by Leye Adenle
‘No.’
‘Did anyone see you do magic?’
‘No. Only on stage.’
‘Go back to town and tell them to take you to the garden. We will be under the Agogo tree.’
She turned her face to the open sky above the clearing and lifted off the ground, Adesua and Brother Moses in her arms.
Chapter 40 Stabbed in the Front
I ran into Titus’ assistants on the road back to town. We all stopped when we saw each other. They were still pretending to be Titus Titus and Rachel, but I knew that they knew that I knew. The one that was the magician turned back into the woman and the one that was Rachel became the dreadlocked man. They slowly began to back away. They were afraid of me.
‘He left you behind,’ I said. They stopped their retreat. ‘And he took my friend.’
The man spoke. ‘We didn’t know what he was up to, man. We were only doing what he told us to do. You’ve got to believe me, man.’
‘What are you going to do with us?’ the woman said. ‘What is your name?’ I asked.
‘Yun.’
‘And you?’
‘Simon.’
‘Are you gonna let us go?’ the woman said, ‘or are you gonna kill us?’
‘Mr Magic is no killer,’ Simon said. ‘Right, bro? I mean, you’re like all good ‘n’ all, right? This whole thing, it’s just a mistake, you know. We thought we were coming to meet you. To learn stuff from you. When we got to this place, that’s when he told us what he really wanted to do. We had no choice. He was gonna kill us.’
I relaxed as Simon talked. Yun saw the change in my demeanour and hissed, showing her clenched teeth. She ran at me, leapt, and in the air she morphed into black puma. I stepped aside and her claws missed my neck. She landed and tumbled behind me. She scampered onto her paws and hissed at me. I thought out loud, ‘I have no time for this.’
‘Get lost,’ I said.
I swept my hand at her as if to shoo her off. A gust of wind blew from my gesture, lifted her off the ground and threw her several metres through the air and against the trunk of a tree. She fell to the ground and got onto her paws. She looked at me, turned, and bounded away into the forest.
I turned back to find Simon was right in front of me, with a dagger clasped in his hand. He jabbed at my chest, driving the dagger into my heart. I looked down. Blood flowed down my chest to the white linen round my waist. ‘Sorry, bro,’ he said, ‘but I can’t leave you alive or you’ll find us and kill us. I don’t wanna die, bro. It ain’t personal, just common sense.’
Chapter 41 For Fear of Men
The puma scrambled to its feet and disappeared into the vegetation. A branch sprang back into place.
‘I was going to let you go,’ I said.
I turned and caught Simon’s hand, still clasped around the handle of the dagger. The tip of the weapon bent a strand of hair on my chest. The look of surprise on his face turned to panic. He couldn’t drive the blade forward into my flesh and he couldn’t pull his hand away. I watched the effect of pain on his face. First, tiny vessels in his hands began to burst, then his bones cracked and continued to fracture. The pain travelled from his hand to his wrist, up his forearm to his shoulder, and then into his heart. He fell to his knees, his hand still in mine, being steadily crushed, his other hand futilely trying to pry my fingers apart. His mouth remained open in a mute scream. I had no pity for him. I had seen what he meant to do. I had felt his blade cut through the soft tissue of my heart. I had seen him do to me what I was about to do to him.
The soles of my feet tingled. I could hear ants moving in their anthills, birds picking at their nests, snakes gliding over the dead leaves of the forest around us. I could hear a caterpillar munching on the edge of a leaf on the other side of the forest, and a snail crawling on its belly onto the road, beyond the signs warning people to stay away from Faka fiki.
From the vibrations my feet detected, I could tell how far away the people of the town were. They were coming for us. They had clubs and stones, and in their hearts they carried murderous intentions which quickened their stride.
I understood Adesua’s warning concerning people. I understood why my mother asked me if anyone had seen me do magic. The people of Faka fiki had learnt our secret and become afraid of us. To them we were wizards and witches able to harm them with our magic, and there was only one way they knew to deal with such beings. It also became clear what Adesua meant when she said they outnumbered us. It wasn’t the sheer combined physical force of an army; no army, however large, could be big enough to defeat the ingenuity of one able to call forth fire breathing dragons. It was the collective force of their will. Together, united in fear and purpose, they had become more than just the sum of the parts, and the resultant excess was a formidable opponent in the face of any force known to man.
Simon’s hand was seconds from turning to pulp in my grip. I pushed down on him, forcing him into the ground until he was buried up to his waist and unable to escape. I wiped my bloody hand clean on his locks and I took to the sky.
Chapter 42 Into the Magnetic Garden
How can I describe flying? It feels normal. Why can’t you fly? You need only do it. Don’t try; just fly. It is natural, but our brain in its default mode just doesn’t know it.
I flew in whatever direction I wanted to go. If I wanted to go faster, I did. If I wanted to slow down, I did. I didn’t need to think of it, or concentrate on turning right or turning left, like you don’t need to think of placing one leg in front of the other when you walk, you just walk. I neither felt weightless nor propelled by an invisible force. I wasn’t carried by unseen hands or buoyed by a special current. I just flew because people can fly. They just don’t know it.
From the sky the world looked different. I wasn’t as high up as a plane and I wasn’t going as fast either, so I could notice things. I saw the faces of the people who looked up and pointed at me. I saw the disbelief in their eyes. I saw the chained dog that winked at me and went back to sleep. I saw the deflated, sun-faded balls on the roofs. And when I flew higher, I saw the place I was searching for. A circle of colours in the middle of a green forest.
I landed behind a wall of ancient Iroko trees. They were close together so that their trunks had fused and their branches mingled high above, forming a seeming- ly impenetrable circle several kilometres wide, with no obvious passage through into the enclosed garden. With the great wall of trees behind me, I took in the strange garden. The soil was black and it sparkled in the sunlight, as if it had a million tiny diamonds in it.
The trees were much shorter than the surrounding forest and no two of them were alike. Their trunks were slim or thick, smooth or rough, grooved or thorny, a single colour or an entire rainbow. The leaves were every shape and colour you could imagine. Some were tri- angles, some were perfect circles. Others were like two leaves fused together down the stem. Between the trees, otherworldly plants grew with strange flowers, each petal a different colour. Patches of tall grass grew in clusters as if they had been planted specifically where they were. The blades of grass grew in every colour: green, black, yellow, blue, purple, and some were transparent.
There were no dead leaves on the ground. I couldn’t hear a bird singing or an insect crawling. I walked into the garden. I passed between a white tree with yellow leaves on my left, with purple buds shaped like prisms, and on my right a tree with a grey trunk, translucent leaves and shimmering black flowers. On its trunk I found the insects I had not heard.
White soldier ants the size of bees, marching up and down with glasslike bites of leaves in their beaks.
I came to a lake I had seen from a distance. I had to get close to believe what I had seen from afar. The water was as clear as water in a cup. At the bottom of the lake pebbles of different colours lay close together, and above the water, twelve inches from the surface, fishes of different sizes, colours, and shapes swam and interacted in the open air as if they were in the water. There were small fishes the size of
a finger, larger ones as big as my forearm, and some as large as a dog, all swimming using their fins and their bodies to paddle and turn as if they were in water. But they were above the lake.
‘Osaretin,’ my mother called. I turned to her.
‘I saw you coming,’ she said. ‘Follow me.’
She was not surprised that I had managed to fly. The expression on her face was the same detached one I had learnt to accept as just the way she was. I had just watched her chase dragons away and make a strong magician flee, but judging by her face and her voice, and her coolness that was as unnerving as always, none of it meant more to her than anything else that could be in her mind at any time. I followed her in silence through the fantastic plants of the garden and towards the soft sound of a hundred bells.
The Agogo tree had a smooth, shiny, black trunk about six feet wide. It looked like polished marble. It reflected our images as we approached. The fat trunk was also quite short, and at first I thought I would have to bend to avoid its jet black leaves shaped like tongues made of marble. Its branches spread wide, covering a large area of ground beneath it. The sound was coming from its round black fruits that hung in clusters like grapes. I thought the sound was made when they clinked against each other but I could detect no motion, yet they rang softly like bells of various tones, and they made an ever-changing melody.
Beneath the tree, on the soft black soil, Brother Moses, Adesua and four other people I did not know lay in foetal positions.
The bruises had vanished from Adesua’s body. Brother Moses’ leg was no longer burnt. I could see no injuries on the bodies of the other people. But it was Adesua I was most concerned about.
‘Will she be ok?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ my mother said. ‘And Moses. But it’s too late for the others.’
‘Can she hear us?’
‘No. They are asleep. They need to rest for the garden to repair them.’
I watched Adesua’s face. I tried to detect her breathing. Her palms were together under her head as a pillow.
‘You really like her,’ my mother said. I nodded.
‘What happened to her soul?’
‘You can tell?’
‘Anyone can tell.’
‘It was my fault.’
‘I see. And you want to get it back for her?’
‘Yes. If I can learn how to.’
‘If she allows you to. What about the other girl? You want to save her?’
‘Yes.’
‘She’s not like us, you know that?’
‘Yes. I know. We work together. It’s my fault she got mixed up in all this.’
‘I see. Do you know where he has taken her?’
‘To the moon?’
‘If you go there, you might not return, and if you try to get this one’s soul back, you could die.’
‘Are you asking me to choose who to save?’
‘Which one are you ready to die for?’
‘Why can’t I save both of them?’
‘Why can’t you? There is no reason at all.’
Chapter 43 Taken in The Night
My mother sat on the ground and rested her back on the smooth trunk of the Agogo tree.
I sat beside her, and slowly rested my bare back upon the trunk, expecting it to be cold like the marble it resem- bled, but it wasn’t. It was neither warm nor cold, perfectly matching the temperature of my own body.
I had so many questions for my mother, but I knew I had to ask the right ones. She had a habit of getting bored with me. Since I was a child she would only indulge my inquisitive nature for so long. A point was always reached, and the length of getting to that point varied, when she would suddenly be done and either stop answering or outright tell me to go and read my books. It got worse after my father died. Then, she hardly had time for me even though it looked like she had given up everything for me. She would not let me ask any questions, stopping me before I finished speaking. And even when she had questions for me, she would answer them for me. Are you hungry? Yes. You shouldn’t be. You’ve had too much to eat today.
‘What happened when I was born?’ I said.
‘I went into labour, I pushed you out, they cut the umbilical cord.’
‘Brother Moses asked if I know about the circumstances of my birth.’
‘Well then he should have told you.’
‘Mother.’
‘Ok. It is not about your birth. Your birth was ordinary. I was in labour for fourteen hours. I was glad to get you out of my body. Nothing special. He was talking about something else your father told him.’
‘What is it?’
‘When I was a little girl in this town, I used to be taken onto a ship like the one you saw. It always happened at night and always when I was alone in my bed. The light used to come through the wall. A man would come and take me up into his ship. No one believed me so I stopped telling them.
‘The man taught me everything. From a young age I could do some amazing things.
‘I was five when he started taking me onto the ship. It didn’t stop until I was twenty-one. Just before I met your father. I was three months pregnant with you when I met your father. Your father’s people knew. That’s why they’ve never accepted you.’
‘Who was my father?’
‘Don’t be silly. You know who your father is.’
‘But you said you were pregnant before you met him.’ ‘Your father did not recognise me when we met, but I knew who he was. He was the man on the ship. The man I was with, three months before I met him.’ ‘I’m confused.’
‘So was he. Your father is the only man I’ve ever been with. There is only one of him. He is your father. You don’t need to understand. You just need to know.’
‘Did he know I was his son?’
‘You look like him, don’t you?’
‘Did you tell him?’
‘I didn’t have to. Something happened to him after we married that made him know all he had to know.’
‘What happened to him?’
‘I don’t know. Ask him when you see him.’
‘But, he’s dead. He is dead, isn’t he?’
‘If you can exist in any dimension, will you stay here?’
‘Where is he?’
‘Everywhere. When you find him he will answer the rest of your questions.’
‘Mother?’
‘Yes?’
‘Who am I?’
‘You are my son.’
‘People say I am Mr Magic.’
‘Then that is what they say. Have you decided?’
‘Decided what?’
‘Who you are going to save.’
‘I can save both of them.’
‘Do you know how to get her soul back?’
‘No. Not yet. Do you?’
‘No. It is not for me to do. I can take you to the moon.’
‘I can fly.’
‘Not to the moon. Don’t be silly.’
‘How would we get there?’
‘He left his ship. When I was little, he taught me how to fly it. He said he would leave it for me in case I needed to use it one day.’
‘Where is it?’
‘It’s been here hundreds of years. It’s what makes this garden magnetic.’
‘It’s here?’
‘Yes. It’s in the lake. We should go now, if you really want to get her back.’
‘What about them?’ I looked at Brother Moses and Adesua sleeping silently. The villagers had seen me fly into the magnetic garden. They were on their way to lynch the witches and wizards.
‘They will be fine.’
Chapter 44 Afternoon Trip to the Moon
My mother stood up and began to walk out of the shade of the Agogo tree. She stopped and turned to look at me. I recognised the look on her face from my childhood, when she would stare at me blankly and soon after be satisfied with whatever action I took to appease her in interpretation of her look.
I got up and she continued walking. I could hear th
e villagers; they had just arrived outside the wall of Iroko trees. I followed my mother to the clear lake whose fish swam over the surface of its water. She knelt by the edge of the lake and placed her hand into the water. The fish swam away from her in a frenzy. She watched the water but nothing happened. A minute passed and she kept her eyes on the water, and still, nothing happened. One at a time, the armed villagers were passing through a thicket at the bottom of the wall where a narrow passage though the great trees was hidden from view.
My mother continued staring at the water but nothing happened. The men were gathering at the mouth of the passage inside the garden, waiting till they were all through then they would come for us. I remembered the queen saying that the garden had gotten weak. My mother said it was the spacecraft that made the garden magnetic. Perhaps its battery had drained out. The men were matching into the garden now.
‘Mum,’ I said, but she kept staring at the water, then the fish became excited. They swam in an agitated fashion, turning and turning again, and they began to leap several feet into the air, landing again where they swam above the water. The surface of the lake rippled in concentric circles that spread out from the middle. The fish gathered at the edge of the water. The ripples intensified in frequency. The entire surface of the water began to vibrate so fast that drops started to dart up. The pebbles at the bottom moved as if they were being pushed apart. They gathered at the edges of the lake. A metallic ship rose from the exposed sandy bottom and broke the surface, water washing off its smooth body. It kept rising and spinning slowly, the lights on its underside glowing white. When it was about twenty feet above the water it stopped and hovered in place. I heard the footsteps of the men as they ran though the magnetic garden with their cudgels and their deadly fear of what they thought we were. They had seen the spacecraft. They knew we were at the lake.
From a circle in the centre of the ship, light shot out at an angle and fell at our feet on the bank. It was the same strange, alive-like light I had seen Titus Titus and Rachel rise up through. My mother took my hand and stepped into the beam just as the first of the men began to arrive at the lake. I held my breath and also stepped in to the light. In my belly I felt I was falling, but in reality we were rising weightlessly up through the light. I couldn’t hear anything but it was not silent, rather it was as if the sound waves hitting my ears were so strong they blocked out everything including themselves. After a few moments I felt solid ground beneath my feet and I swayed as gravity reaffirmed its force on me and the light dissolved away around us.