Prince of Flames Chapter 5: Journey into Darkness

Quite why her father had taken to showing such pity to him was a mystery to her. Uju had long known her father to be a man prone to pity, one whom often picked up orphans and ruffians whom he would attempt to reform. It was something of a bad habit of his one that Uju had sought to remedy and correct more than once in the past. In this situation though, she had long since come to the conclusion that this might well be the very worst of all the ‘pitiful’ charities he had taken into his mind to aid. Quite why he had done so was a mystery to her.

Certainly the man was mighty, by all accounts of those women she often in recent days visited with for their gossip, he was a lion of a man. One who could fight better than any other, and could crush any who might resist his mighty blade. The trouble was that though he spent most of his days shivering, weeping or otherwise hiding from the suns’, he was also prone to lashing out, to losing his temper and otherwise screaming madly.

The man is daft; Uju was prone to telling herself, and he could no more be of service to them than water was to sand. She could not see what her father saw in him.

“He is a broken man, my daughter,” Owalade told her sadly, “It is only by the grace of the gods that he is still alive, and does that not compel us to aid him and bandage him?”

“Hardly,” She would often respond.

“If a village rejects her child, that child will go on to burn the village to the ground,” Her father was fond of saying, it was a proverb he had come along on their many travels. “If we want to be good converts to the faith of Amun-Re and that of Roma, we really ought to do as it is preached in Deshret and the Orissian Empire what we can to help another.”

“Bah, I know that however this man will not help others,” Uju exclaimed every time they had that disagreement.

Usually it was at this time every day that the innkeeper arrived to tell them to be quiet, that brother Kayode was attempting to sleep or that the neighbours could hear them. Frustrated Uju would feel obliged at this time, to go attend after their patient which she would and usually found him asleep muttering to himself, or otherwise staring blankly or apprehensively at one corner of the room.

That day, something strange happened. It was not the innkeeper who interrupted the argument between her and her father, but rather Kayode. Stepping out of the room he had occupied for the past month, he glowered furiously at the young girl, saying to her with an air of authority that at once destroyed her will to resist. “And just what is this commotion about? I cannot believe how noisy you are so early in the morn’ Uju.”

“I did not mean to wake you!” She apologized mortified.

Her mortification was made all the worse when her father chuckled a little at her expense. The dark look that was cast in his direction stifled his chortles, and made him choke a little, as he hurriedly apologized also.

It happened that though both father and daughter had high hopes that he might decide to leave matters as they were, Kayode was hardly finished. “I was already awake, but how can a man pray for a safe day, for this lovely community that has taken us into the bosom of their family, if the two of you are preoccupied with exchanging curses and needless arguments. It is true that Aganyú Prince though he is, has done much wrong over the course of his short life however; to simply leave him to die in such a manner is unbecoming. In particular since he has survived thus far, for a reason, and that is because he has a destiny about him.”

“Destiny? I would venture to say that he has survived thus far precisely because he is a brute, rather than any such thing.” Uju snapped with a role of her eyes, hardly impressed by how he spoke of Aganyú.

“Yes, indeed young girl destiny, not that you would know anything of the sort about it,” Kayode snapped at her sharply, before he glanced away to look up the steps. “It is time now for us to check his wounds, come away with me. I would speak with him, as I do believe the two of you intend to leave before the end of the month correct? You intend to leave for Ariluwa to the north of this place?”

Uju was astonished, as was her father. Neither of them had after all spoken of their plans to the monk, who had demurred from discussing his own. Certainly they had spoken of the city of Fadaodi, but neither of them had mentioned Ariluwa to him. “How did you know this?”

“Thanks to the owner of this tavern, whom you told in a drunken stupor two weeks ago,” Kayode retorted with a faint roll of his own eyes.

“Will you be joining us?” Owalade asked hopefully, having greatly enjoyed the monk’s company in their journey south-west from Deshret.

Uju waited with bated breath. Certainly she liked Kayode also, however since they had first left Deshret for the south-west, on this commercial pilgrimage of sorts, he had comported himself with a great deal of sanctimony and haughtiness. Certainly he was a tireless worker, who never asked what he was not willing to do himself of them, however he often took to preaching to Uju in particular.

It was thus with a great deal of relief that she strove to hide from her face and eyes that she took in the revelation, “No I cannot. My duties pull me elsewhere sadly,” something of her true feelings must have shone on her face so that he snapped at her. “And do wipe away that glee from thy face young lady, it is quite inappropriate for a lady to behave so.”

“Agreed, especially when it is an honour to travel with one such as the holy Kayode,” Owalade grunted with a sharp glance of his own to his sheepish daughter.

Spluttering she did not quite succeed in regaining her composure until well after Kayode declared with a glance up the stairs that led to the second storey of the small building. “Unless my ears do deceive me, it would appear that Aganyú has awakened. Come Uju, we must be away to tend to him. He shall prove instrumental in your own journey north, he and that friend of his.”

“What friend?” Uju asked curiously of her father’s friend.

Kayode did not answer at once. Turning away, he led her up the stairs with a burst of speed that could have impressed even the swiftest of falcons. To the mind of Uju it was as though he was seeking to defy all assumptions that those around him had made in prior days about his bulk when he crossed the whole of the tavern in less time than it might have taken Owalade to drink his wine or Uju to swallow a hunk of bread.

Staring at one another in alarm, father and daughter were quick to tip toe their way up the steps after the monk. Both of them were to hurry up after him, only to discover Kayode in the midst of severely correcting the shabbily dressed wanderer who stared aghast and in surprise at his interloper. “What-?”

“Kolwé you viper, I knew it had to be you, and do not think to pull up that vulture-cloak of yours and escape from me,” Kayode growled as he caught the younger man up by the arm, leaping forward to prevent the man from leaping out the large window. “I said not to consider it, and there you are keen to leap out once more!”

“Release my wing- I mean my arm, I did naught wrong!” Kolwé shrieked eager to escape the older man, his eyes flashing with madness as he struggled in the manner that might have better fitted one who had gone mad.

Still though, the monk held firm to the man’s arm whereupon he rounded upon Aganyú who looked on with a similarly confused gaze to that which father and daughter bore. The warrior broken and battered bore the mark of a number of blows, so that it was at this time that Uju’s heart first began to twist with pity.

Her heart though was never half so soft as that of her father, who seeing the marks on the face and part of the chest of his charge, and the rod that Kolwé held in his left hand became outraged. “Slaughter him Kayode, run him through with a knife! A rusty one I say! How dare, he do that to poor Aganyú!”

“Poor Aganyú you say? He is a murderer!” Kolwé squawked not unlike a bird that has had a stone thrown at it.

“As though you Kolwé the Brigand are much better,” Kayode snapped, seeing the startled expression of the other man he sneered. “Yes, I know of you and of thy vile misdeeds. I know of all the misdeeds; murder, extortion, theft, among many other crimes, yes I know, as I have been asking about you since I first heard you visiting my patient.”

Kolwé looked as though a solid bucket of cold water had been dropped upon him. He did not quite know what to say or do, this much was evident. The plump young man looked on at the monk in bewilderment and outrage.

It was as he attempted to make a new flurry of indignant excuses for his actions that, the man before him interrupted him once more, this time with a single finger held up to his face. “Did you think I would not notice the fresh bruises that have appeared all over my patient, since that first night we took him in?”

“He is still a murderer! And what I did, I did mostly to greedy merchants and corrupted noblemen.” Kolwé excused himself to the disdain of the father and daughter.

“That may be so, though I know not how true it is,” Owalade snapped having at last lost all semblance of self-restraint, “But this man is under my protection and therefore you have no right to beat or humiliate or degrade him! To have beaten him- why I ought to beat you!”

“As though you could-” Kolwé began to say.