Nonzame debated night after night if she should share the words of the wise-woman with Lukaya. It was her husband’s child, too, yet she felt he did not suffer in the same way as she.

He was baffled by her claims to see a baby’s face in bodies of liquid. Yet, with patience and love, he had accepted her refusal to do dishes, to only bathe by sponge. But she suspected he believed her mind was bruised by grief and would not hear or believe what had occurred in the wise-woman’s home.

Over dinner one night, she asked, “Where do you think unborn babies go?”

“What do you mean, my wife?”

“Our baby, my husband, where did it go? When it left my womb it was not expelled on the sheets. We had nothing to bury, so where could the child be?”

With a heavy sigh, he placed his napkin on the table and wheeled over to his wife. He scooped her out of her chair, setting her on his lap, where his strong arms encircled her tight.

“I do not have any answers, my wife. Some have said that the magnetic forces of the three suns coming as one causes the unborn children to dissolve into the water that the mother expels. If this is true, then our child has crossed to the other-side, as we all must when it is time.”

As her husband stroked her head, his hand running down her braids, the beads at the end click-clicking into the night, she knew this man she loved with all her heart would not be able to understand why she would have to leave. If she left, even if the journey ended in failure, she could tell herself she tried. But if she stayed, her sanity would surely be lost.

* * * * *

The smoke from the stallion’s nostrils looked blue in the moonlight.

“I know you,” she said, soft and low. “And I know what you have done.”

The stallion snorted, unrepentant for his deeds. For it was he who broke her husband’s back on the day the man tried to saddle him. He was banished to the farthest field, but Lukaya had refused to slay the animal, declaring, “A beast should not be killed for acting as nature intended. I was a fool to try to saddle him.”

Nonzame, however, had wanted the stallion dead. It did not matter to her that he was the finest golden-hoofed zebra that she or her husband had ever seen. She did not care that his seed alone brought them wealth, purchased at a high price it was, by farms further afield. This beast had stolen her husband’s dance, and for her, that was all that mattered. But now, as she gazed at its smoky breath, she decided he was the perfect animal to aid her quest.

“You brought my husband untold pain; now you will take me to my child.”

She tossed a blanket upon the stallion’s back and secured a bundle to her own. Then she seized the mighty beast’s mane, and swung herself up.

The stallion stamped a golden hoof, belching smoke, as a low growl rumbled deep in his broad chest, but he did not buck. Nonzame gripped her legs around his girth and gave a squeeze. “Fly!”

With the rumble of hooves, the handsome animal ran straight towards the fence that encircled his field. His gait gathered speed, and with his powerful haunches, he leapt into the air, clearing the barrier. His pace did not slow as his hooves touched the ground on the other side.

Neither beast nor woman looked back.

 ***

Tell us: What do you think of Lukaya’s statement: “A beast should not be killed for acting as nature intended”?