by Angeline Bandon-Bibum
PROLOGUE
Nyanza, Rwanda
July 1955
As a boy, Joseph was playing hide and go seek with his younger cousin, Theodetta. He hid in one of the many corridors of the palace inhabited by his uncle and aunt, the King and Queen of Rwanda. Joseph heard the footsteps of his little cousin, Theodetta, as she searched for him. He heard the girl’s voice echoing through the hallways, as she called out for him. The boy said nothing, but he ran through the seemingly endless corridor of the palace. He then suddenly bumped into the legs of an extremely tall man, the King of Rwanda. The king was called the Mwami. He wore an elaborate headdress, and draped over his elegant French suit, was a toga-like, white cloth. In his hand was a golden scepter that reached to the floor. Joseph was terrified. Would he be beaten, or thrown out of the palace? He looked up at the Mwami, and the Mwami's face was serious. Joseph kneeled and bowed down in front of the Mwami. He looked at the shiny, black European shoes that the king wore. Then Joseph dared to look up again. To his surprise, he saw that the Mwami was smiling at him.
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Kigali, Rwanda
July 1994
Joseph was dreaming. He was lying on a his back on a cot, looking up to the sky. The sun seemed red. Its rays radiated in concentric circles. Joseph thought to himself. What world was he in? A red sun was blazing down at him; it seemed to be bleeding, like the bodies that he had seen for the last several months.
When Joseph woke up, he could smell the rotting human corpses that were piled all around the city of Kigali, Rwanda. He sat up on his cot in the military barracks. He could not get use to the sickening smell of decaying bodies. Joseph had employed a teenager, Charles, to fetch water for him and to wash his clothing and carry his clothes and military equipment. The boy went to fetch two buckets of water from a nearby river. Joseph reminded him that the water had to be boiled before he could use it to drink or wash.
Charles had lost his entire family during the killings in Rwanda, in the summer of 1994. To Joseph, it seemed that Charles was always in a daze, and silent. Joseph had managed to convince the silent boy to tell his story nonetheless. It was a story of bloody barbarism and horror; Charles had watched his family butchered alive right before his eyes. Everyone in his own family was probably dead, too, Joseph thought. However, he hoped that his niece, Valentina, had somehow survived.
Copyright © 2007 by Angeline Bandon-Bibum
