Zahrah the Windseeker

by Nnedi Okorafor

  I was pondering over what lay inside the jungle. How come no one ever goes too far into it? I wondered. Hunters and explorers went in every once in a while, but they rarely came back, and when they did, they were usually crazy. I knew I wasn't supposed to think about the forbidden jungle, but I couldn't help being curious.

  Then Dari walked up to me in that bold way of his and loudly asked, "Why do you sit there?"

  I looked up, my thoughts broken.

  "What?" I said, straightening out the hem of my dress. I pushed one of my thick dadalocks out of my face. The piece of palm fiber I was using to tie my hair back had broken earlier in the day.

  "Why do you sit there?" he repeated.

  I only shrugged and looked away, hoping he would just ignore me like the other children always did. He didn't go away.

  "Why is your hair like that?" he asked.

  I sighed and rolled my eyes. Even at the age of seven, that question was not new to me. I shrugged again and continued hoping he'd go away. Instead he put his hands on his narrow hips and kept talking.

  "My mother said that my hair could cut steel, that's why she shaves it so close," he said, running his hand over his practically bald head. It was such a funny thing to say. When I smiled and looked him in the eye, in that moment, we became friends.

  "Dari?" We were almost at school now.

  "Mmm?"

  I paused. I knew I could trust him. But the things on my mind were very personal. And I didn't quite understand it all myself. All I knew was that something was happening to me. For days, things had been ... moving around me. Or so it seemed. Everywhere I went there was a breeze. Even when I was inside, it was like there was a window open nearby. My homework would get blown around, or I'd step out of the shower and a cool breeze would send me scrabbling for a towel. I was scared that maybe all the bad rumors about being dada were coming true!

  I stopped walking. I knew I wouldn't say a word once we got to school.

  "Dari, can you keep a secret?" I asked, my heart beating fast.

  "Always," he said, checking himself out in his mirror. Then he looked me in the eye. I knew I could trust him. I could always trust Dari. "What is it, Zahrah?"

  I held my breath, trying to urge the words out of my mouth. Then I shrugged and looked away, deciding not to tell him. I needed to think about it some more first.

  "Nothing," I said. "I was just ... thinking, that's all."

  Dari looked at me for a long time. Then he opened his mouth as if to say something. He closed it. Dari knew me too well. If he tried to talk me into telling him, I'd only retreat more. He knew it was better to wait for me to talk.

  "OK," he said. "Thinking is good."

  I sighed and hiked my backpack higher up my shoulders. I didn't really know what was going on; all I knew was that whatever was going on was extremely strange. And then something even stranger had happened.

  I'll tell him when I figure it out, I thought. Yeah, that's what I'll do.

  Chapter 3

  Old Ways

  If I only knew then what I know now.

  The reason I didn't understand what was going on was that such a thing had never happened to anyone in the history of my entire town! Kirki was only four hundred years old, but that's still a long time to me. I was experiencing one of the "old ways." Something people thousands of years ago used to experience quite often. Something that was once normal but was now quite strange. Stranger than my dadalocks!

  Few people remembered such old ways. My hometown was not a place where people liked to look too closely or deeply at what had happened centuries or millennia ago. When people wanted answers, they looked up their question on the network and got an answer. People didn't really care where the answer came from. As long as it was "correct," which really meant as long as things made some sort of sense and weren't too complicated. We liked to focus on how we could get ahead, further into the future, and we ignored the past. So I had no point of reference for what was happening to me.

  It all started after my mother left my room that night. Well, maybe it really started before that with the breeze that had followed me around since the morning. Still, when I got home from school, I temporarily forgot about the strange breeze because when I went to the bathroom, I discovered that I was bleeding!

  It didn't hurt, but still I was afraid and ran to tell my mother. I remembered the things we had been taught in school about menstruation. But things are always different when they actually happen to you. After my mother explained, I realized all was well and normal. Then I realized that because I had gotten my menses, my mother would prepare a delicious feast, and everything was fine. No, actually, it was great! I stuff ed myself with candied plantain, mango slices, rice and red stew with big chunks of goat meat, all my favorites. Afterward, my father gave me his gift, which he had run out to the market to buy as I was eating: the latest installment of the Cosmic Chukwu Crusader Series. He also gave me a whole blue petri flower! That's ten petals! Enough to buy several style mirrors and some sweet treats and still have some money left over!

  I squealed and threw my arms around my father.

  "Thank you, Papa! I didn't even know it was out yet!" I said.

  I couldn't wait to pop the disk into my computer and read about my favorite superhero's next adventure. Rumor had it that the Cosmic Chukwu Crusader would meet his greatest challenge yet, the Wild and Crazy Universoul Lady.

  Later that night, I shut my door and climbed into bed. I had a slight bellyache, but I had too much to think about to really care. Plus my mother said that such a thing was normal. I closed my eyes, smelling the sweet scent of the blue burstflower that grew up my windowsill.

  It was my first night of physically being a woman. It was like being in a new body and in a new bed. I fidgeted for a while, trying to get comfortable. My eyes were closed, and I was almost asleep when things suddenly became strange.

  At first, it was just that annoyingly mysterious soft breeze blowing about my room. Then my skin began to feel tmgly and itchy, the way a scab feels right before it falls off to reveal new skin. I scratched my arms and legs but still felt irritated. Then I, myself, felt light and breezy, like a feather swept high into the air by the wind. Then slowly, I began to rise off the bed!!

  At first I thought I was dreaming.

  I was terrified of heights. As a matter of fact, just the thought of the great city made me nauseous. The buildings and towers were so tall, and the idea of being inside them, way up in the sky, made me want to sink to the floor with my hands over my head.

  Nevertheless, when I slept I often dreamed of the very thing I feared. Being in the sky. But in my dream, I flew about, circling the great city towers, even as high as the Ooni Palace. I woke from these dreams with my heart beating fast, feeling horrified but exhilarated. It didn't make sense.

  However, what happened that night was different. I was awake, wide awake.

  "What...?"

  I felt for the bed but reached several inches below me before I found it. Slowly, I looked around. My room was dark, lit only by the moonlight, but I could see myself in the large mirror next to my bed. It was the most eerie sight. My hair and bed sheets were hanging down as I floated above my bed. Immediately, I dropped down onto it with a thud.

  "Oof!" I said, rolling onto my side and then jumping to my feet. "What the...?!"

  I stood there in the middle of my room, my legs slightly bent, prepared to run away from whatever was coming after me. I don't know why I thought something was after me. There were no noises in my room, other than the sound of flapping paper as the breeze continued to blow about. But still, I had this feeling. When I think about it now, I wonder if it was a premonition of the near future.

  I slowly climbed back into bed. Maybe it was just a really vivid dream.

  Yes a dream, I thought drowsily. I was extremely tired from all the excitement of the day and my eyes quickly grew heavy. I lay back down and tried to get comfortable. The minute my body relaxed, the breeze
started again. This time, I was sure I was awake. I looked around but didn't move. I held my breath.

  And then I felt it, right through my covers: a soft current of air circulating around me. Then I started to rise! I rose about two inches from my bed. The current of air lightly blew underneath my long yellow nightgown.

  "Oh my," I whispered breathlessly. I tried to wiggle my toes, and I dropped down again. I frowned. I wasn't one to kid myself when something was obvious. This was really happening. But why? I wondered. And ... can I make it happen? If so, how?

  I considered calling my mother. But instead I licked my lips and took a deep breath. Then I concentrated on the air current.

  I imagined the breeze to be a light blue friendly mist surrounding me and slowly lifting me off the bed. Nothing happened. Even the breeze died down.

  I just lay there for several minutes, confused. Then I tried again. Still nothing happened. By the third try, I was slightly disillusioned, and I visualized the blue mist with little hope of anything happening. I was relaxed and nonchalant. Suddenly, the breeze quickly returned as did the circulating air.

  Easily, I floated a little higher. I urged myself to go higher and higher until I realized that I didn't know how to stop or get down! Nothing was supporting me, and there was nothing to grab on to. The moment panic set in, I plopped back onto my bed.

  I blinked and looked around. What's happening to me? I thought. I looked around my small bedroom again. I had several potted leafy green plants growing in the windowsill and another leafy green plant growing out of the wall around my large mirror. I could see my desk weighed down with my schoolbooks. Everything looked normal. I concentrated and tried again. Nothing.

  Then I just lay thinking and thinking and thinking. I didn't sleep much that night. And when I did, I dreamed of flying.

  Chapter 4

  The Dark Market

  A few days later, I stopped just outside the market.

  I leaned against a large tree and pulled off the piece of twine holding my hair together. I wanted to scratch my scalp, but I knew there were people already staring at my freed dadalocks. If they only knew that my hair was far from the most peculiar thing about me. Since that first night, the floating thing had happened several times. Actually, I'd made it happen.

  The night before I even did it on the first try, and I managed to float halfway to the ceiling! I was too scared to go much higher. Always, the minute I lost concentration or got nervous, I'd plop down. I can't convey to you what it felt like to be able to do something so odd and impossible.

  But at the time, all I could think of was my dry itchy scalp and the fact that it wasn't polite to scratch it. The day before, I'd washed it before I realized I'd run out of the rose oil I always used afterward. By lunchtime at school, my hair had finally dried, but boy was my scalp itchy!

  "Just scratch your head if you want to!" Dari had exclaimed at school. "Why do you torture yourself?" Then he'd dug his hands into my hair and scratched until I was crying with laughter. Dari usually came with me to visit my mother at the market, but that day he'd had too many chores to do.

  I shook out my hair, and that gave me a little relief. Then I retied the twine, brought out my mirror from my backpack, and made sure I looked OK. My hair was neat, and my long green dress was spotless and unwrinkled. I smiled at myself in my mirror. I avoided looking at my dadalocks. Even if they were neatly tied back, they were only a blemish to my appearance. Still, I looked nice and civilized.

  The oldest tree in Kirki, a tall, tall iroko tree whose top was seen only by the birds and the army of leaf-cutter branch hoppers that took care of it marked the entrance of the market. I tapped its trunk as I passed. To do so brought good luck.

  The market was busy as always, and I was glad to quickly be swallowed into it. My mother's fruit stand was on the far left side, which gave me plenty of time to listen to arguments and discussions along the way. The market was always full of life. Tomatoes, videophones, both hydrogen and flora-powered cars, netevisions, clothes, crude leather, digi-books, leaf-clipping and -mending beetles, paper books, all species of CPU seeds, from the most expensive to the cheap—one could find anything at the market if one knew where to look. I walked slowly, as I always did, taking in all that was around me.

  A man wearing a long white caftan was standing in his market space, looking miserable. He was selling every kind of music one could think of on flash disk: Highlife, Hip-Pocalypso, Tree Rhythm, Spice Soul, Hip-Hop, Ju Ju Funk, Jungle, and everything in between. At that moment, he was blasting Highlife on his flash disk player to attract customers. Normally one would be happy to work around such music, but this man looked as if his dog had just died. I found myself smiling and walking to the beat as I passed him. I giggled to myself, trying not to look him in the eye.

  The reason he was miserable was that his music had attracted a swarm of rhythm beetles, and an insect party was going on above the man's head. Several landed on his arms and in his thick Afro. He swatted at them in annoyance as a customer handed him a flash disk she wanted to purchase.

  Most of the beetles were crowded on his umbrella; they were raising their shiny black wings and shaking their behinds to the beat of the music. Some of them had even landed on the flash disk player to dance. He must be used to them, I thought. Though rhythm beetles were more active at night, they were attracted to music like moths to bright lights.

  I moved on, inhaling the smells around me, and for the moment I forgot about the strangeness of the last few days. Perfume, sweat, cooked meat, leaves, soil, fruit—there was a bit of everything. I loved the hustle and bustle that went on whether I was there or not. I smiled when I saw my mother sitting among her pyramids of oranges, mangoes, and lychee fruits. The lychee fruits were my favorite.

  The small round fruits had thin brown skins that were easily peeled to reveal the sweet white fruit. I could never get enough of sucking the soft fruit from the brown smooth seed in the middle. My mother bought all her fruit from a family connection at the farms on the fringes of the Forbidden Greeny Jungle. So it was always the best. Sometimes I'd pop one in my mouth and peel the fruit with my tongue! My mother would always yell at me when she saw me doing it. She said it was unladylike the way I spat out the fruit skin. Of course I did this only at home, never in public.

  "Good afternoon, Mama," I said, walking around the fruits and setting down my backpack. I sat on the small wooden stool.

  "Good afternoon," said my mother. "How was school?"

  I shrugged. "The usual."

  "Are you feeling fine?" she asked. I had been feeling slightly queasy and crampy since the day before. In the morning, my mother had me eat a mango and drink some warmed goat milk sweetened with honey. It helped.

  I nodded. The coming of my menses was not as much of an ordeal as I thought it would be. Once my mother showed me what to do and I realized it was just a part of life, it really was no big deal at all. What was a big deal was the fact that I could float in the air when I chose to. And sometimes when I didn't.

  A breeze picked up around me and I felt my stomach rise. I could feel myself lifting slightly. Luckily my mother's back was turned.

  "I have a lot of homework," I said, grabbing the stool and pulling myself back down.

  "Nothing you cannot handle?" my mother asked.

  The breeze continued, but I was able to keep myself on the ground.

  I smiled and said, "No. Nothing I can't handle."

  "Good. Now, go buy me a bag of cashew fruit and some light bulbs," my mother said, handing me two petri flowers. The red flowers were about the size of my hand. They each had five petals. "That should be more than enough."

  "OK."

  "Be quick. I need you to sort this fresh batch of lychee fruit."

  I got up and said, "Is it OK if I buy some rose oil, assuming I use some of my gift money?"

  "Just be quick."

  I nodded.

  "I hope I can find it," I said. "The lady who sells it is always movi
ng her stand around."

  "That's bad for business," my mother said, turning to a new customer. She smiled at the woman and asked, "Can I help you?"

  "I'll be back, Mama," I said, stepping into the milling crowd.

  I loved being by myself in the market with money in my pocket. Everything I could afford suddenly looked brighter. And I loved the feeling of being on a mission. It was almost like being someone else, someone who was capable of anything. My mother could always rely on me. It didn't take long to get the cashew fruits and the light bulbs. Like my mother, both sellers had kept their stands in the same place for years.

  "You look nice, Zahrah," the woman who sold light bulbs said. Her daughter was the annoying Ciwanke Mairiga from school, my worst harasser. Nevertheless, unlike her daughter, she was quite nice.

  "Thank you, madam," I said. "So do you."

  "How is your father? Your mother?" Mrs. Mairiga asked.

  "They're fine, madam," I said, taking the potted light bulbs. The light bulbs were buried in the cups of soil, though I could still see their glow. My mother was the best at coaxing the light-producing plants into the walls at home. "Do you know where the oil lady is today?"

  "I think she's in the Dark Market," Mrs. Mairiga said apologetically. "Soriy. You'll probably find her elsewhere tomorrow."

  I frowned, my shoulders drooping. The Dark Market was where the strangest market items were sold, like stockfish teeth, six-legged dogs, and juju magic potions. You could even buy dream ticks, insects that bit you and injected an opiate into your blood that was fifty times stronger than the one used in hospitals ... among other darker items. My parents always warned me not to go there, and I never had. Dari, on the other hand, had sneaked into the Dark Market several times.

  "I don't just blindly believe everything I hear," he would say. "I need a good reason. And no one could give me one when it came to the Dark Market, except, 'Oh, it's a bad place.' Why?! That's not good enough," he'd said after the first time. "I needed to see for myself." He crept closer to me with a mischievous grin on his face, a small brown sack in his hands. "And you know what, Zahrah? It was great! Look at these!"