The Quest

'Finish him!' Meren ordered, and one of his men decapitated the man with a swing of his battleaxe. Eighteen horses were missing.

'We ca

'We won't,' Meren promised grimly. 'We will retrieve them - on Isis's teats, I swear it.'

Taita examined one of the Luo corpses in the firelight. It was the body of a short, stocky man, with a brutal ape-like face. He had a sloping forehead, thick lips and small close-set eyes. He was naked, except for a leather belt round his waist from which hung a pouch. It contained a collection of magical charms, knuckle bones and teeth, some of which were human. Around his neck, on a lanyard of plaited bark, hung a flint knife caked with the blood of one of the sentries. It was crudely fashioned, but when Taita tested the edge on the dead man's shoulder it split the skin with little pressure. The Luo's body was coated with a thick plaster of ash and river clay. On his chest and face were traced primitive

designs in white clay and red ochre, spots, circles and wavy lines. He stank of woodsmoke, rotten fish and his own feral odour.j 'A repulsive creature,' Meren spat.I Taita moved to attend to the wounded trooper. The spear thrust was deep and he knew it would mortify. The man would be dead within hours, but Taita showed him a reassuring face.

In the meantime Meren was picking his strongest and fittest troopers for the punitive column to follow the thieves. The rest of the party would be left to guard the baggage, the remaining horses and the sick.

Before it was fully light the two Shilluk went out into the reedbeds to find the outward spoor of the raiders. They returned before sunrise.

'The Luo dogs rounded up the runaway horses and drove them in a herd towards the south,' Nakonto reported to Taita. 'We found the bodies of two more and another who was wounded but still living. He is dead now.' Nakonto touched the hilt of the heavy bronze knife that hung from his belt. 'If your men are ready, ancient and exalted one, we will follow immediately.'

Taita would not take the grey mare on the raid: Whirlwind was still too young for hard riding, and Windsmoke had been wounded in her hindquarters by a Luo spear, fortunately not gravely. Instead he mounted his spare horse. When they rode out, Windsmoke whi

The hoofs of the eighteen stolen horses had beaten a wide road through the reedbeds. The bare footprints of the Luo overlay the tracks of the horses they were driving. The Shilluk ran easily after them, and the horsemen followed at a trot. The trail led them south all that day.

When the sun set, they rested to allow the horses to recover, but when the moon rose it shed sufficient light for them to go on. They rode all night with only short breaks to rest. At dawn they made out another feature in the distance ahead. After so long in the monotonous seas of papyrus their eyes rejoiced to behold even this low dark line.

Nakonto sprang on to his cousin's shoulders and stared ahead. Then he gri

'Old man, what you see is the end of the swamps. Those are trees, and they stand on dry land.'

Taita passed on this news to Meren and the troopers, who shouted, laughed and thumped each other's backs. Meren let them rest again for they had ridden hard.

From their tracks Nakonto judged that the Luo were not far ahead.

As they rode forward the line of trees loomed larger and darker, but they

I

could not make out any sign of human habitation. At last they dismounted and went forward leading their mounts, so that the riders' heads would not show above the tops of the papyrus. It was long after midday before they stopped again. Only a thin strip of papyrus screened them now, then even that ended abruptly against a low bank of pale earth. It was no more than two cubits high, and beyond it lay pastures of short green grass, and groves of tall trees. Taita recognized Kigelia sausage trees, with their massive hanging seedpods, and sycamore figs, with the yellow fruit growing directly on the fat grey trunks. Most of the other species were foreign to him.

From the cover of the groves they could clearly make out the tracks that the stolen horses' hoofs had left as they climbed the soft earth bank.

However, there was no sign of the animals in the open pasture beyond.

They scrutinized the tree line.

'What are those?' Meren pointed out distant movement among the trees and a fine haze of dust.

Nakonto shook his head. 'Buffalo, a small herd. No horses. Nontu and I will scout ahead. You must remain hidden here.' The two Shilluk moved forward into the papyrus and disappeared. Although Taita and Meren watched carefully they did not see them again, not even a glimpse of them crossing the open pasture.

They moved back from the edge of the papyrus, found a small patch of open, drier ground, filled the nosebags and let the horses feed while they stretched out to rest. Taita wrapped his shawl round his head, placed his staff at hand and lay back. He was very tired and his legs ached from trudging through the mud. He drifted over the edge of sleep.

'Be of good heart, Taita, I am close.' Her voice, a faint whisper, was so clear and the tone so unmistakably Fe

It was some time before sleep returned, but he was weary and at last he was dreaming of fishes that leapt from the waters around him and sparkled in the sunlight. Although they were myriad, none was the fish he knew was there. Then the shoals opened and he saw it. Its scales sparkled like precious stones, its butterfly tail was long and lithe, the aura that surrounded it ethereal and sublime. As he watched, it transmuted into human shape, the body of a young girl. She glided through the water, her long naked legs held together, pumping from her hips with the grace of a dolphin. The sunlight from above dappled her pale body and her long bright hair streamed out behind her. She rolled on to her

back and smiled up at him through the water. Tiny silver bubbles streamed from her nostrils. 'I am close, darling Taita. Soon we will be together. Very soon.'I Before he could reply a voice and a rough touch shattered the vision.

He tried to cling to the rapture, but it was torn from him. He opened his eyes and sat up.

Beside him squatted Nakonto. 'We have found the horses and the Luo jackals,' he said. 'Now comes the killing time.'

They waited until nightfall before they left the concealment of the papyrus and climbed the low earth bank on to the open pasture.

The horses' hoofs made almost no sound on the soft sand.

Through the darkness Nakonto led them to the trees that were silhouetted against the stars. Once they were under the spreading, protecting branches, he turned parallel to the edge of the swamp. They rode in silence for only a short while before he turned into the forest, where they had to bend low on the backs of the horses to avoid the overhanging foliage. They had not gone far when, above the treetops ahead, the night sky was suffused with a rosy glow. Nakonto led them towards it. Now they could hear drums beating a frenetic rhythm. As they moved towards it, the sound grew louder, until the night throbbed like the heart of the earth. Closer still, a chorus of discordant chanting joined the pounding of the drums.

Nakonto stopped them at the edge of the forest. Taita rode up beside Meren and they looked across an expanse of cleared ground to a large village of primitive thatch and mud-daub huts lit by the flames of four huge bonfires, sparks streaming up in torrents. Rows of smoking racks stood beyond the last huts, covered with the split carcasses of fish, whose scales glittered like a sheet of silver in the firelight. Around the bonfires dozens of human bodies twisted, leapt and spun. They were painted from scalp to heels in glaring white, decorated with weird designs in black, ochre and red mud. Taita realized they were of both sexes, all naked under their coating of white clay and ash. As they danced, they chanted in a barbaric cadence, a sound like the baying of a pack of wild animals.