But I didn't blink, and though it took only a split second to go by, I saw its shiny, black, elephant-like body, lethal trunk, beady eyes, and blur of shuffling feet. As it passed, it blew up dirt and branches and leaves. I'd have been blown off my feet if I hadn't held on to a tree. This was what I was up against. When things settled down, I touched my glass necklace again.
"I'm almost there, Dari," I whispered.
It took me another day to find the large cave that sat on a hill surrounded by smooth-trunked tall palm trees. When I did, I quietly stepped behind a tree and sat down. I didn't take out my digi-book. I was getting to the point where I no longer needed it. I already knew many of the creatures mentioned in it. If I didn't know a creature, I used my knowledge to make educated guesses about it, and I was usually right. Plus the elgort entry didn't work anyway.
Nor did I take out my compass. I knew exactly where I was. It was as if I had a compass in my head now.
What I needed at that moment was to sit and let my mind rest. I squatted down behind the tree and placed my head in my hands, closed my eyes, and tried to focus my mind. Two years earlier, Dari had been obsessed with the Mami Wata Mambos, women who honored a powerful water deity. They were known for falling into such deep meditation that they could go for days without eating or sleeping, and when they awoke, they were strong enough to climb the tallest palm trees and hike up high mountains. Dari had looked up their methods on the net, and we had both tried to meditate like the Mami Wata Mambos before our final exams. We'd both been somewhat successful, feeling vibrant for our exams even after little sleep.
I closed my eyes and used the method we'd practiced, imagining I was swimming through soft, warm clear water as a bird flew through the sky. Slowly, I felt my body relax and I was able to think clearly. I realized that I wasn't afraid. No. Not after coming this far. I was apprehensive. I was excited. I was finally at the place I'd been traveling toward for weeks. I was in a position to do what I wanted to do.
"But I have to calm myself first," I whispered. "Get ready. Relax, Zahrah. Relax. So you can do this right."
As I crouched there behind the tree imagining water and warmth, my body became perfectly still and quiet and I began to listen. Then there was another presence. I felt it more than I heard it. A burst of dirt and leaves filled the air. Then it screeched. I slowly brought my head up, turned, and glanced around the tree. There it was in full view. It stood motionless at the mouth of the cave. It screeched again, lifting its thick trunk high like a giant meaty trumpet. My heart somersaulted in my chest. I held my hands to my ears to drown the sound out, but I could still feel it vibrate through my body. I never want that thing's eyes on me, I thought.
The elgort was probably a female, her nest inside the cave. She turned and went into her lair. I could hear her moving around inside. I set my things down, keeping them close to me. Then I sat down, closed my eyes, and tried to meditate. The time hadn't come yet. It arrived hours later, when I heard the elgort emerging from her cave. I had stopped meditating and fallen into a terrified stupor, watching the sunlight leak from the sky. It had become night and the moonlight gave the forest a dim glow. It was dark, so I closed my eyes and tried to see with my ears.
The elgort was at the lip of the cave. She was hungry. Why else would this creature come out of her cave? Then there was the blast of air as she ran off to forage. When I stood up, my joints were stiff and my hands shook, but I didn't hesitate. If I had, I would never have gone in.
***
I thought I no longer needed the digi-book, and to an extent I was right. I knew the Forbidden Greeny Jungle. I had mastered it! Sort of. But not even masters know everything. What the digi-book couldn't tell me about the elgort, even if I could have read the entire entry, was that a female elgort doesn't go too far from her nest when she looks for food. On top of this, I believe that sometimes a female elgort can even sense when her eggs are in danger.
This elgort must have been only about a mile away when she got the prick in her small brain that a foreign creature was hovering close to her eggs. I imagine that in three crunches, she ate the bush cow she'd caught and immediately began making her way back to her nest.
Inside, the cave wasn't very deep, and within a few minutes, I was standing on several layers of dried fern leaves looking over seven elgort eggs. I needed to take the unfertilized one, but which one was that? All of them were smooth and white with purple dots.
"Oh, Joukoujou, help me," I whispered, holding my glow lily closer for a better look. From not far, I heard the screech of the elgort and my heart raced even faster. Which one? I stared harder, squinting my eyes. The eggs were perfectly round, about the size of the bounce pods people used when they played netball. I bent down and reached for one of them. It was warm and twitched at my touch. I snatched my hand back.
"Ooooooh," I moaned, not knowing what to do. They all looked the same. I couldn't make a mistake there. If I took one with a baby elgort in it, then there would probably be no yolk, especially since these eggs looked as if they were ready to hatch at any moment. And what if it hatched after I took it? Even baby elgorts were probably dangerous. If I didn't choose correctly, all was lost for me ... and Dari.
I wanted to sit down and just cry. Cry my brains out. I was tired; tired of taking chances, tired of not knowing anything for sure, tired of looking death in the eye. The mother would be back soon, but still I just wanted to ciy. Enough was enough. But it wasn't and I couldn't. I had to make a choice.
I slowly stepped forward and touched another egg. It twitched, but this time I forced myself not to jump back. And in that moment, my hand on that twitching egg, it came to me. I moved to the next one and touched it. It also was warm and twitched at my touch. I went from egg to egg. When I touched the fifth one, a piece of eggshell fell away and a tiny trunk grabbed at my arm. It held on tight and I could feel its undeveloped teeth trying to gnaw at me.
"Ah!" I shrieked using all my strength to pull my arm from its strong grasp. The place where it had caught me throbbed, but I had no time to inspect it. More eggshell was falling away from this baby elgort, and soon its whole head was out. Its eyes were yellow with flecks of red, and they looked right at me. It then raised its trunk and let out a feeble screech. Feeble, but one that I was sure its mother would hear. I ran to the next egg, ready to just grab it and run. I wanted to get away from that baby elgort and out of the cave as soon as possible. I had to take a chance, and I had a one-in-seven chance of being right.
"No, Zahrah, stay calm," I said out loud. I would touch them all first. My father always said that even in moments of crisis, it was best to stay calm and hold on to logic.
The sixth egg was cool and did not move.
Without further thought, I snatched it into my arms, shoved the glow lily into my satchel, and ran out of the cave. The egg was somewhat heavy. It weighed about as much as two bounce pods filled with water. I was standing on the lip of the cave when I felt the ground rumble. From the hill, I could see the forest top and the trees falling from view! The swath of tumbling leaves and timber was growing closer with impossible speed. I'll never forget that sight.
Immediately, I turned and ran like a madwoman! I took off down the hill to the right and into the jungle, hoping with all my heart that I wouldn't trip and fall. I plunged into the forest, smelling leaves, soil, and moisture. I imagined the choking scent of the elgort's madness just behind me. Like fire and the reddest pepper. I had grown strong and quick from my travels, but there was no way I could outrun that madness.
Behind me, I heard the elgort give its warrior cry, "Screeeeeeeeech!" It was so loud that I thought my ears would burst. I wanted to scream, but I was breathing so fast that all I could do was whimper.
Pure fear heightened my night vision, and my long skinny legs moved me fast around the trees, rough bushes, dead leaves, and vines. I was leaping over a moss-covered log when two large trees crashed to my left and right! Leaves, twigs, and dirt blew onto me with such force t
hat any exposed skin was immediately scratched to pieces. And if the elgort wasn't going to kill me, the falling trees it knocked down would.
Even as I ran, I was aware, on some level, of the need to focus and stay calm. I could hear the grunts of the elgort and the crack, snap, and crash of the trees and bushes as the elgort flattened them. Suddenly, a small tree hit my arm as it fell. I stumbled, almost falling, but kept running.
The elgort was a beast, a monster, a living demon fueled by rage. I tried not to imagine its legs, though I could hear it behind me; the rhythm of its steps was impossible to discern because those feet were moving so fast. It would break my back with the first chomp, press the blood from my body with the second, and crush my head with the third and then swallow.
I started to cry. I was breathing hard, tears of terror flying from my eyes when I looked at the sky that peeked between the leaves and branches. The elgort would soon be on me. Any moment now.
As I clutched the egg to my chest and the elgort's shadow fell on me, blocking out the moonlight, images of my life flashed through my brain. My mother tucking me into bed. My father's laugh. Papa Grip touching my hair and saying it was OK. I'm a wise woman, I thought. Sitting on the lower branch of a tree, Dari on the branch above. What did the teasing matter? The days on the playground where kids pulled my hair and chanted, "Witch lady, witch lady, where is your juju?" Sitting quietly in my room looking out the window at the sky.
The elgort was a half moment away. I could feel its breath on my back. My heart beat a frantic rhythm.
Just behind me, it grunted as it reached for me with its trunk. I felt the tip of it touch my ear! Another large tree fell forward, only a yard to my side. If I tripped or a tree fell on me, I would be dead within milliseconds. I thought about how I had disturbed this elgort's babies. The mother elgort probably wanted to not only kill me but cause me pain and suffering.
I wheezed and could feel my legs ready to give way. Who was going to save me? I'd abandoned Nsibidi days ago. If she was trying to find me, she would have done so by now. The Greeny Gorillas also had let me go. My parents didn't know where I was, and if they did, I was too far for them to make a difference. This situation was my doing and I was on my own.
I'm not born to die like this.
The thought echoed in my emptying mind. I'd been shy, introverted, lived my life up to the last few weeks cowering from the world. When people made fun of me, I would go home and hide in my room. I was born with a strange ability, and once again, I cowered from it. But look at how I've survived in this place, I thought.
I'm not born to die like this!
In that moment, I was sure. It was as if something clicked in my brain and I was ready. I was immediately energized. I relaxed, and before I knew it, I shrugged off the darkness, my blood pressure dropping as my body calmed. The elgort's trunk touched my ear again, this time more firmly, and I knocked it away.
Then, as if I had always done it, I took to the sky. Yes, I knew how to fly. I could fly. It had been in the back of my mind for weeks. An unthinkable, unspoken possibility. But in that moment, I chose to fly, not die. Nsibidi was right; it came when I wanted it to. I just had to want it hard enough.
I flew fast and high, branches and leaves slapping and painfully scratching at my face and body getting caught in my dada hair, and tearing my clothes. I gritted my teeth through the pain. When I broke the forest's cover, I glanced below me and saw the elgort. I smiled deliriously. Elgorts were fast, but they couldn't climb anything. They were strictly land animals, like bush cows.
Below, the elgort raged, her angry screech shaking the entire jungle and her thousand teeth glinting in the moonlight. I faintly heard a group of palm-tree crows fly from a nearby tree, cawing in panic. When I made it through the jungle's canopy, I clutched the egg as tightly as I could and then flew away from the elgort with as much speed as I could muster. All my muscles were straining to their limit.
I was too concerned with the egg to notice that I was hundreds of feet in the air and bathed in moonlight. I didn't notice how peaceful it was up there. Nor did I notice the zigzags of elgort paths below me. I did notice that the elgort was not following me below. Instead she ran back to her nest—to check on her eggs, I was sure. When she'd realize that I had taken the unfertilized one, she would probably screech a less aggravated screech and sit on her unhatched brood, looking around angrily.
I flew slowly, afraid to move too fast and drop the egg. A few times I was sure I would drop it. When I had gotten about a mile away, I actually did.
"No!" I screamed as I watched the egg fall between the trees below. I zoomed down after it, my eyes tearing from the rushing air. I'd come this far only to drop the egg by accident! I landed on the ground and looked around frantically. Trees and bushes to my left, more on my right. Decaying leaves and mulch underfoot. Grasses, ferns, creeping plants, a patch of lemongrass, blue lilies, the sound of a bird flying away here and a beetle clicking there. Where was it? There. Right in front of a bush. I frowned as I ran to it. What is that? I squinted. Then I laughed.
"How...?"
"I have my ways," said the Speculating Speckled Frog, sitting on the egg. Today its voice was higher, like a woman's.
"Have a seat," the frog said. "We need to talk."
I plopped down, suddenly exhausted. Only moments ago, I'd been running for my life. Then I'd dropped the egg. Now a frog was telling me to sit down.
"How do you feel?" the frog asked.
I must have been shaking with excess adrenaline and terror. I knew I looked stunned.
"Stunned," I said. I picked a thorn from my cheek and looked at my pants. They were slashed in places, and blood soaked through in others. I stuck my finger in my ear as if doing so would stop the ringing from the elgort's screeches.
"You should feel proud of yourself," the frog said. "You've done the impossible."
I grunted. Without a thought, I flicked away a large bush spider that was scrambling toward me. The frog chuckled.
"A thirteen-year-old Ooni girl who has never left her comfortable home walks into the Forbidden Greeny Jungle and masters it, and then successfully snatches an elgort egg to save her friend. In my three thousand and four years, I have never seen anything like it."
I wasn't paying full attention. Several of the trees that had scratched me must have had some mild poison in their leaves and branches, because my scratches and scrapes were itching terribly and I felt a little lightheaded. I had an idea how to make it better, and I would do that when the frog was finished with me. I looked at my hands. They were still shaking.
"Now you will head home, no?"
"Yes," I said.
"May I ask you one question?"
I shrugged. "Sure."
"What have you learned in your travels?"
I laughed. "I've learned that the sky above the jungle is safer than the ground." Unless I come across one of those monstrous horse-eating birds, I thought. I paused as the frog waited for me to continue. "I don't know. It's too early to think of—"
"By the time you're fully relaxed and you stop shaking, you won't remember what you've learned. Not completely. It's best to say it out loud, put words to it. I know you are very tired, but this is a moment to reflect."
I paused as I thought about this. The answer came, but the words were hard to speak. Just like that day when Papa Grip pushed me in front of the mirror and asked me to tell him what I saw. I took a deep breath, this time not needing any coaxing.
"I've ... I've learned so much about myself, what I'm capable of, about the world ... you know, things. I'm stronger than I thought. Much stronger. I'm no longer afraid of heights."
The frog nodded.
"It has been good watching you," the frog said. "You've been great entertainment. And mark my words, you will be the talk of the jungle for many centuries to come."
I looked up from examining my wounds. "Really?"
The frog nodded.
"The Greeny Gorillas will tell their
children: 'There once was a quiet, shy girl who discovered she wasn't so shy or quiet. Who discovered that she could do whatever she put her mind to. She learned this when she and her friend were playing in the forest and got attacked by an elgort. Her friend was so scared that he fainted.' They will then tell a colorful story about how the girl fought that elgort, jumping on its back and strangling it with her bare hands!"
I laughed. "That's not what I did. "
"Well, stories often change and shift when told over and over again," the frog said. It smiled and hopped off the egg. "It's all yours."
I stood and picked up the egg. Its shell was thick and hard. I realized that it could have fallen from higher up onto concrete and still not crack.
"Why don't you put it in your satchel?" the frog said.
I did so, dumping out my nightgown and a pair of pants to make room. It was much easier to carry that way. I knelt down and touched the frog's feet the way I saw the gorillas do to Chief Obax and whispered, "Thank you." Then I kissed the frog's smooth moist skin and stood up.
"Now go, wind girl," the frog said. "Your friend awaits you."
Chapter 25
South
The flight home took only three days.
The actual act of flying didn't tire me at all. I stopped only because of hunger, thirst, and the need to sleep. I slept with the elgort egg held to my chest. The rest of the time I flew. I was like a migrating bird, and even though I checked my compass once in a while, I realized that I knew exactly which way to go. I didn't need it anymore.
I easily avoided the giant eagles, and even when they saw me, they didn't attack. They didn't seem interested in eating me, but they were curious. As I flew, I was delighted to learn that the sky wasn't as empty as it looked. All kinds of birds populated it, large, small, fast, slow, high flying, low flying, colorful and dull.
I liked flying higher than most birds. I found myself in the company of vultures, hawks, and the giant eagles—the birds of prey. Several of the giant brown eagles soared over to me and flew beside me for miles. Their wingspan was over forty feet and their beaks were larger than my head! Some had bright green eyes, others had purple, gold, and even blue eyes. Like precious stones!