‘Lagos,’ I say under my breath lest I scare it off.
It is all here, its sky-liners, the overhead railroads, most in ruins, but here. And there’s the colour, like the rains of September came and never left. Algae like carpets of green crawl over the buildings in the most intentional manner. Vines, branches and foliage loop and weave through windows, down rooftops. A breeze whistles in the trees and comes for me, combing through my hair. Swaying down to the grass, it runs through them, and like a hall of children they whisper ‘shhhh’. This place, Lagos, it feels like something alive.
Unsure, I walk. With each step, the grasshoppers dart off the waist high grass. The hares follow, peeping cautiously before hopping off like toads wearing fur. I come upon a stream. Its water is a mirror. I see the scales on the trout and the smooth corners of the pebbles at the bottom. Squatting for a drink, I spot someone right by the water’s edge, their legs crossed in meditation. There are markings spiraling the ground around them. I inch in for a closer look and they jerk awake, eyes piercing mine.
‘Sorry I — sorry who are – what is this – this —’ I barely stutter through before they come speeding at me. I do not see their feet leave the ground. Walking backwards as I make to run, I trip over a rock, my body thudding hard to the ground. I sit up and my assailant pushes into me, their hands wrapping my body.
‘Mama, it's me.’
In a raging desert storm, wind and sand thrashing at me, I could pick out that voice. Pulling her face up to mine, I look at the strange thing. Behind the intricacy of the dye patterns on her face, behind the cowries and corals lined in her hair, I see her staring back at me.
‘Abi – Abike?’
‘Mama,’ she sobs, wiping the tears starting to stream down my cheeks. ‘Praise Father! It worked this time. I’ve been trying for so long.’
‘Nwa’m,’ I say as the pieces of my heart find each other, ‘nwa oma’m, my beautiful child.’
I squeeze her into me. The prickly scent of herbs in her hair, the night shade of her skin, the energy burning within her, it overwhelms me and I take it all in.
‘What is going on? Why — how are you here?’
‘You are more beautiful than I imagined,’ she says, ignoring my question, as she takes strands of my hair in her hand.
Bringing my hands to her cheeks, I stare into her eyes, ‘You can see me?’
‘Yes Mama, yes,’ she laughs, ‘Father healed me’.
She goes on and on about this Father, how he made her stronger, faster. How she never fell ill or stopped to catch her breath. I do not hear half the words she says, I do not care about any of it. She is here with me, nothing else matters. I bring my forehead to hers, she smiles, the kind of smile you give an old friend.
‘You look the same as the day I lost you.’ I hadn't seen it at first, not with all the tears clogging my vision, but her face, it has not aged a day.
‘Really?’ she asks, her tone riddled with amusement.
‘Yes. You’ve been gone for so long and —’
‘How long?’
‘You don't know?’ She shakes her head from side to side, rather slowly, like she wasn't sure she wanted to know. ‘Abike, it’s been over two decades’.
‘What?’ her eyes sink, ‘And all that time, you’ve been alone?’
‘Abike it's fine. Look at me,’ I lift her chin ‘It's alright. We are together now’.
She pushes into me again, gently this time.
‘Wait till you see Kadiri,’ she muffles, her mouth pressed against my chest.
‘What — what are you talking about?’
‘Kadiri, Mama she's here,’ she says gesturing to the bushes.
I watched Kadiri thin out on a hospital bed. Her hands were clasped in mine when the light left her. I laid her in the garden behind our home, next to Dike. Looking towards the bushes and seeing no one there felt like losing Kadiri all over again.
‘Abike, honey, there’s no … ’
Then I see it; Mmēghárị ányà, Illusion sorcery. It wafts around her like a scent, a scent you could see. I’ve seen it way too many times before, it’s impossible to miss.
‘Ow! Mama what are you doing?’
Tasting the strand of hair I pulled from her head, I realize it would take ten of my sisters to craft a curse this potent and even more to break it.
‘Abike, Kadiri is not here,’ I shake her vigorously, perhaps hoping to shake her out of it.
A rustle comes from the bushes. It is a boy. Others follow, appearing from behind the trees and nearby buildings. Soon, we have an audience. It's uncanny but they all look quite like Abike. It's not the dye on their faces, nor the jewels in their hair. It isn’t the exquisite Ankara material they are draped in either, their cuffs and shoulders lined in glistening gold. It’s something else. The Illusion! It wafts around them too. To craft sorcery of this scale, one would require an unending source of power. Something is not right with this place, with these people.
‘Abike what have you done?’ the boy asks, his eyes scanning me, ‘And who is this?’
‘She is my mother.’
Mother? Questions erupt from the gathering. Did she say mother? What has she done now?
‘You know better than to go against Father,’ the boy continues, a frown setting in his face.
‘Father would be furious,’ someone from the crowd chimes in.
‘Father? What Father?’ I can sparsely mask my irritation any longer.
The ground beneath our feet starts to rumble as if to answer my question. Heading in our direction, giant rhinoceros’ trample through the grass. If the gathering weren’t as unfazed as they are right now, I’d have grabbed Abike and ran. When the beasts halt and the dust settles, the riders come into view. The rider in the lead dismounts and when his feet hit the ground, it does not make a sound. He is tall, taller than the guava tree in our garden back in Botswana. With his face long and thin, his eyes half closed, vacant, he reminds me of a professor I had back at the university. The spongy afro sitting on his head is the white of cotton. He makes his way up to us, a staff engraved in carvings, clenched in one hand. Beneath his robes, his left arm and legs stay shrouded. The people pour to their knees, heads to the ground. He and I are all that’s left standing.
‘She must leave.’ He does not look at me when he speaks to Abike.
‘Father please,’ Abike pleads, rising to her feet.
‘You have disobeyed me again and again. Why?’
I step in between them, ‘Ehh, I don’t know who you are or what— ’
‘I have lived ten thousand lifetimes before the first of your kind crawled through the mud. Do not presume to speak to me.’ His voice is empty. No pitch, no expression, empty. ‘You are not welcome here’.
‘Fine, but I'm not leaving without my child,’ I grab hold of Abike.
‘Your child? You flatter yourself, witch,’ he says, mockery tainting his voice. ‘Abike is not yours, she never was, and she never will be.’
‘And who are you to dictate what is and what isn’t?’ I let him hear it, the anger in my words.
‘Alápa-dúpé. I am Alápa-dúpé. Abike is born of my blood.’
There is utter silence.
‘So where were you?’ I crack open the quiet, ‘when your people were massacred and scattered across the continent? When I took Abike, nursed her, protected her? Where were you?’
‘Protected her? You can barely protect yourself,’ the mockery is louder now, ‘I am protecting her, protecting all of them from that insanity of a world. Here she is safe. Here she gets to survive, to thrive’.
‘You stole my daughter, you psycho! And these people,’ I gesture to the gathering, ‘you took them from their homes, their families.’ Though I have no idea what he looks like, I imagine Athjar’s husband is somewhere in the crowd listening. He never had a picture of him, said he needed him to exist only in his memory.
‘I have had enough. I do not need to explain myself - least of all to you. You know what is o
ut there?’ he says, turning to the gathering, ‘The wars, the suffering. They have massacred your brothers and sisters and they’ll do the same to you. Your strength, this paradise, your immortality is a blessing possible through me’.
‘Alápa-dúpé, forge of the Ailopin, mind wielder, the fall of rain and tempest of Olodumare,’ I say, bringing his gaze back to me, ‘Yes, I know very well who you are’.
I’d heard the stories, some more terrifying than others. They said he was an ancestor who killed his Chi and stole his seat. It is said he once struck a village of his own people with madness and made them feast on themselves.
‘I also know that just like every other ancestral deity, the end of your lineage, is the end of you.’ I catch it, the subtle narrowing of his eyes. ‘That is why these people are here ... they fuel you. Without them your existence, your power, is a myth. Their immortality is not a gift, it is a guarantee that you get to live forever’.
Murmurings escape the crowd. Those close to him draw back.
‘Choose your next words wisely,’ he inhales, clasping his hands around his staff.
‘Or what? You’ll murder me like you did millions of Lagosians?’ I see him now, I see as he unravels.
‘Murder? Millions? What are you talking about Mama?’
‘Oh, you didn't tell them, how you drowned the other tribes and citizens of Lagos so you could keep your exotic birds in this little exotic cage.’ Talks of drowning and murder fill the air. ‘You say our world is a disaster, an insanity, do you know what you did when you destroyed Lagos! The imbalance and strife you wreaked! You are the evil in the world!’
‘A spirit killer accusing me of murder. That’s a bit of a conundrum don’t you think?’
I can feel him flipping through my mind like it’s some picture book. ‘Get out of my head!’
‘Go on, tell them, tell your daughter how you bound those spirits and set them ablaze. How you sentenced them to a fate worse than death. Tell her.’
To a people like the Ailopin, murdering spirits, souls who had perished once before was evil unheard of. A second death is utter erasure from every existential plane. It means they never get to see the ones they left behind, the ones they love, not in an afterlife, not in reincarnation, not ever. It is a punishment meted out on people who had led the most despicable, abhorrent lives. And without batting an eye, I had done the same to my own ancestral spirits. I watch the fear and confusion on the faces of the Ailopin people slip away. I watch disdain take their place. But it is irrelevant. Their hate is theirs and they can keep it. All that matters to me is Abike.
‘Then you know what's coming for you,’ I catch his gaze and I hold it.
‘Witch!’ He charges at me, staff raised, lightning sizzling through it.
I charge back.
When we meet, he brings the staff down, probably intent on splitting my skull. I grab it midair. The lightning runs from the staff, right into me. I do not waver. His eyes widen in disbelief and in that distraction, I pull the staff from his grip. Bringing it to my knee, I break it in half.
‘You filthy peasant!’ Hitting me across the head, he sends me crashing meters away. I pick myself up, collapsing back to the ground and throwing up a mouthful of blood. My head feels like it is coated in steel. From the corner of my eye, I see him draw near.
‘You dare stand against me! I, who saw the birth of the sun!’ A spear materializes in his hand as he speaks, ‘No one will mourn you’.
‘Father no!’ I turn to see Abike holding him back from me. Like a rag doll, he tosses her aside.
‘Don't you touch her!’ With my scream comes a force, stronger than the sandstorms of Maradi. Just like he did me, it takes him, sending him headfirst through a stone pillar and right into a building which proceeds to collapse with him in it. The once clear clouds blacken as I soar to the sky. Lightning and hail pour from above and whatever is in their path, comes undone. The trees crackle to a crisp as the buildings crumble and fall.
‘The blood of seas courses through me. They who stand against me, stand against many,’ I say as the strength of my sisters pours into me.
I had known I would not last a minute in combat against Alápa-dúpé. So before he came charging at me, I channeled my sisters. Ours was a bond that transcended time and space. Their power courses through me like a river, consuming me. It is unlike anything I have ever felt. I am one and I am three hundred.
‘Mama! Mama!’ I hear it through the storm raging around me, like a candle flame in the dead of night. ‘You need to stop! You'll destroy us all!’
With my life force starting to ebb away, I do need to stop. Power of this intensity, though tempting is never meant for one to keep. Through a witch's scream, I let go of it and before I fall to the ground, Abike catches me. Being in that power, everything else was shut out, all I had was rage. Returning to myself, I see clearly now. Burning foliage litter the grounds and the buildings lie in far worse state than before. The life I once felt in this place feels gone.
‘This, this is why you are not welcome here,’ Alápa-dúpé says as he pushes a boulder off himself, ‘humanity kills everything it touches’.
‘No I — I did not mean for any of this to happen.’
‘But it did,’ he says, pointing to the people. Scattered across, some are injured and being helped up by others, some lie unconscious. ‘Abike,’ he turns to her, ‘you know what you must do ... for all our sake.’
Exhausted, I am still in her arms, my hands latching on to her. She looks at me, her eyes are red shot but they hold no tears.
‘This is goodbye Mama.’
‘No, Abike no,’ I tighten my grip on her.
‘Mama —’
‘Listen, listen to me, I cannot live in a world where you do not exist, I will not. Please come with me, we can be a family again. We’ll be happy and...’
* * *
I am back on the wet floor of my apartment. Did she just send me back?
‘No no no no,’ I cry, touching the water, the pieces of glass piercing my fingers.
‘We have to leave now.’
Startled, I jolt back, swinging around to the voice. I watch Abike step out of the shadows and stumble up to me.
‘No, this is another one of his mind tricks,’ I say, shutting my eyes.
‘Mama it’s no trick. I have bound our spirits, it was how I was able to pull you to me. We can never be separated.’ She traces her hands up my head, cupping my face in them, ‘Where you go, I go’.
‘Oh Abike … your eyes,’ I caress her face. Her sight is gone once again.
‘I see you.’ She says.
Bringing her forehead to mine, ‘Nwa oma’m, I see you.’
‘We must hurry, he will come for me.’
‘Let him come.’
2
“Things Boys Do” © Pemi Aguda
Originally Published in Nightmare (Issue 89, February 2020)
Children can be cruel, you know?
* * *
The first man stands at the bedside of his sweating wife. He is watching their baby emerge from inside her. What he does not know is that he is watching their son destroy her insides, shredding, making sure there will be no others to follow. This man’s wife is screaming and screaming and the sound gives the man a headache, an electric thing like lightning, striking the middle of his forehead. He reaches to hold her hand, to remind her of his presence. But he is surprised by the power of her latch, this strength born of pain, the way she crushes the bones of his fingers. He has to bite down to prevent himself from crying out.
And here is the baby; bloody and outside for the first time.
The baby opens his eyes, and the first man flinches at the sudden appearance of white eyeballs in the midst of all that slimy red. The baby is blinking now, and watching, but not crying, just watching?
“Um,” the doctor says, frowning. “You have a son.”
The first man leans down to catch the mumbled words from his wife’s mouth. “Yes, hon. He�
�s alive,” he reassures her. The whites of his baby’s eyes are impressed in his mind, behind the headache, like an image from biology class, so long ago. He looks up to the doctor who is still holding onto the baby, brows furrowed. “He’s alive, right, doctor? Is everything fine? Isn’t he supposed to cry?”
The doctor looks everywhere but at the first man. They fuss around, the doctor and the nurses, snipping, cleaning, moving.
“Doctor?” the man prompts.
“Mr. Man, you have a son! Congratulations! A living breathing boy!”
* * *
The second man huffs beneath the weight of his wife. The Ikeja General hospital has sent them home even though his wife is still bleeding from the birth. “Sorry, no space,” the head nurse had told him, her attention moving so easily to the next patient. “Take her home; everybody bleeds.”
The second man’s mother holds the door to their apartment open, one elbow cradling the baby like an expert. She trails them to the bedroom, where the man gently lowers his wife to their bed—still messy with signs of frantic packing for the hospital. Once his arms are free, the mother transfers the baby to him, as if she has been waiting to rid herself of the infant.
“Maami,” he starts to say, but his mother leaves the room.
The baby is sleeping and his eyes move around beneath his thin lids. The second man is repulsed by this movement, this unconscious shifting that strangely brings to mind the Goosebumps books he read and traded as a teenager, so long ago. The man is discomfited by this reaction to his child. He deposits his new son in the new cradle that smells like wood polish, then goes to find his mother in the kitchen.
“Maami, will you make peppersoup for her? Will that help?”
The mother is staring out the kitchen window, her fingers steeping in a bowl of uncleaned fish. “That baby is not yours, I’m sure of it.”
The Year's Best African Speculative Fiction (2021) Page 2