“I know where your sister is,” I said, opening my eyes. “West of the Red Eye, near the Nigeria-Niger border.”
“That’s where the Bukkaru council holds its most important meetings,” DNA said. “It’s where they know they’ll be only amongst themselves. Do you know what they’re doing there?”
“The text message said, ‘It’s ok. Wuro will sit.’？”
He frowned, shaking his head. “I don’t know what that means. There was no other information?”
“I can dig, but not without alerting them to my presence. Might be better to do that when we have a plan.”
“True,” he said. “Are you all right?”
I smiled. “I’m fine.”
“Good,” he said. “So . . . can you do a little something more?”
* * *
—
It didn’t take me long to locate them. And because it was simple, finding them didn’t hurt me. DNA knew the exact details to give, but he couldn’t have known that those he had asked me to seek had arrived in the Hour Glass so recently. I located and sent them messages. Two hours later, they came through the cornfields. We’d waited there and when the corn stalks started rustling, we both thought they were something else.
“Are there wild animals here?” I asked, jumping to my feet.
“Pigeons, lizards, geckos, flies, the occasional scorpion, things like that, nothing big,” he said, keeping his eyes on the rustling corn stalks. They came one by one. Within a minute of each other. Three of them. All men. When they emerged from the corn field, they stood staring at each other, surprised to see someone else emerging from the corn. One of them couldn’t hold back his tears, and he angrily looked away. The other two held DNA’s strong gaze. I took over when it was clear none of them planned to speak.
“Hi,” I said. “I’m the one who found you and sent a message. Can you tell me your names?”
“Lubega,” the one who was crying said. Tall and thin and the blue kaftan and jeans he wore made him look even more so. He couldn’t have been older than nineteen.
“Tasiri,” the one who looked about DNA’s age said. Tall with light brown skin, his dreadlocks were so strong that they stood straight up despite being inches long. “Who are you?”
“See them now,” the third one said, looking at Lubega and Tasiri. He could have been about thirty-five and was wearing nothing but red shorts. “This is why we came, right? To see them with our own eyes?” He pointed at DNA, glaring. “Do you understand what is happening? What you’ve done?”
“I didn’t do anything,” DNA snapped. “You know that. You saw the video. And you saw them kill my steer and my friends and their steer! I carry no Liquid Sword. I’m no terrorist.”
“Idris,” I said. He froze and stared at me. “Yeah, I know your name. I know a lot of things. Another thing I know is that I don’t have energy for this wahala. You’ve just been through hell. I understand. But I didn’t call you here to unload on DNA. He needs your help. And it’ll help you three, too.” I paused. “Please. Hear him out.” I stepped back.
“Thank you, AO,” he said. He turned to the herdsman. “Before I ask, please, I want to hear what happened to you. I need to know the details. How, why, when.”
It was surprisingly Idris who told us everything. His English was the strongest.
They’d indeed arrived in the Hour Glass hours ago. There was no one to vouch for them, so a human rights group had stepped forward to offer them temporary housing, food, and care. They’d arrived with wind lacerations having walked all night through the Red Eye with nothing but a personal anti-aejej to protect them. Personal aejejs were too weak to protect a person adequately from the strong winds of the Red Eye, so, although they weren’t swept away, they’d been pelted for hours and hours, miles and miles with the blowing sand that penetrated the anti-aejej’s protective field.
The five of us sat on the sand in a sort of circle, Lubega and Tasiri beside Idris, DNA and I across from them.
“We had no choice,” Idris said. “The three of us, we meet every month at a petrified palm tree a mile or so from the Red Eye. It’s a nice place to meet and a reminder that though we are few, we are still here. Even in these strange times. Our steer rest, and we sit and gaze at the disaster while we drink milky tea, eat whatever we have to eat, share stories and updates; then we part ways in the morning. We go in different directions every time. None of us goes north.”