Dark Matter

by Sheree R. Thomas

  “You wouldn’t want him to wander away,” Gimmile had warned.

  Dossouye knew it would take an elephant to dislodge Gbo once she commanded him to remain in one place. But Gimmile had sung his soothing songs and smiled his open smile, and Dossouye led Gbo into the enclosure and watched while Gimmile, displaying a wiry strength not unlike her own, wrestled the stone corral bar into place.

  He played and smiled while leading Dossouye up the twisting stairwells through which thin streams of light poured from small ventilation holes. He sang to her as he boiled the plantains he had obtained from a storage pot. When she ate, he plucked the kalimba.

  Gimmile ate nothing. Dossouye had meant to question him about that; but she did not, for she was happy and at peace.

  Yet… she was still an ahosi. When Gimmile took away the wooden bowl from which she had eaten, Dossouye posed an abrupt question:

  “Gimmile, how is it that you, a singer of songs, live in a fortress a king might envy?” Gimmile’s smile faded. For the first time, Dossouye saw pain in his eyes. Contrition stabbed at her, but she could not take back her question.

  “I am sorry,” she stammered. “You offer me food and shelter, and I ask questions that are none of my concern.”

  “No,” the bela said, waving aside her apology. “You have a right to ask; you have a right to know.”

  “Know what?”

  Gimmile sat down near her feet and looked up at her with the eyes of a child. But the story he told was no child’s tale.

  As a young bela, new to his craft, Gimmile had come to the court of Konondo, king of Dedougou, a Mossi city-state. On a whim, the king had allowed the youthful bela to perform for him. So great was Gimmile’s talent with voice and kalimba that the envy of Bankassi, regular bela to the court, was aroused. Bankassi whispered poison into the ear of the king, and Konondo read insult and disrespect into the words of Gimmile’s songs, though in fact there was none. When Gimmile asked the king for a kwabo, the small gift customarily presented to belas by monarchs, Konondo roared:

  “You mock me, then dare to ask for a kwabo? I’ll give you a kwabo! Guards! Take this jackal, give him fifty lashes, and remove him from Dedougou!”

  Struggling wildly, Gimmile was dragged from the throne room. Bankassi gloated, his position at Konondo’s court still secure.

  Another man might have died from Konondo’s cruel punishment. But hatred burned deep in Gimmile. Hatred kept him alive while the blood from his lacerated back speckled his stumbling trail away from Dedougou. Hatred carried him deep into a forbidden grove in the Mossi forest, to the hidden shrine of Legba.…

  (Dossouye’s eyes widened at the mention of the accursed name of Legba, the god of apostates and defilers. His worship, his very name, had long ago been outlawed in the kingdoms bordering the Gulf of Otongi. At the sound of Legba’s name, Dossouye drew away from Gimmile.)

  In a single bitter, blasphemous night, Legba had granted Gimmile’s entreaty. Baraka, a mystic power from the god’s own hand, settled in Gimmile’s kalimba… and invaded Gimmile’s soul. Wounds miraculously healed, mind laden with vengeance, Gimmile had emerged from the shrine of evil. He was more than a bela now. He was a bearer of Baraka, a man to be feared.

  On a moonless night, Gimmile stood outside the walls of Dedougou. Harsh notes resounded from his kalimba. And he sang…

  The king of Dedougou is bald as an egg.

  His belly sags like an elephant’s,

  His teeth are as few as a guinea fowl’s,

  And his bela has no voice.…

  In the court of Konondo, the people cried out in horror when every strand of the king’s hair fell from his head. Konondo shrieked in pain and fear as his teeth dropped from his mouth like nuts shaken from a tree. The pain became agony when his belly distended, ripping through the cloth of his regal robes. Only the bela Bankassi’s voice failed to echo the terror and dismay that swiftly became rampant in Dedougou. Tortured, inhuman mewlings issued from Bankassi’s throat, nothing more.

  Gimmile had his vengeance: Soon, however, the bela learned he had not been blessed by Legba’s gift of Baraka. For Legba’s gifts were always accompanied by a price, and Legba’s price was always a curse.

  Gimmile could still sing about the great deeds of warriors of the past, or about gods and goddesses and the creation of the world, or about the secret speech of animals. But the curse that accompanied Gimmile’s Baraka was this: The songs he sang about the living, including himself, came true!

  “And it is a curse, Dossouye,” Gimmile said, his tale done, his fingers resting idly on the kalimba’s keys.

  “Word of what I could do spread throughout Mossi. People sought me out as vultures seek out a corpse. They wanted me to sing them rich, sing them beautiful, sing them brave or intelligent. I would not do that. I had wanted only to repay Konondo and Bankassi for what they had done to me. Still, the Baraka remained within me… unwanted, a curse. Men like the daju you killed surrounded me like locusts, trying to force me to sing them cities of gold. Instead, I sang myself away from them all.”

  “And you—sang this rock, where no such rock has a right to be?” Dossouye asked, her voice tight with apprehension.

  “Yes,” Gimmile said. “I sing, and Legba provides.”

  “Legba sent you this tower,” Dossouye said slowly, realization dawning as Gimmile rose to his feet. Gimmile nodded.

  “And Legba has also sent—”

  “You,” Gimmile confirmed. His smile remained warm and sincere; not at all sinister as he flicked the keys of his kalimba and began to sing.…

  Dossouye’s hand curled around her swordhilt. She meant to smash the kalimba and silence its spell… but it was too late for that. Gimmile’s fingers flew rapidly across the keys. Dossouye’s fingers left her swordhilt. She unfastened the clasp of the belt that secured the weapon to her waist. With a soft thump, the scabbard struck the cloth-covered floor.

  Gimmile placed the kalimba on a nearby table and spoke to it in the same manner Dossouye spoke when issuing a command to Gbo. As he walked toward her, the instrument continued to play, even though Gimmile no longer touched it.

  Scant heed did Dossouye pay to this latest manifestation of Gimmile’s Baraka. Taking her hands, Gimmile raised the ahosi to her feet. She did not resist him. Gimmile sang his love to her while his fingers tugged at the laces of her cuirass.

  He sang a celebration to the luster of her onyx eyes. She stopped his questing hands and removed her armor for the second time that day. He shaped her slender body with sweet words that showed her the true beauty of her self; the beauty she had hidden from herself for fear others might convince her it was not really there.

  Gimmile’s garments fell from him like leaves from a windblown tree. Spare and rangy, his frame was a male twin of Dossouye’s. He sang her into an embrace.

  While Gimmile led her to a stone bed softened by piles of patterned cloth, the ahosi in Dossouye protested stridently but ineffectively. She had known love as an ahosi; but always with other women soldiers, never a man. To accept the seed of a man was to invite pregnancy, and a pregnant ahosi was a dead one. The ahosi were brides of the King of Abomey. The King never touched them, and death awaited any other man who did. Such constraints meant nothing now, as Gimmile continued to sing.

  Dossouye’s fingers toyed with the beads in Gimmile’s braids. Her mouth branded his chest and shoulders with hot, wet circles. Only when Gimmile drew her down to the bed did he pause in his singing. Then the song became theirs, not just his, and they sang it together. And when their mouths and bodies met, Gimmile had no further need for the insidious power of Legba’s Baraka. But the kalimba continued to play.

  Abruptly, uncomfortably, Dossouye awoke. A musty odor invaded her nostrils. Something sharp prodded her throat. Her eyelids jarred open.

  The light in Gimmile’s chamber was dim, Dossouye lay on her back, bare flesh abrading against a rough, stony surface. Her gaze wandered upward along a length of curved, shining steel—a swo
rd! Her vision and her mind snapped into clear focus then, the lingering recall of the day and night before thrust aside as she gazed into the face of the bearded daju, the attacker whose life she had spared.

  “Where is… moso?” the daju demanded. “You have it… I know.”

  Dossouye did not know what he meant. She shifted her weight, reflexively moving away from the touch of the swordpoint at her throat. Something sharp dug at her left shoulderblade.

  Ignoring the daju she turned, slid her hand beneath her shoulder; and grasped a small, sharp-edged object. She raised herself on one elbow and intently examined the thing she held in her hand.

  It was a figurine cast in brass, no more than three inches high, depicting a robed bela playing a kalimba. Beaded braids of hair; open, smiling face… every detail had been captured perfectly by the unknown craftsman. The joy she had experienced the night before and the fear she was beginning to feel now were both secondary to the sudden pang of sadness she experienced when she recognized the tiny brass face as Gimmile’s.

  “That is… moso!” the daju shouted excitedly. Eagerly he reached for the figurine. Ignoring the daju’s sword, Dossouye pulled the moso away from the thief’s grasp. Her eyes swiftly scanned the chamber. With a tremor of horror, she realized she was lying on a bare stone floor next to a broken ruin of a bed.

  “Hah!” spat the daju. “You know how… to bring moso to life. Legba made… Gimmile into moso to pay for Baraka. But moso can… come to life… and sing wishes true. Mahadu and I… found moso near here. Could not… bring to life. We were taking moso… to Baraka-man… when we saw you. Now… you tell… how to bring moso to life. Tell… and might… let you live.”

  Dossouye stared up at the daju. Murder and greed warred on his vulpine face. His swordpoint hovered close to her throat. And she had not the slightest notion how Gimmile could be made to live.

  With blurring speed, she hurled the moso past the broken bed. The figurine bounced once off jagged stone, then disappeared. With a strangled curse, the daju stared wildly after the vanished prize, momentarily forgetting his captive. Dossouye struck aside the daju’s swordarm and drove her heel into one of his knees. Yelping in pain, the daju stumbled. His sword dropped from his hand. Dossouye scrambled to her feet.

  Twisting past the daju, Dossouye dove for his fallen sword. And a galaxy of crimson stars exploded before her eyes when the booted foot of the daju collided with the side of her head.

  Dossouye fell heavily, rolled, and lay defenseless on her back, waves of sick pain buffeting her inside her skull. Recovering his blade, the daju limped toward her, his face contorted with hate.

  “I will… bring moso to life… without you,” he grated. “Now… Abomean bitch… die!”

  He raised his curved blade. Dossouye lay stunned, helpless. Without a weapon in her hand, not even her ahosi-trained quickness could save her now. She tensed to accept the blow that would slay her.

  The daju brought his weapon down. But before it reached Dossouye’s breast, a brown-clad figure hurled itself into the path of the blade. Metal bit flesh, a voice cried out in wrenching agony, and Gimmile lay stretched between Dossouye and the daju. Blood welled from a wound that bisected his side.

  The daju stared down at Gimmile, mouth hanging open, eyes white with dread and disbelief. Dossouye, consumed with almost feral rage, leaped to her feet, tore the daju’s sword from his nerveless grasp, and plunged the blade so deeply through his midsection that the point ripped in a bloody shower through the flesh of his back.

  Without a sound, without any alteration of the expression of shock frozen on his face, the daju sank to the floor. Death took him more quickly than he deserved.

  Dossouye bent to Gimmile’s side. The bela sprawled face-down, unmoving. Gently Dossouye turned him onto his back and cradled his braided head in her lap. Though his life leaked in a scarlet stream from his wound, Gimmile’s face betrayed no pain. His hands clutched his kalimba, but the instrument was broken. It would never play again.

  “I never lied to you, Dossouye,” Gimmile said, his voice still like music. “But I did not tell you everything. The king of Dedougou has been dead three hundred rains. So have I. After I sang my vengeance against Konondo and Bankassi, after I sang this tower to escape those who wanted to use me, the truth of Legba’s curse became clear. I would forever be a moso, a unifying thing of metal. Only great emotions—love, hate, joy, sorrow—can restore me to life. But such life never lasts long.

  “It was your rage at the daju who stole me that brought me to life by the river. I saw you… wanted you, even as the daju did. The Baraka of Legba gave you to me. I wish… I had not needed the Baraka to gain your love. Now… the kalimba is broken; the Baraka is gone from me. I can feel it flowing out with my blood. This time, I will not come back to life.”

  Dossouye bowed her head and shut her eyes. She did not want to hear more or see more; she wished never to hear or see again.

  “Dossouye.”

  The bela’s voice bore no sorcerous compulsion now. Still, Dossouye opened her eyes and looked into those of Gimmile. Neither deceit nor fear of death lay in those earth-brown depths. Only resignation—and peace.

  “I know your thoughts, Dossouye. You bear the seed of a—ghost. There will be no child inside you. Now, please turn from me, Dossouye. I do not want you to see me die.”

  He closed his eyes. Dossouye touched his cheeks, his lips. Then she rose and turned away. His blood smeared her bare thighs.

  Memories diverted by the fight with the daju returned in a rush of pain. Even as she gazed sorrowfully at the dust-laden remnants of the accouterments of Gimmile’s chamber, Dossouye remembered his warmth, his kindness, the love they had shared too briefly. The memories scalded her eyes.

  * * *

  Dossouye and Gbo stood quietly by the bank of the Kambi. The sun had set and risen once since they last saw the heat-mist rise from the river. Dossouye stroked Gbo’s side, thankful that Gimmile had penned him the day before. Formidable though the war-bull was, there was still a chance the daju might have brought him down with a lucky thrust of sword or spear. In her swordhand, Dossouye held a brass figurine of a bela with a broken kalimba. Tarnish trickled like blood down the metal side of the moso.

  “You never needed Legba, Gimmile,” Dossouye murmured sadly. “You could have sung your vengeance in other cities, and all the kings of Mossi would have laughed at Konondo’s pettiness, and the laughter would have reached Dedougou. The sting of your songs would have long outlived the sting of his lash.”

  She closed her fist around the moso.

  “You did not need Legba for me, either, Gimmile.”

  Drawing back her arm, Dossouye hurled the moso into the Kambi. It sank with a splash as infinitesimal as the ranting of woman and man against the gods.

  Mounting Gbo, Dossouye urged him into the water. Now she would complete the crossing that had been interrupted the day before. Her road still led to nowhere. But Gimmile sang in her soul.…

  AT THE HUTS OF AJALA

  Nisi Shawl

  (2000)

  They all keep calling her a “two-headed woman.” Loanna wants to know why, so after the morning callers leave, she decides on asking her Iya. When she was little, the other kids used to call her “four-eyes.” But this is different, said with respect by grown adults.

  She finds the comb and hair grease on the bureau in the room where she’s been sleeping. When she left Cleveland three days ago, it was winter. Now she steps out onto the wrought-iron balcony, and it’s spring. Her first visit, on her own, to the Crescent City, New Orleans, drowning home of her mother’s kin.

  Iya sits in her wicker chair, waiting. She is a tall woman, even seated, and she’s dressed all in white: white head scarf, white blouse, white skirt with matching belt, white stockings and tennis shoes, and a white cardigan, too, which she removes now that the day has warmed. She shifts her feet apart, and Loanna drops to sit between them.

  Certainly Loanna is old enough to do
her own hair, but Iya knows different ways of braiding, French rolls and cornrows, special styles suitable for the special occasion of a visit to Mam’zelle La Veau’s grave. Besides, it’s nice to feel Iya’s hands, her long brown fingers gently nimble, swiftly touching, rising along the length of Loanna’s wiry tresses and transforming them into neat, uniformly bumpy braids. Relaxed by the rhythm and intimacy, she asks, “Why all you friends call me that?”

  “Call you what, baby?” Iya’s voice is rough but soft, like a terrycloth towel. “Hand me up a bobby pin.”

  “Two-headed,” says Loanna. She lifts the whole card full of pins and feels the pressure as her Iya chooses one and pulls it free.

  “Two-headed? It means like you got the second sight, sorta. Like Indian mystics be talkin’ about openin’ they third eye. Only more so.”

  “But why say it like that?” Loanna asks, persisting. Some odd things have gone on since she got here: folks dropping on one knee, saying prayers in African to the dry, exacting sound of rattling gourds. Tearful entrances and laughing retreats, gifts of honey, candles, and coconuts. Not every question gets her an answer, but she’s here to learn, so she always tries again. “Why call it two-headed, and why say that about me?”

  “Oooh, now, that’s a story.” Iya pauses for a moment, finishing off a row, and the murmur of a neighbor’s voice rises through slow rustling trees and over the courtyard wall, light and indistinct. Iya sections off another braid and repeats herself. “That is truly a story, baby. You wanna hear it now?”

  Loanna nods, then winces from the pain of pulling her own hair. “Ow! I mean, yeah,” she says.

  “Ty to sit still, then, so I can concentrate. Lessee. This story started before you were born, Loanna, ’bout fifteen years ago. The night before you were born, actually, to be exact. You remember that night?”