The Shaman woke up just before dusk and as soon as he did, he ordered his apprentices to request the Chief and the other tribal leaders to meet him at the temple for a meeting as soon as possible. Although it was nowhere the concept of a request but he chose to stick to the formality for now. The apprentices took off in a jiffy.
All that was left with him in the temple were the obscenely and barely clothed female apprentices. It was one of the master strokes by the lust driven Shaman to convince the female apprentices that the Goddesses bestowed more on those who wore such revealing outfits and he had succeeded in getting for himself a show of nudity on the daily basis. He ordered one of them to fix him a luxurious breakfast, one of the privileges of being the supreme religious authority governing an ignorant mass and ordered another one of them to massage his bare back. The Shaman laid on his belly on the bed and the apprentice complied happily. Moments later, the luxurious breakfast comprising a fried egg, a fruit juice, roasted whole chicken and a giant beef steak, arrived in front of him. While the massage was in its peak phase of satisfaction, the Shaman failed to feel it amuse him no matter how hard he tried to put his mind to it. The cows or buffaloes in the village were deemed sacred, so God knows what that steak came from. The aroma of the meal filled the room and Shaman felt his stomach grumble. He signaled the massager to stop which she did instantly and leapt to the wall of the Shaman's chamber where the rest of the Female apprentices stood with attention, and their heads down. He stood up and walked to his table where the breakfast waited for him. He sat on his humble dining table and gestured the apprentices to leave the room. They exited hastily. He picked a piece of bread wondering if the meal would clear his mind. As soon as he took a bite, the embarrassed faces of the tribal leaders flashed before his eyes. He spat out the food and threw his platter across the room. He was fuming with rage, no one had ever managed to keep him waiting for this long. Either the hunting parties and the trackers had become lazy and useless or the escapee was more resourceful than they had imagined. If the first possibility was the case, he had more than likely resolved the issue by making an example of the leader of the hunting party but if the preacher had been underestimated, he had to use all his creativity to put him out of his misery. Tai was in no mood to endure anymore incompetence and the tribal leaders had no intention to test the Shaman's patience.
In a few minutes, the recipients of the invitation came knocking on the door of the temple. The similar protocol was followed and the guests were seated in the congregational prayer room. The air in the room was different this time around. The room was still lit by the torches clamped on the walls after every few feet. Perhaps it was the silence. The room missed the faded sound of the villagers shouting and chanting frantically and the utter pandemonium of drums that was held the last time they had had this meeting. There was pin drop silence. The faint crackling and rustling of the flames of the torches was the only sound audible in the room. The invitees had waited only for a few minutes when the Shaman barged in, casually kicking through the door inquiring, "Any ideas from you morons?". The tribal leaders had ceased to even feel insulted by whatever Shaman pelted at them. But this treatment was new to the Chief who had been accustomed to all sorts of formalities and protocols just a day ago.
"You wouldn't have asked this dumb question if you had figured something out yourselves", blurted the young Chief half-heartedly while avoiding eye contact. But he could definitely feel the blazing gaze of the Shaman drilling into him. He couldn't care less. The Shaman fought the urge to pounce on the Chief and grab him by the throat. He barely succeeded in overpowering the urge. He was breathless with rage but he already had too much on his hands. He had little time to waste in power shows.
"All in right time", the Shaman muttered under his breath to himself.
"And besides, how the hell is this our problem? It was you who wanted to kill them off, not us. Clean up your own mess!", the Chief continued his onslaught. The Shaman was enraged but the Chief was right as well. It wasn't his idea to make an enemy out of the preachers. It had always been the Shaman who had initiated the raids after making up some weak excuse to produce an angry mob out of the villagers which was never a too hard job. The Shaman chose to ignore the comment.
The Shaman quickly turned to the other occupants of the table and gave them a questioning nod without sparing any words for the silent, gutless slaves. To which they contributed with the usual downward gazed silence. The Shaman rolled his eyes and sighed in agony. The only reason he had spared the tribal leaders was because he thought that he might need their tribal connections in crucial times like this and now when the moment has arrived, they had proven to be utterly useless. He started to create a checklist in his mind regarding whom will he get rid of first and who will have to wait. The room was dead silent for a few minutes. The silence was broken by the Chief getting up from his chair and dusting his robes. He let out a sigh and started walking to the door. The Shaman and the rest of the guests looked at him, waiting for any sort of input from his side. He kept walking while his shoes made the only sound in the room. As he reached the door he stopped.
"Go home all of you. I'll take care of this", the Chief hissed without turning to face them as he stepped out of the room. His guards flocked toward him to escort him to his long house.
"Did WHITE BOA return yet?", he whispered to one of his guards. The answer was affirmative.
"Escort him to me", he said and took off.
The Shaman and the other tribal leaders were speechless. They had not expected the Chief to remain this bold after what had happened a day ago. They assumed that there would be one more speechless monkey in their group chanting yes sir's in front of the Shaman but some-how he had managed to maintain his upper hand. The Chief was not in any mood to surrender his throne without a fight.