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  Peeping through slit eyes, Gogo Maya watched the little creatures settle down on a small mound in front of where she lay. They chewed on globs of the glutinous substance, and it seemed, the more they chewed, the more transparent they became, until she was able to look right through some of their little faces. It was quite unnerving the way she could watch the toffee shift from cheek to cheek. She wondered what sort of powerful new magic was in the innocent looking treat. It was definitely not forest magic.

  “Morathi,” drawled the stranger’s cool voice.

  “Yeeees,” Morathi breathed nervously.

  Gogo Maya knew that name. That bloody lunatic, Morathi, from Kapichi village. They were Tokoloshe, she realised, even if they did not look much like it at the moment. What sort of trouble had he got his clan into now?

  “Morathi,” the voice said. “You will find out how much the witch knows, and you will find out if she can hear my thoughts. Then you will get rid of her.”

  Gogo Maya’s eyes flew open in astonishment. What did he mean, “get rid of her”? Did he mean for them to kill her?

  Bristling with indignation, Gogo Maya tried to sit up and protest, but she might as well have saved her breath. No one could understand a word of what she was saying around the mango pip, and the air of relief emanating from the Tokoloshe told her the owner of the voice had disappeared back into the forest.

  Morathi rounded on his men. Some looked keen to carry out the voice’s orders but most shuffled about, looking embarrassed.

  “You, you and you, drag the old crone over here, and you, go and fetch my bow,” he ordered.

  “I don’t want to,” whined an almost visible Tokoloshe.

  “Yeah, fetch your own bow,” another said, folding his arms across his bare chest and frowning.

  “Look, you fools!” Morathi was now puffing himself up to his full height. “We made a deal. He gives us the nzuri thana and we do what he says.”

  “You mean like slaves?” an invisible Tokoloshe said, from beside Gogo Maya’s ear.

  “No, more like someone who has accepted something from someone, and now owes that someone something in return,” Morathi said to a spot somewhere to the left of where the invisible Tokoloshe stood.

  The rest of the Tokoloshe whispered anxiously amongst themselves.

  “Please,” a stumpy old Tokoloshe took the toffee out of his mouth and went to hand the sticky mess back to Morathi. “We thought we were just stealing it.”

  “Um,” a small voice beside Gogo Maya said. “It seems altogether less risky if we just sort of... go home.” Already, quite a few of them were edging their way in the direction of the woods.

  Well, that served him right, Gogo Maya snorted to herself in approval. Usually the Tokoloshe did not have the sense they were born with, but one or two at least were showing an instinct for self-preservation.

  However sinister their nzuri thana supplier was, Gogo Maya had not survived in this jungle for over fifty years without a trick or two up her own sleeve. She tightened her fist around her amulet. If push came to shove, she could use the power of the opal to make herself disappear and reappear someplace else, and the Tokoloshe would be left holding some small forest creature. Although she shuddered to think of the terrible ramifications if that particular trick went wrong again. Last time... Oh she did not even want to think about last time.

  A loud snarl reverberated around the clearing and Gogo Maya watched as her leopard, Salih, backed jerkily into the clearing. Invisible Tokoloshe were apparently dragging him by the tail. This was going to get interesting. Salih could kill a Tokoloshe with a swipe of his paw, and if he did not think that would do, he had a plethora of mind tricks he could apply if he wanted to.

  “What are they?” Salih said between gritted teeth while unseen little fingers tied him up against Gogo Maya. “I channelled a mildly repellant flow through them, but it had no effect. I couldn’t quite get a fix on what they were. I didn’t want to harm anyone unnecessarily if it turned out to be a game, because I think they are related to the Tokoloshe.”

  “They are Tokoloshe.” Gagged by the mango in her mouth, Gogo Maya projected the words directly into Salih’s mind. “Someone has given them something to enhance their powers, but as invincible as it’s made them, they are as stupid as ever.”

  Salih snorted. “It was a bit stupid to tie us up together.”

  Ooh, thought Gogo Maya. If Salih was glad they were tied together, perhaps this was going to be one of those rare occasions when he was going to use his own magic. Better yet, if he was going to channel his magic through her, he would leave residues of his own powerful magic in her, vastly magnifying her own resources.

  Salih gave her a stern look.

  “No, then?” she said.

  “You know I only do that as a last resort,” he said. “Do you have the opal?”

  “But what about the last time we used the opal?” she tried, but Gogo Maya was not that surprised; Salih was notoriously stingy with his magic.

  “Are you sure we want to take the risk?” It was not just that she had hoped to use Salih’s magic, but the opal was a bit hit and miss. If they did a switch using it, there was no telling where they might end up. Worse, they had no idea what or who might replace them.

  “If we switch with another witch from the village,” she said, “there is that small matter of who we ‘borrowed’ the magic from in the first place to make the amulet. There will be some awkward explaining to do. Besides, that would put someone else in danger with these Tokoloshe.”

  “I don’t want to hurt them.” The leopard sounded apologetic.

  “The trouble with you, Salih, is that you are too much of a softy,” Gogo Maya projected at him. “True, there are certain to be casualties among the Tokoloshe if you use your magic, especially in their present condition, but it would serve them right. They had been planning to kill me.”

  “It’s not really their fault,” Salih said. “You know how gullible they are. Also, we need them to have their wits about them so that we can sneak back afterwards and find out who’s been manipulating them.”

  “Well, if you insist.” Gogo Maya shrugged.“Hold on tight then.” Keeping a firm grip on the opal of the amulet, she shut her eyes, and mentally and physically jumped into the abyss.

  3

  A Picky Boy

  The heat did not let up in Harare, Zimbabwe, even with both bedroom windows open. Ethan Flynn pushed his hair out of his eyes and snapped his laptop shut with a sigh – the battery had run out. It was just about impossible to get anything done on it in this backwoods place because electricity supply was so erratic. The power was down now, and he’d heard it might be days before it was restored. He flung himself down the passage in the direction of the verandah where his dad and stepmother were having their evening cocktails. He supposed he would have to speak to them eventually; it might as well be now.

  Sophie shot him a belligerent look from her deck chair as he came out onto the verandah. He guessed she couldn’t help herself. She was dressed in a pair of short shorts, and a halter-top without a bra. The bitter lines of her face were smoothed by pulling her wispy blond hair up tightly behind her head in a high ponytail. Daintily extracting a slice of lemon from her gin and tonic with long, blood-red fingernails, she popped it into her mouth, then grimaced; possibly from the sourness of the lemon, but more likely at the sight of Ethan. With deliberate effort, she adjusted her features into some semblance of a welcoming smile.

  “Ah, here he is now,” she said. “Ethan, I was just telling your father that Uncle Alan is popping into town tomorrow to collect the kids from boarding school and has offered to take you on safari with him.”

  “But I only just got here,” Ethan said, a bit taken aback. He poured himself a glass of orange squash from the drinks trolley. He hoped the water had been filtered properly. Sophie glared at him with that exaggeratedly expectant expression that she used to remind him of his manners.

  “Oh, I forgot,” he added.
“Sophie, please may I have a drink.”

  Ethan glanced at his dad, who gave no indication whether or not he thought it was unreasonable for a fifteen-year-old to have to ask for a soft drink in what was technically his own home. Regarding Ethan placidly from behind steepled fingers, he said, “Something has come up. I have to fly to Malawi for a couple of weeks.”

  “I don’t mind staying with Sophie then.” Ethan knew it was going to be a nightmare staying alone with Sophie, but his skin crawled at the thought of being subjected to the questionable hygiene of a farm.

  His dad ran a hand distractedly through his thinning brown hair and allowed it to flop back over his forehead. He took a sip of his whisky, swooshed it around his mouth, and swallowed. “Well, that’s just the thing... Sophie has to come with.”

  Ethan opened his mouth, about to point out that there was no reason for a housewife to have to travel with her husband on business, but thought better of it. Sophie had reminded them often enough before that it was not her responsibility to look after Ethan. He wondered why Sophie and his dad had campaigned so heavily to have him visit them in the first place. Sophie had been even more insistent than his dad.

  “It’s Neil’s turn,” she’d spat down the phone at Ethan’s mother. “It’s his turn and he is entitled to have Ethan for at least four weeks.”

  So Ethan had come. They must have known they would have to go to Malawi.

  “Well, I would like to fly back to mom and Eric then,” he said now.

  Sophie’s mouth tightened. “Don’t be stupid,” she said, as if Ethan wore upon her patience. “We can’t send you home yet. You only just got here. Besides, your mother needs the break.”

  Ethan was flabbergasted. He would put up with a lot of things from Sophie if that was what his dad wanted, but she was not going to use his mother as an excuse. “No, actually, she doesn’t need the break! She didn’t want me to come, if you remember.”

  Sophie whipped her head back to glare at Ethan, her wispy ponytail swinging round and hitting her in the face. “Are you calling me a liar?” she hissed through her tightly pursed lips. “Spoiled little rich brat. You never do anything you don’t want to.” She slammed her drink down on the coffee table, then rose from her chair and stomped off into the house.

  Ethan bit the inside of his lip. He glared at his father, waiting for an apology, or even some show of support, an explanation even, but the man could barely contain his irritation.

  “Now look what you’ve done,” he grumbled instead, through clenched teeth. For a moment or two Ethan watched the tendons pulsating in his father’s neck, but his father’s eyes stayed firmly fixed on the progress of the gardener who manhandled an ancient lawnmower back and forth across the yard in the semidarkness. It vaguely annoyed Ethan that there was enough fuel for the mower but not for the back-up generator that supplied the electricity for his computer, which he needed to complete his homework assignments for the holidays.

  At last, his father sighed as if he had come to a decision. “I’m going to the gym,” he said, shoving himself to his feet and stalking around the side of the house to his car.

  ~~~

  It actually came as a relief to Ethan when Uncle Alan collected him the next morning.

  “Welcome to Zimbabwe!” his uncle declared, waving an arm expansively to indicate the whole country, as if he owned it. He was a beefy blonde man with a booming laugh and kindly eyes that slanted downwards at the corners like Ethan’s mom’s. He wore the same faded, ranger-style, olive green fatigues and shirt that he always wore, even on his visits to Ethan’s family in Cape Town.

  “What kind of a school are you going to now, boy, that lets you grow your hair so long?” Ethan ducked his blonde head out of Alan’s reach before his uncle managed to tousle it. Ethan didn’t like to be touched. Alan grinned sheepishly and withdrew his hand, patting the dog instead. The dog’s tongue lolled out of the side of its mouth, dribbling disgustingly. Watching a glob of dribble fall and hit the driveway right next to Alan’s foot, Ethan just stopped himself from gagging. It was a good thing his uncle had shaken hands with him before he touched the dog and not the other way around, he thought.

  Alan looked Ethan over with an appraising eye. “Dad gone to work already?”

  Ethan shrugged. “Not so much. He went to the gym again before I got up this morning. Sophie is sulking because I implied she was lying.”

  Alan didn’t have to ask. It seemed even he was familiar with Sophie’s outbursts. He hefted Ethan’s rucksack onto the back of his beat-up Land Cruiser pickup, his rough, weathered features relaxing into a cheerful smile. “She is kind of hateful, isn’t she?” he laughed. “Come along, Ethan, cheer up. You’re going to have a fantastic holiday. I want to pop into the Farmers’ Co-op to collect a few things for the guys from Tjalotjo village while I’m in town, and then we’ll fetch your cousins. Joe has a friend coming to stay. A real character. Hop in, I’ll tell you all about him on the way.” He hooted and waved a friendly farewell to Sophie, who had twitched the curtain aside to glare out at the truck as it disappeared down the drive.

  “She feeds her spite by brooding about the money,” Alan explained later in the coffee shop at the Farmers’ Co-op. “You see, she thought it belonged to your dad. It was a bitter blow when your mom took it all with her.” He flashed Ethan a mischievous grin and heaped more cream on his apple pie. “Of course, when your mom and Eric sold his computer program for so much money, it was an even worse slap in the face for Sophie. She can’t get her head around the idea that if it belongs to your step-dad, your mom doesn’t have to pay any of it out to your dad.”

  After coffee Ethan helped his uncle load the back of the pickup with supplies for his farm and Tjalotjo village. They left three neat little nests amongst some grain bags up near the cab for the boys to sit in during the trip.

  “Now about the boy, Tariro,” Alan said, wrestling a tin of sheep dip into an impossibly small space. “He’s a difficult customer. The oldest of four sons, you see, and used to bossing his brothers around. But that is not the worst of it.” He leaned across the bed of the vehicle and regarded Ethan intently, as if contemplating whether or not to divulge a secret. “He’s a good kid, but his dad is a very dangerous man – something in the government to do with land acquisitions. He could take away my hunting concession, and my farm, if he wanted to.”

  “Surely they would never get away with it,” Ethan said. He’d heard this happened a lot in Zimbabwe, and he knew they would get away with it, but still, it didn’t seem fair. “And why is Joe hanging around with a kid like that anyway?”

  “Easy, I didn’t say the dad will take my farm – just that he can.” Alan placed a hand firmly on Ethan’s arm. “According to the school, Joe saved the boy’s life. Joe won’t talk about it but they’re as thick as thieves now.” He moved to the other side of the truck where he made a slipknot at the end of a long rope, hooked it onto the side of the truck and threw it over the bed in Ethan’s direction.

  “Besides, I don’t know. The more I get to know the boy, the more I like him.” Uncle Alan smiled. “Who knows, if you try, you might find you have something in common. Either way, we have already committed to having him for the holidays so you’ll have to make an effort to get on with him.”

  Ethan fed the rope under a hook on his side of the truck and passed it back over the bed to his uncle. He wasn’t sure he wanted to find something in common with this boy. The more Ethan thought about it, the less he liked having someone so volatile around his family. The government this boy’s father belonged to had seized most of the white-owned farm land in Zimbabwe and now they seemed to be seizing farms willy-nilly, according to which political party the rest of the people belonged to. Usually with the help of thugs with machetes.

  “I’ll do my best,” he said somewhat hesitantly.

  ~~~

  “Now what’s all this about you not wanting to go on safari?” Alan said in the Land Cruiser on the way to the girls’ school.r />
  Ethan shook his head and smiled at his uncle. “There is just no way that I can ever get you guys to understand,” he sighed. “Tramping around the bush after wildlife holds as little interest for me as learning to play games on the computer holds for you.”

  Alan retracted his neck into his shoulders like a tortoise. “Computers!” he laughed. “We don’t need the belligerent blighters. They make no sense at all. In any case, we don’t have power out at the farm most of the time. We only run the generator in an emergency. Have to save the fuel for the vehicles. But I get your point, my boy.” He flashed Ethan a roguish smile and wiggled his eyebrows up and down. “If you want, you can stay at home with your Aunty Cheryl and the girls.”

  “That’ll be the day,” Ethan said. “The last time you left me alone with those two, they cut my hair while I was sleeping. Don’t get me wrong, Alan, I love Amy and Jessie dearly, but they’re a menace.”

  Ten-year-old Jessie shrieked across the schoolyard at the unexpected sight of Ethan. She raced towards him like a leaping impala, two flaxen plaits flying out behind her as she wove precariously in and out among the cars of the other parents collecting their children. She was followed closely by her sister. At twelve, Amy was a little more circumspect, but not much. She dropped her school bag on the road and launched herself at Ethan.

  Since Jessie was already hanging on to his back, Amy’s hug brought a squirming Ethan down on the filthy grass verge. He hoped no one had spat there. The three of them wrestled under the indulgent eye of Uncle Alan till Jessie manoeuvred herself on to Ethan’s chest, pinning his arms above his head.

  “Okay, I yield, you little animals,” Ethan laughed. The more he showed his discomfort at being on the ground, the longer Amy and Jessie would keep him there.