When Jabali was captured on the plain near the caves, he was not merely a defeated man. He was the Chifu's heir in the eyes of part of the family, with warriors who obeyed him and traders who had promised him profits.
Two days after his imprisonment, three of his uncles came to the council hall. They claimed that Chifu Baraka had disgraced the blood of the clan by allowing Mama Naliaka to strike Jabali with a stick in public.
“He raised a sword against civilians,” the Chifu said.
“Civilians who gathered a crowd without permission,” the eldest uncle replied.
Neema was not allowed into that meeting, but Amani heard about it through a council clerk. The uncles wanted Jabali handed over to the family, not to the envoys of the high ruler. The Chifu refused.
That night, two guards from Jabali's house fled on horses.
The next day, the Chifu family's mark was drawn on several houses belonging to traders who supported him. People began to fear that a division within the clan would bring war to Mbuyuni.
Mtemi used that fear. He told the people that the women's granary had broken tradition and turned the Chifu into the servant of a crowd.
“Today they measure a measure,” he said. “Tomorrow they will measure the rulers' blood.”
Neema replied at a market meeting, “Blood does not need a measure. Grain does.”
But Mtemi's words found ears. Some elders disliked the way women had begun speaking before the council. Others feared that Liwali Hamadi, if he came, would remove the Chifu and install an outsider as ruler.
Chifu Baraka summoned Neema at night.
“If you keep pushing the case in public, my family may split,” he said.
“And if you hide it, the town will know that the law stands before blood.”
“It is easy to say that when you have no ruling clan.”
“It is easy to rule when you have never slept beside a hungry child.”
The Chifu grew angry. “Do not think that because I have listened to you, we have become equals.”
“I have never thought that.”
They sat in silence. Then the Chifu confessed something he had never said before to anyone from the market.
“Jabali is the son of my dead sister. I raised him. I taught him to ride, hold a spear, and read the clan marks. I saw his greed, but I thought power could be directed.”
“And now?”
“Now I see that I taught him the seal was his future property.”
Neema said, “Then teach him one last time that it belongs to the people he wants to rule.”
The Chifu agreed to put market guards together with the family's guards at Jabali's house. He also ordered every use of the seal recorded on a public board.
The following night, Jabali's people tried to free him.
They came over the back wall, broke a small door, and unlocked him.
But Musa, who was on duty after paying for his old mistake, saw a shadow. He struck the granary bell.
People came out of their houses carrying torches. Jabali and his followers ran toward the river, but the path to the bridge was filled with women, farmers, and guards.
Hamisi told him, “Put down your weapon.”
Jabali laughed. “A porter is giving me orders?”
“A man standing in your way.”
Chifu Baraka arrived alone, without his ceremonial robe. He stood between the two sides.
“If you pass me with a sword,” he told Jabali, “you will not be my heir. You will be my murderer.”
Jabali trembled with anger. For a moment, Neema thought he would strike his uncle.
At last, he threw down the sword.
His followers did the same.
In the morning, the Chifu summoned the people. He announced that no member of his family would use the seal without the signatures of three witnesses. He also said that the successor to power would not be chosen by blood alone, but by the clan council and representatives of the town.
His uncles left angrily.
But war did not begin.
Jabali remained imprisoned, and the seal was placed in a box with three keys.
Neema saw Chifu Baraka leave the grounds looking older than he had the day before.
Power, too, had been measured.
Sometimes its measure was what a person was willing to lose so that the law could remain alive.
---
The grain from the caves gave Mbuyuni time, not salvation.
Each day, the measures grew fewer. Rashid was still in Kizinga, and the eastern road was controlled by men whom Jabali had paid before his arrest. They had set up camp in a narrow gorge that every cart had to pass through.
The Chifu wanted to send fighters.
Neema said, “If they fight, the sacks will be burned or seized.”
“Then what is your plan?”
“A road closed by force can be opened by the hunger of those who closed it.”
She sent two people to the gorge, not with weapons but with news: Jabali had been arrested, Mtemi could no longer pay them, and anyone who returned to Mbuyuni without fighting would be forgiven and given three days of food.
On the first night, five men left the camp. On the second, seven. Their leader beat the men who wanted to leave, which made the others angry.
On the third day, Neema went to the gorge herself with Chifu Baraka and two elders. They carried a pot of thick porridge.
The leader of the guards was called Mamba. He was a large man with a scar on his face.
“Go back,” he said. “Our order is not to let the grain through.”
“The person who gave the order is in prison.”
“His money is still worth something.”
“Where is it?”
Mamba did not answer.
Neema set the pot down. The smell of porridge spread. The men behind him swallowed.
“You can guard this gorge until your last piece of bread,” Neema said. “But no one will pay you. Or you can open the road, and each of you can receive food and work guarding the caravan.”
Mamba laughed. “You want to buy me with porridge?”
“No. I am showing you the difference between a promise and a payment.”
Mamba looked at his men. He saw how tired they were.
“What if he betrays me?” he asked, looking at the Chifu.
Neema produced an agreement stick marked with three lines. “The Chifu, the council, and the granary will witness it. If you open the road without bloodshed, the offense of blocking it will be forgiven.”
Chifu Baraka hesitated. It was the first time he had been asked to place his authority on a stick together with other people.
At last, he made his mark.
Mamba allowed the road to open.
Four days later, Rashid's caravan entered Mbuyuni carrying six hundred sacks of dried cassava, millet, and beans.
People wept when they saw its dust rising in the distance.
Rashid climbed down from his donkey and handed Neema a copy of their agreement.
“I did not reduce a single measure,” he said.
Neema inspected three sacks.
“And I will not reduce a single payment.”
Mtemi, under house arrest, watched from the window.
He had used hunger to bind people to him.
Neema had used trust to open the road.
---