While the Gods Slumber

Zhura feinted, pretending a thrust with her staff, and then blocked Kajimani's swing. She crouched under the block, reversing her staff smoothly over the shoulder to counter with her own swing. Kaj skipped back. Zhura advanced, jabbing again.

Menga the ironsmith had taught her the short staff, training her since childhood alongside his sons. The staff was an ideal weapon for a village woman, he said. In skilled hands it could break a wrist, ruin an eye, or crush a windpipe. Yet it stood only chest high on Zhura. It was light of weight, and innocuous enough to appear as a walking stick.

Made of well-crafted hardwood, the staff could turn an axe or sword at the right angle. Zhura stifled a grin, remembering the smith's words as she circled. She wove an imaginary shield around herself with her weapon, blocking a flurry of strikes from an increasingly frustrated Kaj.

She had always believed Menga trained her to fight because he thought of her as his third son. But now she wondered if he knew someday she would need to protect herself.

Where did I come from?

Two years older than Zhura, Menga's eldest son was quicker and much stronger than her. She hadn't bested Kaj in sparring since he was twelve. Now, sweat glistened on his corded muscles as he tried desperately to finish her. But on this night, Zhura's body was awash with energy, and she kept one step ahead of him.

After her encounter with Ntoza, Zhura had returned to the crone to prepare remedies and make a stew. Once the old herb-witch had retired to her bed for the evening, Zhura came to Menga's compound as she often did, to spend the remainder of the night with the only friends she possessed in all the world.

"Beware, my love," Amina quipped as she watched them from the edge of the yard. The merchant's daughter tended a pot of millet beer as it warmed over the fire. "I think Zhura is still angry about being taken advantage of by a stranger."

Zhura felt anger, but it wasn't emotion that gave her such boundless energy. She stepped offline, deflecting another attack and countering. Kaj struggled to block.

"If anger makes her so quick," Kaj panted, "Give her spear and shield and make her a warrior instead of an herb-witch."

Zhura rapped his knuckles with the shaft. He bent at the knee, absorbing the blow. An instant later, she held the point of her staff poised at his throat. Kaj dropped his weapon.

"It's been a long day," he said.

Zhura set her staff aside and clasped his hand. "Thank you, Kaj. It has been a long day. I know you were already tired."

Kaj showed her a genuine smile. Both of them were dripping with sweat, he in only a training breechclout and she with breechclout and halter. They ambled across the grass-lined yard to join Amina. She already had stools and beer ready for them.

Amina, still dressed in her colorful wrap skirt and halter from working in the market, grunted hungrily at her man. They made a provocative couple. She with a heart-shaped face and deceptively innocent dark eyes. He with long limbs shaped by the hammer and bellows, and a scruffy-bearded boyish face. They were pledged to marry.

Well, aside from certain obstacles...

"You must try this millet beer from the south. Mama has been selling it at market for the last few days and it is all the frenzy!" Amina said. She handed each of them a clay cup. "It is good for your yoni and popo."

Zhura guffawed into her cup. The flavor was sharp, with whispers of honey and ginger.

Kaj took a sip. "Father says he hasn't seen his friends for days because they are off trying to make babies with their wives," he grinned. "He says it's the southern beer."

As they all sat, Amina dried her lover off languidly with a dry cloth. "Maybe that explains your encounter this morning," she said to Zhura. "The woman was drunk on heady beer."

Zhura pursed her lips in thought. "It doesn't make sense that she would have been so far upriver. She came there for me."

"How did you get your hands on all this beer, 'Mina?" Kaj asked. "It is so much in demand, your mother can turn a profit with whatever she can sell."

Amina shrugged. "The jugs were just laying around."

Kaj groaned in realization, covering his face in his hands.

"You know, you have a reputation, Amina," Zhura laughed.

"That was long ago!" Amina shot back. "When I used to get caught, and Mama threatened to abandon me to demons! I don't do that anymore."

"She means she doesn't get caught anymore," Kaj clarified. "Just don't steal from me," he admonished, looking up to her.

"Never, my love." Amina's kiss lingered on his lips, while her hand played lightly, wandering down his chest.

Zhura shifted uncomfortably on her stool. She cleared her throat. "Ntoza told me to come to her, but I am afraid to go alone."

Do you want to know who you are, Zhura?

"Don't worry," Amina said, breaking the kiss. "I wouldn't let you get royally rutted again by yourself," she said. "I want to watch."

Zhura snorted. She was certain Ntoza had ambushed her that morning. If the strange woman presented any threat, Amina could at least go for help. Amina knew much about foreigners from her work in the market. She might notice some useful detail. Zhura couldn't let the opportunity pass, if the southern woman had some link to her past.

Zhura knew little about the south. Only what Menga told her when he spoke of fighting in the Impi War before Zhura was born. Boma was one of a cluster of Sung-speaking villages in a forest valley bordered in the south by a range of hills. The trade route from Boma ran downstream along the Little Mongoose to kingdoms that nestled in those hills. Morore, where Menga had once soldiered - was the nearest and youngest of the kingdoms.

South of the hill kingdoms lay a vast savannah, ruled by the Sizwe Empire. The Impi War had been fought to stop the Sizwe advance northward. Zhura had no idea where in the south Ntoza might have come from, or who her own parents were. Were they killed in the war? Did Menga bring her back with him? If so, why would he say she had kin in the north?

Amina was shamelessly fondling Kaj. She bent and kneeled before him, kissing his chest while her slim hand explored the inside of his breechclout. Menga would never have approved, but he was away for the night, drinking with other old men. Because of him, the two lovers rarely had time together. Obviously, they were determined to make the most of it.

Zhura felt a twitch of lust between her legs.

"Zhura is watching us," Amina murmured. She knelt and drew Kaj off his stool momentarily so that she could slide his only garment down and off his legs.

Zhura had never seen Kaj fully naked before - at least not since they were children. She'd certainly never seen that thick cock, jutting out, proudly erect, from his lap.

"Let her watch," he said, as Amina planted kisses and licked sweat from his taut belly.

Zhura's hands drifted down and under her breechclout, where her furred slit was already moist. She still felt a delicious ache from the morning, and it only intensified her desire. Maybe there was something to the southern beer...

"She wants to join us," Amina said, turning around to watch Zhura fondling herself.

"She's already had her fun," Kaj said, gently turning Amina's head to the task at hand, which bobbed insistently in front of her face.

Amina began to kiss and suck the head of his cock, with one hand fondling his balls. The wet, sucking sounds drove Zhura mad. She pushed the breechclout off her waist so that she could better access her slit. She began to play with her tender folds. She stuck two, then three fingers into her cunt, delving deep, creating sucking sounds of her own.

Kaj groaned in pleasure as his lover took his cock into her mouth. She bobbed on it, taking it deeper with each stroke, until it reached her throat. His fingers plunged into the frizzy dark cloud of Amina's hair. She paused, raising her arms to allow him to pull her halter off, completely baring her slender, dark back.

Zhura reached into her own halter, fingering her nipples as she continued to rut her increasingly sloppy cunt with the other hand. She looked over to the dry grass on the ground. Standing, she let the breechclout fall off her wide hips and to her feet. Then she spread out on the grass to watch her friends.

Kaj leaned back, raising his hips to thrust into Amina's mouth. As she kneeled before him, she slipped a hand under her skirt to rub herself. He groaned as she released him, her lips making a pop as he sprang free. He kicked off his sandals and went over to lay on his back on the strewn grass, fisting his glistening shaft.

Amina stood, untied the knot of her skirt, and let it drop to the ground. She wore nothing underneath, not even a loincloth, and her slit was shaven smooth. But for her the cowrie charm bracelet and her sandals, she was naked. Amina smiled at Zhura and Kaj as they both stroked themselves.

"Do you want to join us?" Amina asked Zhura.

"You're my friend," Zhura said, finding it hard to form words while plunging fingers into her cunt. "Kaj is like my brother."

"Kaj is

not

your brother," Amina laughed. She sauntered over to her lover, fingering her own slit.

Zhura, burning with anticipation, drew her fingers out and tasted her own wetness. It seemed such a deliciously wicked thing to do, but it reminded her of her morning encounter. She felt another taste of lively power, weaker but similar to what she had felt before.

Amina spread her nether lips as she squatted down on Kaj's thick cock. She slid slowly down him until her butt rested fully on his thighs. She sighed, rolling her hips to swirl him around inside of her. Then she began to ride him, bouncing slowly up and down his shaft.

Kaj held her butt, kneading and spreading her cheeks as she rutted him. Amina was quite a beauty to watch. Her skin was dark, almost the shade of eggplant, because, she said, her grandmother was born in the north, in the Shanga Empire. The contrast between her complexion and Kaj's middling brown enthralled Zhura.

Zhura had met Amina several years before, when Amina came to the crone looking for something to avoid becoming pregnant. Zhura, eager to have a friend, gave her blood-seed tea for her menses. Blood-seed, the crone had taught her, was a secret amongst herb-witches that they kept only for themselves. But Zhura provided it for Amina, and kept giving it to her from that day on.

Amina increased her pace, and Zhura rutted her fingers to match, imagining herself suckling her friend's stiff nipples as Amina bounced up and down. Then she remembered the morning again, and the spot Ntoza's fingers had found. Zhura lay back, and reached up inside herself, on a quest for the same spot. Her other hand rubbed her bud of pleasure. Zhura moaned, sensing that she was about to come, hard. She held off, waiting for her friends to reach their own peaks.

"Yes!" Amina cried. "Rut! Yes!" She shuddered atop Kaj. As she slowed, he rolled her over in the straw, spreading her legs as she lay panting on her back. Then he plunged back into her cunt, rutting her with increased vigor.

Zhura couldn't hold back any longer. She rubbed furiously at her secret spot. The dam within her burst. As Zhura climaxed, clear fluid gushed out over her palm.

Kaj growled as he plowed Amina's cunt, holding her leg up in the air. Her sandal flopped off her jerking foot, and she shuddered, mouth gaping open as if she were still in the throes of orgasm. Finally, he pulled out, spurting his seed across her belly and perky breasts.

Zhura lay her head back, still breathing hard, basking in the afterglow of her climax. She licked her dripping hand, her tongue curling in the crevice between her fingers and around her wrist. She hoped her friends weren't watching. Though by now her growing wickedness must have been obvious to them. If she couldn't trust them, who could she trust?

Kaj collapsed by Amina's side. "By my sacred ancestors," he swore, as he lay, completely spent.

After some moments, Amina propped herself on an elbow. She swirled Kaj's creamy seed on the dark surface of her belly and rubbed it into her skin.

"So," she said to Zhura, "Were we as good as this morning?"

Zhura grinned. Fresh vigor pulsed through her veins. She felt better than ever. She began to laugh. "I love you both of you more than life. That will never change, Amina. You were better than this morning."