The Hunt: Bloodlines

Chapter 1

Falling

It was in the waning hours of the day that spelt an end to a battle that had raged on for days on end. He staggered up a small hill as the sounds of brutalized men sounded behind his back and looked over the Kingdom of Shigu Siuna. For days, he had led his men against the plucky little villagers of the Tamers in a fierce confrontation against those numerous, unskilled but incredibly spirited warriors and was losing his legions, and indeed himself, to their unyielding endurance. 

His men had been reduced to a handful of soldiers cowering behind rocks and on trees, spears sticking out of them like a malicious growth, arrows tearing through their hearts like love gone sour. It was not a lost battle of course, but it looked no closer to victory, and with the spear burning a hole through his heart and throwing out blood in violent fits and jets, defeat needed not to be the death of those Tamers.

Now, as the sun set, Kemaa stood against a tree and watched the furious red sunset blaze on his Kingdom. His face, streaked with sweat and blood, soiled with the dirt of battle, glowed along with the fire of the setting sun. A sad smile crawled on his dry, pale lips. Defeat shone from his dying eyes. Something then burst from his eyes. Tears. Plenty of them. 

In the fading light of daylight, he saw it. Just as The Hunters had tamed, subdued and conquered others, so would they be conquered. It was a cycle, and their time was coming. The mighty felled others. But when their time came, they would fall too. It was the inevitable truth. Not matter how mighty one was, no community and its structures was immortal.

With that, he closed his eyes and slid down the tree to the ground with a hard thump. Dead.

Black Rose synopsis

In a childhood rife with adversity, I figured that things couldn't possibly get any worse.  Indeed, my teenage years, despite their unique offer of misfortune, were the best years of my life to this day, and I felt that they were a clairvoyance of what I was to expect from life. 

Fast forward to university and life frowned upon me like I had taken away its toy. Caught between conflicting philosophies, disappointing realities, and unfulfilled, and indeed unfulfilling fantasies, I took a pause...or rather,  life forced me to take a pause and recalibrate. I would soon realise that, it was hard - very hard in fact, almost impossible tbh - to pursue one's dream, and that the only guarantee in life is death, because even with taxes, you can evade...

Book cover design concept by Joy Alunga

Strings of the Attached Heart

"I should have been more sympathetic to you. I should have stood by you. I have been by your side for a while now, I have learnt the history, seen the people and experienced the world through your eyes. It made me realise that, as a white person, I'm at home pretty much anywhere. While you have to justify your existence even in your own country. I will never know what it's like to walk in your shoes, but I promise, I will be more empathetic to you and every other black person. I will do my best to be there and to speak up. That's my biggest regret - that I was not empathetic to you at your most vulnerable. I'm sorry, Protus. "

"Thank you for this." I said, taking her hands into mine and squeezing them gently, "I know it was hard for you to come to terms with that failure, but we learn, and grow. And I am glad and proud to have watched you grow."

"Growing is the least I can do." She said with a nervous smile.

"It's the best part. Uncomfortable, but vital."

She nodded and gave my hand a squeeze.

We looked into each others eyes, and a spark shot from the gaze of her beautiful eyes and into my being, shaking me to my bones, emptying my head of reason and thought. I reached out and caressed her cheeks. Blood boiled in me and my stomach turned into knots. I was sweating and my body was trembling all over. She was magnificent. I wondered if she felt the same way about me. I could tell she loved looking into my eyes from her delicate, gentle gaze, from that shadow of a smile that creased, faintly, the side of her matte red lips. But I wasn't going to jump into conclusions. I had already been hurt a few times back for jumping. I couldn't risk it again. So I braced for impact.

"Can I tell you something?" I asked, rubbing the back of her hand with the thumb of my holding hand.

"Don't just tell me something, " she said with a coy smile, looking at me with such keenness that I felt she was extracting what I wanted to tell her through telepathy, " tell me all of the things, because I'm here for you...and I love you."

My Becoming

My Becoming

I sit in my silent muse
Wondering just what it would take
To let go of memories of me and you
Of what we were, and used to do
I torture through the redolence shelves
Like pushing against a firm mountain
Swimming in an ocean without a shore
Or getting caught in an unending storm
If roses grow from memories,
I have a vibrant orchid
Of white and red, a bed of you and me
The joy that you bring
The talk of youth and being
I then, pray, that time on my memory puts a blemish
As you have on the good I still cherish
That as I lay my head upon a battered pillow
Find myself lost in a new sun-bathed meadow
No more thoughts of you and me
Just me, myself and my being
My comings, my goings and my becoming .

Poetic muse

My continued occupance of this same spot for years is a damning inditement to my desires for a better life.

From a ferocious, violent want for a better life,  now I trundle along like a rudderless ship, my desire for more, now nothing but calm waters lapping gently on the shores.

If it indeed gets better, well and good, if it doesn't, how sweet is death?

I've seen them come and go, the good and bad times,  and the hopes and despair, and hope cloaked as despair, despair disguised as daunting deliriums

How I wish I could turn back the clock, go back to being naïve and full of blind hope, with a keen eye for reality,  but still a bit obtuse

But I guess I face reality, a reality too bleak to stare into, shining with rays of a thousand, five hundred suns, biting deeper than a burning pain from a knifing heartbreak, like the burning sensations from a broken bone...

Or should I take some time off, a short break from life, from obligations, from work, from hobbies, from dreaming, from loving and hating, from writing and editing, from doing and from just being?

Or should I take a longer, permanent break from just living?

True,things do get better, but how much worse before then? I wish to find out, I do not wish to keep waiting in line to find out...

And I can't cut ahead; one, because I can't see anyone I know to plug me in, but secondly, I have decorum and ethics,I think - haven't found anyone offering the right price for my values yet...

So in line, I wait...

My Pompous Writing

I pose therefore
That if the rich are allowed a show of opulence
A display of power and might
Why can't I,
A writer but of modest means
Be allowed to be pompous in my writing,
From which I derive so much joy
So much hope, so much - life?
Living life on a big spoon, they say of the wealthy
Writing with a big pen,
Or as the big, brilliant mind conceives
I say therefore
Of my free-spirited self
A pompous writer but of modest means.

Love Dilemma

I know it's not the best thing to do but I know it suits the time now. She might think its a travesty to the love she feels but it could not be further from the truth. At the moment and in the foreseeable future, it just doesn't make sense that we get together. Because I, normal on the outside, cannot seem to find peace and tranquillity within, what with my demons constantly driving me down the cursed avenues of their nefarious existence. What with my pockets empty as a ghost town. I will make her happy but at the right time. The love is true, the fantasies valid. The time, unfortunately, is a fault. Such is the dilemma of living. How does such a good thing come and claim its rightful place at such a wrong time? Or could it be that it's not the best thing for me or for her? But let it be known that there is none other that makes me feel so warm and fuzzy, and tender and loved. But I just don't know what to do. Let it go or move in and try to build it with her? And will she wholeheartedly embrace my inglorious toils and crippling flaws? Thing is, I don't want to drag her into the fetters that restrain me in perpetual squalor, into the horrible, sinful chambers of my troubled existence. She is just too good to stoop this low. Her beauty too profound to waste away in my blind wanders. And I, too careworn, terribly wasted and dogged with much to worry about to make her happy. And I know she is doing the proper act by moving on. Hopefully, I will find my own love when the time is right. But if life were at my behest, the right time would be now and the love of my life would be her.