Free The Heart of Redness: A Novel by Zakes Mda

and false gods.”
    This was before Mlanjeni died of tuberculosis.
    But Twin shouldn’t have mentioned his name, for this inflamed Twin-Twin. He demanded that Twin should withdraw Mlanjeni’s name from the list of prophets, because he was not a true prophet.
    “Look what happened to us in the war! Where is our father now as we speak?” demanded Twin-Twin.
    But Twin was adamant that Mlanjeni was a true prophet in the same league as Ntsikana and Nxele.
    Relatives had to be called to separate the twins from a bloody stick duel. The elders of the village had to sit down and negotiate peace between the children of Xikixa. The twins shook hands and swore in the name of their headless father never to fight again.
    Once again they became close to each other.
    But another evil struck. A marauding disease that attacked cattle in their kraals, in the veld, and even in distant mountain cattle-posts. It crept in during the night, seizing its victims when they least expected it. No one had ever heard of it before, but those who had contact with the white settlements came with the news that it was lungsickness.
    Raging lungsickness. Strutting around like a bully. Laughing in the faces of grown men as they wept when they saw their favorite cattle wane away.
    White people knew of lungsickness because it came from their country. There were reports that it had killed many cattle across the seas in the land of the whites. It was brought to the land of the amaXhosa nation by Friesland bulls that came in a Dutch ship two years earlier, in 1853. Therefore even the best of the isiXhosa doctors did not know how to cure lungsickness.
    The disease was traveling the land of the amaXhosa people and of the amaMfengu like a wild fire. Cattle owners were trying to escape it by driving their herds to mountainous and secluded places. Yet many cattle were lost.
    Soon enough the disease attacked the twins’ village. Twin-Twin wept as he watched his favorite bull die a horrible and protracted death. First it was constipated. Then it became diarrheic. It gasped for air, its tongue hanging out. When it died he was relieved that at last the pain was over, and he was determined to escape with his remaining herds. Twin did not need persuading. He too had suffered losses. He agreed with Twin-Twin that they should take their families and drive their cattle to new pastures where they could establish new homesteads.
    As if lungsickness was not enough, the maize in the fields was attacked by a disease that left it whimpering and blighted. It crept through the roots and killed the plant before the corn could ripen. It certainly was not going to be a year of plenty.
    Such a calamity had never been seen in kwaXhosa before. It was the work of malevolent spirits and of ubuthi, of witchcraft. The twins hoped that in a new settlement they would escape all this.
    The twins’ great trek took many days. It was a slow and painful journey, made even slower by the women and children, and by the pigs and chickens. During the day the trekkers camped so that the cattle could graze and the wives and their daughters could cook food. Those who were tired slept. When night fell they moved on again. They were accompanied and protected by the Seven Sisters, the stars from which the Khoikhoi were descended. The seven daughters of Tsiqwa. He who told his stories in heaven. The Creator.
    Qukezwa led the way, for she knew the language of the stars. She rode reinless on Gxagxa, Twin’s brown-and-white horse, which seemed to know exactly where to go without being guided by her.
    Twin was proud of his wife. She could do things that Twin-Twin’s numerous wives could not do. Even though people had constantly laughed at the foreign woman who used to open her thighs for the British soldiers, now her people’s stars were leading everyone to fresh pastures. Twin-Twin should be grateful, instead of making snide remarks whenever the couple added a stone and aromatic herbs to the piles of stones they