«Warrior of Kanda, are you not going to slay us?»
Blade shook his head angrily. «Why should I? And do not call me a warrior of Kanda! I am not from there. I have never been there in my life.» He was about to add that nothing in the world would ever make him go there, then decided against embroidering his story too much. As long as they believed he was not from Kanda, they would be less likely to stick spears into him first and ask questions later. There would be other and better times for telling the story of where he really came from.
Nayung shook his head slowly, as if shaking it hard might make it fall off, and rubbed his stomach. Then he said, «No, you must be right. No slavehunter of Kanda would ever spare six warriors of Zunga if he had them where you have us now.» He could not quite bring himself to say at your mercy. «And there are few of the slavehunters who could defeat six Zungan warriors.» He struggled to a sitting position. «If you are not of Kanda, are you of Rulam?»
Blade shook his head. «I am not of Rulam either. And while I am not going to kill or hurt any of you, I do think I am going to ask the questions for a little while. Then you may ask me who I am, and I will tell the truth if you do.» He lifted the staff to emphasize his words. «First, tell me what is Zunga?»
Nayung looked at him as blankly as if he had been a man in London and Blade had just asked him what was England. Obviously he did not want to believe that Blade was mad, but he was having a hard time believing anything else.
Finally he found his voice. «It is the land of the People.»
Blade nodded. That was enough to go on for now, at least about Zunga. «And what is Kanda?»
Nayung's face darkened. «The city of the Priests of the Ivory Tower. The city of the killers of the Ivory People and the ivory thieves. A city of slave raiders. They come and take us away, to Kanda or even to Rulam. We die there in Rulam. We die in the firestone mines, we die in the arenas, we die in the slave barracks.»
Blade asked another question. «Is Rulam another city?»
«Yes.» Nayung grimaced. «Without the soldiers of Rulam, we would not fear Kanda and the Priests of the Ivory Tower. We could march up to its walls and climb over them, kill all the Priests and take our ivory back from the tower. But Rulam sends soldiers. They have swords and hats and coats of iron. We cannot fight them with our spears.» Nayung suddenly seemed to realize how much he was telling this stranger, and clamped his jaw shut.
Blade ignored the gesture. He could fill in the details later, without asking any more questions now. He stood up and said, «As I told you, I am not from Kanda, and I am not from Rulam. My name is Richard Blade-«
«You have two names?»
«Nayung,» said Blade gently but with an edge in his voice, «I said I would ask the questions for now. Yes, I have two names. I come from the land of the English. I am a warrior there. I have coarse to Zunga-«and there he had to break off suddenly. What was a safe reason to give for his coming to Zunga? Curiosity, they would not believe. And they might very easily think an explorer was another kind of slave raider or ivory poacher.
«I was exiled from England by my king,» he began. «Now I must wander from country to country, living as well as I can by my skills as a warrior. I have become a better warrior during my wanderings, though. I have learned many things about fighting.» He did not go on to offer to teach the Zungans some of what he knew. This was not the time yet. He wanted to look around him a little more first.
Nayung laughed. «You are not telling us anything we do not know already when you say that you are a great warrior. There has never been a warrior who could defeat six Zungans single-handed without taking a single wound. Chamba boasted that he could, but never tried to do it. It is too bad that he did not try. He would have been killed or disgraced, and we would have been spared having to listen to him for many months.» Again Nayung's face clouded as he realized he had been speaking too freely, and he was silent for a while.
Then he painfully dragged himself to his feet and spread out both hands toward Blade. «I make the Peace Hand to you, Richard Blade of the English. And I tell you that you do not need to travel on beyond the land of Zunga. You will have my voice for you among our people as long as I live.»
Blade grinned and returned Nayung's gesture. «That is good. Then I will go with you and your warriors to your camp tonight. Is it far?»
Nayung shook his head. «Our camp is only an hour from here. That way.» He pointed across the pond. «We are hunters who came to the forest to hunt one of the Ivory People and bring his ivory back. The Ivory People were drinking at this water when we came upon them. But they scented us, and ran off before we could spear one according to the laws and customs. We waited, hoping they might come back, but saw only the Lomban.» He made a sinuous motion with his hands that told Blade he meant the big snake. «Then we beat our drums to drive the Lomban away. After that, we saw you step out on the bank and make the Peace Hand. We came out to find out who you were. We learned.»
Blade laughed. «You did indeed. And I learned who you are. Good men, brave warriors.» He pointed to the other five men sitting or lying on the ground. «I came to this water to drink, and I have not done so. Why don't you get your men on their feet while I drink?»
CHAPTER FOUR
By the time Blade had drunk enough to quench his thirst and had filled the hollow gourd that Nayung had given him to use as a water bottle, the Zungan warrior had gone around to all of his men. Those who had been unconscious he had revived, gently or roughly as the case required-Chamba very roughly indeed.
The man with the smashed kneecap, however, could not walk. Even to try standing made him scream again in agony and, collapse, writhing on the ground. Nayung looked down at him, his face set hard.
«He cannot walk. The spirits of his feet are gone. If we had an Ulunga with us we might try to bring the spirits back to his feet. But none of us, is an Ulunga. He cannot walk, and we cannot carry him. It is our custom then for the D'bor to give him a quick death with the spear, so that all the other spirits of his body may go together. If we leave him here… «
Blade nodded and raised a hand. «I understand. But if your camp is only an hour away, I think I can carry him myself. If I cannot do so by myself, I know a way in which two can carry him.»
Nayung was looking at Blade with interest when Chamba strode forward, waving his spear in his left hand. «Nayung, do you call this man a warrior when he is so soft he will not see that the customs must be followed? If neither of you has the courage to follow them, then I will.» The spear in Chamba's hand stabbed downward into the chest of the man on the ground before anybody could move. The man gasped, clutched at the spear shaft for a moment, then relaxed all over and lay still.
Nayung glared at Chamba. «Chamba, you have a very thick head. But if you ever do this again, I will break that head into so many pieces that its spirits will spend the next thousand years finding them.» His grip on his spear shaft tightened. «The warrior Richard Blade of the English is second to me now. Do you understand?» The spear came up and the point was leveled at Chamba's stomach.
Chamba looked down at the spear, then up to Nayung's grim face, and nodded slowly.
«Good,» said Nayung. He turned to Blade. «If that fool Chamba makes any more trouble, kill him.» Blade nodded reluctantly. He didn't like Chamba any better than Nayung did, but he wasn't sure if it was a good idea to humiliate such a proud and dangerous man in front of a stranger. Chamba would be thinking of revenge now that was certain.