Fyskar

Chapter 11

Seonaid and Fearchar watched time slip by. Plants grew, and the seasons changed from dry to wet. Callum and Albin grew out of their baby fat.

"It was into their third or fourth year that I was taken in by the doctor of the village when he learned I had talent for healing. Ajuji had come down with a seasonal cough, but he feared the doctor and refused to see him. I provided him a dose of one of my simple tinctures to still the aggravation. Kgomotso, whose uncle was close to the doctor, told his family. Soon enough, everyone knew that I had cured Ajuji's cough. I trained in their way and contributed my own learnings in earnest. The man taught me the various plants and insects, animals, river creatures of the forest and how to harvest and store them.

"He taught me how to render dyes to be used for clothing and ceremonies. I remember the first time trying bat. That was a horrifying experience, more so than the snakes." He quivered at the memory, the crunchy leather scratching across their senses.

"He was a great man. I don't think anyone in the village knew how old he was. Everyone referred to him respectfully as Baba or elder. He was the one who blessed me with the name Impundulu, making me a formal member of the village the night I saved Lindelwa from being taken by a crocodile. The beast was later eaten." He flexed his hand, remembering touching the creature. Its hide had been thick and scaled, wet from the river, yet warm from its daytime sunning. The deep bellow in its throat as he had passed the fear he felt into the animal had resonated through his bones. "It's amazing how much fear a human can contain within themselves." He looked up at them, trying to fight that moment of panic all over again.

"Baba died in the middle of the wet season when Callum and Albin had started to speak full sentences. The village mourned in such a wretched way I never thought we would come out of it. I was entrusted with his funeral pyre, and Amina and Tau provided the ceremony for accepting me as the village's doctor in place of Baba. I was not nearly so prepared to provide alone. He knew so much and left too soon," Eoin confessed.

He stood in the darkness, embers sparking up through the canopy of the trees to burn out near the stars. His lower half was wrapped in a fine white, grey, maroon, and green patterned cloth, a belt of fur holding it at the waist. His feet had been painted with red mud up to his ankles. A thin string of black and red beads hung from his right shoulder to his left hip. His tattoos glowed in the dusk. A silver bracelet stacked with white shell bangles flashed at his wrist. A net cape-like necklace, worked finely with small white and dyed red shells and fur, draped from his neck to his shoulders. Smudged red markings ran in parallel from his hairline, down the middle of his eyelids to his chin. In one hand, he held what appeared to be a heavily decorated gourd. In the other, a long walking stick with a bulbous end to it, feathers tied at the base of the protrusion.

"Wha's Impundulu?" Fearchar asked, a tingle of fear rippling up his skin as Eoin battled with his emotions once more. Eoin allowed the ceremonial outfit to melt away to his regular clothing.

"It's based on a legend from Amina, Tau, and Baba's old tribe. A massive bird that lives in the clouds of storms. He is the size of a human, a grand white and black beast. When he lands, he brings down lightning upon the land. It is thought to be a bad omen and drinks blood, which I could have done without knowing. Baba said that I must be the lightning bird's human form. The villagers thought that I must be a protective spirit. Maybe bad omen should have been considered more. Not like it did much good." He twisted a metal stick that flashed silver in his fingers.

"Your hairstick?" Seonaid motioned to the instrument. He handed it to her, ginger with it in his thoughts. She gently took it from him to look it over. It was graciously carved with tiny animals that led up to the stick's head, a fan shape with a bird carved in it. The animal's wings opened wide, little lines zig-zagging away from it.