by Robi, Carol
“Why don’t we ask the girl, if your greatest fear is that she’ll find out that this deal was made without her knowledge,” my father surprises me by saying.
“No,” I beg of father, turning to my uncles to compel them to talk some sense to father. They don’t seem to be in league with me. I then turn to my sister.
“Tell father not to, dear sister. She’ll think I don’t love her..” However all my sister does is shake her head.
“Think of the kingdom, before you think with your heart..”
“No need to bother with that,” Nyangi’s father calls. “We won’t bother my daughter with a whisper of this nonsense. The answer is no! Any offer for my daughter’s hand in marriage is denied, if this outrageous request is attached to it.”
“It isn’t, Maga Umbe!” I call.
“Of course it is,” father rushes to say out loud, attempting to pull me down to seat by him.
“I decide what deal is good enough for you,” father mutters firmly, his teeth ground together as he speaks. “I’m the head of the family, remember?” He goes on to add, his eyes now bloodshot with anger.
“Then I renounce you,” I surprise all by saying, at first my voice weak and shaking.
“Brother!” Gati calls in alarm.
“I renounce you as my father!” I call out more firmly, sure of myself now. “I renounce my family, my claim to the throne, every title I hold, if that is the condition that I might marry her. I renounce it all, and if she still wishes to marry me, then I beg you, king of the Bagumbe, that you might let me marry her!”
The whole room is stunned into silenced by my passionate declaration. It’s outrageous, I know, but never has anything ever meant as much to me, as the desire I have to call her wife.
“Do you know what you are saying, son?” Father asks shaken.
“Yes,” I tell him resolutely. “I’m very much in my right state of mind. I have two younger brothers very capable of taking the title of crown prince. If the condition is that as prince of Nyabasi I may not have Nyangi as my wife without our debt being forgiven, and if it is her father’s decree that he’ll never agree to such an offer, then I hereby renounce my title, my name and my blood..”
“Brother would you stop that nonsense and think of what you are saying!” Gati says sharply, rising and arresting my hands, her gaze finding mine and holding it.
“You lose all!” She says, firmly shaking me. “You lose me, you lose your kingdom! You lose your family..”
“Surely my family can’t love me much if they won’t let me marry the woman I love.”
“You will cease to be a Nyabasi warrior, and even then her father might still refuse to let her marry you..”
“I hope, Maga Umbe, that you are a kinder father than mine. That you’d still let her marry me because we love each other, even if I was to be without name, title, land, or citizenship. For I’d give it all up just to call her wife.”
Nyangi’s family seems shocked. As shocked as I am. I never realised before the violence of my affections for her. Not until this moment, when the prospect of losing her looms so close.
“I.. I must say I’m stunned beyond all words. It warms me to think that my daughter might have found one who loves her as much as I do. However, prince, I can’t help but suspect this might be a ploy, a scheme to melt my heart. It is for this reason that before anything else is decided upon, I must call her and ask her what she thinks of all this.”
“She’ll think I don’t love her,” I beg of her father. “Don’t you see, if she hears that this is the deal my family and I discussed, she might think I intended to have her so as to pay our debt all along.”
“But it is the truth, son. You chose to come here with your sister, father and uncles and ask for my daughter’s hand in marriage only if I’d forgive your debt.”
“Even so, but then I was a prince. I had to do as my father king said. I’m not a prince anymore..”
“Son!” Father says sharply from my side.
“Father if I’m to leave here without the promise of Nyangi’s hand, I ask that you let me break my oath of allegiance..”
“Alright! Gods be damned, alright!” Father concedes, surprising me, though I suspect I oughtn’t to be. He does love me after all, more than he loves to be free of his debt. I’m glad to know that.
“The condition is off,” father tells his brother king, who seats back, a gleam in his eyes as he assesses me, and probably realises for the first time that I do indeed mean it when I say that I love her.
Chapter 33
My queen, soon to be, his words ring in my ears all through the long rains season, the flooded river Mara seeing to it that I don’t see him after that day.
Words that comfort me, but not enough that I don’t forget his mother and grandmother’s words. They said they’d fight him on the decision to marry me.
My queen, soon to be, are the words he’d whispered when later that afternoon we’d delivered the royal Nyabasi women back to the foot of our royal gooti, where we’d met up with the male concession again. The men seemed to be in cordial agreement, though unmistakable was the tension between the Nyabasi king and his son.
Something eventful had happened in there, but father and my brothers are tight lipped about it. Each time I ask, all they say is that it went fine.
“We settled on the price of dowry, princess,” father keeps saying in answer. “Once it’s paid, the date of your wedding will be set.”
I know that something else went down. I’ve always had a sixth sense for such things, to detect underlying tensions, but the men in my family have remained tight-lipped.
As is mother. Whatever happened, father is sure to have told mother. They confide each other in everything. But each time I ask her, all she says in answer is, “your father said it went all. That young prince does surely love you!” She’d add with an almost secretive smile.
My queen, soon to be, the words ring in my head again and again. Does he still think so after talking with his mother and grandmother? I wonder to myself as I rock my youngest brother to sleep, watching the heavy downpour outside through the window. Does he still believe those words that now haunt me, or has his mother and grandmother convinced him otherwise?
How long those days are, how slowly they draw on, the rain incessantly coming down.
The Mbura festival is soon upon us, my days spent sewing and dyeing costumes to be used by my younger siblings, nephews and nieces for the festival.
Extremely busy days we have before, during and after the festival. But even then, his words do still ring in my ears.
My queen, soon to be.
I remember the exact way he whispered those words, and the almost cheeky gleam in his eyes, and that confident smile he almost always wears. I remember how my body had burned and glowered, despite the terrible feeling that had settled in the pit of the stomach when his mother and grandmother declared that they wouldn’t accept me.
My queen, soon to be! The words still ring in my ears as the rain begins easing off and the days grow warmer.
Unlike the last rainy season, it rains just enough that it waters our seeds to germination, but doesn’t drown them that they rot.
There’s a promise in the warming, brightening air, and the clear blue skies. A promise of good things to come. I feel it, I smell it, I swear I sense it. I hear it in the songs the birds sing, which sound brighter and more cheerful than before. A great promise indeed.
It isn’t only our land that is blessed with abundance, I am too. My skirts don’t fit anymore, a thing I never thought I’d ever boast. My skirts don’t fit because my hips have widened during this rainy season. Who’d have thought? They haven’t widened to be as supple as Matinde’s, but so much so that it’s unmistakable that I’m indeed a woman. Will he see it? Will he notice it? Will he like it?
Matinde reassures me that if he loved me before, he’ll be driven wild with me now. I cried when she voiced that notion, and she’d chuckled lovingly while
embracing me. Who’d have thought I’d ever hear kind words from her? Who’d have thought she ever loved me enough to feel the necessity to voice them?
Warmer and warmer the days grow, and lower the water level of River Mara drops. The cereal on our farms develops into a lovely golden colour, and the fruits on our trees blossom and deepen in varying colours, as once again the gods bless our land.
The days grow even warmer, so much until it is finally time to resume our trips to Pride Lake. How I shiver on my zorse in anticipation to see him, and how I weep later that night when I get back home without having seen him once.
He never came! I thought he’d be looking forward to seeing me as much as I’d be to see him! Maybe his mother and grandmother managed to convince him against marrying me. Soon he’ll send a delegation to let my father know that his dowry request was too steep for them to pay, euphemism for he doesn’t wish to marry me anymore.
My queen, you’ll never be! Are the words that haunt my dreams the next couple nights.
I never intended to attend this fete, but father and my brothers wouldn’t hear of it, and mother had agreed with them.
“I don’t wish to go..”
“Nonsense! Your betrothed shall be waiting for you, and he’d think you have cold feet if you aren’t there!” Chacha had firmly said over our first meal.
“But.. you don’t even know if he’s changed his mind about marrying me!” I’d exclaimed in fear.
“Nonsense!” Father had said hastily. “That boy loves you very much!”
“How do you know? You don’t know that for certain,” I’d said in despair.
“I know that, because I’m never wrong in such matters,” father had said. “I’ll not let you cower away from your future happiness,” he’d finished in a firm resolve, and that was that.
That is how it came to be that I should be in the company of my peers at the moment, headed towards the homestead of a Bagumbe family at the easternmost tip of our kingdom, right on the edge of the river bordering us and the Nyabasi. It is why my family believes that my betrothed shall be in attendance.
If he’s still my betrothed, I remind myself, the words of my latest nightmare ringing in my ears.
My queen, you’ll never be!
What a hard struggle it is not to cower and hide with the riding beasts all night, rather than follow my peers and thereby confirm that indeed, my betrothed is not in attendance!
How hard my heart beats in my ribcage as my eyes look around, taking in all around me, searching the faces, and coming up empty, a darkness settling over me as I realise that he isn’t here.
He never came. Father was wrong. He doesn’t care for me anymore.
“My queen, soon to be!”
Chapter 34
Oh my poor heart! At this rate it shan’t survive long enough until we’re safely married.
“My prince!” I call in a whisper of disbelief as I turn his way, and my eyes meet his.
“Why do you weep, my princess?” The depth of concern in his voice as he questions this nearly breaks me, as more tears spill down my face.
He lifts his hands in a motion to brush them away, but difficult as it may be, I force myself to take a step back.
We mustn’t touch.
“My heart, tell me why you weep so?”
“I weep for you,” I confess, when I’m finally able to speak, wiping at my tears as quickly as I can, as I start to walk away to a more secluded section of the courtyard where we won’t risk been bumped into by dancing partners.
“Why do you weep for me, my love?”
“Because I thought you don’t care for me anymore..”
“Nonsense! What utter nonsense you dare utter!” He says with violent passion.
“I.. ‘tis because I’m a stupid girl is why,” I let him know.
“I love you, I want you to always know that. And if you ever forget, I need you to ask your father or brothers. They know just how much!” He states, surprising me.
“They do seem awfully sure of it,” I tell him now, my tears starting to dry up, as I look into his gleaming eyes. “It was only this morning as I doubted your love that they reassured me. I thought it so odd that they should be so sure. What has them so sure, my prince?”
“We men have a form of telepathic..” He draws off into laughter at the face I now make.
“Alright, alright!” He says chuckling. “Let’s just say I did something to convince them.”
“What?”
“I’m not going to tell.”
“My prince..”
“You may also call me Makena.”
“I can’t, you know I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“You know why not. Terming you my prince is taking it too far already. It wouldn’t be proper to call you by your first name.”
“And why must we conform ourselves to what is proper or not?”
“Surely you know it better than anyone else that we just must. It’s rightly so. Custom dictates it.”
“And do you always do as custom dictates?” He asks dangerously low, drawing closer to me. I’m momentarily mesmerised by him, the expression in his eyes, and the reflected light as it bounces against his well shone body. Luckily I recover in time and swing away.
“My prince!”
“Call me Makena. I told you.”
“I won’t, you know I can’t.”
“You can!”
“I can, but I shouldn’t.”
“Then I swear I’ll throw all caution and silly rules of propriety into the air and kiss you this very moment..”
“Makena,” I say in a whisper, greatly troubled by having to fight that part of me that just wants him to take me in his arms and kiss me senseless for my stubbornness to follow rules.
“What great resolve you have,” he now says, leaning against a pole that bears a brightly burning torch above our heads.
“I don’t, my prince,” I say.
“Are we back to that again? All the formalities of propriety?”
“You know I must regard you so!” I say yet again.
“Then promise me one thing at least,” he now voices.
“What?” I ask in an interested whisper.
“Call me Makena when we are in privacy.”
“I promise to, Makena,” I whisper, looking around me to be sure that no one is at earshot. This seems to amuse him a great deal.
“May I have the same liberty with your name?”
“Of course,” I reassure him. “Nothing will make me happier.” His smile widens when I say this.
“On the contrary, Nyangi, there are many things I could do to you that’d make you much happier..”
“My prince!” I exclaim right then.
No, I can’t take it anymore, to stand in his presence and yet resist him. Not tonight. The temptation is too great. And so I suddenly turn and run away, leaving him laughing behind.
To love,
Is a bliss none above!
There once was a poem that thus began. I can’t particularly remember the rest of it, but I don’t need to. Those two lines are the most important.
Going to evening fetes and the Pride Lake, a task I’d previously much hated, has become most enjoyable. Seeing Makena, realising each time that I do that he’s mine, is most endearing. A most gratifying peace settles over my senses each time. Soon we shall be married, and soon we shall start our family.
The notion once scared me, of moving to a new home among strangers. However as much as I fear his family, especially the women who are most domineering and strong, a great contrast to me, the knowledge that he loves me is enough to fill my heart with courage.
As I get off my zorse today in the company of my peers, one of my chains suddenly breaks, and falls to the sandy ground. I drop on my knees to pick it up, but he does suddenly appear before me, and drops to his knees at the same time to pick it up.
My heart skips a beat as always at his proximity, and my eyes are much taken by his beaut
iful chiselled face, tracing it’s lines and contours that my hands wish so much that they could physically trace.
That is the moment I see it, not just love, but a burning desire behind his eyes, as though he wishes for nothing else at this moment but to just grab me in his arms and..
“Why do you affect me so, princess,” he says in greeting today.
“My prince,” is all I manage as a response.
“Your necklace..” he starts, lifting the delicate silver string, and then stopping when his gaze falls to my thigh, and that is when I realise that my skirt has patted to revealed the inner of my thigh where the tribal branding of paws brandish my skin as darkened engraved markings.
I then see him swallow, so deeply that the ball on his throat bobs up and down.
“Gods, woman! We must set a date, or one of these days I won’t be able to stop myself from having you right there and then regardless!”
My heart stopped yet again at that moment, and when it began again, it was with such a ferocity that my whole body threatened to burst.
A couple days later, a messenger arrives from the Nyabasi kingstead, declaring their intentions to visit our home so as to pay dowry and settle on a date. The date proposed however is the date Matinde’s betrothed’s family is to attend us and discuss her dowry, so father proposes yet a different date. The messenger comes back yet again and confirms that Maga Ribasi and his family accept the said date.
The last days of our dry summer season are there by very busy for Matinde and I. Our relationship has never been better, and our spirits never as high. We prepare for days for Matinde’s visitors, and then we prepare for my visitors, in between having to attend wedding ceremonies of our peers. Two of mine get married, and most of Matinde’s peers are all married apart from her and another maiden.
Matinde’s future in-laws love her, as is expected. Everyone loves her. Mine however- how I dread meeting them again!
However, when next the family Ribasi visits, there’s a much great change in the air between us. The queen-mother and queen treat me so well, that I almost suspect I imagined the case as it’d happened last time they’d visited. His father is amiable with me, as he’s always been even when he didn’t know my name. His uncles are funny, and I quickly see where Makena gets his humour from. My dowry is substantial, only fare, being that I’m a princess, and a very much accomplished maiden. They even go as far as to throw in extras, a signal that they are in great agreement with my wedding their son.