Abena held her breath in fright as she recognised the smell. In her younger days as a shepherdess she had come across a caprid that had strayed from the herd and been mauled by some plains predator. The stench of that carcass under the thermal suns had been 35
horrendous, bloated as it was with gas. The smell coming from the carriages was almost the same.
‘Ashwana’s grandmumu? We must eat soon before the food is cold,’ said a voice from behind her. It was a quiet voice, a young voice.
Startled, Abena turned quickly, drawing her bow smoothly. But when she turned there was nobody there. Perhaps the voice had been carried by the wind? She strained her eyes against the gust of wind to look at the other carriages, set in a concentric ring around a communal firepit.
Whip‐fast, in the furthest corner of her vision, she sensed movement. She did not quite see it, but felt that sudden absence of stillness.
‘ How de body?’ Abena called out in customary greeting. ‘I cannot see you.’
The wind gust picked up, drawing a veil of rusty particles across her vision. No more than twenty paces away, she saw a figure stand up from between two carriages. Judging by the raw‐boned shoulders and narrow torso it was a young plainsmen of the Nullabor, but she could not see him well.
‘What is your name, little son?’ Abena asked the man, making known that she was a person of elder seniority.
‘I can’t remember my name. I remember yours. You are Abena. We should put out the fire pit so the others can sleep,’ said the silhouette.
The man must be so feverish he was talking nonsense, Abena realised. Her grandmotherly instincts wanted her to tell the boy to sit back down until the rust storm had passed, but something cautioned her to keep quiet. The silhouette began to stumble towards her, speaking fragmentary phrases that made no sense.
‘Remember to lock the talon squall pens,’ he ordered angrily, before lowering his voice and chuckling. ‘This is my best and most favourite shuka.’
Abena was wary. She remembered folktales of the dead who returned to their homes with only fragmentary memories of a past life. Vodou they had called them, and although they had no minds, they retained enough fragments of their past – things they had said often in life, or certain things people had said to them, and they mimicked the living with their vocal cords, luring out distraught relatives with pleas and familiar phrases. She had never believed in such things – raising Ashwana on her own had required a sturdy head –
but now she was not so sure.
‘I do not know you,’ Abena shouted.
The rust storm died away, leaving the particles to twirl and settle. Like a curtain falling away, Abena saw the corpse that was walking towards her. That was what shocked Abena more than anything, the corpse walked with a loping gait as it had in life. Despite the fur of mould that grew across its pale, bloodless skin, it was walking. It appeared unhurried as it approached her, although its face, bloated by fluid beyond all recognition, was angled away towards the sky. It was as if the man was stuck between life and death, the skin and flesh rotting away while it talked of a past life and moved like the living.
Abena aimed and fired a hunting arrow into its chest. The dead man wheezed painfully as one of its lungs collapsed, but it kept walking. It was close now and Abena found herself paralysed by a mixture of fear and fascination.
It was so near, she could see the man was dressed in a sarong of undyed funeral wool. It meant the man had been buried and sealed in the bole of a boab tree. Somehow, it had clawed its way out and had returned to its home. Perhaps the tales were true.
36
It reached out a hand towards her and touched her upper arm. The coldness of the palm on her warm skin shocked her into movement. She ran several steps, her bow already drawn before she swung around and released another arrow. The copper head cut deep below the dead man’s ribcage and punched out through his back with a dry, meaty thud.
Entirely unfazed by the wounds, the man snatched for Abena with stiffened fingers. She wrenched away, frantic with adrenaline. She began to run, racing down the dune slopes.
Wordlessly, the corpse pursued her. She could feel