CHAPTER 10
HEDGE OF SPEARS
Nyirare, Least Favored Wife of Shemwindo, lay passively beneath her husband on the sleeping-mat. She focused her eyes at the darkness at the top of her dwelling. Her hands lay flat against the raffia fibers of the mat. Shemwindo’s weight pressed down on her as though the night itself was flattening her against the floor.
The Mwami did not often go to Nyirare’s dwelling. Her father, Bukumba, had been the only sub-chieftain to oppose Shemwindo’s rise to the leadership of the Bana-Tubondo. Bukumba had warned that Shemwindo’s overweening pride would one day be the undoing of the people.
Bukumba’s talk had reached Shemwindo’s ears. The wrathful Mwami’s advisers had managed to talk him out of slaying the skeptical sub-chieftain. But from the time she had sat across from Shemwindo on the marriage-stools, and seen the sullen glare in his eyes as he licked the mbu from her hand, Nyirare had known that her status in the royal compound would be that of Least Favored Wife.
She waited for Shemwindo to finish. He had already visited the dwellings of his other wives that night. Nyirare was, as always, last as well as least. He brought nothing of his other wives to her. For he was always careful to clean himself with banana leaves before entering the dwelling of the next co-wife – even Nyirare.
The Least Favored Wife wished that she, not Iyangura, had been the one to go into the river with Mukiti. As Shemwindo neared his final impersonal thrust into her body, Nyirare imagined warm water closing gently over her head …
Wordlessly, Shemwindo detached himself from her. In the warm darkness inside the dwelling, Nyirare could hear the soft breath of the wind through the thatch of the roof. She and Shemwindo were silhouettes in shadow.
Shemwindo felt a sudden urge to speak to her. But the words of her father stood between them like a hedge of spears. He rose and departed from the dwelling. She continued to lie in the same position, and made no attempt to stem the flow of her tears.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
KITUNDUKUTU’S MESSAGE
Shemwindo walked slowly across the open yard of his compound. Low-burning fires illuminated his dark skin as he walked past. Aside from a single string of white clay beads looped around his waist, the Mwami was naked. And the beads said: Wives, you will soon bear children for me.
He could only shake his head at the irony of the beads’ message as he bent to enter his dwelling. Two rains had passed since his victory over Mpaca and subsequent ascension to the status of Mwami of Tubondo. During that time, not one of his seven wives had ceased to make her monthly offering of blood to the Bashumbu of the Moon.
Shemwindo’s lack of progeny was the only blight on his reign as Mwami. If he did not soon stem the offering of at least one of the seven women, the whispers he heard behind his back would become louder …
As he straightened inside his dwelling, Shemwindo heard a familiar chirruping sound. Quickly, his eyes adjusted to the darkness and he spotted a tiny form clinging to the dwelling’s wall.
“I see you, Kitundukutu,” the Mwami said.
The cricket had begun to visit Shemwindo soon after the downfall of Mpaca. At first suspicious, Shemwindo soon came to enjoy his conversations with the insect. For Kitundukutu’s words often contained wisdom. And Shemwindo knew nothing of Kitundukutu’s association with the Bashumbu of the forest.
“Did you enjoy your visits to your wives this night?” Kitundukutu chirped.
A scowl crossed Shemwindo’s face. There were times when he wondered whether Kitundukutu was subtly mocking him. Then he would discount the possibility. The small one wouldn’t dare …
The Mwami sat down on his stool before speaking further. In the silence, Kitundukutu sang wordlessly.
“All but one,” Shemwindo finally answered. “This time, perhaps Elili-Kahombo, the Bashumbu of good fortune, will be kind to me.”
“Kind in what way?” Kitundukutu inquired.
Shemwindo gave the cricket a sharp glance.
“In what way do you think?” the Mwami returned testily. “Do I not need a son? And soon?”
Now, the words of Mpaca flowed out of the mouth of Kitundukutu.
“You, Shemwindo,” the cricket said. “Tubondo belongs to you. A son will want to divide Tubondo with you. Two sons will divide it more. Three sons will divide it yet again. And think on this: would a son, or two sons, or three sons, or seven sons, not desire to sit upon your royal stool before you are ready to give it up?”
Shemwindo’s brow furrowed as his mind digested those words. Never before had he considered the prospect of sons in such a way. He had always assumed he would be Mwami until he died – either of old age, or in battle. The thought of danger to him from a product of his own loins had never before occurred to him. His only concern had been that he, rather than his wives, might be barren.
Now, he recalled the history of the Bana-Tubondo, as well as the Bana-Bira, the people who dwelt on the next mountain range and were hostile to Tubondo. Songs were sung of long and bitter feuds of succession … brother against brother, son against father, family against family.
Deep within Shemwindo, there was a place that the iron that surrounded his heart did not touch. It was the place where his fears and insecurities had gone to hide on the day he set out to challenge Mpaca. The inhabitants of that hidden place were beginning to stir. Shemwindo’s teeth clenched in anger as he realized that place continued to exist, despite all his efforts to eliminate it.
He glared at Kitundukutu.
“I have heard enough, cricket,” Shemwindo growled. “Be gone.”
Kitundukutu hopped away from the wall, spread both sets of wings, and flew out of the Mwami’s dwelling, chirruping in farewell. And Shemwindo remained on his stool for the rest of the night, brooding darkly.