₦airaland Forum

PAPINA
Eyes shut, she reflexively reached for her phone. It wasn't at it's usual position near her pillow. There wasn't even any pillow. She opened her eyes and the memories came crashing though the small window of her consciousness, shooting shards of confusion at her sanity.

She tried to remember each face she had seen, so if she ever got rescued, she would have good descriptions for the police. It was the right thing to do when kidnapped. She was sure this was a case of kidnap. It had to be, though it felt weirder the more she thought of it.

She had been chatting last night with her phone, on her own bed, and probably had fallen asleep. Or was it last night? It was the last thing she could remember. Everything after that was a blur, until the point where she had woke up in this strange place.

There was the short man with a missing right ear, who did not seem at all dangerous. He had even looked frightened and confused when she had asked where she was, then he had spoken in that strange language to the children by her bed,before hurrying out to call the unkept old man.

There was something about the old man that was as intriguing as it was unsettling, like he was the only one who understood her. Maybe it was the way he looked calm and unsurprised, in stark contrast with the others. He had stared deep in her eyes, and even as she thought about it now, she was not sure how she had felt.

The huge man with a woven helmet of animal skin, raffia and the small straight horns of a strange animal, seemed to be the leader. Seven horns in total, or so she had counted. Dressed in a thick garment made of the skin of different animals, he looked fearsome. His eyes though fierce had a bit of tenderness to them when he looked at her. Maybe he pitied her.

Where on earth did she awaken? What did they want her for? How did they manage to kidnap her from her own room? The questions were endless. She made a resolve to tell her story in her blog, if she survived it. She had often told in her blog, fictional tales of survival in which she starred, and she had won many fans and followers. G-girl the Ultimate Survivor, someone had tagged her and it had quickly stuck. This felt different from her stories in every way imaginable. This was real.

The two children had looked as harmless as they looked alike, and they pretty much looked alike. Though dressed in strange garments, there was something about them that reminded her of her little cousin Bolu. It had been a while since they last saw. If she survived this, she...

Heck! She had to stop wishing and start acting. Besides herself, no one was in the strange room. She eased out of the low bed and planted her bare feet on the hard mud floor. It took some seconds for the dizzy feeling to fade. The closest thing to a footwear was too strange looking to slip her feet in. She decided to go barefoot. All the better for stealth.

First she had to know where she was, whether in the middle of a jungle, or the outskirt of some city. G-girl was a survivor anywhere, she told herself, and hitching up her long brown gown for easier movement, she tiptoed toward the door.

It was clear, unmistakable. He turned back to face the children, and Papina spoke again. Not the usual unintelligible attempt at speech for which she had been named, not with her hands, and certainly not a language he had ever heard before.

Confusion was starting to weigh down on his mind. The twins looked at him, then back at Papina. His eyes followed theirs and like the confused moment, the silence was shared.

The girl still sat huddled, and though her fingers had relaxed on the wrapper covering her bed, she still looked frightened.

The room suddenly felt small and airless, he had to get out.

"Wait for me" he repeated his instruction and hurried his short thickset frame out of the room, questions bumping against each other and the walls of his mind.

With the chief busy, there was only one place to go. It was no use sending any of the younger servants.

He found the grey haired healer at the entrance to his home. The old man sat on a log and stared into the sky, his face vacant for expression. Adaba was grateful their eyes did not have to meet.

"What do you want?" the old man queried, still staring at the sky.

'Get up and follow me, crazy old man, I can't explain' Adaba thought. He said nothing.

"Crazy men see farther than the sane, and some men without ears see nothing at all." the old man continued, as if he had read the younger man's mind. "I will follow you alright. I would need to see her for myself."

Adaba, shrugged off his embarrassment and stood in silence as the old man got up and walked into his aged house.

There were only a few men older than Lai Siya in the whole of Azagba, Adaba was sure, and none with a quicker tongue. No one knew the healing art as much or had half as much a reputation.

Adaba had never felt comfortable with the old man, especially with the way his aged eyes seemed to stare deep into his eyes as if searching for something. It was not for nothing that some called him the Eye That Sees.

When they entered Papina's room, Chief Xo was already there. Ko Mari stood with the twins who did not seem to have left the spot he last saw them. Papina sat, her back to the wall, hands folded across her chest. She looked more relaxed now.

"What's the matter with my daughter?" the chief demanded as they entered. Adaba was not sure who he was asking. He racked his brain for an answer.

"I was hoping I would be the one to ask you that, seeing that I met you here." Lai retorted, his incomplete brown set of teeth on full display.

"I was told..." the Chief started to explain.

"I know what you were told" Lai cut in. Adaba flinched. No one cut the Chief shut, no one dared stand up to him without facing his wrath, even the other chiefs, Adaba suspected.

Chief Xo did not reply. When he looked at his daughter and back at the old man, Adaba could see a hint of helplessness in his eyes.

The old man walked past him towards Papina. The girl did not try to back away. She gazed like someone entranced, and broke the stare with a gasp, her breath heavy.

Lai turned toward the chief. Maybe it was untrue that men without ears see nothing at all, Adaba thought, because even with his one ear, he was sure he saw fear in the old man's eyes.

"Xo" Lai spoke, his voice strained, "that... That is not her."

Adaba
Whether the room fell silent when he walked in, or it had already been silent before he walked in, Adaba could not tell. Zima and Zamo stood near the bed, and Papina sat huddled, her hands clutching the wrapper spread over her straw and bamboo bed, and her back pressed against the wall as if attempting to get as far away from them as possible.

"What happened?" Adaba asked the twins standing by, taking a few steps towards Papina, trying to sign to her. The girl tensed up and tried in vain to back away, her eyes wide in horror.

"She... She spoke" Zima replied, her face the perfect mirror of fright.

"Another language" Zamo added in his usual slurred manner. He did not seem distressed.

"Where's Baba?" Zima asked as if his presence counted for nothing. Well it did not count for much, he knew, for he was just as confused as the children. Papina could not have spoken, and besides the 'paaap' sound she made while trying to sign her thoughts, she had never spoken since she was born.

Did she cry when born? Adaba could not remember. He made a mental note to ask Ko Mari later. She had been there. It had been a solemn day, the baby was beautiful, but she belonged to the Mountain Abode as a first child.

Chief Jala Xo had been too heartbroken to name her, or maybe he did, Adaba could not remember either. He hardly every remembered so much at a time. He had a feeling it truly had something to do with his missing right ear, as some said.

'If you don't have complete ears, how would you remember the little you hear?' was a common saying. He had lost it when attacked once by a mountain cat on a hunt. He had killed the animal and had kept its fur of brown, but never got his ear back.

Whatever name the child had been given, if she was given, was never used. It was the way of the people of Azagba, for it was well-known that a first child unnamed was easier to let go.

From an orphan boy taken into the household of Chief Xo's father, also a spiked Chief, Adaba had risen to become the head of Xo's servants, a trusted confidante and a personal protector of the children. He had watched them grow and had loved them as his own, but as he watched the frightened children, he felt unusually helpless.

Their father was away heading an early meeting of the council of spiked chiefs, so Adaba had to act quickly.

"Wait here with her, I'm coming" he instructed the children.

As he turned to leave, he heard it.

He froze.

Lol. Divepen. I hope nothing happens to her too, but I have no idea what's going to happen yet. Let's see how the story unfolds.

Thanks for stopping by

Zima
Zima yawned, then stretched, and her fingers wandered again to the tiny swollen spots on her arms. A quick scratch would give quick relief, until she had to scratch them again.

The sand flies had made short work of her little fleshy arms, yet she had not wanted to leave her unfinished foot caves and the miniature near-replica of the Abode she made with her playmates. The miniature Abode was the largest of the foot caves they had made, and yesterday like the many times before it, she had the privilege of trampling on it and retrieving from it stick figures of people hidden in it. Her skinny playmates liked to pretend they were generous, but she had not forgotten the fight that had birthed that tradition. She had won of course.

It was a game they had always played, though no one ever thought to ask what it meant. Once, her father had watched them with a startled expression mixed with recognition, but afterwards had walked away without scolding her. She was not in trouble then, Zima knew.

She examined her arms. The little lumps were not visible when Papina had dragged her away after she trampled on the large footcave. She had not gotten to rescue the people in it. The stick people would die inside if they weren't removed, she had protested, trying to sign with her free arm, but Papina had not paid any attention. Zima had gone to bed a sad little girl.

The early morning air was chilly, like it had rained at night. Zima wondered if the stick people could still be rescued from the wet sand. They would have been dead anyway.

The frustration was starting to rise again. Why was her sister so difficult to reason with? As if it was not bad enough that Papina couldn't speak or hear, she had a certain iron-will about her choices, and Zima had to suffer it the most.

Mama would have been kinder, she knew, although she had barely known her mother. Baba always talked about her, and each time he did, it was easy to see how much he had loved her and how flawless she had been. It was said that she died of snake bite before the healer could help. Baba had never married another wife, although every other spiked chief had at least two wives. He alone among the chiefs had seven spikes on his cap, he alone had no wife.

Zima stepped out of her little room, and after a glance at her sister's room just next to hers, made her way towards the end of the open space where they stored clean water in a covered receptacle dug into the ground.

The day had slowly started to peel off its robe of darkness. Papina would still be asleep. She was a bit withdrawn these days. Zamo was awake already. Zima never doubted her uncanny ability to tell what her twin brother was up to or how he felt. He also could say the same about her.

After years of being driven away from the fireplace, today was the day she'd finally start to learn to cook and she had to get ready early. Ko Mari had told her the good news yesterday. The Ko was in charge of the kitchens and knew how to cook any meal known to humans. Zima could feel excitement course through her veins.

Baba had once had told her why the elderly woman was a 'ko' and not a 'ka' as married women were addressed - Ko Mari had never been married. Zima had not asked why, but as she washed her face and chewed her mouth stick, she wondered why Baba had not married her. She would have been a good mother, and Papina would not have to...

Her thoughts were pierced by a blood-curling scream. She could have sworn it sounded like...

It could not be!!

She raced towards Papina's room.