Powerful Forest Demons though they were, said the tales, they came no farther. And so it was that from the start the Bakwaniri had ample reasons to stay east of that running water.
When the River Demon had started coming 25 years past, there was great terror and accusation in the ship, for the sir-jon had said that the beast must have come as punishment for some slight against the gods, or in response to an unknown Bakwaniri incursion into the forbidden lands; while still others thought it was a curse from one of those they had recently enslaved, and that this spell had opened a door to the demon.
So many slaves were put to the fire as sacrifice and their flesh consumed, and throughout the Bakwaniri ship did neighbor accuse neighbor, while still others were driven mad and killed themselves from fear.
Worse might have come to the Bakwaniri people had not their sir-jon gone to counsel with the capan, and between them the two divined a truth.
Since there seemed to be but one hungry demon to collect the debt against a transgression that only it perceived; then, the sir-jon felt that such a thing might be readily appeased.
To calm the ship, Capan Sparsall pardoned all tribesmen for crimes against his brothers, launched no reprisals across the river and accepted the lost women as an unfortunate sacrifice.
Gathering his people by the great fire, the capan had given his judgment. The crew knew the old tales and had no wish to relive them, so they accepted the River Demon’s bargain, fearing to bring a greater curse upon their heads.
As the years passed after the deal was struck, the Bakwaniri counted the loss of three or six daughters a year to be a fair investment for their peace of mind. They lived in the jungle, and all were used to the loss of life.
Most hated it, but none dared to haggle a better price.
So decades after the first payment, the daughter of a young hunter called Seetree fell to the demon, and the poor man himself found her bloody corpse upon the riverbank.
This outrage pushed Seetree past his point of tolerable patience, and he confronted the capan, fust and sir-jon about the terrible loss, volunteering himself to lead the hunters into the forbidden lands to slay the demon and bring back its head.
Yet still old Sparsall counseled acceptance, and both fust and sir-jon agreed.
But, the vengeful Seetree had no acceptance in him and would abide no more delay.
As a boy he had glimpsed the River Demon, as had other men who grew up to know the forest hunting craft, and each among them had in their travels north and south come upon hairy gorillas and chimpanzees and returned with its man-like flesh to eat.
And they knew that despite the River Demon’s monstrous appearance and size, it did in shape and movement resemble those other creatures, and from this Seetree reasoned that even bull elephants could be killed if enough hunters tried to kill it.
So despite the fact that Seetree and his mates had labored their whole lives under the River Demon’s curse, and nightly dreamt of its foaming jaws; they were emboldened by the loss of their loved ones to fight back—even if it threatened to revive the greater curse.
To this Capan Sparsall, sir-jon and the fust as keepers of the Bakwaniri knowledge had warned their people and ordered them against the action, but the River Demon had dined too freely of late for the crew to accept.
So the bereaved father spoke his mind by the great fire where all gathered around his daughter’s bones to bemoan the fate of others lost to the demon. And in accordance with ancient Bakwaniri law, a majority among them chose Seetree to be capan.
Old Sparsall was hung for cowardice and his flesh cast uneaten on the fire and for obvious reasons, neither fust nor sir-jon disputed the election results.
Thus stirred by loss and the eager crew, Seetree had sent hunting parties to explore the forbidden lands west of the river with orders to bring back sign of the demon and its kind or kill them if they could.
Far to the west lay the first victims of Seetree’s vengeance. A parent and child had been forever riven to pay for the new capan’s lost daughter. Had the ship’s sir-jon true powers of divination and glimpsed the forces that had been unwittingly set in motion by one masked hunter’s arrow, he might have counseled leaving the Bakwaniri lands altogether and like the first fathers run into the east.
But the sir-jon was no more a seer than the capan was the only creature with a taste for revenge. One of his victims dreamed of it.
With closed eyes Gazda saw night apes in a hollow stone mountain where from that height, they threw fire down in burning torrents upon others of their kind that were wrapped in shining stone and thrusting long-knives up into the burning deluge.
He heard screams as they burst into flames...when he suddenly felt himself drifting.
And Gazda saw a dead forest on a muddy black hill. Night apes like him were there in the trees, but these were poor climbers or had fallen because they were transfixed on the many sharp branches or skewered by splintered trunks. The clumsy creatures were up there moaning, bleeding and wriggling with the wood stuck through them.
Blood trickled down over their toes as they kicked their feet.
The night ape’s heart raced to see so many red torrents, and his throat grew hot with thirst.
He chased the blood until his eyes opened. It was dark when he woke.
Gazda was lying on a bed of moss and dried leaves; his vision flickered through quivering lashes as he tugged himself free of
