Two Moons by J. Raymond Ractliffe - Chapter 24

Two Moons is a new novel by J. Raymond Ractliffe that explores the inner spirit life of Africa, her people and their powerful faith in the world of the Unseen.

The Mark of the Two Moons
Chapter 24

      The darkness held Konjaru fast, pressing against his black skin and holding his mind tightly like a river drying and shrinking in the hot season. Words and dreams swirled as they fought to find themselves, ever changing without direction, spilling over themselves, moulded by the unseen that lived unfettered in the recesses of this empty place.

The darkness lived without end or beginning. Faces came to peer at him from the edge of darkness, disappearing again into the mists and dark echoes. Sounds and voices could be heard, shuffling and murmuring, they came to inspect this new one who came from the other side.

They jostled and pushed each other, straining to touch one who had crossed over, yet remained still part of the physical world. They pressed images of Loved Ones they wished to contact to his mind. Fingers pointed warnings of travels to come, some not saying a word, curious only as to the purpose of his visit, here on the outer edge of man and spirit.

From the outer regions of this darkened place, he could feel a strong presence of One coming. Slow and with purpose, it gently moved ever closer to him. It did not cause him to tremble or fear the close presence of this Unknown. Rather, like a mother come to watch over a child in its sleeping place, a last tear drying, comforted by the presence of the gentle hand always there in the night.

His mind parted like tall grasses before the winds, opening itself to receive this spirit. Konjaru could hear the tinkling of small shells or ornaments as they struck each other. He could smell the aromas of familiar herbs and wild skins, long dried under the hot sun.

The spirit ancestors who had come to peer at him, fell back to beyond the inner circle then remained silent, hands held clasped before them in quiet submission.

Only the shuffling footsteps could be heard, of small feet walking carefully in the sand and dried shrub. He could begin to see stars as they might have been this night, held up in the sky by the hand of Ngai to illuminate the earth as it slept.

A cloud parted from an almost perfect moon, the blue light filling his mind and this place to which he had come. Suddenly bathed in this bright light, the mind became clear and focused.

Konjaru was now standing in the center of stones. the open night-time sky above him, stars blinking to him as they had done since he was a child. The earth warmed his soles, keeping away the coolness of the Africa night. From beyond the horizon, the sounds of the land now filled his heart. What was familiar came close and touched him inside his mind.

The silence parted and a clear voice, dipped with age spoke to him.

"Konjaru! - The Time of the Two Moons has come."

Out of the darkness Majura stepped into the circle, her Milk Eye peering at him. A single finger pointed emphasizing her words in gentle arcs as she spoke.

"Etona is to start his Life and Destiny now. His new life is to be born from blood and sacrifice."

Majura paused then and with a gentle voice, soothing and tender as a mother, she reached up to him as if to touch his moon lit face. Her palm held open in the air. Majura's Milk Eye glowed with an inner light as she spoke.

"Before this night and day ends…

Etona's new path is to be lit by a fire and carved from the blood on your spear. A voice from your childhood is now silent and has found a resting place to live in the star. The One who did this will be humbled by the flames cast by her own hand. You must go and find the long winding trail that leads back to your home.There you will find the laughter and the wild roar under a canopy of green. While Ngai holds in his hand one who has lost his way. Six shall come to this place with the new day, three shall sit at their evening fires"

As her Milk Eye dimmed with her last words lingereing in the air, Majura reached up and draped a leather string or riempie over his forearm. A carved bone ornament shone in the moonlight as Konjaru held it out of the darkness to see. She looked at him now with her Seeing Eye and held his gaze for just a moment.

'Wear this to bind your son to your heart." Majura turned and slowly made her way to the outer stones that had marked this place from the darkness.

She paused for a moment and in a voice fading into the approaching darkness that now began folding in on them, Majura said,

"Your son will fight his Other Soul as the Moon and Sun wage their wars, far from this place of his people. Go in peace Konjaru. Know you walked your path well and your Ancestors have clapped their hands with joy over your life."

A cloud came again to mask the moon, it dimmed the stone circle and then Majura was gone.

Konjaru's mind whirled as he felt himself slipping to the nothing that was before the moon-light had come to this place. Majura's words filled his heart and spirit with fear. His racing mind began to gently slow with each breath, slower and slower, until the sound of his breath and mind finally stopped, held fast like the white streams high up into the snow-topped mountains where cloud and ice lived together in cold mists.

In a moment, the darkness returned with the greater silence and he was alone.