Sunny and the Mysteries of Osisi

by Nnedi Okorafor

  “Chichi…” Sasha paused, an angry look crossing his face, but then he looked at Sunny and smiled. “She told us everything. I’d have done the same thing, no matter the consequences. That’s family, yo. Always gotta protect the fam.”

  Sunny only nodded. Not even Sasha would understand the consequences. When he’d used juju to switch the minds of two police officers back in the United States, he’d been caned. She, on the other hand, had nearly lost her soul. But both he and Samya were right; it was worth it.

  Her eyes met Orlu’s and again she nearly melted into tears. It was as if he could see right through her, witness all that she’d been through. His hands were at his sides, clenching and unclenching. She stepped up to him and Orlu gathered her into a quiet hug. “It’s all right,” he said. “You’re with us now.”

  Sugar Cream went back into the library as soon as Sunny was in the hands of her friends. She said that Sunny was to return for her lessons in a week. The four of them stopped at Mama Put’s Putting Place on the way back when Sunny said that she was hungry.

  “Don’t worry,” Orlu said, pulling out a white plastic chair for Sunny. “I’m paying. Order whatever you want.”

  Sunny’s pockets were full of the gold chittim that had fallen in the basement, but she didn’t argue with him. She’d been gone three days and all her friends could do was worry. They needed to feel as if they could do something. Especially Orlu.

  “It’s late,” Sunny said. “My parents, my brother… maybe it’s best if…”

  “Don’t worry about them,” Chichi said. “I’ve been going over there. They know you are at least okay.”

  “What?! What have you been telling them?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” she said. “I can’t. They already know you are part of something. They’re beginning to understand. So all I’ve said is that you’re fine and will be back tonight. The first day, your father looked like he wanted to kill me.” She laughed. “Honestly, Sunny, your father doesn’t know if he is coming or going when it comes to you.”

  “Your mother came to see my mother yesterday, too,” Orlu said. “My mother said she looked okay, just worried about the reason you were gone.”

  Sunny ordered a plate of stewed chicken. Mama Put said it came with jollof rice, but Sunny asked to replace it with more fried plantain. She didn’t think she wanted to eat jollof rice for a while, or goat meat. She also ordered three bottles of water. When the food came, Sunny’s entire body responded. As she ate and drank and ate and drank, Chichi told her some surprising things.

  “I called your brother that next day,” Chichi said. “Remember, you gave me your phone.” She reached into her pocket and handed it to Sunny.

  “Thanks,” Sunny said. “What’d he say?”

  “Nothing much,” she said.

  Sasha sucked his teeth loudly.

  “Oh, stop,” Chichi snapped.

  Sasha muttered something under his breath, and Orlu’s eyebrows went up.

  “What did you say?” Chichi asked, frowning.

  “My brother,” Sunny interrupted. “My brother… is he okay?”

  “He’s back in school.” Chichi grinned.

  “What? Really?!”

  “He didn’t believe me at first when I said he could go back. But then later that day, he got a phone call. His friend Adebayo couldn’t stop apologising and telling him that it was safe to return. That the confraternity is disbanded. Chukwu didn’t believe it until one of his other friends who was not in the confraternity and knew nothing about Chukwu’s problem called his cell phone laughing and telling him that two of his professors had left their positions to join some born-again Christian group. When Chukwu returned, he found that the capo of the group had also become born-again, though he didn’t drop out.”

  Her brother only missed a few days of school. Her parents never even knew he was gone. The next time he’d be home would be for Christmas, which was weeks away. He’d heal up nicely by then. Sunny looked at her phone. What was she going to tell him when she finally talked to him? She’d cross that bridge once she got to it.

  When she returned home, she made it into the kitchen before anyone knew she was there. Her father stood in the doorway in his nightwear. “Sunny,” he said in a low voice. “Where were you?”

  Sunny’s heart slammed in her chest and she felt her throat tighten. She couldn’t tell him even if she wanted to. “Dad, I–”

  He held up a hand. “Something has always been wrong with you,” he muttered. “What kind of daughter has God given me?”

  “I swear, Dad, I’m not…” She froze as it started to happen, her body filling with terror. But she couldn’t help it, no matter how hard she willed. Her spirit face was coming forwards! And as it began to happen, Sunny could feel Anyanwu’s shock, too. She turned from her father.

  “Don’t swear,” her father snapped. “Don’t swear a thing to me. What are you… What is wrong with you?”

  Sunny was afraid to speak. But as her spirit face retreated, she relaxed. She turned back to her father’s angry face. Two years ago, he’d surely have beaten her when he was this angry… and this scared him. She could see it in his eyes. She was old enough now and had faced enough scary things herself to recognise it. “Are you all right?” he asked in a low voice.

  She nodded.

  “Did anyone hurt you?”

  “I’m okay, Dad,” she said. The djinni bite on her arm itched and ached. Was losing control of her spirit face a side effect?

  He touched his forehead and closed his eyes, letting out a breath. He opened them. “Will this happen again, Sunny?”

  She pressed her lips together, steadying herself. If her spirit face had slipped forwards, would they have returned her right back to the basement? Or something even worse? Why did that even happen? And her father made her angry. She had always known he resented her for not being what he wanted. He was like so many other Igbo fathers. Sons, sons, sons, even when you had two. And if not a son, then a beautiful, polite, docile daughter. “No,” she said, just wanting to escape to her room.

  “I’ll tell your mother that you’re home,” he said, making to leave. He turned back to Sunny. “We love you more than life itself.” He paused, his own words seeming to take his breath away. Then his face became hard and angry as she’d known it most of her life when he looked at her, and he continued. “But you worry her like that again and I will disown you from this family and throw you out of this house.”

  Later on, her mother didn’t come running to the kitchen or her room. But Sunny could hear her sobbing with relief in their bedroom. She heard Ugonna go to their room. Then he came to Sunny’s room, peeked in, and without a word returned to his room. Sunny lay awake listening to her mother’s sobbing and her father’s soft consoling murmurs. She wished she could go to her parents’ room as she used to when she was younger, before she became part of something that was entirely separate from her family.

  She closed her eyes, tears streaming from the sides onto her pillow. Those days were over.

  15

  WAHALA DEY

  A few nights later, Sunny walked into Anatov’s hut with Chichi, Orlu, and Sasha. It was just past midnight. When they walked in through the OUT door and greeted their teacher, Anatov told them he had a special lesson for them tonight. Then he’d pulled Sunny aside.

  “Come with me for a minute so we can talk,” he said. “Excuse us,” he told the others. He’d tied his bushy dreadlocks on top of his head tonight. Sunny noted this. When Anatov tied up his dreadlocks, it always meant the lessons that night would be tough.

  They walked through the waist-high wooden front door labeled IN. It was painted with black and white squares that Sunny had since learned were part of a protective juju that wove through the hut and the mile radius of forest around it.

  As soon as they were outside, Anatov reached into his pocket. When he brought his hand up, he blew green juju powder in Sunny’s face. She immediately began to sneeze and sneeze. She stumb
led back. “What–” Then she was overcome by another sneezing fit.

  Without a word, he brought out his juju knife and made several quick flourishes. He put his knife on the ground at his feet and then snapped both of his fingers in Sunny’s direction. As soon as he did this, Sunny felt a force shove her backwards. She stared at what remained in the place she’d just stood.

  She sneezed another five times as she watched the green mist shaped like herself float there, slowly dissipating into the air like thick smoke. It looked around, as if shocked by its existence.

  “What is that?!” Sunny said. Her stuffed nose made her sound nasally.

  “You travelled fully into the wilderness. When people with your ability do that and then return, you always bring something back with you,” he said, staring at the green Sunny-shaped mist. It was almost gone now, but it was still looking around in shock. It made no sound, but Sunny could smell something. She couldn’t find the words to describe it. “It’s like swimming in the ocean. You come out wet and when you dry, you’re salty. You need to bathe.”

  “So I’m clean now?”

  He chuckled. “Is being covered in sea salt dirty?”

  “Well…”

  “If I didn’t do that to you, you’d become… strange,” he said. “I’ve seen it happen. I didn’t think I’d have to teach you how to perform bush medicine on yourself. Not so soon. But I guess when it comes to you all, things happen sooner rather than later. How do you feel?”

  “I need a tissue.”

  He chuckled. “Aside from your juju powder allergy.”

  “I feel… lighter. Like I just took off a heavy coat.”

  Anatov looked pleased.

  “And I– I can smell something,” she said. “Even with my stuffed nose. What is that? Why’s it so strong?”

  Anatov nodded. “Can’t describe it, right?”

  Sunny shook her head.

  “That’s the wilderness,” he said.

  They paused, Anatov looking pensively at Sunny. Sunny sniffed loudly. Then Anatov smiled and shook his head. “What in Allah’s name were you thinking when you did that to the society’s capo, Sunny? I hope you’ve learned your lesson. You could have died in that basement. We’d all have been torn up, but the world would have moved on, eventually, and you’d have been gone. Don’t you understand yet?”

  “My bro—”

  “I know it was your brother,” he said stepping closer. “I know you love him and that guy hurt him… badly. Nearly killed him. But you are in a secret society. A real true one that is older than time. And we have rules, strict, real, deeply upheld rules. While you were in the basement, Sugar Cream came to me angry as hell. She couldn’t believe you’d do something so stupid. Do you know that? I have never seen her even break a sweat. But this night, she was shaking with fear and anger.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sunny whispered.

  “Tell that to your mentor and never ever cross that line again. We can’t protect you if you do.”

  Sunny’s nose ran and now her eyes were tearing up, too.

  “You essentially died; that’s what travelling fully into the wilderness requires,” Anatov said bluntly. “When it pulled you in, if you weren’t Sunny Nwazue, if you were Sasha or Orlu or Chichi or any other kid without your specific ability, you’d have stayed dead. Do you understand this?”

  Sunny took a deep breath as his words sunk in. “I get it,” she breathed.

  “Good.” He looked down his nose at her. “You set Ogwu and her young free.”

  “They were never really in prison,” Sunny muttered. “She was just ashamed.”

  “Hmm,” he said, putting a long arm around her shoulder. When she looked up at him, his nose ring glinted in the moonlight. Anatov the Defender of Frogs and All Things Natural couldn’t defend her from everything. “Come,” he said. “I assume you brought your usual box of tissues?”

  Sunny laughed and smiled, wiping her tears with her hand. “Yeah.”

  He grasped her shoulder warmly, pulling her into a hug. He smelled of his favourite scented oil—Egyptian musk—and his caftan was scratchy. “Good,” he said. “Good, Sunny.”

  The four of them sat on the floor of Anatov’s hut. Sunny had blown the heck out of her nose, but it still ran happily and freely. She pulled out another tissue, lifted her glasses a bit, and blew. By now her nose probably looked red as a cherry.

  “You okay?” Orlu asked.

  “Get her some water, man,” Sasha said, chuckling. “With all that snot, she’s going to get dehydrated.”

  “Tonight,” Anatov loudly said. He spoke in Igbo. He did this often to help Sasha practice. “In celebration of Sunny’s return, I’ve decided to throw out the planned lesson and replace it with something I think you all need: masking jujus. Jujus you use when you want to perform juju on or around Lambs but do not wish them to see or know it.”

  Sunny sat up straighter, deeply interested. There was juju for that? Leopards were allowed to perform juju on Lambs? She looked at Chichi, who looked equally surprised.

  “One can perform juju on Lambs and around them,” he said. “We know this happens, sure. We can’t live around these people and not be able to do this. However, you must take precautions. And those precautions are not so easy. And people are lazy.” He switched to English, slipping into a Southern American drawl. “They don’t like to cover they asses. And if you mess up… well, y’all know the consequences.”

  He sat in his mahogany throne-like chair with its plush red seat. “Lord knows that Lambs can be damn annoying, with their silly materialism, hatred of education, and love of remaining stupid. They’re obsessed with getting things fast, fast, fast, with the least amount of work, books, no instruction. It’s universal.” He chuckled. “Who can blame Leopards for wanting to throw some juju at them once in a while.”

  He went on to show them several jujus they could do. Empty Hands required a bit of common all-purpose juju powder and allowed one to punch someone without looking like one had done anything. Grace was a juju that you could do with only your juju knife; it allowed one to slip out of a situation unnoticed. Ujo only required a juju knife, too. This bit of juju filled a Lamb person with irrational crippling fear. It could be thrown from a distance of several feet, allowing the thrower to remain undetected.

  Both Sasha and Chichi were especially good at performing this one. “I’m glad no Lambs are around,” Anatov said, after watching both of them. “You’ll both have to learn how to perform Ujo in strength grades… unless you want the Lambs you work it on to run off screaming and vomiting with hysterical fear every single time you use it on them.”

  “Use Ujo sparingly,” Anatov stressed to all of them. “Even a weak version of it can eventually cause brain damage when used on the same person more than once.”

  Of all the things Anatov showed them this day, Sunny’s favourite was Wahala Dey. This was another juju knife spell that caused small things to randomly go wrong. One’s pants would fall down, one would slip or trip, make a wrong turn, drop one’s plate of food, one’s computer would suddenly crash. It only worked on Lambs, and it was an excellent way to slip out of a bad situation or just ruin someone’s day.

  All four of them picked up on the jujus with only mild difficulty, and Anatov was pleased. “I hope this will keep all of you from any further trips to the Obi Library basement or, in your case, Sunny, worse.” She felt her cheeks grow red. “And, Sasha, if you had known some of these, I doubt you’d have been sent here to Nigeria by your parents for being such a fool.”

  “Nah, I’d still have switched those two cops’ minds,” he said. “Police require something serious, Oga.”

  Chichi smiled at Sasha, and he looked ready to burst with pride. Orlu only rolled his eyes.

  Anatov sucked his teeth with loathing, but in a fond kind of way. Their group wasn’t his only group, but even Sunny knew they were his favourite. Chichi was his one mentee, and no elder took on a mentee unless he or she truly deeply loved and felt
great, great confidence in that student. “Sasha, like me, you definitely have African America running through your veins—irrational rebelliousness straight out of Chicago. May the gods help you.”

  Sasha jumped up and did the Crip Walk.

  “I said Chicago, not Compton,” Anatov said.

  “South Siiiide!” Sasha proclaimed, laughing.

  Anatov’s nostrils flared as he clearly stifled a laugh. “Anyway, so before you all return to the safety of your families, I’d like you to go to Leopard Knocks and pick up some of the all-purpose powder that we used for the jujus today.”

  “But we have plenty of that already,” Chichi said.

  “You have the yellow kind,” he said. “Get the white kind. It’s the purest and best and safest to use with Lambs. Just a tiny pound you can hide on your person or in your purse and keep it only for when you wish to deal with Lambs.”

  It was nearly 1am when they stepped up to the bridge to Leopard Knocks. Finding the white juju powder wouldn’t be easy. Anatov said it wasn’t a big seller, since it was juju powder that was exclusively for “use on Lambs.” Sunny just hoped they could find it quickly so she could get a few hours of sleep before school tomorrow.

  She was exhausted and could barely hear herself think as she looked at the tree bridge. The noise of the crashing river always seemed louder at night. She stepped up to the large smooth black stone and laid her hand on it. It was warm as she rubbed. The others were waiting behind her.

  She was so, so tired, more tired than anyone understood. She yawned as she stepped up and faced the narrow slippery bridge. She relaxed herself and brought forth her spirit face. She was going to shift into mist and blow across the bridge, but she was just too tired. So instead, she felt her limber body stretch and she regally began to walk across the bridge.

  Feeling tall and stately, she pointed her sandalled toes as she walked across. She was like a ballerina gracing the stage. Back straight, neck stiff, one foot in front of the other. She smiled softly as she looked down into the rushing water. The water gushed and coiled and thrashed as it tumbled downstream. What was it about this section of river that caused it to grow so turbulent? On each side, there were tangles of hanging trees, vines, and bushes both up- and downriver. How the trees grew at the river’s edges was beyond her. The current should have carried them away.