river snaked through the valley, washed away ground, dirt after dirt, stone after stone, deeper and deeper until by the time of this age of man, she had left valleys that dug so deep that man started to see the opposite, that it was not land lying so low, but mountain reaching so high. Looking up as we went down, and looking across the sky and the mist, we saw mountains pressed beside mountains, each one bigger than cities. So high that they took the colour of sky, not bush. It was enough to keep your eye to the sky and not the ground. The dirt as it reddened, the shrubs as they gave way to trees, the river clear like glass, and in it, fat nymphs, with broad heads and wide mouths, not hiding in the day, and knowing that they were not the prey this caravan hunts for.
The boy, whose name I already forgot, dashed after the Leopard as soon as we came down the mountain. Truth, I knew he was not his Leopard, and I knew the boy would make this cat very angry. He grabbed the Leopard’s tail, and he swung around and roared, crouched, and leapt at the boy. Another roar came from near the first caravan and the Leopard, pinning the boy, trotted away. The boy jumped up, brushed himself off before anyone noticed, and ran after his Leopard, sitting as a man on the grass, looking out to the river. He turned to me and smiled, but said nothing to the boy.
“Your bow and quiver. I bring it,” the boy said.
The Leopard nodded, looked at me, and said, “Shall we meet the slaver?”
The slaver had a tent at the front of his caravan. And the caravan, as long as a street in Malakal. Four wagons that I have seen only along the border of kingdoms north of the sand sea, among people who wander and never sow root. Horses pulled the first two, oxen pulled the last two. Purple and pink and green and blue, as if the most childish of goddesses painted them all. Behind the wagons, carts open and slatted together from wood. On the carts, women, thick to thin, some red from ochre, some shiny from shea butter and fat. Some wore only trinkets, some wore necklaces and goatskins in yellow and red, some in full robes, but most were naked. All captured and sold, or kidnapped from the river lands. None with the scars of the Ku or the Gangatom. Or the shaved teeth. Men from the East did not find those things beautiful. Behind these carts, men and boys, tall and thin like messengers, with no fat under the chin, just skin and muscle, long in arms, long in legs, many beautiful, and darker than the noon of the dead. Fit like warriors, for most were warriors who had lost in small wars, and would now do what soldiers who lose wars do. All wore irons locked around the neck and the feet, each man chained to the man in front of and behind him. There were fewer men with weapons than I thought I’d see. Seven, maybe eight men with swords and knives, only two carrying a bow, and four women with cutlasses and axes.
“In time. He’s holding court and judging the wicked,” the Leopard said with a smile that made me think it was a joke.
But past the caravans and in front of a large white tent with a dome top and flowing cloths sat the slaver. To his right a man knelt on the ground, holding a slender smoking pipe, with a folded rug in his lap. To his right, another man, shirtless like the kneeling man, with a gold bowl in his hand and a rag, as if he was about to wash the slaver’s face. Right behind him stood another, black in the shadow of the parasol he was holding to keep his master in shade. Another had a bowl of dates, ready to feed him. He did not look at us. But I looked at him sitting there, like the prince he probably was. Kalindar was famous for them, but princes with no kingdoms infested Malakal as well, it was said, because the Kwash Dara was stingy with his favors. His men had draped a long robe over his left shoulder with the right shoulder bare, as is the custom with princes. A white robe, the inner one to hide his royal