he told her father, he would throw up everything to get back to her. But if one attempt had been made on her life, would her father be in any position to help? He could put her in protective custody, but sooner or later he would have to justify his actions. If the press heard about a girl being held for safekeeping, then this whole “missing father and son” incident could be blown sky-high. How to keep tabs on Kallie was his dilemma.
Kallie could tell he had made a decision. “I think I can trust you to go home and leave us to try and find the boy and his father.”
“Thanks, Mike. I will.”
“Stupid English kid. As if we didn’t have enough problems trying to find his father. OK, I’ll get someone to take you back to your plane and have one of our air division mechanics sort out your engine.”
Kallie gave him the best smile she could manage without sagging in relief.
Mike Kapuo had reasoned matters through. He knew exactly how he would keep an eye on Kallie. This mechanic would plant a tracking device in her plane, and between that and radar alerts he would know exactly where she was. He convinced himself he was not using her as bait, but rather that, if she knew anything she should not, then Kapuo would have a chance of getting to her-before she got hurt. Though if her father ever found out what he had done, the two old bulls would lock horns. Blood would be spilt.
13
Death was a vacuum. For a nanosecond it was suffocatingly quiet, as still and silent as a crypt buried deep beneath the oldest, biggest church imaginable, a place so noiseless that, if a million people screamed at once, they would not be heard. Air did not move. Thought did not exist. Sensation was diminished to a moment so fleeting, it was impossible to experience it.
And then a surge of thunder, like a confused and violent wave breaking on a shallow reef, hurled him into a void.
As his heart stopped, Max’s mind reverberated through consciousness, traveling beyond the speed of light and sound, as if seeking a portal in space where it should merge, make contact with whatever it was in the great unknown.
Starbursts of light, like the very best fireworks display in the sky, suddenly inverted and became pockmarked black speckles. Then that too suddenly vanished and became … nothing.
Max’s brain told him he was drowning, that he had fallen, for it was now a sensation of tumbling through this invisible force. No time to think, no moments to recollect what he had read once: that when you die, there are welcoming spirits singing heavenly music reaching out to guide you onwards and upwards. This was a white-water ride in a black sea of fear.
His instinct for survival fought against this overwhelming sensation but, like drowning, the moment came when he could struggle no longer, and finally he surrendered. It was a moment of being instantly fearless, incredibly calm. A beautiful warmth enveloped him as he floated. There was no pain, nor was there fear; instead, he had the simple desire to bathe in the comfort and safety of whatever it was that soothed him. In that moment of surrender, his mother’s face touched his own, her hand stroked his cheek, her lips kissed his eyes; he smelled her hair and a breeze of a whisper told him he was loved. That his pain was over. That he should sleep. That she was always with him. Always had been.
An echo of a memory, of what was his own voice, softly called to her. Mum, I missed you so much…. I love you, Mum…. I knew you weren’t dead … I knew…. Can we go home now …?
There was no answer. The gentle night carried everything away and left him as still and unmoving as a deep underground pool of water.
Time does not exist in death. Max stayed in darkness until something flickered. Wisps of fire, then brighter light, a pyramid of flames. Shadows broke the glowing heat. Muted sounds, a chant, ebbed and flowed.
The shaman plunged his fingers into a pouch of powdered herbs. He forced them into Max’s mouth, the sticky mess adhering to the boy’s gums, sitting under his tongue and, through his salivary glands, entering his system. Everyone moved away as the shaman placed his hands on Max’s stomach and heart. When Max’s heart stopped, the shaman pulled a huge eland skin across them both, ushering them into darkness.
Within two minutes, Max’s heart thudded, as labored as an old engine trying to start.
More than twelve hours later, Max’s eyes opened. The canopy of stars greeted him, and sticklike shadows chanted and shuffled around a big fire. Two men held his shoulders, another two his arms and legs,!Koga was one of them, as the shaman curled his fist and ground it into Max’s lower stomach. He worked his fist up below his sternum, and Max felt a lump that became a ball of energy. It rose through his belly and into his lungs and heart, and blood poured from his nose. The men dragged him to his feet, pulled him towards the flames and carried him around the fire as the chanting increased and the blood kept flowing. He was part of a trance dance which lay at the heart of Bushman culture-the Dance of Blood.
Another journey began.
His shadow-form raced through the night, across rock and sand; his eyes saw everything. The moon was high, its pale imitation of day etched the land. Animal-like, he sped across a plateau, its edge reaching into space. Max paid no attention and leaped from the precipice. Whatever form he had taken on the ground had changed, and now he could fly. He soared, glided across canyon and ravine, dry river beds, trees and hills. The dream was reality. A supernatural energy possessed him, an inhuman instinct coursed through him. Arms were wings, his feet curved talons. He felt the night wind and let some unknown guide possess him.
A mottled canopy nestled across the ground, filtering shapes of trees, disguising their hidden secret. It was the dove. The dove beneath the trees that Max had seen in the cave.
He cried out.
A screech, like an eagle’s cry, echoed through the emptiness.
Max was dancing around the fire alone, his head back and mouth open, though that primal shriek was silent. The others watched him. His eyes focused on their hazy images. Suddenly exhausted, he sank to his knees. Hands lifted him, laying him on a grass mat, then covered him with cloth and skins for warmth. The shivering fever had started. It would be hours before he regained consciousness.
!Koga sat with him, bathed his head and face with precious water, and wondered where his friend’s spirit had traveled.
Through a shadowland of dreams, Max vaulted time, soaring through extraordinary landscapes, and then lay dormant as waves of color lapped across his body. Throughout it all, in various guises, was the jackal-Anubis of the Egyptians-weighing his heart on the scales of heavenly justice to see where his spirit should be sent. Then, as a running dog, it paralleled Max’s every move, and changed again into a watchful creature, sitting by a roaring fire in the night, dancing with the flickering images. Never an enemy, always a guide, the dog-creature watched, unperturbed by Max’s unconscious confusion. But deep within the cave of his own mind, Max knew instinctively that the jackal would guide him.
For two days!Koga sat with the fever-ridden Max. The Bushman boy had selected a branch from a wild currant tree from which they made their bows, and had patiently shaped the curve he wanted. As he fastened the gut string and tested its pull, Max groaned and eased himself onto one elbow. His mouth was clammy; the dried blood had been washed from his face, but its metallic taste coated his tongue.
Max eased the stiffness from his muscles. His arms were covered in dried mud; his torso and hair were also caked. He stood up uncertainly.
“Your skin. It was burning,”!Koga said. “I put mud on you. It is good; it will protect you.”
Max took the water-filled ostrich egg!Koga offered him. A small mouthful at first, with which he rinsed his teeth and throat and then spat out. It felt as though he had cleared a ton of muck, and then he drank greedily. The encrusted mud had dried into what felt like a second skin; his shorts were tattered, his nails broken; his muscles still ached from the spasms of the fever and the contortions from the Dance of Blood. But he felt strong. Stronger
