A SHY WORLD WAR

LOOSING LIFE FINDING ONE

He made a sharp angry walk away from Nwoko and returned sharply back in a jiffy. He tapped Nwoko on his back and urged him to stand erect. A heartbroken Nwoko looked him in the face wearily and disappointedly at the same time, and hushed his breath in cuts. He then pointed at Imo’s canoe and said, “You see that canoe? You are going home today with it. Take up your dead and your dying daughter home. I have chosen a place and peace for myself. It has just begun”, Dios commanded Nwoko and left.

Nwoko was stunned as he stared helplessly with teary eyes, and Dios stopped halfway and sat on a felled tree trunk. Holding his tired head by cheek with his right palm, he stared confusedly at the dead body of Imo, half-gone Akwugo and river-crying Nwoko who was so bewildered that words of thanks were not coming in handy. “Ndéwo nwa m [thank you, my child]” was the closest word his head could dish out for his numbed mouth. He uttered it and jack-closed his ajar lips.

The Slave Coast of Biafra was a very busy place. It had become a sleepless makeshift home of slaves where weeping arouses no sympathy; a business depot for slave barons where wealth was calculated in the number of slaves one has. Also, if you were so opportune to have loyal slave raiders that specialised in raiding Igbo districts, it meant you were undoubtedly a well-established business tycoon both in Biafra and Lisbon. It was a land of chilling mental plague for anyone who lost one to slave raiders. Over all, in view, it was a bobbling land that elicited different things to different people. This was dependent on the manner one came around and the number or nature of shocks one could relate to or could not. It was made a land where wealth took an ugly walk up to the west, leaving behind a worn out and disorganised humanity in whose hearts fear and scares reigned.

Nwoko was naturally expecting passers-by to render hands of help to him; to load his dead and seeming boneless daughter, but none got notice of his desperation. Slave Coast had deadened the minds of creatures that appeared to him as humans. Most of the people he saw around were directly or indirectly partakers in the slave trade. Some were slave raiders, middle men, and slave disciplinarians. Some were also drag men of the slave ship, slave depot guards, and informants. Others, mostly Portuguese, were slave barons who were lording it all on the local population. A token of their cowries was huge enough to set a peaceful district on fire. It takes only a puff of cigarette smoke into heaven to shove all the darkness down to nothingness and folks got better. After all, it was a definition of success that Lisbon understood.

Dios had gawked for long. He stood up and walked towards Imo’s canoe as Nwoko was dragging his lifeless body into it. He turned and reached out to Nwoko to help him. “Ị ka n’emere m [are you still helping me]?” was all Nwoko said and it did not come with any reply. He then remained silent to avoid courting yet another trouble in Bonny Island. After all, it was a rare help in recent times in Bonny Island where long guns have paved way for everything that meant evil.

It was a hazy evening that gave birth to a horrific night as Nwoko faced all the storms that engulf Ubani, now called Bonny, trying to meander his way and sail home safely. He could see fishermen casting their nets and hooks to trap tilapias and catfishes. They were majorly the elderly and able-bodied men who fish in groups. They suspected his canoe ascending steadily unto upper old Ubani Island and started watching closely as he came. Alas, they saw a half-lonely Nwoko when they paddled their canoes round about him. It turned out to be a canoe of a dead body, a half-dead woman and a toughly stiffened old man that held his paddle as though his life depended on it.

“Nna anyị ndéwo [greetings our father], the seeming eldest of young fishermen, Odili, said as others followed suit.

“Ndéwonu ụmụ m [thank you my children]”, Nwoko replied.

“E bé ka ịna eje [where are you going]?” Odili asked.

“Nwa m, ána m álá na bem. E jere m na Bonny ga gbapụta nwa m ha tọrọ [my child, I am going home. I went to get back my daughter that was kidn*pped]”, Nwoko said.

“Kedu maka ozu a anyị na ahu ebe a [what about the dead body we are seeing there]?” Odili asked.

“Ọ bu ozu nwanne m dugara m ịje ma na ọ nwụrụ ebe a. Ọ bu zi okenye [it is the corpse of my brother who accompanied me but he died there. He’s an old man]”, Nwoko answered.

“Ọ bu n’ọkaghị mma na ị raghuru rue ụtụtụ? Chi ejigokwanu [is it not better you sleep over till morning? It is already night)”, Odili pleaded.

“Imela, mana ebum ozu. Ọ ga aka mma ka m laba tupu ozu ya emebie [it is better I continue before the corpse decomposes]”, Nwoko pleaded with them.

“Ọ di mma, ma jirikwa nwayo [it is okay, but take it easy]”, Odili appealed.

“Ọ di mma. Ụnụ éméla [it is okay, thank you]”, Nwoko said, and suddenly the fishermen round about him paved way for him to continue his journey. Some of them that were water guards rather formed an entourage behind him and saw him off Ubani before they retreated back for fishing.

Nwoko was really favoured that night, the hazy look of the sky could still allow the rays of the harmattan moon to shine on him and showed him ways. As dark as 3am, he was able to trace the home of his in-law, Akaonye, at Azumini. He sent message to Da Oriaku through Kalu, a hunter, who was on his way returning from his hunting expedition around the banks of Azumini River. It took just about thirty minutes to see Da Oriaku running as her legs could allow her to meet her only surviving brother. “Akwugo, ọ bu gịnị? [Akwugo, what it is?]” was the screaming words she uttered when she saw her niece lying like firewood on the floor of the canoe as her head was made to lie half-way the edge of the back of the canoe. Akwugo scraggily put up a fainting smile as she called out her name and opened her eyes.

“Mama”, she tried to call faintly.

Da Oriaku desperately went all out into the river bank to have a hold of her niece but was shocked when she saw the still body of Imo lying behind Akwugo. She was taken aback before she proceeded further.

“Gịnị mere, Nwoko [what happened, Nwoko]?” she asked.

Nwoko gave a silent reply as he tried to anchor his canoe behind her. After anchoring his canoe, he went to the edge of the bank of the river and tiredly sat down on the bare floor. He called out his elder sister and started telling her the story of his journey. Da Oriaku pleaded with him to give him a little time to warm her soup so that they could eat. Nwoko obliged her.

About an hour and a few minutes later, Da Oriaku came back to Azumini River with plates of fufu, warm bitter leaf soup, and porridge of ukwa she made specifically for her niece, Akwugo, who was not expected to swallow food balls as big as rounded fufu. She gave her younger brother plates of fufu and soup and went further to feed her niece in the canoe. She kept thanking Chukwu [God] as she made a loving battle with the lips of her young niece since it took a whole lot of time to open her mouth. Akwugo struggled to sip some spoonful of her specially made ukwa and stopped halfway but felt more energised and smiled harder as audible voice was still far from her lips. Da Oriaku kept the remaining inside the canoe so she could eat on the way any time she had the appetite to eat.

When Nwoko finished eating, he laid against a palm tree bark behind him. He rested for some minutes and had some discussion with his sister who was crying in-between the lines for their dead kinsman, Imo. Nwoko, suddenly stood up and thanked his sister and re-embarked on his journey home. A few seconds after he disembarked his canoe, Da Oriaku called out to him to return to the river bank.

“Please, you will get home safely, but let me bath Akwugo. It will add some strength in her body”, Da Oriaku pleaded.

“Nne, that’s a good idea but you know we are with a dead body here”, Nwoko said.

“Yes I know, but let’s save the living first. We have lost Imo already”, Da Oriaku said.

With the help of her younger brother, she took weak Akwugo to the back of a raffia palm tree to bath her.

Nwoko walked up to the hilly side of the river bank and waited.

A few minutes after her bath, Akwugo uttered a word more audible.

“Thank you, Da”, she said.

It was a smiling moment for the two.

“You shall not die, my daughter. You will live to take care of your child”, Da Oriaku assured her niece, who then nodded in acceptance with a deep smile that courted some deeper tears.

Memories, especially the bad ones we survive, know how best to cost us some fluid in the surviving sockets of our eyes. Today was one of those days, and Akwugo eyes had confessed that.

“Don’t cry anymore. You are at home already”, Da Oriaku said, as she tried caressing and cuddling her body and hair back to life.

Nwoko came closer, thanked his elder sister, shared deep smiles and tears with his daughter and helped put her back into the canoe. “Thank you, nna m” was all she could mutter to her father for keep.

“For staying strong till I came to Ubani was the best gift you could give me, Ada m. Thank you for holding strong”, he said, and they continued their journey back home.

They got to Item on the hot afternoon of 26th December and was welcomed home by kinsmen who ended up mourning one of their own as they hastily buried Imo. Item was for that day a town of unsubstantiated feelings; of joy, grief, pains, disappointment and of acceptance to what fate could offer humans in a society denied of its true colour under the regime of s*****y.

Before Ogbealu could return from the market square with her granddaughter, Mmano, Imo had been buried. She walked passed mourners at his home and continued heading to her house to meet her rescued daughter whose news of return had spread like wild fire across the length and breathes of Eke market square of Item. She energetically walked into her house and saw a famished-looking Akwugo looking straight towards the door so she wouldn’t miss any glance of her baby when she arrives. It was shock mixed with gratitude when Ogbealu saw her daughter. She felt like babysitting her. She felt like hiding her this time inside her stomach and transferring some of her strength to her. She was indeed all over her as Akwugo was just about only eager to have a feel of her own daughter. It indeed felt like every mother among them was eager to have the first feel of their daughter as Mmano helplessly yearned for anything that drools inside her little mouth. At last, she had it as her grandmother entrusted her in the welcoming yet tiring hands of her mother who, again, dropped some tears as she lowered the left side of her mollycoddling breasts right inside her mouth. Mmano sucked it like a gift from heaven with all the strength in her little body. “Ush” was the last word she screamed with a wide beaming smile. She looked deeply inside her eyes and caressed her head. It was the last time she did this and silence went on as the only sound ever heard in a century, asides the suckling sound of little baby Mmano. It was still a joyous excitement for Ogbealu as she admired her daughters before she danced to the kitchen to prepare a meal for her daughter and her husband, Nwoko, who was still at the burial site of Imo.

In a jiffy, Nwoko returned to his compound and called out to his wife to prepare food for them, for they had come a long way. When nobody answered him, he went inside his wife’s house to discuss what to eat with her. He met baby Mmano suckling on her mother’s breast with all the strings in her body but noticed that Akwugo’s head was not well-kept as her mouth stayed wide open, facing down and motionless. He called her as he went closer to touch her but there was no response. He went closer again and touched his daughter, and it ended in shock. Akwugo was truly dead. Yes, she did not survive Bonny Island like so many others that died in it.

“Ewoo!” he screamed out loud, which attracted Ogbealu, who hurriedly came inside.

“Ọ bu gini, Nwoko [what is that, Nwoko]?” she shouted as she ran towards Akwugo. She touched her and found that she was already dead. Young Akwugo had passed on.

A moment of celebration had turned into a moment of great loss. Sorrow had replaced joy. Great defacing frowning had chased out those deep dimples of happiness that ushered Ogbealu in, and the hard labour of a hero had been ruined into wastage of unimaginable heartbreak. The river storms of harmattan against that late-night canoe was really trying to pass a message but was created to be ravenously voiceless. Yet, Mmano sucked on intermittently as she battled off a calming sleep that raved in when one gets enough of their yearning or lust.

The moral of the people of Item had been tamed suddenly by double mourning of her own children, and their daughter had birthed into their hands a daughter before taking a short walk into the realm of their ancestors. If it was a world, Imo was earlier there to welcome her, although regretfully. The concerned extended family members and kinsmen of Nwoko had come around to see for themselves the tragedy that had masqueraded around them, as the strong-willed among them tried vainly to resuscitate Akwugo, at least for her daughter. But death comes with greater strength.

At last, the people accepted their fate as Baby Mmano cried. It did not take much hassle to assemble the coffin where the body of young Akwugo was laid in state and shortly boxed in and buried. It was the first day Nwoko witnessed his death. Among Igbos, asides all the shenanigans around the presence or token of a male child, daughters, especially most first daughters, stood to mean several good tidings for their fathers. In most cases, their presence means life to their beloved fathers. Akwugo meant more, because she was the reincarnated grandmother of Nwoko under whose care he grew up when their mother, Ije, remarried after the death of their father, Odo.

CHAPTER 2

Akwugo was really unlucky. Maybe she could have lived if that Umuokpara herbalist had met and administered the fruity-herbal powder to her. There was a certain woman that would usually come around in slave depots of Bonny Island and Calabar, and reports had it that she was also seen once in a while in so many other slave depots around West Africa. Most of her visits always coincided with the time ships were readied for loading. Story had it that the presence of Akebula was like a mystery. She was never challenged and no attempt was ever made to sell her into s*****y even when she was young. She was seen as a powerful native doctor and herbalist.

There were many legends built around her person and presence. To the Igbos, Akebula was an Igbo woman from a certain Umuokpara village. It was said that she first came around Biafra slave depots four days after Ugegbe was forcefully put on board Ship Jesus in her native doctor regalia in search of her only child and son, Duruhio. The legends had it that Duruhio was fathered by a certain man who was described as a very fair-complexioned man. He had a dreadlock that was long enough to reach his waist. His name was Enu.

Enu was a wandering man with his wife he calls Nwanne, and they made a stop in Umuokpara where Nwanne died after a while without a child of her own. Her body was taken to a nearby river bank and buried according to her wish. Enu mourned his wife for many years as a widower. Very early in the morning, he would go beside his wife’s grave discussing with voices that were audible enough to some but with no visible bodies that could be seen by mere mortals. To some, Enu was always talking to himself since the multiple voices he spoke with were invincible

One day, Akebula went to the river early in the morning to take her bath and sighted Enu beside Nwanne’s grave, talking, laughing and crying at the same time.

“Leave him alone and find peace. There are women in this land. If marriage is for happiness. There are women here who can make him happy. You are dead and have been buried; allow him to feel life once again”, Akebula exclaimed.

“Who in this land can make me happy?” Enu asked as he stood up and looked towards Akebula.

“It’s just like saying there is no food in Umuokpara when you have not made any effort to look for food. I have a family, meet them and tell them what you will want to do with their daughter and you might be lucky to have her”, Akebula said and walked away.

After Enu met the family of Akebula, they were declared husband and wife. Enu built his house beside the grave of his first wife, and they had a child together who was named Duruhio.

When Duruhio was 9 years old, Enu told his wife, Akebula, that it was time to leave for his country and he intended to go back home with his family. He said he came to Umuokpara to plant the seed of longevity and good health and has achieved it. She pointed at a very rare Plum tree beside his house to Akebula and told her that the fruit will soon start ripening in a few days, and only the lucky ones would eat it and have long life. His wife told him that there was no need to leave the fruit behind when she could stay back and start using it to save lives.

“It is better you leave the lucky ones to be lucky than staying behind to break its rules and nobody gains from it”, Enu said.

“I will keep the rules. I will stay behind and it will help more people. Just leave me and Duruhio. When he is of age, you can come and have him”, Akebula said.

One day, Akebula went to the market square and when she returned, she discovered that her husband had run away with her only child. She was bitter. She quickly entered the remaining boat out of the two they had and started sail-chasing after her husband who she sighted on the water speedily sailing farther off. But Akebula became confused when she came to Bonny Island. The last time she sighted her husband and her son, Duruhio, was when Enu sailed in the middle of two awaiting ships and disappeared. It was her first time on Bonny Island. She became heartbroken when she met a multitude of people being kept in slave camps for onward shipment. She was so sad that she forgot what brought her to the island. Akebula saw people dying and others being chained, dragged, and emptied inside the awaiting ships against their wishes. Her strange fierce-looking demeanours couldn’t allow people to go close to her. They just kept looking at her and she skillfully moved around on the surface of the water.

“Why am I going after who is living with his father when there are many lives here to save?” Akebula said and turned back and left for Umuokpara.

The last day Akebula was spotted in the Bight of Biafra was on an Eke market day. It was on the day she saw little Adaora crying as her younger brother had just bled to death after being shot for trying to escape when the rusty chain on his leg broke apart.

“Mama, they have killed Ikebude. They have killed my only brother”, Adaora screamed out to Akebula, who hastily ran to Adaora and held her by her reddened cheeks. “My daughter, be strong. See how they have readied their guns to kill me. I have been coming here for many years, but all they see is a worn-out old woman that is not useful to them. It could be that their gods had rejected my blood. It makes them look silly because my blood still makes journeys in the veins of my children they bent on denying me. Listen, I can't physically help you now but fear not, they shall one day hold guns in their hands but still look helpless with them. I will be wherever they take you to, and good thing is, the good ancestors of our innocent land, Ikebude and I shall go with you. Our return gets closer each day. Look up into the sky”, she said, pointing to the sky while Adaora looked up. “I see hope for my children beyond the altered blue. Look down into my palms”, Akebula continued before she started predicting events and their years. She named these events in her Igbo dialect.

On reaching home, she was first welcomed by the fall of a ripened plum fruit planted by Enu, her husband. She picked it, washed and ate it. After a short while, she slept off and her husband appeared to her in the dream;

“When it falls again, pick it and slice, sun-dry and make a powder of it to serve out all seasons. Let the lucky ones remain lucky”. ‘Give to them’ was the last instruction Akebula heard from her husband before she woke up and it became a dream.

Ever since Akebula saw the sight of the slave camps in Bonny Islands as a young woman, legend said she always came around to administer his powdered fruits to the captives. “If I can’t save you from these men, I, a woman and a mother can at least give you what can guarantee some relief and longevity after all. They have taken our men and left only the famished”. She would always say this when putting her powder of life in the mouths of the camped slaves, as everyone would look as though they were under her spell.

On that Eke market day she was spotted in Bonny Island, she gave the slaves awaiting shipment her powdered fruit and offered them the last word before she disappeared as a legend she has come to be.

“This shall be my last time on this Island for this. The mission has given me more time to live but I am happy it has given more people more time to live to see the end of this cruelty inflicted on my children. My mates have all died and many generations after mine have passed on, and it has become childish for me to discuss with children that now call themselves old. So, what am I living for? But I was kept alive to make sure that some people, the chosen ones, are kept alive to prepare the other side of history that will suit my children. I am not dying my children, I want to go home and rest in myself”, Akebula said.

It was said that she would sometimes put some in a wrapper and tie them around the waist of one of the slaves to give to whosoever they wished when they were offloaded. It was said that she once gave Dios the powder, but he couldn’t capture the description of the taste in words. It was later discovered that this fruit powder came from a plum tree the Portuguese later named Eboe Plum, which changed the face of the winery in Portugal.

After several years, Akebula continued to age in strength and ravishing beauty and met new faces that grew to fear her in and around the slave depots. The mission remained unclear but one thing that remained noticeable was that the slaves who were lucky to have tasted Akebula’s powder lived long and healthier lives. Most of them outlived second generations of the white men that purchased them.

CHAPTER 3

As days passed on, it became increasingly obvious around the slave depot that Dios was acting up and showing changes he was not known for. To him, something had hit him really home. The tamed Caucasian skin he had gotten from his Portuguese father and Igbo chocolate skin from his mother started creating some meaning in him as two of Sir Diogo’s children visited their father in Bonny Island from Lisbon with their mother, Aline. It was in October, and Dios had run upstairs to welcome his stepmother, half-brother, Estevo, and little sister, Beatriz. He was beaming with smiles while making attempt to hug them when Sir Diogo cynically and bodily barricaded his way and ordered him to wait for him downstairs. Dios was really hewed down emotionally by that singular act and Mrs Aline was eager to have some words with him. However, Sir Diogo interfered immediately he noticed what his wife wanted to do.

‘‘Don’t worry, I need to have a quiet time with my family now. You can talk with him later. He is still around. He is a son around here. He was born of one slave woman around here. All the merchants around here treat him special. No doubt, he has something to do with Lisbon but he belongs here in Biafra. His late mother died in a plantation farm in Madeira some years ago. I took special care of him and he has been of great help to me, supervising the activities of the slave keepers. They called me his father, and really we are almost close to that”, Sir Diogo said.

“Wow, he is just a very handsome-looking man. Bring him home with you on your retirement. He can manage my father’s slaves very well. He looks strong and well-behaved too’’, Aline pleaded.

Those words impacted the recent life of Dios who heard everything they were saying upstairs about him as he glowered down the staircase with a heavy-laden heart. He went straight inside his room, locked the door, laid down and wobbled on his bed. It was a moment in moments for young Dios. The helpless cries, the midnight gasping of young virgins and thunderous shouts like ‘papa, mama, ụmụnne m, biko, hei!, mere m ebere’ as sighing words of victims of s*****y started regaining their true meanings in the head of former commanding Dios. He stood up and sat on the edge of his bed, holding his head as though all the lands of Biafra were laid upon him. Every of his body parts became too heavy for him to shake off. He had become sober and reflective, and also more vulnerable within himself. No doubt, the no-sense of ownership exhibited by Sir Diogo before his Lisbon family towards young Dios had created in him self-ownership. Within him, only he could salvage himself. Yet, the respect he commanded among native slave managers remained intact, and even more, fear of him tripled because nobody understood him anymore and none had direct gut and access to Sir Diogo to the level of painting him black before whom they believed was his father. Ever since that day, Dios started avoiding having direct conversations with Sir Diogo. It lingered because it did not disturb the free flow of slaves down to Bonny Island. “You know what to do. You know the right thing as you should” was the last commanding word he gave the slave managers before he started schooling himself on the best part of history to live by.

Before this time, Dios, the portrayed son of Sir Diogo, was a known name among Biafrans and up to the Bight of Bini. He was exchanging holidays with mullatos fathered by Portuguese in Bini. He was about falling in love with one of them, Miss Agueda, before Aline’s family visitation.