CHAPTER 184: CHAPTER 184 - PATIENCE IS THE BLADE

Faizah woke to mud-streaked light and the smell of stale sweat. Her wrists ached where the ropes had bruised her skin; the chair beneath her was rough and splintered. Around her, the cell hummed with the bored cruelty of men who had been given power for a night.

A soldier spat near her boot, a wet, ugly sound. "Worthless," he muttered. Another laughed and called her names—words meant to wound, to remind her of the place they believed she belonged. They shoved a tin of sour porridge across the stone and left, their boots clanking away like a judgment.

Hours slipped by in a blur of waiting. When the heavy door finally opened, the torchlight painted the corridor in angry gold. Lumingu entered, his face a mask of fury and unease, flanked by two of his brutish guards. He regarded her with a hot, dangerous gaze, the kind of look a man gives a dog that has defied him.

Lumingu prowled the small cell like a wolf tasting the air. He slammed a palm on the table until the torchlight jumped, then leaned in, face close enough that Faizah could see the sweat at his hairline and the shallow lines of a man who had not slept in days. "Where is the king?" he demanded.

"Where do the traitors hide? How many of you are there? —who sends your orders?" He jabbed a thick finger toward her chest with each question, the nails digging into leather gloves.

Faizah held their stares like a stone. Each question slammed into her like a hammer and fell back. When Lumingu’s voice slipped into threats—when he suggested with a leer that his men might take their pleasure with her—she only chuckled through the blood in her mouth.

"It’s always the same with you people," she spat, spit landing on the flagstones. "You use fear and threats to get what you want. That won’t work on me." Her voice was ragged, but the defiance burned clear. "I will enjoy watching you burn."

Lumingu’s face tightened; for a moment she saw panic flash behind his anger. He grabbed her roughly by the throat. "Let your little prince come," he hissed. "I will crush him under my boot."

He left then, his stride too loud in the corridor. The guards shut the door with the casualness of men who believed the battle already won.

***

Taban moved like a shadow stretched long by dawn, keeping to the dark edges of street and wall.

He tailed the patrols at a distance that let him count faces but not be seen, watching where they paused, how they laughed, which of them spat and which of them carried keys.

When they dragged Faizah into the governor’s compound he let them pass, then slipped to a sheltered alcove where pigeons nested and the stink of cooking oil masked human scent.

From that hollow he watched the compound’s rhythms: a sentry at the eastern gate who took his tea from a chipped mug at dawn, two younger guards who switched places every thirty minutes, a larger man who came and went with crates but never left the inner yard.

He mapped the stones with his feet and the guard rotations with a soft count, marking the angle of approach, the places shadows pooled, and the single narrow service-ladder that would let a man climb the back wall unseen if he timed the turning of the sentry’s back.

His jaw ached from clenching; exhaustion hummed beneath him like an insect, but he would not retreat. He waited, a blade coiled in patience, measuring each breath until the hour when the compound’s pride would falter and the smallest gap would open.

***

Mwinyi ran until his lungs protested and his legs felt like lead. The city slid past him in a blur: shadowed doorways, soldiers at sentries, a cat barking in the dark. He reached the catacombs exhausted and raw, and Onyango met him at the entrance, steady as a rock in the dark.

Onyango helped him to a narrow bed and pressed a waterskin to his lips. "Breathe," he said. "Then speak."

"Faizah’s taken," Mwinyi rasped. "They grabbed her after she drew the patrols away. Taban tailed them, but he’s tired—he needs relief. We need reinforcements. We can’t lose her."

Onyango’s face hardened into the pattern of command. "Where did you last see them?"

Mwinyi swallowed and gave the last location. Onyango snapped a quick order. "Korir and Joyi will ride to Taban. They will move to sweep the quarter and find their holding cell. Rest a little — then tell Zara and Kiprop what happened."

Zara and Kiprop arrived from their own mission minutes later, the weight of leadership settling over them. They sat with Onyango and Mwinyi in a tight ring, voices low but urgent. Korir and Joyi had already been sent to locate Taban; the rest were bracing for whatever came next.

"What should we do?" Onyango asked, honestly seeking counsel as much as command. "Do we attempt a rescue now, while Lumingu’s forces are strong?"

Zara’s gaze was cool and hard. "Not yet," she said. "Faizah is cunning and trained. If we rush in blind, we’ll sacrifice more than one life. We watch. Keep eyes on the compound. Lumingu will be compelled to bring his backers into the light—he will want to gloat, to secure his patron’s favor. The puppet master will appear to shore up his investment. That is the man we must find."

Kiprop nodded. "Faizah has survived in worse hands than these. We have to use patience as a tool. We’ll map their guards, count rotations, learn their routes. When Lumingu’s patron shows, we will know the face behind the coin. Then we strike, clean, and fast."

Onyango’s shoulders eased fractionally. "We need numbers and routes. Korir and Joyi will find Taban. Once we know the prison, we can decide on extraction or bait." He looked at Zara. "Call back everyone still out. We regroup, rest, and be ready."

Zara’s voice dropped, hard with the cost they’d already paid. "Tell every shadow to fall back and sleep. Wounds are mended with rest. We will not throw more bodies away tonight. We hold. We watch. When the puppet master comes, we take him."

Korir and Joyi slipped into the night, moving toward the last place Taban was seen. The catacombs hummed with plans and prayers. Outside, Mbanza turned in its sleep; inside, the shadows tightened into a net, waiting for the last thread to fall.