CHAPTER 161: CHAPTER 161 - THE GATHERING STORM

Inside the royal palace of M’banza-Kongo, power moved like smoke—thick, choking, and impossible to grasp.

Sarai kept her head bowed and her hands busy. She had taken the guise of a young servant girl, one of many tasked with cleaning the outer court and assisting the palace attendants. No one asked questions if you looked like you belonged—and if you kept quiet.

She had been in the palace for almost a week now.

And in that time, she had seen enough to know one thing: Lumingu’s shadow stretched further than any of them feared.

Portuguese soldiers came and went with impunity. Not just merchants or advisors—but uniformed men, speaking softly in hallways and handing sealed documents to ministers with faces like stone. They never stayed long. Just long enough to remind everyone that the throne was no longer entirely Kongo’s.

She listened, always. Gossip from maids, mutterings between kitchen hands, whispered arguments behind closed doors. Some of it was nonsense—rumors about witches and ghosts and blessings gone sour. But some threads were undeniable.

The king no longer met with his council every day.

He rarely left his chambers.

One maid said he hadn’t spoken in three days.

Sarai swept the same floor twice just to stay within earshot. "They say he’s under a curse," a boy had whispered. "Or a potion."

"Or grief," another said. "His eldest son disappeared last month. Some say Lumingu had him taken."

All of this pointed to the same conclusion: the king was alive—but not ruling. And no one dared speak of it aloud.

But rumors weren’t enough.

Sarai knew what she had to do.

If she couldn’t speak to the king, she had to find his paper trail. The ministers were meticulous. Somewhere, within the high tower above the audience hall, there had to be records. Reports. Orders. Secrets.

That night, she slipped through the servant’s quarters after her shift and made her way to the narrow stairwell that led toward the upper chambers.

The hallway was dark, lit only by sparse lanterns in bronze sconces. A chill hung in the air—the upper floors weren’t meant for night wanderers. Only scribes, ministers, and guards.

She wore the same grey cloth wrap, and moved barefoot, clutching a woven basket filled with fake cleaning tools. Anyone who saw her might think she was lost... or stupid. She would play either role if she had to.

She passed two guards asleep at their post.

Their snores rumbled like distant drums.

Sarai slipped past and pressed herself against the wall just outside the scribe’s office. Her fingers trembled as she reached for the latch.

It opened with a soft creak.

Inside, the room smelled of ink and dried paper. Moonlight streamed through a single high window, catching the edges of scrolls and palm-leaf books stacked in woven bins. Everything was neat. Tidy. Dangerous.

She had minutes. Maybe less.

She began scanning.

One scroll was sealed in crimson wax—Lumingu’s mark. Another bore the royal crest, but had been annotated heavily in Portuguese. She unrolled one report halfway, eyes flicking over names:

...orders to redirect funds from the king’s treasury toward "foreign assistance"...

...mention of southern priests being "removed for obstruction"...

...a list of individuals marked for detainment. Some names were scribbled out.

She took two scrolls and three letters. Folded them carefully and slid them into the false bottom of her basket. Her heartbeat was now in her throat. Every creak of wood, every whisper of wind felt like a sword raised above her.

She turned—

And froze.

A shadow moved outside the door.

A single pair of boots paused near the threshold.

Sarai dropped to the ground and pretended to be scrubbing. She muttered under her breath in broken Kimbundu—nonsense syllables. A servant caught off guard. A fool.

The figure passed.

She waited. One breath. Two. Ten.

Then fled the room as quietly as she had entered.

She didn’t stop moving until she had made it back to the outer gatehouse. A horse cart was leaving for the lower district. She clambered onto the back, hidden among sacks of grain. Her hands were still shaking when the city walls disappeared behind her.

Later That Night – Forest Clearing

The fire crackled low. Zara, Faizah, Kiprop, and Taban looked up as footsteps approached the clearing.

Sarai emerged from the darkness, hair disheveled, dress stained with sweat and dust. But her eyes were blazing.

"Sarai?" Kiprop stood. "What happened?"

"I was in the palace," she said hoarsely. "I couldn’t get to the king. But I found something better."

She dropped the hidden documents onto the fire-warmed stone beside them.

"Proof. Of everything. Ministers working with Lumingu. Priests being removed. Names of those targeted for assassination."

Zara’s breath caught. She leaned over the papers. "And the king?"

Sarai shook her head. "Isolated. Surrounded. I don’t know how much he even sees anymore. But I know this—"

She looked at all of them.

"Lumingu has already begun the takeover. The next time the people look up, it’ll be too late."

Faizah pressed a hand to her forehead.

"We have what we need," she murmured.

"Then let’s burn their whole plan to the ground," Taban said.

***

The scent of salt and sweat clung to the Luandan air like a second skin.

Mwinyi stood at the edge of a bustling dockyard, disguised as a coastal spice trader. His tunic was dyed in the brownish red common among inland merchants, and he wore a trader’s sash with worn sandals caked in dust. He blended in perfectly—just another man bartering cloves and dried fish.

But his eyes saw everything.

He had spent the last week slipping between markets, taverns, and Portuguese-run outposts along the coast, posing as a trader looking for buyers and routes back inland. Most ignored him. Some tried to cheat him. A few got drunk enough to talk.

That’s where he found what he needed.

From an overseer’s assistant, half-drunk on cane wine:

"Buganda? Oh, they’ll come around. They always do. The Restorers are already laying the groundwork. Lumingu’s got that region by the throat."

From a frustrated Portuguese lieutenant trying to woo a Swahili translator:

"The inland clans are the key. Buganda’s hesitant because of that blasted Nuri alliance. Once we take Kongo fully, they’ll cave. Their king doesn’t want war, but he doesn’t want to be left behind either."

From a barkeep with a greedy smile:

"Nuri’s ruining everything. Their coastline is locked tight. No ports. No bribes. And their Abyssinian friends? They’ve got eyes in every shipyard. The portugese are furious."

And from a high-ranking Portuguese merchant, not knowing Mwinyi understood Portuguese perfectly:

"Forget the Abyssinians. If we lose Buganda, we lose the interior. We’ve already lost trade in the east. The Ottomans are closing in from the north. If we don’t secure Kongo and Buganda soon, the Crown will pull its support."

That was the most revealing moment of all.

Mwinyi had nodded and played dumb. Just another ignorant merchant. Just another listener with no tongue.

But his heart had pounded.

Buganda wasn’t just a maybe—it was the last domino.

If Buganda aligned with Nuri, Portugal’s grip on Central Africa would slip. But if Buganda stayed neutral or—worse—sided with Lumingu and Kongo, the continent would burn.

Mwinyi knew what that meant.

He left Luanda that night under a storm-heavy sky, riding under cover of rain. By the time he reached the forest clearing near Kongo’s northern edge, dawn was bleeding into the sky.

Zara saw him first.

"Mwinyi!"

He slid from the saddle, soaked and exhausted. "You won’t like what I have to say."

Kiprop helped him sit. "We’re used to bad news."

Mwinyi took the gourd offered to him, drank, and said plainly:

"Portugal is scared. Of us. But they still have the numbers. They want Buganda. Badly. And if Lumingu succeeds in Kongo, they’re going to turn everything they have on the east."

"Did they say how?" Faizah asked.

"Collapse Nuri’s allies. Turn Buganda against us. Make the coast bleed. They don’t want trade—they want submission. Nuri ruined their ocean routes. Now they want our rivers and inland kingdoms instead."

Silence settled over the fire.

Sarai stepped forward, her voice tight. "That means if Kongo falls... the coast is next."

Mwinyi nodded. "They’re trying to build a wall around Nuri. One kingdom at a time."

The sun was just beginning to rise over the trees, casting long shadows through the forest. The squad sat together now—five warriors cloaked in sweat and dust and the weight of too much truth.

Taban, Zara, Sarai, Faizah, Kiprop, and Mwinyi. Each had returned with a piece of the blade. Now, it was sharp. And aimed.

They laid out the intel like weapons:

Zara brought word of a pact between Lumingu and the Portuguese—funded, fueled, and almost ready to strike.

Taban revealed that the royal family of Kongo was marked for quiet execution.

Sarai held evidence of ministers and clergy already turned.

Mwinyi warned that the coast was just the beginning, and Buganda stood on a knife’s edge.

There was no more time.

"Then it’s us," Faizah said quietly. "We’re the last thread. If Kongo falls before we act..."

"It won’t," Kiprop said. "We’re still here."

Sarai rolled out her stolen scrolls and touched the king’s seal with her fingers. "Then we start by saving the king."

Zara looked toward the horizon, where the smoke of M’banza-Kongo was beginning to rise into the blue morning sky.

"We came to uncover a plot," she said. "Now we’re part of the war."