Copyright © 1992 by Mike Resnick, All rights reservedcopynotes. First appeared in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, August 1992. For the personal use of those who have purchased the ESF 1993 Award anthology only.
THE LOTUS AND THE SPEAR
by Mike Resnick
Once, many eons ago, there was an elephant who climbed the slopes of Kirinyaga, which men now call Mount Kenya, until he reached the very summit, where Ngai ruled the universe from His golden throne.
"Why have you sought me out?" demanded Ngai.
"I have come to ask you to change me into something else," answered the elephant.
"I have made you the most powerful of beasts," said Ngai. "You need fear neither the lion nor the leopard nor the hyena. Wherever you walk, all My other creatures rush to move out of your path. Why do you no longer wish to be an elephant?"
"Because as powerful as I am, there are others of my kind who are more powerful," answered the elephant. "They keep the females to themselves, so that my seed will die within me, and they drive me away from the water holes and the succulent grasses."
"And what do you wish of me?" asked Ngai.
"I am not sure," said the elephant. "I would like to be like the giraffe, for there are so many treetops that no matter where he goes he finds sustenance. Or perhaps the warthog, for nowhere can he travel that there are no roots to be found. And the fish eagle takes one mate for life, and if he is not strong enough to defend her against others of his kind who would take her away from him, his vision is so keen that he can see them approaching from great distances and move her to safety. Change me in any way you wish," he concluded. "I will trust to Your wisdom."
"So be it," pronounced Ngai. "From this day forward, you shall have a trunk, so that the delicacies that grow atop the acacia trees will no longer be beyond your reach. And you shall have tusks, that you may dig in the ground for both roots and water no matter where you travel upon My world. And where the fish eagle has but a single superior sense, his vision, I shall give you two senses, those of smell and hearing, that will be greater than any other animal in My kingdom."
"How can I thank you?" asked the elephant joyously, as Ngai began the transformation.
"You may not wish to," answered Ngai.
"Why not?" asked the elephant.
"Because when all is said and done," said Ngai, "you will still be an elephant."
###
Some days it is easy to be the mundumugu - the witch doctor - on our terraformed world of Kirinyaga. On such days, I bless the scarecrows in the fields, distribute charms and ointments to the ailing, tell stories to the children, offer my opinions to the Council of Elders, and teach my youthful assistant, Ndemi, the lore of the Kikuyu people - for the mundumugu is more than a maker of charms and curses, more even than a voice of reason in the Council of Elders: he is the repository of all the traditions that make the Kikuyu what they are.
Some days it is difficult to be the mundumugu. When I must decide disputes, one side will always be unhappy with me. Or when there is an illness that I cannot cure, and I know that soon I will be telling the sufferer's family to leave him out for the hyenas. Or when Ndemi, who will someday be the mundumugu, gives every indication that he will not be ready to assume my duties when my body, already old and wrinkled, reaches the point, not too long off, when it is no longer able to function.
And, once in a long while, it is terrible to be the mundumugu, for I am presented with a problem against which all the accumulated wisdom of the Kikuyu seems like a reed in the wind.
Such a day begins like any other. I awake from my slumber and walk out of my hut into my boma with my blanket wrapped around my shoulders, for though it will soon be warm the sun has not yet removed the chill from the air. I light a fire and sit next to it, waiting for Ndemi, who will almost certainly be late. Sometimes I marvel at the facility of his imagination, for never has he given me the same excuse twice.
As I grow older, I have taken to chewing a qat leaf in the morning to start the blood flowing through my body. Ndemi disapproves, for he has been taught the uses of qat as a medicine and he knows that it is addictive. I will explain to him again that without it I would probably be in constant pain until the sun was overhead, that when you are as old as I am your muscles and joints do not always respond to your commands and can fill you with agony, and he will shrug and nod his head and forget again by the following morning.
Eventually he will arrive, my young assistant, and after he explains why he was late today, he will take my gourds down to the river and fill them with water, and then gather firewood and bring it to my boma. Then we will embark upon our daily lesson, in which perhaps I will explain to him how to make an ointment out of the pods of the acacia tree, and he will sit and try not to squirm and will demonstrate such self-control that he may well listen to me for ten or twelve minutes before asking when I will teach him how to turn an enemy into an insect so that he may stamp on him.
Finally I will take him into my hut, and teach him the rudiments of my computer, for after I am dead it will be Ndemi who will have to contact Maintenance and request the orbital adjustments that will affect the seasons, that will bring rain to the parched plains, that will make the days longer or shorter to give the illusion of seasonal changes.
Then, if it is to be an ordinary day, I will fill my pouch with charms and will begin walking through the fields, warding off any thahu, or curse, that has been placed on them, and assuring that they will continue to yield the food we need to survive, and if the rains have come and the land is green, perhaps I will slaughter a goat to thank Ngai for His beneficence.
If it is not to be an ordinary day, I usually know at the outset. Perhaps there will be hyena dung in my boma, a sure sign of a thahu, or the wind may come from the west, whereas all good winds blow from the east.
But on the day in question, there was no wind at all, and no hyenas had been in my boma the night before. It began like any other day. Ndemi was late - this time, he claimed, because there was a black mamba on the path up my hill, and he had to wait until it finally slithered off into the tall grasses - and I had just finished teaching him the prayer for health and long life that he must recite at the birth of a new baby, when Koinnage, the paramount chief of the village, walked up to my boma.
"Jambo, Koinnage," I greeted him, dropping my blanket to the ground, for the sun was now overhead and the air was finally warm.
"Jambo, Koriba," he replied, a worried frown on his face. I looked at him expectantly, for it is very rare for Koinnage to climb my hill and visit me in my boma.
"It has happened again," he announced grimly. "This is the third time since the long rains."
"What has happened?" I asked, confused.
"Ngala is dead," said Koinnage. "He walked out naked and unarmed among the hyenas, and they killed him."
"Naked and unarmed?" I repeated. "Are you certain?"
"I am certain."
I squatted down near my dying fire, lost in thought. Keino was the first young man we had lost. We had thought it was an accident, that he had stumbled and somehow fallen upon his own spear. Then came Njupo, who burned to death when his hut caught fire while he was inside it.
Keino and Njupo lived with the young, unmarried men in a small colony by the edge of the forest, a few kilometers from the main village. Two such deaths might have been coincidence, but now there was a third, and it cast a new light on the first two. It was now obvious that, within the space of a few brief months, three young men of chosen to commit suicide rather then continue their lives on Kirinyaga.
"What are we to do, Koriba?" asked Koinnage. "My own son lives at the edge of the forest. He could be the next one!"
I took a round, polished stone from the pouch about my neck, stood up, and handed it to him.
"Place this beneath your son's sleeping blanket," I said. "It will protect him from this thahu that is affecting our young men."
"Thank you, Koriba," he said gratefully. "But can you not provide charms for all the young men?"
"No," I replied, still greatly disturbed by what I had heard. "That stone is only for the son of a chief. And just as there are all kinds of charms, there are all kinds of curses. I must determine who has placed this thahu on our young men, and why. Then and only then can I create strong enough magic to combat it." I paused. "Can Ndemi bring you some pombe to drink?"
He shook his head. "I must return to the village. The women are wailing the death chant, and there is much to be done. We must burn Ngala's hut and purify the ground upon which it rested, and we must post guards to make sure that the hyenas, having feasted so easily, do not come back in search of more human flesh."
He turned and took a few steps toward the village, then stopped.
"Why is this happening, Koriba?" he asked, his eyes filled with puzzlement. "And is the thahu limited just to the young men, or do the rest of us bear it too?"
I had no answer for him, and after a moment he resumed walking down the path that led to the village.
I sat down next to my fire and stared silently out over the fields and savannah until Ndemi finally sat down next to me.
"What kind of thahu would make Ngala and Keino and Njupo all kill themselves, Koriba?" he asked, and I could tell from his tone that he was frightened.
