 Chapter 35 of Narda the Lily by H. Ryder Haggard. This Librivox recording is in the public domain. The vengeance of Mopo and his fostling. It chanced that on this day of Narda's death, and at that same hour of dawn, I, Mopo, came for my mission back to the cryl of the people of the Axe, having succeeded in my end for that great chief whom I had gone out to visit, had hearken to my words. As the light broke I reached the town, and lo! it was blackness and a desolation. Here is the footmark of Dinghan, I said to myself, and walked to and fro, groaning heavily. Presently I found a knot of men, who were of the people that had escaped the slaughter, hiding in the mealy fields, lest the slayers should return, and from them I drew all the story. I listened in silence, for my father I was grown old in misfortune. Then I asked, where were the slayers of the king? They replied that they did not know. The soldiers had gone up the ghost mountain after the wolf-brethren and Narda the lily, and from the forest had come a howling of beasts and sounds of war. Then there was silence, and none had been seen to return from the mountain. Only all day long the vultures hung over it. Let us go up the mountain, I said. At first they feared, because of the evil name of the place. But in the end they came with me, and we followed on the path of the impie of the slayers, and guessed all that had befallen it. At length we reached the knees of stone, and saw the place of the great fight of the wolf-brethren. All those who had taken part in that fight were now but bones, because the vultures had picked them every one, except Galasi, for on the breast of Galasi lay the old wolf death-grip that was yet alive. I drew near the body, and the great wolf struggled to his feet, and ran at me with bristling hair and open jaws, from which no sound came. Then being spent, he rolled over dead. Now I looked round, seeking the axe-grown maker among the bones of the slain, and did not find it, and the hope came into my heart that some slupe-a-gas had escaped the slaughter. Then we went on in silence, to where I knew the cave must be, and there by its mouth lay the body of a man. I ran to it, it was some slupe-a-gas, wasted with hunger, and in his temple was a great wound, and on his breast and limbs were many other wounds. Moreover in his hand he held another hand, a dead hand that was thrust through a hole in the rock. I knew its shape well, it was the little hand of my child, narder the lily. Now I understood, and bending down I felt the heart of the slupe-a-gas, and laid the down of an eagle on his lips. His heart still stirred, and the down was lifted gently. I bathed those with me, dragged aside the stone, and they did so with toil. Now the light flowed into the cave, and by it we saw the shape of narder, my daughter. She was somewhat wasted, but still very beautiful in her death. I felt her heart also, it was still, and her breast grew cold. Then I spoke, the dead to the dead, let us tend the living. So we bore in some slupe-a-gas, and I caused broth to be made, and poured it down his throat. Also I cleansed his great wound, and bound healing herbs upon it, plying all my skill. Well I knew the arts of healing my father, I who was the first of the izin-yanga of medicine, and had it not been for my craft, from slupe-a-gas had never lived, for he was very near his end. Still there where once he had been nursed by Galazi the wolf, I brought him back to life. It was three days till he spoke, and before his sense returned to him, I caused a great hole to be dug in the floor of the cave, and there in the hole I buried narder, my daughter, and we heaped lily-blooms upon her, to keep the earth from her, and then closed in her grave, for I was not minded that some slupe-a-gas should look upon her dead, lest he also should die from the sight, and because of his desire to follow her. Also I buried Galazi the wolf in the cave, and set the watcher in his hand, and there they both sleep, who are friends at last, the lily and the wolf together. Ah, when shall there be such another man, and such another maid, at length on the third day, from slupe-a-gas spoke, asking for narder. I pointed to the earth, and he remembered, and understood. Thereafter the strength of a slupe-a-gas gathered on him slowly, and the hole in his skull skinned over, but now his hair was grizzled, and he scarcely smiled again, but grew even more grim and stern than he had been before. Soon we learned all the truth about Zinita, for the women and children came back to the town of the people of the axe. Only Zinita and the children of them slupe-a-gas did not come back. Also a spy reached me from the Makhlabatine, and told me of the end of Zinita, and of the flights of Dingan before the Boas. Now, when I'm slupe-a-gas had recovered, I asked him what he would do, and whether or not I should pursue my plots to make him king of the land. But I'm slupe-a-gas shook his head, saying that he had no heart that way. He would destroy a king indeed, but now he no longer desired to be a king. He sought revenge alone. I said that it was well. I also sought vengeance, and seeking together we would find it. Now, my father, there is much more to tell, but shall I tell it? The snow has melted, your cattle have been found where I told you they should be, and you wished to be gone, and I also, I would be gone upon a longer journey. Listen, my father, I will be short. This came into my mind, to play off Panda against Dingan. It was for such an hour of need that I saved Panda alive. After the battle of the Blood River, Dingan summoned Panda to a hunt. Then it was that I journeyed to the Kral of Panda on the lower Tugela, and with me I'm slupe-a-gas. I warned Panda that he should not go to this hunt, but he was the game himself, but that he should rather fly into Natal with all his people. He did so, and then I opened talk with the Boars, and more especially with that Boar who was named Ungalunkulu or Great Arm. I showed the Boar that Dingan was wicked, and not to be believed, but Panda was faithful and good. The end of it was that the Boars and Panda made war together on Dingan. Yes, I made that war that we might be revenged on Dingan. Thus, my father, do little things, thee too great. Were we at the big fight, the battle of Magongo? Yes, my father, we were there. When Dingan's people drove us back, and all seemed lost, it was I who put into the mind of Nungalaza the general, to pretend to direct the Boars where to attack, for the Amabuna stood out of that fight, leaving it to us black people. It was Amslopagas who cut his way with grownmaker through a wing of one of Dingan's regiments, till he came to the Boar captain Ungalunkulu, and shouted to him to turn the flank of Dingan. That finished it, my father, for they feared to stand against us both, the whites and the black together. They fled, and we followed and slew, and Dingan ceased to be a king. He ceased to be a king, but he still lived, and while he lived our vengeance was hungry. So we went to the Boar captain and to Panda, and spoke to them nicely, saying we have served you well, we have fought for you, and so ordered things that victory is yours. Now grant us this request, that we may follow Dingan, who has fled into hiding, and kill him wherever we find him, for he has worked us wrong, and we would avenge it. Then the white captain and Panda smiled and said, Go children and prosper in your search, no one thing shall please us more than to know that Dingan is dead, and they gave us men to go with us. Then we hunted that king, week by week, as men hunt a wounded buffalo. We hunted him to the jungles of the Umphalosy, and through them, but he fled ever, for he knew that the Avengers of Blood were on his spore. After that for a while we lost him, then we heard that he had crossed the Bongolo with some of the people who still clung to him. We followed him to the place Kwamiawo, and there we lay hid in the bush watching. At last our chance came, Dingan walked in the bush, and with him two men only. We stabbed the men and seized him. Dingan looked at us anew as, and his knees trembled with fear. Then I spoke, what was that message which I sent the old Dingan, who art no more a king, that thou didst ill to drive me away, was it not? Because I set thee on thy throne, and I alone could hold thee there. He made no answer, and I went on. I, Mopo, son of Makedama, set thee on thy throne, O Dingan, who was the king, and I, Mopo, have pulled thee down from thy throne. But my message did not end there. It said that, ill as thou hadst done to drive me away, yet worse shouldst thou do to look upon my face again, for that day should be thy day of doom. Still he made no answer. Then I'm sloppig ass spoke. I am that slaughterer, O Dingan, no more a king, whom thou descends slayers many and fierce to eat up at the crawl of the people of the axe. Where are thy slayers now, O Dingan, before all is done thou shalt look upon them. Kill me, and make an end, it is your hour, said Dingan. Not yet awhile, O son of Senzangagana, answered I'm sloppig ass, and not here. There lived a certain woman, and she was named Narda the Lily. I was her husband, O Dingan, and Mopo here, he was her father. But alas she died, and sadly she lingered three days and nights before she died. Thou shalt see the spot, and hear the tale, O Dingan, it will ring thy heart which was ever tender. There lived certain children, born of another woman named Zinniter, little children, sweet and loving. I was their father, O elephant in a pit, and one Dingan slew them, of them thou shalt hear also. Now away, for the path is far, two days went by my father, and Dingan sat bound and alone in the cave on Ghost Mountain. We had dragged him slowly up the mountain, for he was heavy as an ox. Three men pushing at him, and three others pulling at a cord about his middle. We dragged him up, staying now and again to show him the bones of those whom he had sent out to kill us, and telling him the tale of that fight. Now at length we were in the cave, and I sent away those who were with us, for he wished to be alone with Dingan at the last. He sat down on the floor of the cave, and I told him that beneath the earth on which he sat lay the bones of that nada whom he had murdered, and the bones of Galazi the wolf. Then we rolled the stone down the mouth of the cave, and left him with the ghost of Galazi, and the ghost of nada. On the third day before the dawn we came again and looked on him. Slay me, he said, for the ghost torments me. No longer art thou great, O shadow of a king, I said, Who now dost tremble before two ghosts out of all the thousands that thou hast made? Say then, how shall it fare with thee presently, when thou art of their number? Now Dingan prayed for mercy. Mercy thou hyena, I answered, thou prayest for mercy who showed none to any. Give me back my daughter, give this man back his wife and children, then we will talk of mercy. Come forth, coward, and die the death of cowards. So my father we dragged him out groaning to the cleft that is above in the breast of the old stone witch, that same cleft where Galazi had found the bones. There we stood, waiting for the moment of the dawn, that hour when nada had died. Then we cried her name into his ears, and the names of the children of Omslopigas, and cast him into the cleft. This was the end of Dingan, my father, Dingan who had the fierce heart of Shaka without its greatness. End of chapter thirty-five, chapter thirty-six of Narda the Lily by H. Ryder Haggard. This Librivox recording is in a public domain. Mopo ends his tale. That is the tale of Narda the Lily, my father, and of how we avenged her. A sad tale, yes a sad tale, but all were sad in those days. It was otherwise afterwards when Panda reigned, for Panda was a man of peace. There is little more to tell. I left the land where I could stay no longer, who had brought about the deaths of two kings, and came here to Natal to live near where the Kral-Duguzah once had stood. The bones of Dingan, as they lay in the cleft, were the last things my eyes beheld, for after that I became blind, and saw the sun no more, nor any light. Why I do not know, perhaps from too much weeping my father. So I changed my name, lest a spear might reach the hearts that had planned the death of two kings and a prince, Shaka Dingan and Umklangana of the blood royal. Silently, and by night, umslop a gas my fostling led me across the border, and brought me here to Stanga, and here as an old witch-doctor I have lived for many, many years. I am rich, umslop a gas, craved back from Panda the cattle of which Dingan had robbed me, and drove them hither. But none were here who had lived in the Kral-Duguzah, none knew in Suite the blind old witch-doctor, that smopo who stabbed Shaka the lion of the Zulu. None know it now, you have heard the tale, and you alone my father, do not tell it again till I am dead. Umslop a gas, yes, he went back to the people of the axe and ruled them, but they were never so strong again as they had been before they smote the Halakazi in their caves, and Dingan ate them up. Panda let him be, and liked him well, but Panda did not know that the slaughterer was son to Shaka his brother, and umslop a gas let that dog lie, but when Narda died he lost his desire to be great. Yet he became captain of the Uncomobacosi regiment, and fought in many battles, doing mighty deeds, and stood by Umbulazi, son of Panda, in the great fray on the Tugala, when Chuaio slew his brother Umbulazi. After that also he plotted against Chuaio, whom he hated, and had it not been for a certain white man, a hunter named Makumazahu, umslop a gas would have been killed, but the white man saved him by his wit, yes, and at times he came to visit me, for he still loved me as of old. But now he has fled north, and I shall hear his voice no more. Nay, I do not know all the tale. There was a woman in it, women were ever the bane of umslop a gas my fosterling. I forget the story of that woman, for I remember only these things that happened long ago, before I grew very old. Look on this right hand of mine, my father. I cannot see it now, and yet I, Mopo, son of Makedama, seem to see it as once I saw, red with the blood of two kings. Look on! Suddenly the aged man ceased, his head fell forward upon his withered breast, when the white man to whom he told this story lifted it, and looked at him, he was dead. End of chapter 36 End of Narda the Lily by H. Ryder Haggard Read by Phil Benson in Sydney, Australia