Page 52 - Microsoft Word - FANG EMPIRE - NOVEL.docx

“I know of the Rhunes,” Zuba said. “Their Taghaza trade route from Timbuktu goes

through Araouane and Taoudenni, then across to Ghadames before reaching Tripoli. But

eventually they turn back and ride to Aoudaghost near Fez in Morocco. They will surely report

seeing us to the Moroccans or be tortured into giving up our location.”

“The Rhunes serve no master but God,” said Daka. “They are far more hardened than we

are. They face a more brutal monster than the Moroccans every day.”

“Who?”

“The Sahara,” Daka replied. “They will not betray us. When they discovered we guarded

Omar of Timbuktu they recounted tales of his valor. He fought at their side when raiders attacked

them. He saved their lives, and their profits.”

“Prince Omar is too great to die in a cave,” said Zuba.

“But your solution, if it’s what I think it is, may be a fate worse than death,” Daka said. “If

that creature is anything like Sooth described, she is Beelzebub himself.”

The magnificent secret caves were hewn into the solid rock of the mountain. The entrance

was one hundred feet above the ground, stunning, surreal, and awe-inspiring. The weary riders

looked small as they came into range of the great rock under the starry night.

Daka thought to himself, “Explaining Zuba’s plan to the queen will require voices more

persuasive than ours.” He prayed to God in the silences of his soul to let Omar live. As captain of

the royal guard, he dedicated his life to defending the royal family. In his heart, he believed he was

the one who had failed them most.

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The Royal Palace of Timbuktu had been converted into a way station and makeshift City Hall for

the bureaucratic side of the Moroccan war machine. Men and women, civil servants, merchants,

and military personnel, came and went as they engaged in the deconstruction and colonization of

Timbuktu. It was as if the kingdom of Kanja Khan had never existed. Ramoth walked through the

throng of Moroccan civilians with his new Moroccan male aide, Kojo, barely out of adolescence.

Kojo walked with that un-rhythmic young apprentice amble as he tried to keep up with Ramoth’s