the docks and the shore. We continued south and did not stop until the horses crossed the canal and took us out of the city. Above, a flock of birds followed us. They followed us even as we rode through forest and grassland, and as the sky started changing colour of day. Until we could no longer see Kongor. Right above us some dove for our heads. Pigeons. Nsaka Ne Vampi yelled and the King sister shouted, Move! Nsaka Ne Vampi led her through a patch of trees, which blocked the birds, but they started diving again as soon as we were out of the patch.
Ahead of us was something white and moving, either clouds or dust. The King sister rode straight for it and we followed. The birds dove at us one more time. One flew straight into Mossi’s head. He yelled for me to get it out so I yanked it and threw it away. Fumeli slapped away birds with his bow, as the Leopard rode hot after the two women. The buffalo charged on past us. We rode so hard that it was not until we were in the mist—for it was a mist—that I noticed the birds did not follow. I had no name for the smell. Not a stench, but not a fragrance either. Maybe something like when clouds are fat with rain and lightning has scorched them. We rode to a stop beside the King sister—a good thing too, for she stopped at the steep drop of a cliff. Mossi nudged me to dismount. Below us, but still a distance away, lay those lands, waiting on any fool to enter it.
“Sogolon said take him to the Mweru,” the King sister said. “He would be safe from all magic and white science in the Mweru. In that, at least, we can trust her.”
She said it in a way that I could not tell if she was telling or asking. I turned to her and saw her looking at me.
“Trust the gods,” I said.
She pointed to the trail leading down, laughed, and rode off without saying anything of gratitude. I could not smell the boy even when I looked at him. As they rode off his smell finally came to me, then it vanished again. Did not fade, but vanished. Nsaka Ne Vampi turned to me, nodded, then rode off back to Kongor.
“Leopard,” I said.
“I know.”
“What will she be riding back to, with the Ipundulu dead?”
“I don’t know, Tracker. Whatever it is, it will not be what she wants …. So, Tracker.”
“Yes?”
“The ten and nine doors. Was there a map? Did you see one?”
“We both saw one,” Mossi said.
“From here to Gangatom we would have to cross a river to Mitu, ride around the Darklands, cut through the long rain forest, and follow two sisters river west. That is at least ten and eight days and that’s not counting pirates, Ku warriors, and this King’s army and mercenaries already plundering the river folk,” I said.
“What about the doors?” Leopard said.
“We would have to sail against current to Nigiki.”
“You wish us go back past Dolingo?” Mossi said, loud enough but clearly to only me.
“Six days to Nigiki if we go by river. Take the door at Nigiki and we are in the Hills of Enchantment, three days from Gangatom.”
“That’s nine days,” the Leopard said. “But Nigiki is South Kingdom, Tracker. Catch us they will, and kill us as spies before we even get to that door.”
“Not if we move with a hush.”
“Quiet? Us four?”
“Darklands to Kongor, Kongor to Dolingo. We can only go one way,” I said.
He nodded.
“Take care,” I said to everyone. “Slip in like thieves, slip out before anyone, even the night, knows.”
“To the river,” the Leopard said.
Fumeli kicked the horse and they galloped off. I turned back to look at the Mweru. In the dark, with the sky a rich blue, all I could see were shadows. Hills rising upward, too smooth and precise. Or towers, or things left behind by giants who practiced wicked arts before man.
“Sadogo,” I said to Mossi. “I loved that giant, even if he went mad when one called him so. If I had fallen asleep, had you let me, I would have been the one to throw that old man from the roof. Do you know how much it pained him to kill? He told me of all his killings one night. Every single one, for his memory was a curse. It took us right into the break