The Ring Of Sheba Page 8

  They could also be fiercely territorial.

  Joao readied his blunderbuss. “Do you want me to shoot it?”

  “No,” Ngola replied. “Leave it. But if it attacks, kill it.”

  Nodding, Joao stepped to the side and circled the clearing so he would have an easy field of fire.

  “You know how I hate those things.” Drury had a bloody history with the vultures. Once, he had been staked out on a coastline and left for the raptors to feed on. His midsection still bore the scars. It was an adventure that he’d never completely told to Ngola despite their years together.

  “I know.” Ngola holstered his pistol. “I also know we wish this old witch’s help, so killing what could be one of her pets would be a bad move.”

  Drury grunted, unconvinced.

  “Keep the rest of the men here with you.” Ngola strode forward and waved to Joao to hold his position.

  The young warrior nodded but kept his weapon directed at the vulture as it moved slowly along the roof’s edge.

  6.

  The Witch’s Bargain

  When he reached the campfire, Ngola took a log as thick as his forearm from a nearby pile of carefully stacked wood. Smooth ends showed the wood had been cut with a saw and later split. The cuts also told him the witch didn’t take her own firewood. Someone provided it for her.

  He stirred the campfire embers with the wood, watched greedy flames lick up, and laid the log in them. Immediately, the fire spread up the wood, tunneling through the dry bark. The increased illumination beat back the darkness, peeled it back to the hut, up the small wooden steps, and to the old woman sitting in the structure’s open doorway.

  She didn’t look like she was in much better shape than the corpses dangling from the crosses lining the river. Her blue-black skin sagged in the revealing glare of the campfire, looking like it was ready to whisk off her bones with one good tug.

  Bright red and yellow feathers stuck out from the gray, frizzy hair that haloed her shoulders. Age wrinkled her features into a prune that made her features look too small for her head. Gray whiskers blurred at her chin. A necklace of human finger bones and teeth ringed her saggy throat and hung down to her bare, pendulous breasts. A leather breechclout covered her loins.

  Her black eyes glittered, reflecting the rising flames in the campfire as she regarded Ngola with withering contempt. He knew the look. Only the ancient or the powerful could pull it off because only they walked through life with impunity.

  Ngola knew the woman was old, but his inner sense—that part of him that recognized supernatural things—picked up the warning that radiated from her. She lived out here, among dangerous creatures, and someone looked out for her. They wouldn’t do it from the goodness of their hearts. Whoever cut the wood and provided any other services the woman needed did so because they feared her.

  Standing there with his cutlass naked in his hand, Ngola chose to be polite. But he wasn’t about to sheathe the blade with the vulture watching him with such keen interest.

  “Good evening, grandmother.” He inclined his head slightly. “I am Ngola, captain of the Mambele.”

  “I am not your grandmother, and you are not from this place.” The old woman reached back into her hut.

  From the corner of Ngola’s eye, Joao shifted his blunderbuss from the bird to the woman. Instantly, the vulture spread its dirty gray wings and cried out savagely, suddenly looking imposing and threatening. A shadow broke free of darkness skirting the bottom of the hut and a magnificent black leopard padded to the old woman’s feet and sat, glowering at Ngola with malevolent yellow eyes.

  The old woman spoke softly in a tongue Ngola didn’t recognize, but the leopard reluctantly lay down. The mouth opened in a bored yawn, baring gleaming white fangs against pink gums and a curling tongue. The cat’s long tail swished the bare earth.

  “I’ve come seeking an evil man,” Ngola said, “and I was told this man was seeking an audience with Delfina.”

  The old woman put a pipe to her thin lips, struck a match with her thumbnail, and applied the flame to the bowl. The bright light shone in her dark eyes, then she shook out the match and tossed it to the ground. She puffed for a moment and gray smoke drifted up and away from her.

  “Many have taken their chances with speaking to me,” she said.

  “You are Delfina?”

  “I am.” She nodded and expelled another cloud of swirling smoke.

  “Have you seen a man named Machado?”

  “I have seen a white man. A slaver, judging from the stink of him. He came to me only three days ago.”

  “Where is he?”

  Delfina pointed to the northeast with her pipe. “He went to look for the Lake of the Sharp-Toothed Shadows.”

  “What is that?”

  “A place curious people go to die.”

  Ngola scowled.

  Seeing the look on his face, Delfina laughed.

  Anger blazed up in Ngola, and he was reluctant to let such a lack of respect go unchallenged. His men would not see him treated in such a cavalier manner, in spite of the great bird and the deadly cat that doted on their master.

  “Have a care, witch,” Ngola growled. “I have come in peace, but I won’t be made a fool of.”

  “I mean no harm.” The old woman held her hand out in a placating manner. “It is just that it is not so often I watch men rush to their doom.”

  “Is Machado dead?”

  She shrugged. “Not to my knowledge. He went into the jungle and has not returned.”

  That agreed with the discovery of the Portuguese longboats. Ngola was certain Machado and his men would not walk out of the jungle.

  “But,” woman continued, “I know he will never return.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because no one who goes to that place returns. They die there. Or worse. All of them seeking Sheba’s ring at the bottom of that cursed lake.”

  Worse? Ngola’s mind played with that before he seized control of his thoughts and made himself think only of taking the slaver captain. If Machado was out there and Ngola found him there, the Portuguese would not return. Ngola would make certain the old witch’s words were true.

  “How far is this lake?” Ngola asked.

  “Half a day’s journey. If you get started in the morning, you should find it by mid-day.”

  “In what direction?”

  A slow smile spread across Delfina’s face, revealing her toothless state. “Come. We must make a bargain first. You say you pursue this man. What do I get out of this?”

  “What did Machado give you?”

  She cackled. “The white captain wanted to give me gold.” She slapped her knee in mirth. “Like I would have need of such out here.”

  “He must have given you something.”

  “When he saw that I had no interest in his gold, this man then presumed to sell me my own life.” She leaned her head back and showed a line of crusted scabs across her neck. “He told me that if I did not show him the way to the lake, he would slit my throat.”

  “So you told him.”

  She nodded and looked displeased. “I did, and once I told him, I cursed him, brought down the fury of the dark gods on him.” She spat. “This man you seek, he is no keeper of bargains or truths. You cannot trust him.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Good. Then maybe you will live when others did not. Perhaps you will be the vengeance I asked the gods for.”

  “I will make a bargain with you.” Ngola slid his cutlass into place at his hip.

  “What do you have to offer?”

  “Food. Tobacco. Whiskey. These are all things we brought with us. If you would have more, I would ask that you accept my word that it will be delivered when my business here is finished.”

  The old woman nodded. “We can trade fairly.”

  “Let me know what you wish.”

  “I will, in due time. Do you know what this evil man wants?”

  “I was told h
e was looking for a ring once owned by the queen of Sheba.”

  “What do you know of the ring?”

  “Nothing. That it probably doesn’t exist. Machado is filled with avarice. He’s a human magpie and will chase after anything shiny or that advertises easy profits.”

  “And what do you know of the black queen?”

  “I have heard her name mentioned in tales that men tell in taverns and during lulls upon the ocean.”

  Delfina waved Ngola in closer. “Approach me, Captain Ngola. Bring your men in with you and I will tell you all the tale of the queen and her lost ring that some say now resides in that lake your quarry has gone in search of.”

  7.

  The Queen’s Virtue

  In a short time, though with some reluctance, Ngola’s crew sat around the campfire and basked in the warmth. They passed out food and made tea, though none of them was relaxed with the vulture and the leopard looking on. Their weapons stayed close to hand, and Joao never released his grip on the blunderbuss. Yalua ate reluctantly, sitting close at Ngola’s side as though he would protect her.

  Drury sat on the other side of Ngola and seemed fascinated by the old witch, though not without some trepidation.

  “We had witches in Ireland too,” he’d confided to Ngola. “But they were hedgewitches, people who knew medicine and healing arts. They didn’t consort with dark gods or post dead men out in front of their houses.”

  “Long and long ago,” Delfina said, “in the old times when the empires in Africa were great, before white men came to take what wasn’t theirs, the queen reigned in Sheba.” The witch held a walking staff in one hand now, and at the top sat a small human skull that had been stained a deep blood red. “Her kingdom was powerful and wealthy, filled with brave-hearted warriors and gold mines. As men learned to travel far and wide with ships and caravans, and no longer denied their curiosity about faraway places, tales were told of the beautiful queen and her riches.”

  Ngola ate salted beef and injera, large, flat pieces of spongy bread. He washed it down with watery tea.

  “As you might imagine,” Delfina went on, waving her free hand open and slow, as though she were parting the mists of time itself, “the queen did not lack for suitors. Men chased her, warriors and kings, but she wanted none of them. Those men were all prideful and greedy, wanting only to add her kingdom to their own. Still, she wanted a true love. In the meantime, she took lovers where she pleased, but no man ever captured her heart.”

  “That is the kind of woman I wish to be,” Yalua said quietly. She hung onto every word, mesmerized by the vulture, the leopard, and the old woman who talked with such animation before them.

  “If you do,” old Mokonga stated from behind, “you will end up living in a hut in the middle of nowhere too.”

  Yalua shot the sailor a scornful glare.

  Mokonga only laughed quietly at her.

  “I was a slave only a few days ago,” Yalua said. “My future lies unwritten.”

  “Shhh,” Ngola said.

  They quieted, but Drury chuckled.

  “No man captured the black queen’s heart,” Delfina said, “until she laid eyes on Solomon.”

  The sailors sat raptly, eating their food as if they were in a tavern listening to stories. For a moment Ngola feared the witch might be casting a spell over them, but he felt nothing, so he remained silent and watchful.

  “According to the stories the queen heard, Solomon was a fair and just man, handsome and loving,” Delfina went on. “Those stories made her curious and she chose to journey to see him. It was something she had never before done, so a great celebration sent the queen off, and many hoped that she would at last find her true love.

  “When she arrived in the kingdom of Solomon, she discovered that Solomon was better than most men, but still the same in some of his intentions toward women. He desired her, for have I not mentioned the queen’s beauty? And like all men that desire a woman, he decided he had to have her.

  “The queen would not so lightly give herself to him, though. It was a contest of wills that people talked of for generations, till only some of the stories yet live. Solomon told the queen that she could stay with him for a night, and he agreed to keep her virtue intact and would make no moves on her. However, she could not take anything from him during her stay, or he would get to claim her in his bed.

  “Angered by Solomon’s certainty that she wouldn’t be able to keep her end of the wager, the queen agreed. That evening he fed her a meal with a lot of peppers, but he forbade her anything to drink. Not wishing to be defeated, the queen went to bed. Unfortunately, during the night, she slaked her thirst with a glass of water.”

  Yalua said something in her native language that Ngola didn’t understand, though he was sure it was an unkind thing against Solomon and the king’s shrewdness.

  “With the bargain broken,” Delfina said, “Solomon claimed his prize as victor. And the queen fell in love with him, because he was a skilled lover.”

  The sailors hooted with celebratory cheer and ignored Yalua’s scathing admonishments.

  “However, not even prowess at the arts of love will trap a woman’s heart if she chooses not to give it,” the old witch went on. “So, after a time, the queen decided to leave. The decision to leave hurt her, but she knew she didn’t love Solomon enough to stay. It is said that she cried for days.

  “To celebrate their time together, Solomon had a golden ring crafted for the queen. It was a thing of beauty, encrusted with gems, and was said to be blessed by the gods because Solomon held favor with them.” Delfina paused to lean down and stroke the leopard’s head, causing the big cat to purr and stretch contentedly. “It was also said that the goldsmith hammered some of the queen’s tears into his work.

  “On her journey back to her kingdom, raiders attacked the queen and made off with some of the treasures she’d brought back from her visit to Solomon. One of those lost things was the ring she had been given.” The old witch lit her pipe again and smoked.

  “How did the ring get to the bottom of this lake?” Ngola asked.

  “There are some who say the bandits fled the queen’s warriors and came to this place hoping to find a ship that would take them far away across the Atlantic Ocean. They only made it as far as the Lake of Sharp-Toothed Shadows, which was known by another name in those days.” Delfina puffed on her pipe. “The thieves and the warriors fought, never knowing that the lake was a place of power, a place the old gods chose to hide away from men.

  “During that battle, blood spilled into the waters, as did the queen’s lost ring. In that place of power, with the blood in the water, the ring released the tears of the queen that had been forged in the gold and gave them shape and substance. They became first of the Sharp-Toothed Shadows.”

  “What are they?” Drury asked.

  Delfina shook her head. “Some say they are vengeful women. Others say they are demons or spirits crazed by pain. I do not know, for I have never seen them. I have never been to that place.”

  “But you know the way?” Ngola asked.

  “Yes, though I am loathe sending you to it.” She puffed her pipe and smiled. “But I still want my vengeance for the betrayal I suffered at that white man’s hands.”

  “We have a bargain,” Ngola said, intending to allay his men’s fears, because he had seen them shifting and shuffling again as the thought of what they might face settled over them. “We will be your vengeance. You have only to tell us where to go.”

  And he hoped everything would go as smoothly as he made it sound.

  8.

  “There’s Something in the Water, Captain!”

  At first light, after getting directions from Delfina, Ngola assigned Joao to lead them deeper into the jungle. Sleepy and slightly hungover from the thin, sour wine they’d drunk after dinner, the sailors grumbled and cursed their ill luck, but they woke up rapidly when they realized the jungle canopy blocked the morning sun. Once in the brush under the impossibly
tall trees, it was like they had stepped into a shadow world.

  “What do you make of the old woman’s story?” Drury asked as he trudged after Ngola. He carried his Baker rifle at the ready.

  “It’s a story,” Ngola replied.

  “You and I, we’ve seen some strange things on this continent. Seen a few in other places as well.”

  “Aye.”

  “Do you think there’s any truth to the tale she told us?”

  “Let me ask you something.” Ngola brushed aside branches and watched a monkey scamper up into a tree. “If someone told you this story over a tankard of ale in a tavern, would you be willing to kit up and come chase a mystic ring at the bottom of a lake?”

  “Not a chance.”

  “Neither would I. We’re only here because Machado is the kind of man who does chase such things, and because I intend to kill him for the evil that he has done.”

  *

  Hours later, just before noon, Ngola stood in the trees seventy yards distant from the small emerald lake that lay in the middle of a rocky bowl twenty yards below. The body of water hardly justified the name lake, though. It was larger than a pond, nearly a hundred yards across. It reminded Ngola of some of the tarns he’d seen when in France. Those small mountain lakes had been created by glaciers, though. He didn’t know what had made this place.

  A thin creek poured down a jagged hill, plummeting into the basin and creating a roil of white water and low thunder that covered up any noise Ngola and his crewmen might have made in their approach.

  Under a copse of trees along the lake, the brown canvas of tents stood out against the greenery. Campfires sat like burned scars in the middle of them. Lines running between trees held clothing and packs that swung in the gentle breeze.

  “Do you see them?” Drury asked quietly.

  Crouched down at the edge of the cliff overlooking the lake, Ngola scanned the surrounding land again. “No.”