Tribal Dawn: Blood-and-Shadow (Volume One)

by Cassie Wolf

  “Where is my son?” Dia roared once more.

  The warriors dragged him away as he continued to yell and bellow, the realisation hitting him: there was no infant there.

  Masika could hear the shouting in the distance. The smell of herbs burnt her nostrils as she inhaled and she could feel the prickle of thread was swiftly sewing up the ache between her legs. “No,” she tried to say, but her mouth couldn’t move. She could see the robes of healers over her. “Stop,” she attempted once more. The healers spoke over each other while Dia yelled in the distance. Sensations were coming back to her. Her stomach surged with dread, the heartache of saying goodbye to her new born burning afresh. Her brother had been here. She had seen him with her own eyes, the skull helm. She was meant to be with her parents. “Stop!” she tried again.

  The healers suddenly surrounded her, the echoes of words became clearer. “Her eyes are flickering,” a male announced. But the hooded figure was soon pushed out of the way.

  Dia loomed over her. Masika tried to shake her head. His face, half crushed and the other half beaten. His breath reeked as he spoke. The touch of his fingertips on her cheeks made her want to cry, want to run.

  “Don’t worry, Masi,” his voice echoed a hundred times over in her mind. He knelt down and kissed his dry lips on her forehead. “I will never let them get you again.”

  TRIBAL DAWN: DESCENDANTS (VOLUME TWO)

  - CHAPTER ONE -

  T he auroral morning star of Father Solianga bathed the tribal village in spears of light, warming the thatch rooftops. Casting its rays over the village where, nearing two decades after the war had turned most of the buildings to piles of ash, the homes stood newly rebuilt and more robust than before. However, despite the chimes and songs being sung throughout by the villagers, the stain of defeat had never left its people. The warriors who fought on that day left behind many widows with children to be cared for, and few workers to keep the community together.

  After the chaos and destruction, the smells of decay still lurked underfoot, and the paths were still stained by the fallen and the wounded. Where the flames had tainted the soil, little could be grown to fill the stomachs of the famished and with the warriors’ deaths there was scant hunting. Most of the young died of starvation. Some of the people took their own lives instead of living in the misery that remained.

  It had been a couple of years since the suicides dwindled. The people were driven by fear under their new Chief, Dia, since his father’s body was recovered. On the night of the siege, Chieftain Jasari had been murdered some distance away by the enemy, but instead of leaving his mutilated corpse in its place, they’d dragged it all the way back to the village before intertwining it with the spine of the Chieftain’s chair - the trokhosi of a tribe.

  In every tribal community the trokhosi was the Chief’s pride and joy. A seat of prestige and power, decorated to reflect the history he sat upon. For the Blood-and-Shadow tribe, it took the appearance of an enormous skeleton, made from the bones of prisoners and enemies and joined together with thick pieces of rope. The illusion of a rib cage, created out of many victims, with a space between to sit. Jasari, however, was found with his corpse mangled into the bones. The ribs impaled his chest, the spine ripped through the back of his head and out of his mouth, his eyes were torn from their sockets. As Dia approached the corpse of his father, the trail of his intestines, split from his gut and dangling free on the ground, knocked him sick as he attempted to lift him away, each tug and twist making it worse until Jasari was nothing more than a flayed corpse.

  For Dia, it was the worst day of his life. Not only was his father so desecrated and ripped apart, also his heavily-pregnant mate was presumed dead beneath the rubble. Masika, a young woman who had been very much desired by males of the tribe, including his father. Her face was blessed with the shape of a heart, a symbol of beauty. Catlike copper-brown eyes gazed down over her straight nose, above her full, cracked bow lips. Her tattered clothes swamped her waif-thin hourglass figure and her midnight waves rested upon her bony shoulders. To Dia, she was the light at the end of the tragedies.

  When the garasums - the slaves born without acceptance or acknowledgement from their fathers - hauled her pale, lifeless body back to the charred remains of the walls, he was certain she was dead. The healers and warriors draped her on the bloodstained floor, still wrapped in ragged covers from where she had been left to die in the drizzling rain. The healers hurried to her side and from the looks on their faces, it didn’t appear they believed she would live through the trauma. From the blood leaking between her legs and layering a glistening crimson on the muddied puddles of organs and remains, it was clear that she had given birth in the wilds. What was worse, someone had attempted to stitch her wounds. Dia stayed by her side, whispering, praying and caressing her soaked locks until she spoke.

  Masika, her mind splintered into a million shadowed shards and secrets, didn’t say a word of what happened. She wouldn’t tell her mate she gave birth to a son, nor that she gave him to their exiled witch doctor Inari to take away for a better life. She had been in a state of shock, unable to utter a single word. She was ready to die that day. Inari saw it in her eyes, there was no fight left in her to bring up the child. With her heart broken, she watched as her son was taken away in the arms of the closest thing she had ever had to a father.

  Masika was one of two survivors of a devastating fire in her family home. Her parents and her four younger siblings were either crushed beneath the wooden roof beams or died from suffocation, unable to be saved. She didn’t have much memory of the event. The only thing she was certain about was that her older brother Zaki rescued her.

  Zaki was only eight years old at the time. He told her how he heard their baby sister crying when the smoke drifted beneath the door and quickly filled the room until his eyes burnt. He didn’t think twice when he lifted Masika up and managed to get outside before the wood snapped and the roof caved to the ground. For years after, the pair were called the “cursed orphans” and some believed it was Jasari’d who cast the spell. Jasari used their tragedy to his advantage and tried to tempt Zaki into selling his sister to him afterwards, but he would never let her go.

  As part of their traditions, a male would not become a man, or able to use his birth name, until he was taken out into the jungle wilds to an unknown location and made it back before a moon passed. When Zaki was six years older than every other boy in the village to take their trial, no doubt to humiliate him for as long as possible, Jasari called him to the hut to begin his. But her brother was set up to fail. With the promise that everything he owned, including Masika, would belong to the Chief if he came back late, Zaki believed he had made it on time. He was wrong. The moment he entered the guarded gates he was greeted with the sound of the hammers and axes smashing his little home into pieces.

  He would be known forever as “Brother” and nothing more. Until, that was, another Chief arrived and granted him not only the right to a new name, one that wasn’t associated with the Blood-and-Shadow, but also the binding hand of his daughter. Now known as Chieftain Atsu, he sat in his own trokhosi, still believing his sister died in the war Jasari called, living an entirely different life from those he was once forced to call his brethren.

  Masika saw her brother on that fateful day. After all the months that had gone by, she was sure she was ready to meet him, even as the enemy. But her heart raced, and her head went dizzy with joy to have him so near. When the effects of the conflict began to settle, and the remaining people worked on rebuilding, it dawned on her it was probably lucky that he never saw her. Her son, who Dia believed to be his was, in fact, Zaki’s. If he’d seen her in labour, there was no doubt in her mind that his life would be very different than the one he led now. He was not a stupid man and would have known from the moment his eyes set upon the raven-haired infant the child was his.

  Within the society of Blood-and-Shadow, it was unusual to choose a mate who wasn’t related by blood. Sinc
e the tribe settled some seven hundred years ago, every Chieftain’s mate was their sister. But it was also common for multiples of siblings to be bound to one another, each breeding over the years to make an heir who was “pure” in blood to honour the ancestors. Sometimes, in rare cases where there was only one male heir, the Chieftain was allowed to pick from within his people a “spare” mate to bind with. When the female was chosen, she would remain behind the walls of the Chieftain’s hut, kept out of sight to breed and never heard from again. This was the role Masika played to Chief Dia.

  After the trauma in which she gave birth to her infant in the jungle, the healers told the Chief it was unlikely she would be able to carry another child. She took this in her stride and believed it was punishment for her own abandonment, quietly living with the consequences. However, some fourteen years later, she was surprised when she didn’t bleed like usual. The healers confirmed she was carrying a son. She named him Nuru after a legendary warrior from her bloodline. When her son reached the age of two, she was granted the gift of life in her womb once more, a daughter named Karasi.

  As much as this was great news for Dia and Masika, Dia’s siblings became jealous, especially when his sister-mate Gugu learnt she too was having his son, Iniko, half a year later. Despite traditions, Dia had already decided he wanted his heir to be Nuru, a mighty warrior to take away the foul stain of defeat from his already badly diminished blood. His stars were read by a star-caller within the first hour after his birth, an expense which was far too lavish in times of starvation. Regardless, Nuru was known as a blessed wolf, a ferocious beast with his pack who would be respected. With the right amount of learning and training, the boy would breathe a new sense of air and authority into the dwindling tribe.

  Masika curled beneath the fur blankets on her hay bed, her stomach swollen with her third child, which was due within months. The pregnancies, while at first a blessing, were now becoming an unbearable weight she carried around, with aching feet and her back muscles going into spasm whenever she moved. As much as she loved her children, she didn’t know exactly how many more she could bear.

  “Mummy. Mummy? Mummy. Hello?” A tiny, cold finger sharply jabbed her arm, causing her to jump. “Mummy!”

  Masika frowned and she gritted her teeth behind the ache of a forced smile. She spun around to find Nuru standing there, covered in his new fur clothing head to toe. As he grew, she thanked the Mother Moon, Luaani that he’d inherited the appearance of her own family rather than the stocky, beaded-eyed look of Dia’s. In fact, the only aspect of her children which resembled him at all was their curly hair. Nuru, a midnight black like his mother, while Karasi had a tint of auburn in her curls.

  “What is it, Nuru?”

  “I need a drink and a sword.”

  Masika raised her eyebrow, perplexed by his comment, and lifted herself to sit. Nuru cleared his throat and impatiently crossed his arms. Rolling his eyes to the ceiling and not understanding why his mother was taking so long to move, he tapped his feet against the wooden floor.

  Masika stretched her neck side to side before rubbing her eyes to adjust to the morning. With the rebuilding of the Chieftain’s hut, the living spaces had been recreated with a generous number of rooms for each set of living quarters. With the walls built from sturdy oak logs, the smell of the wood and its colouring always brought a sense of cosiness within. Nearly all the panels were decorated with charcoal depictions of creatures or symbols of prayer for times of crisis. Beside her bed, the basic, broken drawers packed with fur blankets and clothes for her and her children always filled her stomach with a heaving weight of dread the moment she opened them. Every time she did, it was another reminder that she was imprisoned to breed and never do anything else to make her feel worthwhile. One of the drawings she created on an old pale sheet depicted her out in the jungle with her children, exploring the tastes and textures of the fruits or learning the dangers of the predators in the trees. She had dreamt of the day she escaped from the village for as long as she could possibly remember, but at this point, it would never be anything more than a fantasy. She settled into her life as it was and it was the only one her children knew.

  “Why do you need a sword?” Masika dared to ask. She stood up and took out her red linen dress for the day, a simple, flowing piece, comfortable for supporting her round belly.

  “I need it to cut my food.” Nuru nodded.

  She tiredly shook her head, then tapped him on the shoulder to move him out the way when a high-pitched screech ripped across the living space. Without hesitation, Masika clung onto her stomach and darted straight into the living area.

  “ARRGGHHHHHHHH, LALALALA!” The little girl’s screams came from beneath the barrel, standing out of place in the middle of the dark room. The tone squeaked and echoed within the wood, dulling the sound but still not quite enough to prevent it bursting her eardrums.

  “Kara!” Masika yelled angrily. Her feet were immediately met with damp wood underfoot and water trickling along the cracks to wet between her toes. She ran over to the barrel in the centre and threw it to the side.

  There, sat her daughter, nearing two with a big, toothy smile on her face and her auburn curls soaked. Completely naked, she was happy with the mess she’d caused. With an innocent grin, she blinked her near-black catlike eyes at her mother, as if inviting her to join in on the fun.

  Masika sat the toddler down on a chair while she ran over to the cloths on the side, trying to soak up the rapidly-spreading flood.

  “Mummy, I need a drink,” Nuru repeated.

  She let out an aggravated huff. Her unborn child decided this was the time it wanted to kick and join in with its siblings to aggravate its parent. Rubbing her lower back, she sat up. “We will go to get some more water after the garasums have brought in breakfast.”

  Her son was not happy with the response, but at least he sensed his mother’s short temper. He ran into the bedroom and picked up new clothes for his sister, dressing her to help, even if it was backwards.

  After an hour, there was a knock on the door. The jet-black sleek hair and fatigued coffee eyes of Kanzi appeared around the door with the morning meals for the family. Desperately underweight and overworked more than they had been before the war, the garasums - as much as it pained Dia to admit - were the main reason the village was still standing at all. Usually having the same restrictions as that of the spare mates, the time was too dire to keep them locked away. While a couple made escape attempts during the reconstruction, many remained to help their brethren. They were used to being bullied, pushed to the limits and working all hours of the day, so during the night when others slumbered in their hastily-made tents, they continued to build and wouldn’t stop until they were forced to by fatigue.

  Kanzi, a young girl, had been by Masika’s side since the day Jasari brought her into the hut. Her mother died during her difficult labour, so the other garasums named her after her out of respect. Now in her twenties, the years of hard work had not been kind to her. Her gaunt body was forever swamped in the faded black rags she wore. She had wrinkles around her eyes and the lack of access to bathing water made her skin flake and crumble, causing her to appear at least a decade older than she was.

  “Morning, Masika! Morning children!” She beamed, keeping the tray steady on her arm. Each dawn that came posed the same challenge of trying to keep the food in its bowls and away from the eager hands of Nuru and Karasi, who hastily attacked and grabbed at her legs as if they had never been fed.

  “Morning,” Masika mumbled, ignoring the rush of her children passing her to do their morning assault. Putting her palms before her, she struggled to rise from the floor and sit herself down in a chair, head back while she stared at the ceiling. She glanced over at Kanzi and weakly let a smile curve on her lips. The garasum was not only a servant to her, but the girl had also saved her life all those years ago when she was left in the jungle. That wasn’t enough for Dia to let them be called by their first names. Whenever sh
e and Kanzi were alone, without the children, Masika always called her by name out of respect for her only friend and saviour in the tribe.

  The tray of food finally made its way over to the table. A plate with a pyramid of golden fried pastry, coated with a glaze of thin icing and cut delicately into perfect triangles, piled on top of each other. With their sweet and delicious coconut filling, it was easily the children’s favourite and one of their more filling morning meals. Their eyes wide with wonder and nearly drooling from the corners of their mouths, their quick hands soon flashed in a blur across the table, slowly deconstructing the pyramid.

  Masika picked up a serving between her fingers. “Kara decided to hide in the water barrel.” Kanzi helped herself to one of the pieces. It had become custom over the years for the pair to share their meals. Masika never finished any of the larger servings herself.

  “She’s becoming a little explorer!” Kanzi pinched the pink flushed cheeks on the toddler. “I will refill the barrel after this.”

  Masika shook her head and rested her hand over her active, kicking stomach. “I will go. I could do with the air.”

  When she gave birth to Nuru, Dia granted her permission to walk into the village, but not anywhere near the boundary unless warriors were with her, and not for leisurely strolls, only if she needed to get something for herself or the children. This included trips to the well.

  “Where is Dia now?”

  Masika shrugged without a care. “Don’t know. He said he got a trace on someone and had to go check it a few weeks back. Didn’t tell me who or what for, just he had to deal with it himself.”

  Kanzi nodded and let the flakes of pastry crumble between her fingers, pretending not to notice Nuru’s sneaky hand cross her plate. “Let’s hope he’s not going to the Whites. We’re only just recovering from that damage.”

  Masika agreed. Dia had been on different trips over the last couple of years, but so far his arrogance had not yet led him to Atsu’s forever-seething wrath. Sometimes she wondered exactly what her brother would do if he saw her again, or Dia. She wondered if he would kill him, or her. Would he allow her to be near his tribe now? A few warriors and hunters had been killed for coming too close to his borders and added to the myths about skeletons of trespassers in the trees or piled as pyramids like the delicious breakfast before her. Whether it was true or not, she never knew and never would. Not within her breeding prison.