The pursuit of Kapteni Steiner's fleeing remnants was a grim, relentless affair. Hamisi, his scarred face set in lines of cold fury, and Lبانجى, his Wanyisanza trackers moving like vengeful spirits through the parched woodlands, gave the Germans and their remaining askaris no respite. Kaelo, receiving Jabari's updates via a chain of swift runners, had emphasized one crucial instruction: drive them east, towards the treacherous expanse of the Ngono swamps. It was terrain where European discipline and firepower would be largely negated, where local knowledge and resilience would hold the ultimate advantage.
Steiner's men, already demoralized and exhausted from their defeat at Makuyuni, now found themselves in a desperate flight through an unforgiving land that seemed to rise against them. Hidden Wanyisanza archers, firing Seke's small, wickedly barbed arrows, harassed their flanks, forcing them deeper into the pre-ordained path. Batembo skirmishers, appearing as if from the earth itself, would strike at their rearguard, letting loose a volley of spears before melting back into the dense thorn scrub. Steiner's men fired their modern rifles wildly into the bush, wasting precious ammunition on fleeting shadows, their famed discipline fraying under the constant, unseen pressure. They abandoned more equipment – spare boots, cooking pots, even some of their heavier personal packs – in a desperate bid for speed.
While this deadly chase unfolded, Jabari, with a retinue including Mzee Kachenje, Kibwana, Boroga, and a curious Seke, rode to inspect the abandoned German fort by the Great Ruaha River. The sight that greeted them was one of chaotic desolation. Steiner, in his flight, had attempted to set fire to his stronghold, but the haste of his departure had made it an incomplete job. Several of the main store huts were gutted, their thatched roofs collapsed into smoldering ruins. The log palisade was scorched in places, but largely intact. The two small brass cannons Juma had reported sat askew on their carriages, their muzzles hastily spiked with iron rods hammered into their touchholes – a crude but effective method of disabling them, Kaelo noted with a grudging respect for Steiner's desperate thoroughness.
"He sought to deny us even the bones of his camp," Hamisi's son, a young warrior named Deka who had accompanied Jabari, spat onto the blackened earth.
"He has denied us little of consequence," Jabari corrected, Kaelo's mind already assessing the true value. "The knowledge that such a fort can be built here, that it can be broken, is worth more than any goods he might have left."
Seke the smith, however, was like a child in a new kraal. He ran his calloused hands over the spiked cannons, his eyes alight with an almost feverish curiosity. He examined the metalwork of the hinges on a salvaged door, the iron bands on a broken crate, the very composition of the nails Steiner's men had used. "Their iron is different, Ntemi," he murmured, tapping a cannon barrel. "Harder, yet it does not shatter. And the way they join the pieces… there are secrets here."
Kaelo instructed his men to systematically salvage anything of potential use: unburnt timbers, metal tools, discarded cooking pots, even scraps of European cloth and leather. Every nail, every hinge, every unbroken bottle was collected. The spiked cannons, too heavy to move easily, would be studied by Seke in situ before a decision was made on how best to utilize their metal or understand their construction. He ordered the remaining structures razed to the ground, the earthworks leveled. No foreign power would easily reoccupy this spot. A tall pole was erected in the center of the flattened compound, and from it, a Batembo shield, newly painted with Jabari's chosen clan symbols, was hung – a stark, silent declaration of sovereignty.
Three days later, as Jabari was overseeing the final dismantling of the German fort, a runner arrived, his face grim but triumphant. Lبانجى and Hamisi had cornered Steiner and his last, desperate handful of men in the heart of the Ngono swamps.
The final confrontation had been brutal but brief. Steiner's men, plagued by insects, sinking in mud, their ammunition exhausted, had been reduced to a pathetic state. Hamisi, following Jabari's earlier instructions influenced by Kaelo's strategic preference for minimizing Batembo losses, had offered them a chance to surrender their weapons in exchange for their lives. A few of the remaining askaris, broken and starving, had thrown down their spears. But Kapteni Steiner, along with his two remaining German subordinates, had chosen to go down fighting, charging out from a reedy islet with pistols blazing, until Batembo spears and a final, merciful volley from the Nkonde sya Ntemi had ended their desperate last stand. Their bodies, along with those of the askaris who fought with them, now lay in the unforgiving mud of the Ngono.
Hamisi and Lبانجى returned to Jabari's temporary camp near the ruined fort two days later. They brought with them five captured, terrified askaris, a dozen more modern rifles – some damaged but repairable by Seke – and, most importantly, Kapteni Steiner's personal strongbox, which had been abandoned during his final flight. The German East Africa Company's presence in this region was, for now, decisively extinguished.
The fate of the prisoners was Jabari's immediate concern. The European prisoners, Steiner and his lieutenants, had resolved their own fate. For the captured askaris – Nyamwezi, Sukuma, and a few men from even further afield who had taken service with the Germans – Kaelo advised a pragmatic approach. After a stern lecture from Jabari about the folly of serving foreign invaders against their own people, they were offered a choice: swear allegiance to the Batembo and be integrated into his forces (their skills with rifles, however rudimentary, were valuable), or be stripped of any weapons and given enough food to return to their distant homes, carrying with them the tale of Steiner's defeat and Jabari's strength. Most, seeing the Batembo's new power and perhaps fearing retribution if they simply fled, chose to swear allegiance. Kaelo saw them as a potential source of intelligence about other European methods and a nucleus for training future riflemen.
The contents of Steiner's strongbox, when prized open by Seke, yielded further treasures. More detailed maps, correspondence with his company directors on the coast (revealing their ambitious plans for plantations and mineral exploitation, and their increasing impatience with Steiner's lack of progress), a list of trade contacts in Zanzibar, and a small bag of silver Maria Theresa thalers, the preferred currency of coastal trade. Each item was a piece of the larger puzzle Kaelo was assembling in his mind, a clearer picture of the forces he would eventually have to confront on a much grander scale.
News of Steiner's utter annihilation spread like wildfire through Unyamwezi and beyond. Jabari, the young Ntemi of the Batembo, was no longer just a rising chief; he was a legend, the African leader who had defied and destroyed a powerful sun-haired invader. Villages that had once paid tribute to Steiner, or feared his presence, now flocked to pledge their allegiance to Jabari, seeking his protection. The Wanyisanza, under Ntemi Gwala and the now-heroic Lبانجى, became his staunchest allies, their trackers and warriors an integral part of his expanding forces. Even Boroga, seeing the undeniable tide of Jabari's success, seemed to shed the last vestiges of his skepticism, becoming a genuinely enthusiastic supporter, his organizational skills proving invaluable in managing the influx of tribute and new allegiances.
In a grand ceremony at the main ikulu, Jabari honored his victorious warriors. Hamisi was publicly lauded and gifted Steiner's own surprisingly fine (though now bloodstained) officer's sword. Lبانجى received a significant share of the captured rifles and ammunition for his Wanyisanza warriors. Juma was elevated to lead Jabari's personal intelligence scouts, the Maso ya Ntemi – the Chief's Eyes. Seke was given a place of honor on Jabari's council and promised all the resources he needed to continue his vital work with iron and firearms. The families of all who had fallen, both in the battle of Makuyuni and in the pursuit of Steiner, received double the customary compensation, a gesture that resonated deeply with the clan's sense of justice and community.
With the immediate external threat removed, Kaelo pushed Jabari to focus on internal consolidation and development with an almost ferocious intensity. The newly acquired territories and allied villages needed to be integrated into a cohesive political and economic unit. He began to lay the groundwork for what he privately termed the "Batembo Kingdom." Mzee Kachenje, with the help of Juma and the other youths Kaelo was trying to teach basic literacy, started to codify Batembo laws and the terms of alliance with tributary chiefdoms, creating a rudimentary administrative framework. Agricultural output was pushed, with new lands being cleared and Kaelo subtly introducing ideas of crop rotation and water conservation he remembered from his distant past. The ivory trade, now more securely under Batembo control and benefiting from Wanyisanza expertise, brought in a steady stream of wealth, which Kaelo directed towards acquiring more firearms, tools, and reserves of grain.
He knew this was merely a lull in the storm. Steiner's German East Africa Company would not simply forget their losses. News of a defeated European expedition, however small, would cause ripples on the coast and eventually in Europe itself. Retaliation, or at least a renewed and stronger attempt at colonization in the region, was inevitable. But Kaelo had bought them time, precious time.
One evening, weeks later, Jabari stood alone on the rise where Steiner's fort had once stood. Only a few blackened timbers and the flattened earth marked its passing. The Batembo shield, his clan's symbol, now fluttered from the pole he had erected, a defiant assertion of sovereignty. He held Steiner's captured journal in his hand, Kaelo's mind still sifting through its contents, seeking any further insight into the European mindset, their long-term goals, their vulnerabilities.
The swamp of Ngono, where Steiner's ambitions had met their ignominious end, lay hidden by the curve of the earth to the east. The German captain had sought to carve out an empire for his company. Instead, his defeat had become a stepping stone for Jabari's own nascent kingdom. Kaelo felt no personal triumph in Steiner's demise, only the cold satisfaction of a necessary objective achieved. The price of victory had been high, paid in Batembo and Wanyisanza blood. But the path to ascendancy, the path to forging a power capable of truly defending this small corner of Africa from the coming deluge, was now clearer, if no less daunting. The ashes of Steiner's outpost were fertilizing the seeds of a new African power, a power Kaelo was determined would grow to cast its own formidable shadow.