Читать книгу Heart of Atlantis - Группа авторов - Страница 1

“Who’s there?”

“Hush! Sh!”

“Who’s that?”

“It’s me, Kayumba. I’ve come to save you, Umanga!”

“Kayumba …”

“Have no fear, I’ve put the guards to sleep. Grandmother Maganda gave me some magic herb. I made small balls from it, spit the balls at them through a tube out of the bushes and they fell asleep. They will not wake up till sunrise. And we will have gone far by sunrise! Grab the liana! Oh, how heavy you are!”

It was fresh and nice atop. After staying in the musty deep pit for three days he savoured the fragrance of the mysterious Atlantean night with all his primitive scent.

“Let’s flee, Umanga! If we hide in the mountains before sunrise, they won’t find us!”

He gazed admiringly at this slim twelve-year-old woman, a true huntress-maid. She risked everything. She condemned herself to eternal expulsion, to live hiding from people till her very last day. To live away from her close people, from her tribe. And everything – for his sake! There appeared a goldish glimmer on her long black hair in the light of shadowy, gleamy, unconceivable stars. Her slim strong legs seemed to be running already there, towards the mountains, to save him. She was restlessly making some fatuitous movements:

“Let’s flee, Umanga!”

He took her in his arms, cuddled her. Maybe if she had come on the first night, he would have run away with her without hesitation. He would have been running on the sunbeaten grass warm even at night with all the irrepressible agility of his strong fast legs filled with the energy of fourteen years of age; he would have picked up Kayumba in his arms and would have been running, running with her to the place of the saving mountains tops, where they would be together for many hundreds years to come, where a new tribe would be born: his and hers.

She embraced him squeezing herself up against him breathless. She did not understand why he stopped at pause:

“Let’s flee, Umanga!”

Maybe if she had come on the second night he would also have fled with her. He still had some doubts then … He knew that at sunrise after the third night he would be taken to the precipice and thrown down. He would be flying long. Like a bird, a strong, independent, carefree bird. Yes, there were stones down there, yes, he would crash against them and his blood would splash the neighbouring rocks. But there would be several seconds of flying before that …

“Let’s flee, Umanga!”

But this was already the third night. What had changed? Nothing exteriorly. He had just stayed one night longer in the deep pit with smooth upright walls, damp and clayey. He will not be taken to the precipice after the third night. He will go there himself. He, Umanga, the eldest son of the Great Chief, he, the strongest, fastest and smartest among the young warriors, he who had been recognized by his tribe to be the best among the best so many times. It was he who was to be sacrificed. Otherwise his tribe would lose the war with the aliens. Otherwise the whole tribe was in for death or slavery at best. No, at worst it was slavery. At best it was death.

“Sorry, Kayumba…”

He went back down by the same liana thrown by Kayumba. He waited for the dawn. The first sounds above him made him start. Guards? Had his time come? Would he be taken there, to the rocks?

No. This was Kayumba coming down to him.