War is a lion on whose back you fall, never to get off.
Old Zulu saying
A raucous flock of hadedas gave the sun away as it tried to sneak silently into the world.
But Lindani had no need of the noisy birds. He’d been staring at the sky since he’d lain down to sleep in the scout camp. Watched it turn from black to inky blue, to pale gold.
Inyoni’s face, drawn and troubled, haunted him, and he could not get to sleep.
He didn't think the clan chief had truly thought her a danger to Zululand. He'd seen an opportunity and used it. Used them both.
Unable to lie any longer, Lindani rose and took up a gourd to get water at the small stream, swollen as a tick on a cow’s back with the summer rain.
As he crouched down and dipped the gourd into the fast flow of the water, he wondered what Inyoni was doing. How she had even managed to walk back to the camp the night he and Malusi had seen her was beyond him. Not since he’d pulled her out of the sea, half-drowned, had she looked so ill.
They had been away for two days, carrying her information to the general, and he’d feel better if he could see her in the camp. See her coping. He stood, hefting the gourd in one arm. Between Malusi and himself, they could go down to the river and watch for her. Malusi could mutter about it all he wanted – she was his source of information, and his responsibility, too.
Even if they could not speak with her, at least Lindani would feel he was doing something.
He’d given his mother and his wife his word that he would not let harm come to her, but he knew with uncomfortable certainty he had no power to help her if she was in danger.
The best he could do was watch over her, and if she did come to harm, revenge her on the battlefield.
He went cold at the thought. He’d saved her life once. Now, because of him, her life was in danger again. Caught this time in a sea of men. A tidal wave of rifles and guns.
Wading in to save her this time would be suicide.
“Want a nip?”
Elizabeth regarded the smudged silver bottle Jenkins held out to her in his grimy hand and tentatively took it from him. The strongest drink she’d ever had was the beer she’d made in Lindani’s village and she felt no need to change that. But to refuse would be too notable.
“T’won’t kill ya,” he laughed.
She made a face. “I’m not sure about that.” She did not also mention that it was eight in the morning, and the thought of home-brewed rotgut did not appeal. Jenkins would not understand that reasoning. She gathered it appealed to most soldiers, most of the time.
“God, yer a strange 'un. What you doing 'ere, eh? Fancy accent like yours, you could work as a clerk or summfink.”
Elizabeth lifted the flask. “Looking for adventure.”
Harry Stokes came up behind her and plucked the flask from her hand. She felt a surge of warmth towards him for taking it before she’d been forced to have a sip.
He took a gulp and smacked his lips. “What adventure would this be? The nightly adventure of braving the latrines with the hope no beastie or snake is lying in wait? Or the simple adventure of taking dinner every night an' 'oping to God it won’t kill you?”
“Something like that.” Elizabeth stood, noticing how black her nails were.
She looked down at her feet. Her boots were red-caked with mud, and her trousers were encrusted with it.
She suddenly couldn’t stand it anymore. Couldn’t cope with the dirt. She had to be clean.
“I have things to do for Captain Burdell.” She gave them both a friendly nod.
“Not working for Chambers today?”
Elizabeth shook her head. “Captain Burdell needs some things seeing to.” As she walked away from the fireside where she’d eaten her breakfast, she still could not believe her day stretched out before her, all her own. Even the thought of it, arranged a few days in advance, had helped her get through the days in between.
She’d kept her gratitude to Burdell to a murmured thanks, but in truth she’d felt like weeping with relief.
Burdell rarely even spoke to her directly, and yet, he’d noticed her fatigue. Her shock at how close she must look to losing her grip frightened her enough to make her response to his kindness subdued.
And just as he’d taken note of her, she’d noticed his restlessness, his constant need to be in the thick of work.
He volunteered for more pickets than any other officer.
He was out on one now, and she could please herself. And it pleased her very much to get clean.
The river roared like a lion further down, the sound a backdrop to everything else, but here, where the curve of the river swung round in a wide, lazy arc, ample as a woman’s breast, it was almost silent in comparison.
Elizabeth stood quiet, looking behind her for a few more minutes, making sure there was no one following her.
The silence stretched out, and with a flash of dazzling green and yellow, a sunbird swooped onto the thick, spike-lined leaf of a nearby aloe and ruffled its feathers.
She was safe.
She sat and pulled off her boots, tucked them behind a bush. In her stocking feet, clutching the nightshirt Burdell had given her in one hand and steadying herself with the other, she half-slid, half-leapt down the bank.
She got to work unbuttoning her clothes.
One by one they landed in a pile on the rocks, the nightshirt joining them, and then she stretched, naked for the first time since she’d joined Central Column. Free for the first time.
Crouching, she rifled through the clothes until she found her trouser pocket, and pulled out the soap she’d taken from Burdell’s supplies. She’d left him a note, explaining, even though he would have said she could have it if he’d been there. She did not doubt it, and did not think he would be anything but embarrassed not to have offered it to her sooner.
She smiled. There was a hardness in Burdell’s eyes despite the fact he stopped her heart every time she looked at him, and yet, there was also a respect and an ingrained politeness in him she was sure he’d suffer torture before abandoning.
A man of many sides. Of unplumbed depths.
She shivered, even though the heat roiled above her head, radiating off the hot red earth, and the sun bit into her arms and shoulders.
She looked down at her naked body, and wondered what it would feel like to have Burdell’s hands on her breasts, or sliding down her sides to pull her close.
She lifted a palm to a hardened nipple. Dropped her hand, her heart thundering in her chest.
She would make herself mad if she pursued this attraction. Encouraged it in herself.
Grabbing up her bundle of clothes, she waded into the quick-flowing water and found a smooth rock just above the surface to wash them on. She began beating and rubbing them against it, as all good Zulu daughters know how.
The action soothed her, and when they were clean, she scrambled up the bank to drape them over bushes before leaping back down into the water and ducking completely under.
The current dragged her backwards, towards the camp, and she anchored her feet, lifting up with the water breaking over her back and shoulders as she pushed against it until she reached her wash rock.
She soaped herself, rubbing her scalp until her hair squeaked in protest under her fingers.
When she was clean, and the soap was nothing but a sliver, she held the rock, letting the current drag her feet up and under her, so she was weightless.
It felt good.
“Inyoni.”
Lindani’s shout jerked her head up, shocking her out of her calm. Heart thundering, she stood, waist-high, her mouth open in astonishment to see him, hunkered down on the other side of the river.
“What is it?” She could only think of Nosipho, perhaps she’d gone into early labour? Or another column had invaded, somehow overrun the village . . .
Lindani made a down motion with his hand, shaking his head. “Nothing is wrong. I came to see if I could check on you at the camp. See if you were all right. And here you are.” He laughed suddenly, relief in the lines of his body as he flopped down on the rocks.
She must have looked closer to the edge than she thought the other night for him to put himself in danger. To brave a close-up look at the Rorke’s Drift camp.
“I was given time off.” She spoke in Zulu, and kept quiet about Burdell. Something told her Lindani would worry more if he knew an officer had seen through her disguise.
“Good. You needed it.”
“What in God’s name . . ?”
Lindani jerked his eyes up from hers, over her shoulder, and Elizabeth spun round.
Standing on the bank, her jacket in his hand, was Jumping Jack Burdell.