Their number was so great that from the hour of dawn till the sun was high in the heavens they passed the gates of the kraal like countless herds of cattle--they the unconquered.

Little did they know that victory smiled on them no more; that they must die by thousands of hunger and fever in the marshes of the Limpopo, and that those of them who returned should come with their shields in their bellies, having devoured their shields because of their ravenous hunger! But what of them?
They were nothing.

"Dust" was the name of one of the great regiments that went out against Sotyangana, and dust they were--dust to be driven to death by the breath of Chaka, Lion of the Zulu.
Now few men remained in the kraal Duguza, for nearly all had gone with the impi, and only women and aged people were left.

Dingaan and Umhlangana, brothers of the king, were there, for Chaka would not suffer them to depart, fearing lest they should plot against him, and he looked on them always with an angry eye, so that they trembled for their lives, though they dared not show their fear lest fate should follow fear.

But I guessed it, and like a snake I wound myself into their secrets, and we talked together darkly and in hints.