Indaba, My Children: African Tribal History, Legends, Customs And Religious Beliefs. Vusamazulu Credo Mutwa
Shrill screams were heard above the shattering anger of the storm as Masai, frightened out of their wits, ran through the burning forest to escape the deadly embrace of the flames. Many were caught by the grumbling wind-fanned fire and burnt to death, shrieking like insane women for their traitor god to save them.
Then hail came, as big as babies’ fists, in a howling curtain to scourge the dazed earth with insane mercilessness.
The storm thundered for the best part of the midnight hour and the Wakambi cringed and cowered in the darkness of their huts and caves. But gradually the storm spent its passion and the midnight winds of heaven carried the angry clouds away. A silence deeper than the deepest wells fell upon the dazed land. It was an eerie silence that was as ugly as it was frightening; it was the silence of Death.
‘Listen, Oh Kahawa,’ whispered the grizzled old witchdoctor Somojo. ‘Listen!’
‘I hear nothing, Oh Somojo,’ whispered Kahawa.
‘Yes, my prince, that is what I mean – the silence is unusual. And yet it is terribly familiar!’
‘It is like the silence that precedes an attack by the Night Howlers,’ said Mpushu soberly.
‘The Night Howlers only attack in early summer,’ argued Kahawa, ‘and now it is well into late summer.’
The frightened men lapsed once more into silence and the Great Silence seemed to deepen. Kahawa found his thoughts drifting towards his mother. He found himself wondering how she was faring in the dark cave in which he had imprisoned her. Heedless of his cruel throbbing wounds, he rose and made for the door of the hut. He never passed through it.
The hut was torn apart as though it were a ball of cobwebs, showering the petrified men inside with grass and broken twigs. Kahawa looked up and found himself staring into the great redly luminous eyes of a creature of unbelievable proportions whose dark silhouette obstructed the stars now peering through the clouds – a nightmare creature which had grasped the big hut in its vulture-like talons and was slowly and gloatingly tearing it apart to get at the men inside.
For a few moments the brave son of Marimba was paralysed with fear. He stared with hypnotic fascination deep into the huge eyes of the Night Howler – eyes that blazed like glowing embers, lined with veins that glowed like red-hot copper. The burning split pupils were the size of warriors’ shields.
Then Kahawa instinctively hurled his war club, landing it straight in one of the Night Howler’s eyes. The eye shattered and the glowing fluid poured down to the ground while the huge monstrosity let out a howl that split the night in two. Other Night Howlers descended upon their wounded comrade and quickly devoured him.
Others were still raising havoc amongst the huts. Most people managed to flee in wild terror into the caves, but quite a number were caught in the open and these were being driven into one area. Stray ones were promptly gobbled down. Many a warrior who had fought like a thousand lions, defending his wife and children against the alien Masai only a while earlier, ran like a rabbit, wetting his loinskin all the way and screaming like a mad girl, while a bloody-jawed Night Howler played havoc with those same wives and children.
Only Mpushu and his badly wounded friend Kahawa had the courage to fight, urged by their initial stroke of success. Already between them they could account for six of the hideous hell-monsters. They had accidentally discovered that the Night-Howlers’ eyes were most vulnerable and easy targets in the dark. And each time they succeeded in hitting the target the creature would cringe and fall and many others would settle upon it, giving the tribe a brief respite.
The newly invented slings turned out to be most formidable weapons and practice was making Kahawa and Mpushu quite expert in their aim.
The great settlement was already razed to the ground and all the people who could not reach the safety of the caves were concentrated by the Night Howlers into one panic-striken madly screaming mob, ready for an orgy of devouring. But they were waiting as though to commence on a particular command.
Mpushu and Kahawa knew they were fighting their last battle. Their arms were numb through handling the slings without pause and they knew it was now simply a matter of time before they too were overwhelmed. Finally, they decided they could do nothing about those already herded together and they made off to reach the safety of a cave. As Mpushu turned to flee, a strange manly voice halted him in blank astonishment:
‘My friends, I am with you.’
Kahawa, too, turned to look at their newly found friend and got the shock of his life. Running with them was the tall Masai whom they had captured earlier – Koma-Tembo.
This totally unexpected ally put new strength into the two young men and, standing together, the three of them took a heavy toll of the Night Howlers. They fought until a voice of no earthly origin rang out as though from the empty air above their heads:
‘Lay down your weapons, oh mortals, and yield yourselves into my mercy. I am Nangai and when I command I am obeyed.’
The three men dropped their slings to the blood-stained ground in paralysed amazement. They could vaguely discern a queer apparition in midair above them. They knew very well what Nangai wanted even before he spoke.
‘Where is the immortal female Marimba?’
No one answered. Mpushu noticed that silence had once more claimed the village – or what was left of it. The Night Howlers were silently awaiting further instructions.
‘I asked you a question, young mortal dog!’
‘Marimba is my mother, Oh Nangai, and I have taken her to a place of safety. You, and even the Most Ultimate God will reach her only over my dead body!’
‘Nangai is not here to bandy words with immature mortals and he does not appreciate childish sentiments. Bring forth the female Marimba?’
‘The mighty god Nangai can go and relieve himself in a rat hole!’
‘Wretched mortal, you obey my command this instant, or I shall pass further instructions to my beasts that howl in the night.’
Kahawa knew the meaning of naked fear for the first time in his life. He knew that Nangai was serious and that gods, high or low, active or outcast, never make idle threats. They are not burdened with a conscience like human beings, nor are they loaded with emotion. A god does not know the meaning of love or loyalty; these are human weaknesses. Only the Goddess Ma suffers from these weaknesses and we have inherited ours from her.
‘You keep me waiting, miserable mortal. I give you ten more heartbeats!’
Mpushu began to weep. He tried to implore Nangai, but the god ignored him and addressed himself only to Kahawa. The Night Howlers looked appealingly at Nangai, waiting for the order to commence their delicious meal. Nangai ignored them just as he ignored Mpushu.
‘Well, mortal, your time is up.’
There was no reply from Kahawa. Through further moments of silence Kahawa’s hand closed firmly around the hilt of his bone dagger and Mpushu saw a gleam of unearthly light in the eyes of his young friend. Then very calmly Kahawa measured his words: ‘My answer is still No, Oh Nangai!’
The young prince Kahawa half-drew his bone dagger from its sheath. Into his eyes there came a look that Mpushu could not at first explain. It was the look that comes into the eyes of one who has just had a shattering inspiration, one who has suddenly found the answer to a problem that had been gnawing at the back of his mind with the persistence of a rat. Mpushu saw his friend direct a stare of unspeakable contempt at the god Nangai floating on his throne in empty air. Then the young Kahawa sneered right into the god’s face, sneered as one sneers at a human enemy whom one holds beneath contempt.
Suddenly the eyes of the god blazed with cold, murderous fury. He realised that a dead Kahawa