The Hundred Wells of Salaga

by Ayesha Harruna Attah

  Wurche’s fear was briefly replaced with glee, but disappeared when Etuto’s messenger burst into the room, his clothes swallowing his emaciated body, looking as if he’d been dragged in dust and beaten. He nodded before the gathering and prostrated himself before Etuto, who gave him permission to get up. He panted and whispered to Etuto. Etuto’s mouth dropped open, but he gathered himself and thanked the messenger, who bowed and moved to the back of the room. Etuto turned to his mallam and conferred with him before facing the group.

  “We have to act quickly,” he said gravely. “My messenger was on his way to Kpembe to deliver the news of our intended meeting to the other Kanyase leaders, when he met one of his trusted friends. His friend told him that not far off were soldiers being sent by the Singbung and Lepo families to attack us because they think we are plotting against them. Once they finish me off, they will install Prince Nafu as Kpembewura. The Lepo and Singbung lines are backing him and the other Kanyase leaders have declared me a rebel. Now, my friends, we are not well armed here. We have to leave for Dagbon as soon as possible. They’ll come here and find no one. When we get to Dagbon, we’ll finesse our strategy. Get the women to prepare. Thank you for your time.”

  Wurche’s insides churned. She was not ready. She had to do something, come up with an idea to delay their going to Dagbon.

  “Our problems started when we split into lines,” she shouted. She couldn’t stop her tongue. “If we came together as one people, one family, and solved problems together, imagine what that would be like. When we get to Dagbon, our strategy should be to get the other lines to work with us.”

  The room grew quiet. Etuto stood, dismissed everyone, and was about to head into his inner chamber when he turned and strode to Sulemana, Dramani and Wurche. Wurche’s heart felt as if it had doubled in size and would burst out of her body. Mma walked over, her brow stitched in disapproval. “Etuto, I apologize,” said Wurche. “I had to speak—”

  “You’ve heard the news yourself. You and Prince Adnan are to be married as soon as possible,” Etuto said. Mma swallowed whatever she’d had to say, the frown replaced with pity. Pity was worse than anger.

  “Etuto, I am entering this marriage for you,” Wurche said. “Involve me in the negotiations in Dagbon. Please. Let’s call the other lines and have Dagbon mediate.”

  Etuto nodded slowly and seemed to look through Wurche. She wasn’t sure if he had heard her. He went back towards his inner chamber.

  The next two hours were spent clearing out and closing up the huts on the farm. Donkey carts were loaded with people, baskets of food and provisions, and behind them ambled sheep and goats and people who were too heavy to sit on the carts. Ahead of the donkey carts, Etuto and a small army sat astride their horses, waiting for the mallam to give them their go-ahead. Etuto was in full military gear, his smock covered from head to toe in strings of square, brown leather talismans, two guns slung from his shoulder.

  Mma sat behind Wurche on Baki—Etuto’s idea. Neither of them was happy with the arrangement: Mma complained that Wurche rode her horse too fast, and the last person Wurche wanted to be with was someone who thought marriage was what she needed. Dramani had been instructed to ride at Wurche’s side to keep them safe, which only increased her ire.

  “We can take care of ourselves,” Wurche said to Sulemana, also draped in a curtain of talismans. “You should have more faith in me.”

  “You’re to be someone’s wife,” said Sulemana, too seriously. “We can’t have anything happen to you.”

  “He’s right,” said Mma. “Wurche, calm down. These Dagbon men…they won’t let you get away with the things Etuto lets you off with. Their culture is very different from ours.”

  Sulemana was given a signal from the front and trotted off.

  “You know that story you’ve told over and over?” Wurche said.

  “Which one? I’m sure I haven’t told anything over and over,” said Mma.

  “The Gonja story,” said Dramani.

  “Yes,” said Wurche. “The one where the king tells his two sons, Umar and Namba, to go down to Bigu, the land of gold, to capture it and make it a part of his kingdom. The princes are brave and they subdue the people of Bigu, but Namba is told there is another land to conquer, leaves his brother and goes off with his soldiers to the east. He defeats the local people and settles in what is now Gonjaland. But that is the problem.”

  “It was a prophecy,” said Mma. “Namba was told he would never be king in his own land.”

  “Yes, that is it. It’s because everyone wants to be king. Even me. The moment Namba split away, it caused division. When Namba died, he left behind several lines. We don’t think of ourselves as one people. We think of ourselves as Kanyase or Lepo or Singbung. If we don’t stop, we’re going to keep being fractured.”

  “But we’ve always done things this way. And people moved because they wanted to make sure there was enough land for everyone.”

  Wurche knew there was no getting through to her grandmother, so she said nothing else. Mma pinched Wurche’s waist, as if to reassure her, but the gesture irked her.

  “I’m sure you’re worried about the wedding,” Mma said, whispering so Dramani wouldn’t hear. “What sunguru wouldn’t be? When we get to Dagbon, the woman there will take you into a room and tell you things about your husband. Please listen to them. I am glad I convinced Etuto that you needed to learn Dagbani from a young age. Now, they won’t be able to keep secrets from you.”

  Wurche grimaced at Mma’s allusion to her virginity. Sunguru. Young, unmarried girl. When Wurche was about twelve, Mma bought a woman from Salaga to do the housework. The woman had a daughter called Fatima, the same age as Wurche. Wurche and Fatima grew inseparable. One afternoon, they sat in the small forest by Kpembe, and after Wurche had concluded one of her earnest speeches to get Etuto to include her in his close circle, she collapsed in joy by Fatima’s side. She’d never forgotten the rush of accomplishment and love and promise she’d felt. Fatima’s applause had said it all. It was an excellent speech, on why women made good leaders. Jaji had just taught her about Aminah of Zazzau. She hugged Fatima and they held on to each other for a long time until their embrace grew bolder. Wurche felt a strong need for more, an urge to surrender to a hunger her body had suddenly developed. And so their bodies met and searched and grinded as if hoping to unlock something hidden, something primal. And when Wurche found the pleasurable pearl at the base of her belly, she couldn’t stop. She and Fatima searched each other’s bodies every chance they got. Until the day Mma caught them. Fatima and her mother were sent away and Mma hadn’t said a word about the incident since. Wurche was sure that Mma’s obsession with marrying her off had begun that day.

  “As I said, their customs are different from ours,” continued Mma. “If you were marrying a Gonja man, you’d be locked up for seven days. But I don’t know how it’s done in Dagbon. On the wedding night, please cry. Cry when you’re being paraded around. Cry when they present your husband to you. You’re too proud to cry. But I also know you are reluctant to be married. You just have to show it.”

  Sulemana galloped back.

  “We’re splitting up,” he said. “Etuto and the soldiers will take another way so they arrive in Dagbon faster. We’ll go the usual route.”

  The usual route was twelve hours of traveling, and when they arrived in Dagbon, they met a crowd of drummers, women ululating “Wuliwuliwuliwuli!” and children weaving between their horses and donkeys. The palaces there were whitewashed, like in Kpembe, but larger. Mma said even though she’d been to Dagbon several times, she couldn’t get over how much grander it was than Kpembe. Wurche herself had been a few times. It was grand, but she would much rather be in Salaga, which held people from all over the world. Dagbon was just a bigger Kpembe: full of pompous royals.

  “Our wife is here! Our wife is here,” sang the old women at the entrance.

&
nbsp; A group of girls approached Baki and helped Mma and Wurche off. They led Wurche as if she were a delicate flower, into a large room where three older women sat on plush cushions before a tray of kola on a mat. Mma sat by Wurche and hooked her arm around hers. The older women watched Wurche gravely, until another set of women came in and sat behind her, enclosing her and Mma. Wurche should have run away. She was stupid to try to bargain with Etuto and now it was too late.

  “We have to fatten her,” said one of the old women.

  “Yes, or he’ll crush her,” said a second.

  They continued watching her and Wurche, tired of being treated like a doll, said, “When is the wedding?” Mma pretended to pick something from Wurche’s dress and pinched her.

  “Ah,” said the first old woman, “impatient.”

  “Just impatient to get married to your son,” said Mma.

  “Well, we’re still setting the date,” said the second old woman, crunching into a chunk of kola. She sent the bowl around. “Let’s get you clean for dinner. After that, we’ll begin your lessons.”

  * * *

  —

  The mallams of Dagbon set the wedding for the day of the full moon, two weeks after Wurche’s family arrived. The elite of Dagbon assembled to celebrate the union of their son with the daughter of Gonja. Cows, sheep and goats were slaughtered; new clothes were woven; drums were beaten from twilight to morning. And Etuto seemed the happiest man alive. He didn’t look like a man about to fight for his life. He drank, ate one bite of meat after another, and had acquired a girl, not much older than Wurche, who kept supplying him with drinks. Wurche’s gaze flitted from her father to her husband-to-be. Adnan was a man who didn’t break rules, the old Dagbon ladies had told her. He would be a good family man. Loyal. A traditionalist. She watched him refuse calabashes of alcohol but accept well-wishers warmly, the flesh of his cheeks rising in orbs to smile at the people who greeted him. He was pleasant enough, handsome, some might even say. But, she couldn’t imagine sharing her bed with him.

  Wurche couldn’t eat, and everyone was soused with millet beer or too full to notice. Drummers pounced on their drums with increased momentum. One of them played with such skill he appeared to be wristless. His hand slapped the skin of his drum with the speed of a sunbird’s wings and he saw her looking. He approached her and rapped at the drum with everything he had. And she watched, entranced, almost forgetting where she was until she was seized from behind and dragged out of the circle of revelers. She was so startled she screamed and then, realizing what was happening, burst into tears. Mma would be pleased. She thrashed her arms and lashed at the person carrying her. She scratched the skin of the arm clamping her, and the person hit her hand and flipped her. The floor became ceiling and she saw the confused, cracked, bare feet of the people in the crowd. Some of the feet lifted up and down in tune with the drumming, others shuffled about with no rhythm, but when the feet grew purposeful, all pointing in the same direction, she knew it was over. She was carried into an incense-filled room and dropped onto the bed. Adnan sat across from her in light cotton trousers. The old ladies left the room and drew the curtain across the doorway.

  Wurche tried to calm down, thinking it could be pleasurable, that what the old ladies had said about pain wouldn’t apply to her. With Fatima, she’d learned of the places one had to pulse to get her heart racing. The old ladies had said to her, young men know where to put their hoses—any and everywhere. Steer him, make sure you are adequately prepared to receive him. A man like Adnan will not help, he will not take his time, he will not get you to your happy place before thinking of his pleasure. So prepare. And preparation begins in your mind. The imagination is a strong tool.

  So that night she summoned two spirits: Moro’s and Fatima’s. His lean dark body, her gentle yet eager fingers. That had to be adequate preparation. She splayed her legs on the white linen sheet, toes curling and flexing. And he didn’t wait. He pounced on her and ended her girlhood with such force she had to bite her tongue to clamp down the scream that would have escaped. It was excruciating. Moro and Fatima were long gone. She had become a pounding board. But then his face crumpled in worry; the expression seemed to ask if he should stop. Wurche encouraged him to go on. The old ladies had said to get the man to his happy place.

  When he stiffened above her and grunted, all she wanted was to hide in a forest. He walked out of the room. No tenderness. And not a minute had gone by before the old ladies barged in, yanking the white sheet under Wurche. Her badge of honor, proudly showing: a splotch of red.

  “Wuliwuliwuliwuli,” sang the old ladies.

  Aminah

  They walked and walked. The horsemen raided villages and led their captives to an unknown destination and, as their numbers grew, bound them around trees in rings like obscene jewelry. The horsemen stole cattle, sheep and goats, and mixed up their captives so they wouldn’t plot escapes. Aminah had managed to hold on to Hassana and Issa, whose skin clung to his bones, but they had lost Husseina. The horsemen had pried her from Hassana’s grip and tied her to another group of people. Every chance she got, Hassana craned forward till she could see her twin, and only then would she relax. Children and women were tied neck to neck, their hands free. The wrists of the men—there weren’t many of them—were bound with cord, and the strongest were restrained with wooden choke holds. Once, when a horseman was retying the cord around Hassana’s neck, she choked. Her skin almost turned purple, and only then did the horseman relent. Husseina had stuck her head out and didn’t break her gaze until the person behind her tripped over her.

  A man tried to run away. Aminah didn’t see the horsemen hang him, but in the bright morning light his slack body swayed from a tree, his feet dangling above the muddy soil. His hairless head, shaped like a cone of shea butter, rested against his right shoulder, his bare body gashed with lines of blood. The horsemen chatted around a fire. The smell of roasted meat wafted the way of the captives, digging into the emptiness in their bellies, into their nausea.

  “I hope they have nightmares,” Hassana shouted. With sunken eyes, she leered at the horsemen.

  “It’s okay,” said Aminah, trying to hush her. “It will get better.”

  Hassana stopped talking but her eyes were fixed on the dead man. Aminah didn’t think it was going to get better. She knew nothing, really. And she was wracked with guilt at possibly having enabled her mother’s death. She should have gone into Na’s hut to wake her up.

  One woman—also Gurma like Aminah’s people, but not from Botu—had said they were being sent to a lake with no beginning and no end. An infinite lake. She called it “big water.” Her weaver husband had gone south to sell in the markets and had seen these pitiful people chained to the fronts of houses. He was told they would be put in boats controlled by white men and sent on the infinite lake. Her husband was shaken by the whole thing; he stopped asking questions. The woman had gone to visit her mother when the raiders attacked her mother’s village. When they started tying her up, she knew her fate.

  At least she’d had some preparation. For the rest of the captives, it was like walking in the forest on a night with no moon. They groped, bumped into things. Wild animals lurked and, sometimes, the animals bit.

  A gust of wind sent the lifeless body swinging and wafted the smell of meat in Aminah’s direction. A lump pressed hard against her sternum, from inside her body. The muscles of her belly contracted and convulsed. Up came bitter liquid. She swallowed it, suppressed it. It was horrible. She’d never had to swallow vomit before.

  After the horsemen feasted, they poured water to quench their fire. They gave their porters the leftovers, and the porters gave some of their captured the bones and gristle. Issa didn’t eat the tiny morsel of meat Aminah gave him.

  Then the horsemen split into two groups. A porter ran along the file, counted up to a point and cut the cord. The group ahead of Aminah, Issa, and Hassana went to the lef
t. That group included Husseina. They walked until the tall grass swallowed them. Where were they going? Would the two groups reunite? Aminah wanted to chase after them to get Husseina back, and just as she thought this, a shriek cut all the noises around to silence. It came from Hassana. Her scream froze blood. She doubled over, folded her arms over her belly, and wouldn’t stop. A horseman trotted over and yelled something at her. She was now curling into a ball on the ground, her nails digging into the red soil. The horseman dismounted and walloped her with his riding whip. She didn’t stop screaming. He kicked her ribs, but still she screamed. Only when a patch of red stained her dress, did Aminah break out of her trance. She fell to the ground and wrapped her little sister with her body and tried to stop the shrill scream by covering her mouth. The man’s riding whip whacked Aminah’s body until Hassana quieted down.

  Hassana whimpered all afternoon. Aminah had lied; it wasn’t getting better.

  * * *

  —

  The captives tried to function as one. They urinated and emptied their bowels at the same time, under watchful eyes. When they were given food, they made sure everyone got at least a small piece. But it was impossible to stay united in such conditions. Some of them were in more pain than others. Issa struggled to walk, slowing down everyone behind him. Aminah begged one of the porters to let her carry him even though she herself had very little strength. He now weighed next to nothing.

  After walking for what must have been a week, like they were never going to stop, they arrived at a place unlike any other they had crossed. Rocks jutted up from the ground and trees grew everywhere. Okra-green grass carpeted the land, and even in her despair, Aminah found the green fresh and beautiful, the rocks mesmerizing. Not far off, vultures flew in circles. The horsemen dismounted, trussed up their stolen sheep and goats, and led the captives towards clusters of large rocks and trees with gnarly crowns. On a large boulder, people were gathered, eating. Aminah’s heart pinched itself in what must have been excitement—the first time in a long time she had felt any hope. Perhaps that was the group that had left first. They could be reunited with Husseina after all. Aminah watched Hassana, but said nothing. Her reddened eyes stared ahead, focused on nothing in particular, as if she were sleepwalking. If they died, would they become spirit walkers? She had to stop herself from thinking like that. She pressed Hassana’s hand—to transmit that something good might be on its way, but also to convince herself.