CHAPTER ONE

From beneath the height humiliated any sight of a living organism. The ancient mountain was the heart and soul of the land. It was the so-called Kirimaara. Kirimaara rested on the fertile land of Ura. It was like a sleeping elephant which never woke. The big sleep of the creator.

 From its three peaks snow restlessly bestowed itself on the surfaces of the cliffs. Three rivers flowed down the dark valleys of the Kirimaara. If three had been no bush and forest covering the slopes you could have seen the rivers when you stood on top of the ridges of Kirimaara that were extensively lying without any discernible plan. Several bayous broke from the three main streams. In the morning steam arose from the water depicting an inevitable sanctuary. People and animals who resented the area depended on the waters of life.

  Kirimaara kept back dark secrets of the land of Ura either happened at night or in the daylight. From its ancient nature served as a bank of even ancestral deeds like Mugwe the seer. Mugwe was the leader of the Baynne community. He was highly respected that when he even coughed, everybody in the land of Ura would leave everything he was doing and kneel with one knee and listen. He saw the visions of the future and spoke them to the many people who came to see and hear him. At times he climbed into a hilly place and spoke aloud his message.

        “A time will come, when my people will conjoin with other community around a humongous mountain and be considered to have the largest share of cake at the dine table of the king. Be warned of their unscrupulous women.”

      These were the Liffenian.

        The message could be heard by everyone through his magic. Mugwe died on seeing the humongous mountain Kiriimaara which he had foretold before. The Baynnian resented on the slopes of the land of Ura.

  Mugwe's linage settled on the upper area divided by Thiita and Thagana. Years passed decades followed up to centuries when war broke between the communities and the lineage of Mugwe was wiped out except for one girl Christine.

  Christine lay on her back. She was in deep thought. Thin rays of the moon penetrated through various cracks in the wall and rooftop made of well-arranged thick and thin grass. The rays fell onto various edges of the hut. She still gazed onto the lazy darkness in which objects lost their clearness. She had a haunting desire. Images formed and flipped across her mind in quick succession. Some envisaged an inevitable smile on her face on the quest of the moon probe to discover her hidden secret. Open smiling it would be a dying yearning for a passing mosquito to land on the palace of her well-arranged white teeth as snow. But before they could make a land a distorted imaginary flipped and well-lined lips made a move. Deep conversation evoked her now and then from the images that formed on her mind until at some points she forgot herself and made an utterance to the darkness. This made her blink severally to confirm if she was asleep or in a dream and even wonder if someone could have poked his or her nose around the hut to hear of her deep secret.

        She raises her hand slowly along her body endowed with good features. The hand reaches her chest and enjoys the fullness and tenderness of her bosom that pointed to the moon as a warning to it for gazing at the bare of Christine. Images now turned into shadows that had no concrete form shadows that came and went sometimes merging from nowhere and filled her bed made of bamboo sticks tied together by strings and lowly made on the left entrance of the round hut. The bed is spread with dry grasses and dry leaves of bananas that gave her comfort. A shadow of a man appeared that frightened her to near death. From side to side she wriggled on her bed trying to close her eyes and shut away these thoughts and would not let her bed try to close her eyes and shut away these thoughts that kept racing in her mind. The yearning even grew tense. She could feel him.

   “ I should be concise .” She whispered to herself forming a foetal position on her bed. Now she recalls several attempts when she stood in front of her mother and was ready to tell her what she held back. This after several rehearsing on how to go about it. Something always interrupted her and found herself talking about irrelevant issues to her mother.

   Her sister Laura, was on the verge of help, on these occasions. Laura, was bold enough to even silence a wise old man when a critique of a problem arose. The men and women of Ura termed her as the passing star. Now she is no more! Laura fell onto the rim of the hands of Mark Slater's soldiers who befell the land of Ura in sought of her. Mutiny propelled the last breath of Laura after she had challenged them. It seemed a rogue operation. Yearning! yearning! Some raised questions with insatiable answers and others became the answers to some of the problems. Her night seemed long. If sleep could have been a person near her she could have knelt and pleaded with him or her to take her no matter the consequence. She could have swallowed it.

               Christine diligently drops her legs off the bed and slowly manages to get her position of sitting on the bed, which was of no good to her. She manages to stand up as the bed cracked and wore her attire. She slides the wooden door open. Still, at the door, she gazed at the hazy darkness. She tried to listen if she could hear anything but she could only hear silence.

    Direct to the door of her house, the hut of her mother, Lucy that built a figure in the darkness. On the right hand, the granary and the hut of the owner of the home posed their standards. Round the home, was surrounded by a wooden fence made of poles that were entrenched half her feet down the ground and tightly fixed to each other that even air bulged to enter the home background.

  Trees formed an inevitable serene at the back of Christine's hut. On the black shadows of its shades in the darkness lay a manageable herd. It was also the show grounds that a meeting would be held on that home. The old men of the Ura had a separate tree just near the Njenga’s hut. With rounded stoned around the tree and a fiery furnace at the centre where in the evening they would meet and scrutinize problems in the land of Ura.

They occasionally would sip a drink made of water, honey and diligently instilled in a pot. At the bottom of the pot a flat, lightweight stone pressed down mithigu. It was a fruit of a tree that grew along the river banks. They would be picked down when unripe and be dissected longitudinally. Then the part would be immersed in a hot water for several minutes and left to dry. It served as a catalyst. The drink is left for days to ferment. The drink is served with a calabash to each one of the wise old men.

They used a nest made of crisscrossed grasses as a sieve of wax and the drink that they drenched slowly down their gut. At the fireplace, meat from the catch of the day withstands the hotness of the red hot charcoal that emitted heat profusely. It was severally carried out in the evening after then day to day duty. Acted as a refreshing activity occasionally. Appeared on this scene of Njenga's home grounds since he was the only left heir in the lineage of Mugwe, the seer. Njenga had only Christine as his only daughter and a child. This always purported his restlessness in having a son as his heir to continue the lineage. Now he even entrusts his thought of having a second wife to bore him a son.

The mist eased the visibility leaving it clear of every edge. Christine notices a beam of light emanating from her father's house. The fireplace had been lit up. Its wavy movements distorted the shadows of two people. Her mother's hut was still dark as charcoal. She was sure that her mother must be in her father's hut.

"sought of a son!" She found herself whispering.

  With that information, Christine paved her way into the darkness that loomed everywhere. Now she becomes one of the darkness. Step by step, she heads to the entrance. The gate had poles crossing along the entrance in a hierarchy from the bottom. Behind her mother’s hut and she negotiates a corner that links her direct to the gate as her hips swayed from one side to another swooping. Slides the two middle logs and squeezes herself through the gap. Now she stood between the world and her. She had no reason why she even sneaked out of the home at that late in the night. That time, also it was a girl in the dark venture. All she could feel is to saunter around.

 The path stared at her. Her short skirt flared above the short thick grass that grew aimlessly on the roadside. Its leaf blades brushed her legs softly, paving way for her as she proceeded down the valley in pursuit of her pleasure. A thick dark cloud unseals the moon that glared at her. It was her companion down the road. At least she had a little courage to not hold her breath when the leaves of trees rubbed against each other due cool breeze of wind blowing unceasingly, across the land she faced now. The ridges were very clear now under the humiliation of the light of the moon. Through her sight, the east ridge formed a figure of a lioness breastfeeding a puppy. A site she had never realized since her birth. She rubs her eyes severally to confirm but the site seemed the centre of attraction on her adventure. The light of the moon is deemed due to almost the whole coverage of its appearance by a light cloud. Christine looks up to curse the cloud for taking a friend who helped her with a comfortable ambience. She slowly gets attention from the cloud. The cloud formed a figure of a falcon snatching a mother of a chick leaving the chick hopeless in the realm of the world.

   The throbbing of the cold icy water against the stones kept the same pace with her heart. The water of river Thagana looked strange at the night. It seemed too dark ."Is it dark or red?" She questioned. Cricket made the shrilling stop as she snares at the verge of stepping their habitant. Christine extends her hand to get hold of a branch of a tree next to her. She missed. She stumbles to regain her stance. Just then, she realizes, she is under the tree they always meet with a love of life, Adrian.

    Now she was sure of what she wanted. What she yearned for. She even draws closer to the trunk of the tree. She laps her hand around it. Her two fawn breasts pressed against it. The urge rose inside her. She longed for him. His caricature of him leaves her in a desperate situation