But there was no such term since a dethroned king was traditionally exiled or killed, and any aging male to have worn the mantle would not give up the name “silverback” without a fight.
So the old silverback Baho would often sit and share his wisdom with the younger apes, telling stories of his time as king, and he had always warned them of Magnuh.
“The beast hates apes,” Baho said later, chewing a mouthful of worms as Gazda and the other young apes now well past their fourth year sat raptly listening. “He has legs like tree trunks, and his body is made of stone—and he has one long arm that stretches out from between his eyes.” Baho used his own arm to illustrate and frighten the youngest listeners. “And he has fangs so long you will be dead before he can taste you.”
The young apes listening to Baho shivered as he spoke.
“If you see him first, you will know, Magnuh,” Baho said, crushing a nut between his cracked molars. “If he sees you first...” The old silverback intoned matter-of-factly, “You will be dead.”
The youngsters squawked and ran shrieking back to their mothers, who in turn chattered angrily, scolding Baho for telling such tales to their little ones.
Was life in the jungle not terrifying enough?
1900-1902
Six to eight years of age.
CHAPTER 7 – Friends and Enemies
Time passed and Gazda grew, but at the core he remained a puzzle to his adoptive tribe, and a mystery to himself. He knew he was different, but no one—least of all him—understood why.
In his fifth year, many of the other apes remarked how much he’d changed. He was still ugly, but all remembered how he had looked when he’d first been brought into the tribe. Then, his flesh had been like white overripe melon, and his facial features soft and undefined. He had been like a dead tree frog then, better for eating than raising as an ape.
Over the years, his features and flesh had refined and grown firm. He still had a puny nose, eyes and mouth, freakishly small compared to the expansive features on the apes around him, and the same disparity applied to his limbs that were stick-like and spindly when contrasted with the muscular arms and legs of the apes.
But he seemed more tangible and distinct to his anthropoid companions.
As his hair had grown in long and black on his head, it was joined by two horizontal tufts over his eyes, and few in the tribe could miss the night ape’s similarity to their old enemy Fur-nose and so they began to watch Gazda’s nose and mouth expectantly—waiting for the characteristic hair to sprout.
As his fifth year came to an end, still nothing had grown there, but the apes waited and watched.
One odd thing had stood out to Eeda, for only a mother could notice such a development, but a scar had appeared that ran across Gazda’s forehead just up by the hairline. It stood out to her for neither she nor her son could remember an injury that would account for such a scar.
She noticed it during one of her weaning sessions. The dark red line had blazed angrily against his white skin as he fought for access to her milk.
The mark had faded with the strong emotion; but the scar remained ever after, and Eeda always pondered it when she groomed him, or at other times when it flared up again with his passions.
She was still very protective of him, and would fly into a rage if her son was the object of too much scrutiny. The she-ape could put on a display of strength that would shame a silverback, stamping her feet and tearing at the jungle plants with such fury, that on occasion Goro was brought rumbling from his circle of grooming courtiers determined to show the tribe that he was firmly in charge of the unruly female.
He disliked using violence upon any of the she-apes, but few escaped the dirt, stones and sticks that he’d fire in every direction during his titanic shows of strength.
But with Eeda, the silverback often withheld his judgment, and with the tribe would watch the mother protect Gazda and redefine her offspring’s borders. Goro could see that the female’s wrath would only be fed by his own, and so he held his ground and allowed her rage to dissipate in the display rather than force a dangerous, and possibly lethal, confrontation.
Such outbursts of emotion were not uncommon in a tribe of apes, though they were usually muted when the king made his displeasure known.
“Another sign that his time is coming to an end,” Omag and the aging queens whispered among themselves as they sat grooming young Ulok in a protective circle of loyal blackbacks. “The king respects a she-ape’s display!”
“Goro is a she-ape,” Ulok snapped, and then he screamed as Omag savagely bit into his muscular shoulder.
Slinking aside to rub at the wound, the shamed young male gaped at his crippled mentor.
“Ulok stupid!” Omag snarled. “Dumb monkey cannot be a king.”
Ulok trembled, hanging his head and slumping against his attendants. Akaki and Oluza watched Omag’s cunning, bloodshot eyes study the youth. Then, he grunted loudly, and with a hoot grabbed the young ape and rolled with him on the grass until Ulok was laughing and the tension bled away into the hot day.
“Ulok must not speak of Goro until Omag says,” Omag cautioned quietly, where he lay upon the grass with the adolescent pinned beneath him. “When Ulok is big and strong, then Ulok can call Goro whatever he wants.”
“Please, father. Ulok has much to learn,” the younger ape pleaded, before attempting to shake off Omag’s grip, and surprising the crippled ape when he almost succeeded. Omag was shocked by the show of strength. Perhaps the time was coming sooner than expected.
He panted good-naturedly and rolled off Ulok as the aging queens moved in to groom the young blackback. They crooned and complimented the adolescent, and Ulok’s heart swelled
