Fearless Master of the Jungle (A Bunduki Jungle Adventure (21 page)

‘
Then
I may be able to help you,’ Charole said, sounding more casual than
she felt.

‘
You?’
Shushi snorted. Why should you?’

‘
To
gain my liberty,’ Charole answered. ‘I would have to be given your
sacred oath to the Dragon God that, if you find the “Earths” with
my help, you will set me free and let me share the secret of how to
make the “Thunder Powder”.’

‘
We
can make you talk without needing to give any promises,’ Shushi
warned.

‘
You
could
try
,’
the Protectress corrected. ‘But you wouldn’t know for sure
whether I’d told you the truth— And you daren’t take too much time
in making sure, or your ruler will get suspicious and start trying
to find out what’s delaying you. I’m sure that you
don t
want that to
happen, Lord Torisaki.’

‘
You
can have what you wish,’ the Cara-Bunte promised, standing up and
raising his right hand. He recited an oath sufficiently like the
one used by the Mun-Gatahs, with a dragon instead of a quagga as
the deity to whom it was directed, for Charole to be both satisfied
that it was genuine, and confident that it would be equally binding
once uttered. At the end, sitting again, he asked impatiently,
‘Well, where are they?’

‘
At
the Jey-Mat Telonga village,’ the Protectress guessed and
elaborated with, although she did not realize it, valid reasons for
the assumption. She finished, ‘So I think the “Suppliers” have sent
them to look after those cowards.’

‘
That
could be correct,’ Torisaki agreed. ‘If the rest of their weapons
are as fine and different as their arrows, the “Earths” must be
well favored by the “Suppliers”.’

‘
Or
they might even be “Suppliers” themselves,’ Charole suggested, in a
voice that throbbed with excitement.

‘
They
might at that!’ Torisaki ejaculated, sounding equally thrilled by
the possibility of being able to lay hands on one or more of their
mysterious benefactors. It had always been his ambition to do so.
He yearned to attain the position of Emperor of the Cara-Bunte
nation and, without being aware of them, he shared the late High
Priest of the Mun-Gatahs’ dreams of conquering the other races with
whom his people had come into contact.

‘
How
soon can we march to Jey-Mat?’ Charole inquired, deciding that she
had been correct in comparing the war-lord with Dryaka.

‘
March?
’
Torisaki barked. ‘You mean go across country?’

‘
Yes,’
Charole confirmed. ‘It’s a pity that you can’t ride—’

‘
We
can ride,’ Shushi protested. As their homeland was roughly the size
and shape of Madagascar, the “Suppliers” had allocated small ponies
as a means of transport around it. ‘But we never bring our mounts
on raids. What we’ll do is go by sea and, although we’ve never
bothered to try it before,
^lviii
we’ll find a way through the
swamplands to a village. Even if it isn’t Jey-Mat, we can make the
people there take us to it.’

While she was speaking, the
war-lady picked up the
halaka.
At the end of her words, she propelled it across
the pavilion. Slicing through the left wall, its disappearance was
followed almost instantaneously by the scream of a woman in mortal
agony.

‘
That
was Muchkio,’ Shushi announced, as Charole and her husband stared
from the wall to her and back. ‘The
Yung-Lib
told me she was eavesdropping and I’ve
been watching to find out where she was standing.’

‘
I
f you’ve killed her—!’ Torisaki began.

‘
Not
even the second cousin of the Empress is allowed to spy on a
war-lord and war-lady,’ Shushi pointed out. ‘But I know what you
mean, my husband. If I’ve killed her—and, from the way she
screamed, I probably have— we’ve
got
to know how to make “Thunder Powder” and
“Terrifiers” before we go back to Tahsha-Bunte.’

‘
Only
the “Earths” can tell you,’ Charole warned. ‘That means you’ll have
to find them to learn how to do it.’

‘
Darling!’ gasped Dawn Gunn, nee Drummond-Clayton, resting
her back against the pillows of her nuptial bed and staring in
delight at the well-laid tray of food her husband of only a few
hours was placing on her lap. ‘This is wonderful. Oh thank
you!’

‘
Don’t
mention it,’ Bunduki replied, sitting alongside the girl who was
now his wife. Wondering if he had ever seen her looking so
radiantly beautiful, he grinned and went on, ‘Just remember, this’s
how I want it brought to
me
every morning from now on.’

All through the days preceding that on
which their marriage ceremony had taken place, in addition to the
various preparations for the event, the girl and the blond giant
had had much to keep them occupied.

One of the main problems that
had demanded Dawn
’s and Bunduki’s attention had been to continue the
training of the quaggas. However, as soon as Isabel and
Shambulia
had come to accept
being saddled and ridden—which had been attained after only one
more spell of abortive resistance apiece—the progress had been
rapid. While there was much for them still to learn, both would
answer to their names and come in response to their respective
owner’s whistle. So successful had this aspect proved that the
Earth couple had already started to teach the animals to obey
certain
Australopithecus
⁹
signal calls as an
aid to communication over even longer distances. Noticing how
little fear was shown by their mounts to sounds which usually
induced panic among
gatahs,
Dawn and Bunduki had been even more sure that they were
gifts from the ‘Suppliers’.

During the evenings, when time
had permitted, Bunduki had set about instructing the Jey-Mat
Telonga hunters in armed and bare-handed self defense. As in the
case of the quaggas, he had wondered how much of the rapidity with
which At-Vee was attaining competence was due to mental
conditioning by the
“Suppliers’. Keen and intelligent as the Hunter undoubtedly
was, the way in which his ability with weapons and unarmed combat
improved was exceptional. None of the others could keep pace with
him in either accomplishment. Nor did they approach the skill
displayed by Joar-Fane and At-Vee in all matters pertaining to the
care and riding of the captured
gatahs.
There was, the Earth couple had realized,
much still to be done before they had established a reliable
fighting force. They had also felt that they had no cause to be
ashamed of what had already been achieved along those
lines.

While riding their quaggas in
the jungle, Dawn and Bunduki had renewed their acquaintance with a
band of forest elephants they had befriended and which had later
proved of the greatest service to them.
^lix
What was more, ranging further than
would have been possible on foot, they had discovered that—as they
had been promised by the ‘Supplier’ they had met-they apparently
possessed a similar empathy with all members of the
subspecies
Loxodonta Africana Cyclotis.
^lx
They had had no
difficulty in establishing
equally cordial relations with two other bands they had met in
their travels.

With the willing agreement of
Tav-Han and other members of Dawn
’s Telonga ‘family’, granted out of
consideration for all he was striving to do on behalf of their
people, Bunduki had been relieved of much of a task that would
otherwise have fallen upon him. They had taken it upon themselves
to carry out most of the work, including the production of the
majority of the food, required to make a resounding success of the
premarital feasting and dancing demanded by convention. It said
much for their efforts that everybody who attended had claimed the
festivities had never been bettered.

However, to establish his
position as a leading member of the hunting fraternity, there was
one thing that the blond giant could not leave to others. So on
three occasions he had gone into the jungle alone at night. Armed
with his bow and a selection of the specialized hunting
points—which he had found at the tree-house and surmised were
presented by the
‘Suppliers’ in response to his almost subconscious
wishes—to supplement the utilitarian Razorheads on the first and
third expeditions, he had restricted himself to the
m
’
kuki
and shield for the second. His yield for archery had been a
large bull gaur and a five hundred pound giant forest hog. Combined
with
very
careful stalking, his skill at throwing the Masai spear had
brought him an exceptionally fine male bongo.

When the heads and hides
of
Bunduki’s
trophies had been exhibited at the Telongas’ equivalent of his
bachelor party on the night before the wedding, which had been
attended by hunters from several other villages and four young men
who had made the journey from Wurka by boat, all had been the
source of admiration and acclaim. The means by which he had
acquired them had increased his prestige enormously.

No other herbivorous animals in the
jungle, not even the forest elephants, were so highly regarded and
respected by the Telonga hunters as the gaur or the—to be strictly
accurate—omnivorous giant forest hog. Both had characteristics
which made it a most dangerous adversary. Each was tough,
aggressive and hard to stop when launching an attack, particularly
when opposed by the primitive weapons owned by the human
beings.

Largest of all the Asiatic wild
cattle,
Bos
(Bibos) Gaurus
was, on Zillikian, matched in size only by the great Cape
buffalo, and the plains-dwelling habits of
Cyncerus Caffer
^lxi
precluded the Telonga hunters from
making its acquaintance. Knowing both species, Bunduki was in full
agreement with those sportsmen on Earth who had claimed the gaur
was the equal to the Cape buffalo on all the points by which they
set their standards.

Most massive of all the
Suidae,
wild pigs, and
possessing its full measure of that genus’s courageously pugnacious
tendencies when roused, the giant forest hog was a creature that
was not generally sought after by the Telonga hunters. While they
had a liking for its meat, they preferred to give the
sub-species
Hijlochoerus Meiner-zhageni
a wide berth in its jungle habitat and go
after the smaller, less dangerous red river hog.

The bongo was not regarded as
being particularly dangerous, although it could be on certain
occasions and in some conditions. Yet it too was held in high
esteem. As on Earth, the hunting fraternity were aware that no
animal was more wary, alert and adequately protected by its senses
than the species
Boocercus Euryceros.
Those qualities had made its flesh highly prized.
That the blond giant should have taken his specimen with the
comparatively short ranged
m
’
kuki
and, instead of waiting in ambush near a watering place for
the prey to come to him, had adopted the vastly more difficult task
of going in search of it, had added to the credit he was given for
his success.

Such had
been the high regard for all
Bunduki had achieved since he had come among them, which each man
had admitted he could not have himself performed, that before the
party had broken up, they had conferred upon him the greatest honor
and title their fraternity could bestow. In future, Tav-Han had
announced—and the information was relayed across the entire Telonga
nation by the ‘talking drums’-the blond giant was to be known as
the
Dapan-Dankara.

Translated into English, the
words meant,
‘Fearless Master of the Jungle’.

During the evening, Bunduki had
had an opportunity to meet the men from Wurka. They had proved to
be a vastly more likeable group than the Senior Elder, Tik-Felum,
and his coterie. Free from the quintet
’s supervision and the presence of
toadies who would have informed upon them, they had not hesitated
to discuss their village’s affairs.

Despite Tik-Felum and his
companions
’
attempts to prevent it, the story of their defeat had passed around
the population. It had given added strength to such of them, the
four visitors in particular, who were resentful of working hard to
support those who were too idle to do so. However, although
desirous of bringing about a change in policy, they had not yet
been able to raise sufficient support from their neighbors. No
hints or suggestions had been passed on either side, but Bunduki
had sensed that the men from Wurka might want to solicit his
assistance in the not too distant future.