Racing the Stars

Sonnanqua was tethered to a tree, and as he waited, whittling away at the thong around his neck, he gazed up at the stars to distance himself from the horror of what was happening on the earth, to the screams and bloodthirsty shouts coming from the San village. The sky that night was devoid of any moon and there was only the faint light of the stars. He prayed to the great hunter father to help him. Three stars of the great one’s arrow pointed towards the east.  

Sonnanqua’s own people had been slaughtered only a week before and he had been taken to be used as a slave and as a tracker by the raiders. He had to get free or they would use him again to track down yet another group of his San people here in the Kalahari.

The black dome stretched from one horizon to the next and the cold shimmer of a trillion stars stared dispassionately onto the plight of two children who had managed to escape the butchers and were running desperately across the red sands. The boy shivered even though he trusted the starry map to show him a way to cross the great desert plain. Noze knew the only hope for them was to outrun the stars that night and he hoped there would still be enough darkness to cloak their escape. Breathing heavily from the sprint, he slowed down and looked back. His eyes flashed white with fear.

Although she was the fastest girl runner in the village, Dinkwa could not keep pace with him any longer. Panting and heaving, she pulled her hand away from his grasp and bent over double. Noze tried to pull her along but she had run too fast and she was shaking. She could see not only the fear in his eyes but the raw reflections of what they were running from. She too turned her head to look back.

The vicious flames leapt and somersaulted wildly like circus acrobats dancing against the black backdrop of the night sky. They leapt higher and higher until they lit up everything on the dry desert earth, lifting the shadows around the few stunted bushes and rocky outcrops of what had been home, exposing the atrocities. Dying mothers huddled over dead children, old people crawling or shaking as they breathed their last, having been cut to pieces as they tried to flee, scattered pots and pans, discarded karosses were some of the images that would forever be burned into their memories. A huddle of young village girls were tied together like penned sheep. All was seen by the two fleeing children in that ghastly orange glow.

Swarthy flitting figures of the raiders picked through the scanty possessions of the village. Dinkwa shuddered, thinking of her mother and younger sister. The boy, Noze,  pulled her away, but this time more gently and whispered, “They are gone, my sister. They are even now with the great hunter father in the sky.” His voice was as low as the night breeze ruffling the desert grass and as he pulled her up and took her hand again he said, “We must hurry. We must run as we have never run before, for the night cannot shelter us much longer. In the morning the Mfecane will send their fastest trackers to follow our footprints.”

Although she knew this boy well, for she and Noze had grown up together in the little group that made up their San clan, she felt he was almost a stranger to her now, for he had been hunting with the men for a year and become strong and muscular.  She had grown too and was tall and “lithe as a reed”, her father had said, but neither she nor Nozes had come of age yet and they were both still really children. Yet they were both fast runners and were the only ones in their San camp who managed to get away when the men had attacked.

They knew that the attackers were what people call – the Mfecane, who were tribeless warriors on the rampage, themselves displaced in the whirlpool of war swirling around Southern Africa after the reign of the brutal Chaka Zulu.

Dinkwa stood up and Noze carefully tied branches around their ankles to sweep away their footprints. It was not comfortable and caused them to move more slowly, especially as Noze chose the rocky outcrops over the sand again in order to minimize their spoor and slow down the trackers from finding their trail.

Dinkwa’s legs ached and her breathing was laboured when at last Noze allowed them to stop beneath a thorn tree which was a marker in the desolate and scrubby landscape and where he was able to get his bearings again.

Noze was already very skilled in the ways of tracking and could find his way using the few landmarks available. He also used the stars. He knew that soon the sky would turn khaki and then it would be tinged with that faintest pink, and before they knew it, it would be dawn.

“We must hurry,” he urged. Already the birds were chattering in every bush and a few animals could be seen roaming the wide plain ahead. In the distance were the hills leading to the mountains and a few gaps that Nose was now staring at, trying to recognise a landmark.

“Look,” he said, at last, smiling. “See that tall rock that is split in two – that’s where the cave is and the tunnel through the mountains where we can hide and will be safe from the Mfecane. But it is almost light already and as soon as the Mfecane reach this ridge, they will be able to see us. Dinkwa, we must run like we have never run before.”

The wistful hoot of an owl stopped them in their tracks. Both children knew that there were no owls in those parts. It must be the Mfecane. They were already hunting them. Nose smiled for he knew that he had made it difficult to find their tracks.

The leather thong around Sonanqua’s neck bit into his flesh as the thick-set raider yanked at the leash. Sonanqua almost fell but he pointed to the sandy patch beneath a rock where there was an imprint of a human toe. The huge black man bent down stared at it, nodded his head and then smiled. The rest of the crew patted the little man on his back. He was their slave, a Khoisan a captive from another raid. They needed his skills to track down the runaway children for them.

Sonanqua was old but as tough as the old leather his skin resembled. He clicked his abuse at his captors all day and occasionally they whipped him for his insolence. His captors knew that if he got loose, he would outrun any of them and so they kept him on a thick leather leash. It bit into his neck because he pulled and struggled so at times. They failed to notice through the blood and stains on the thong, that there was a thinner part which was slowly being frayed by a stone when they were not watching him. It was now almost frail enough.

The leader of this band of Mfecane was a brute of a man and kicked him to get going. Despite Nose’s efforts, the children’s spoor was easy for him to find and he soon started jogging. While he ran, Sonanqua planned his escape, for he saw that the run-aways were following a certain trail of stars. It would lead them all towards the mountains where he could more easily evade these big lumbering men. Right now, the big men were struggling to climb the steep slope and every so often would suddenly tug him back, laughing as he stumbled and fell.

Sonanqua’s sharp eyes had already found the children, for it was getting light. His crinkled eyes could pick out the smallest buck against the scrub and rocky hill at least a mile away. Others would see a dried old tree but old Sonanqua could see the horns of a kudu bull lying asleep in the grass. But he did not show his captors everything that he could see – not yet.

Dinkwa looked at the rocks ahead and at the steep mountain. “Oh, Noze, Noze, I don’t think I can make it.” Dinkwa’s lips were trembling and her eyes brimmed with tears. She was near to collapse after the sprint across the wide expanse of the plain and then up the hill. Now she faltered, “Noze, how do you know that this is where the tunnel is?”

“Dinkwa, I know this place. My grandmother told me how they came through the gap, under the rock that had two faces, and I am sure that it is just up there. Look at the faces of those two rocks!”

“I can’t see faces – all I see is rock.” She slumped down. “Nose, go. You go, because if they catch us, they’ll kill you.”

“I can’t leave you,” he said. “Dinkwa, they’ll do terrible things to you.”

Dinkwa looked up and the sky was no longer black.  The stars had faded but there was still one bright light – the morning star, the one her mother had told her was called the old star because it guided the sun across the sky. And she remembered her mother’s stories of how it marked the way to the land across the mountains, “where the earth is clothed in lush, thick grass, with trees of many sorts, and animals roam the plains in their herds and there is water that runs and water that lies in deep pools.” It was where her mother’s family lived.

.          Sonanqua saw it too: the morning star was fading fast. The time was finally almost here. Sonanqua knew that this would perhaps be his only chance to escape from these big swarthy tyrants with their muscular bodies dripping sweat, with their panting breath and cruel ways. They would kill him after this.  Get them near their prey and then when their attention is diverted by their lust for the hunt, break through the last bit of thong and melt into the scenery. But what of children?

He could not help them – of that he was sure. Each person he knew, had his own path to follow with the stars. The fugitives were maybe just unlucky.

He shrugged and then called out to his captors. He pointed towards the mountain, and to the pale silhouettes of the two youngsters. They could all see that the girl was limping. The Mfecane whooped with excitement. Tying Sonanqua to a rock, they left him with a parting lash of the whip through his face.

The gruff voice of one of the pursuing men sounded right behind the two children and cut the pre-dawn bird chorus. With mounting horror, the children realised that the men had closed the gap. The impossible had happened. The Mfecane had somehow tracked them in the dark.

Dinkwa leapt up, and with pounding heart and breath taken in gulps, she and Nose ran up and up, but they were exhausted and all the while the pounding rhythm of heavier feet were gaining on them.

They reached the rocks but they could not see any sign of a cave. They looked at each other in horror. It had all been in vain and now they were trapped here against the cliff face. Noze looked up to the summit.  A sheer impassable wall of solid rock grinned down.

But what was that? There was something moving on the cliff above them..It was a small man waving and pointing to the deep shadow next to them. The cave was right there all the time but craftily hidden by the shadow. The children clambered gratefully into the cave which was actually a tunnel because they could see an inkling of light as the first rays of the morning sun began to steal in through the other end.  

But the men had been too close and could not have failed to see them. The children were still adjusting their vision to the dark interior when three huge black shadows darkened the cave, even more, the men were there - standing right at the entrance. But, like the children,   they at first could not see it either. For a moment the children thought they’d be safe, but the three men knew they’d just seen the children and eventually, the biggest brute grunted and pointed and the children knew that the game was up.

A terrific roar like thunder rent the air and they all looked up as the sound of falling rock rattled the cave. A jumble of rock preceded the huge boulder that plummeted to the rocky cave floor. It totally blocked the entrance. The three men were no more. It had crushed them as they had been about to enter and only a bloody leg and arm were visible.  The children took one look at the grisly sight and ran. They ran towards the sunlight and life on the other side.

And outside lay Sonanqua. His back was broken as were his legs and arms and he was dying. He’d lost his balance when he tilted the rock and had tumbled down and over the cliff soon after. He looked up at the sky. It was pink as a desert rose and he knew that the biggest star of all had risen, lighting the earth as it did each day. Sonanque smiled, he had raced the stars for the last time. He would join the great hunter father in the sky.