place to hide from sky wrath. They dug wide and deep, and the caverns rose high to hold buildings of three, four, and even five floors. Columns from chopped-down trees and stone to brace the tunnels so that they never collapsed, though two sections collapsed twice. Throughout the tunnels, builders carved out holes above to let the sun and moon light the street, like the lamps of Juba. People in the Malangika were the true first ones to unlock the secret of metals, some say. But they were selfish and greedy, and became the first blacksmith kings. They died holding on to their iron and silver. And some working other kinds of art and craft dug even deeper. But the people of this city soon died out, and the city itself was forgotten. And only in a place forgotten could a new city arise, a city with no notice, a city that was a market. A place that sold what could not be sold aboveground, not even at night. The secret witches market.
The market cleared out. Somebody had woven powerful magic to make everyone forget the street. Most lanes showed the backside of inns where nobody stayed, taverns where nobody left, and sellers of things of all kinds of uses. But in this lane darkness hung low. She walked many steps before stopping, looking around as two spirits pulled themselves from a wall and came at her. Another rose out of the ground, stumbling as if drunk. In the quick, she pulled the amulet from between her breasts. The spirits squealed and backed away; the ground spirit went back under. All the way down the lane, she held out the amulet, and voices squawked, muttered, and hissed. Their hunger was huge, but not bigger than the fear of the nkisi around her neck. Through the mist, at the end of the lane, she pressed herself against a fresh mud wall on the right, then turned around the corner right into my blade.