Who Fears Death

  She’d kept her voice low but she looked ready to jump me. “What is wrong with you?” she said kneeling beside me.

  I looked up from the stew of hare and cactus I was stirring, irritated by her tone. “You’re invading my space, Diti.”

  She moved closer. “We all hear you two every night! You’re like desert hares. If you don’t watch yourself, there will be more than six of us arriving in the West. No one will take well to an Ewu baby of Ewu parents.”

  It took everything in my power not to smack her across the face with my wooden spoon. “Step away from me,” I warned.

  “No,” she said but she looked afraid. “I’m-I’m sorry.” She touched my shoulder and I looked at her hand. She took it away. “You don’t have to flaunt it, Onye.”

  “What are you . . .”

  “If you’ve mastered all this sorcery, why don’t you cure us?” she said. “Or are you the only woman here allowed to enjoy intercourse?”

  Before I could speak, Luyu came running. “Hey!” she said, pointing behind us. “Hey! What is that?”

  We turned. Were my eyes deceiving me? A pack of sand-colored wild dogs were running so fast toward us that they kicked up a wake of dust. Flanking the dogs were two shaggy, single-humped camels and five gazelles with long spiraling horns. Above them flew seven hawks. “Leave everything!” I shouted. “Run!”

  Diti, Fanasi, and Luyu took off, dragging a stunned Binta along.

  “Mwita, come on!” I shouted, when he still hadn’t come out of our tent where I knew he was napping. I unzipped the flap. He was still deep in sleep. “Mwita!” I screamed, the pounding of hooves drowning everything out.

  His eyes cracked opened. They grew wide. He grabbed me to him as they came. We curled into each other as tightly as we could as the large beasts pounded throughout camp. The dogs went for my stew, dragging the pot away from the fire, despite the heat. The gazelles and camels rooted around in the tents. Mwita and I were silent as they stuck their heads into our tent and took what they wanted. One of the camels found my store of cactus candy. It stared at us as it munched the fruit with what only could have been pleasure. I cursed.

  Another camel stuck its muzzle into a bucket and lapped up all the water. The hawks swooped down, snatching up the hare meat Diti and Binta were drying. When they finished, the united animals trotted off.

  “Rule one of the rules of the desert,” I said crawling out of the tent. “Never turn down a travel companion if it doesn’t plan to eat you. I wonder how long those animals have been working together like that.”

  “Fanasi and I will have to go hunting tonight,” Mwita said.

  Luyu, Diti, Binta, and Fanasi came walking back looking angry.

  “We should kill and eat all of them,” Binta said.

  “You attack one and they’ll all attack you,” I said.

  We salvaged whatever food we could, which wasn’t much. That evening, Fanasi, Mwita, and Luyu, who’d insisted on accompanying them, set out to hunt and gather. Diti avoided me by playing a game of Warri with Binta. I warmed some water for a much needed bath. As I stood behind my tent in the dark and poured the warm water on myself, a fly bit me on the arm. Part of the rock fire’s juju was to keep biting insects away but once in a while an insect snuck in. I smashed it on my ankle. It exploded into a smear of blood.

  “Ugh,” I said, washing it off. The bite was already turning bright red. The slightest slap or insect bite always turns my skin redder than normal. It was the same with Mwita. Ewu skin is sensitive in that way. I quickly finished washing.

  That night, I noticed that Diti slept in Binta’s tent. She and Fanasi could no longer sleep in each other’s arms. It was that bad.

  CHAPTER 31

  I KNEW ABOUT THE TOWN HOURS before we got to it. While everyone slept, I had gone flying as a vulture. I flew for miles, riding the cool wind. I needed to think about Diti’s request. I should have known how to break the Eleventh Rite juju. That was the most frustrating part of it. I couldn’t think of a chant, combination of herbs, or use of objects that would work. Aro would have laughed at and insulted my slowness. But I didn’t want to hurt my friends with a mistake.

  The winds carried me west and that was how I happened across the town. I saw well-built sandstone buildings glowing with electric lights and cooking fires. A paved road ran through the town from south to north, disappearing in both directions into the darkness. The north was puckered with small hills and one large hill topped with a house lit brightly from within. When I got back to the camp, I woke Mwita and told him about the town.

  “There shouldn’t be a town here at all,” he said, looking at the map.

  I shrugged. “Maybe the map’s too old.”

  “That town sounds established. The map can’t be that old.” He cursed. “I think we’re off course. We need to find out the name. How far is it?”

  “We’ll get there by the end of the day.”

  Mwita nodded.

  “We’re not ready, Mwita.”

  “We just got robbed of all our food by a pack of animals,” he said.

  “You know how dangerous it can be.” I touch the scar on my forehead. “We should go around it and never mention it. We can find food along the way.”

  “I hear you,” he said. “I just don’t agree with you.”

  I sucked my teeth and looked away.

  “It’s not right to keep them in the dark,” he said.

  “How much in the dark have you kept Fanasi?” I asked.

  He cocked his head and smiled.

  “Luyu suspects you,” I said.

  He nodded. “That girl has a sharp eye and ear.” He leaned back on his elbows. “He asks questions. I answer them when I want to.”

  “What questions?”

  “Have trust,” he said. “And let go some. We’re all involved.”

  We came within a mile of the town by the end of the day. Mwita collected stones for a rock fire. We washed and ate, and then sat before the fire and eventually grew quiet. Fanasi and Diti sat close to one another, but Diti kept pushing his arm from her waist. Luyu spoke first. “We don’t have to go there. That’s what’s on all our minds, right?”

  Mwita glanced at me.

  “We’ve been traveling for weeks now,” Luyu continued. “That’s not long. I don’t know how long it will take us to get to the . . . badness. We’ve all been saying about five months or so, but anything can happen along the way to delay us. So, I say we toughen up. Let’s keep going.”

  “I want some real food,” Binta angrily said. “Like fufu and egusi soup, pepper soup with real peppers instead of weird tasting spicy cactus! We’ll eventually have to ‘toughen up’ anyway. In the morning, we should buy what we need and move on.”

  “I agree with Binta,” Diti said. “No offense, everyone, but I wouldn’t mind seeing some different faces, even for a few hours.”

  Fanasi glared at her. “We should keep going,” he said. “There could be trouble there and we have no pressing need to risk it.”

  Luyu nodded vigorously at Fanasi and they smiled at each other. Diti moved away from Fanasi, mumbling something. He rolled his eyes.

  “I wouldn’t mind seeing a new town,” Mwita said. I frowned at him. “But we’ll have plenty of opportunity for that in the future,” he continued. “And yes, it could be dangerous. Especially for Onye and me. Soon we’ll be so far from home that the very air we breathe will be new. It’s only going to get more dangerous . . . for us all. But I will say this, there is no town mentioned on my map here, so we’re either off course or my map’s wrong. I propose that Fanasi and I go to find out the town’s name and then immediately return.”

  “Why you?” Diti asked. “You’ll attract too much attention. Fanasi and I will go.”

  “You two don’t seem to be getting along very well,” I said.

  Diti looked as if she wanted to bite me.

  “Okay, then Luyu and Fanasi,” Mwita said.

  “I say we ALL go,” Diti demanded.


  “It would be stupid not to,” Binta added.

  They all looked at me. My vote, if for going, would mean a tie.

  “I say we bypass the town.”

  “Of course you do,” Diti hissed. “You’re used to living like an animal in the sand. And you can let Mwita keep you warm at night.”

  I felt the blood rush to my face. I wondered how she’d become so stupid. I was used to Luyu, Diti, and Binta having, maybe not so much a respect, but a sort of fear of me. They were my friends and they loved me but there was something about me that made them shut up when it counted. “Diti,” I carefully said. “You tread in dangerous . . .”

  She jumped up, grabbed a handful of sand, and threw it in my face. I raised my hands just in time to protect my eyes. Mwita had taught me how to calm my emotions. Aro had taught me how to control and focus my emotions. I could feel anger and even fury but never would I blindly use what Aro had taught me. At least that was what he’d taught me. I was still in training. Without a thought and before Mwita could grab me, I launched myself at Diti, taking her square in the back as she turned to run. I only used physical strength to beat my friend. Aro and Mwita had taught me well.

  She screamed and kept trying to scramble away but I held her tightly. I flipped her over. She screeched again, slapping me in the face. I slapped her back even harder. I grabbed her hands, sitting on her chest. I held them together with my right hand and then proceeded to slap her face back and forth with my left. “You vapid whore! You diseased goat’s penis! You stupid idiotic breastless little girl. . . .”

  Tears flew from my eyes. Around me, the world swam. Then Fanasi was pulling me off her as he shouted, “Stop it! Stop it!” My attention focused on him. He was taller and stronger but I too was tall and strong. Physically, we weren’t so unevenly matched.

  My rage coiled in my chest, preparing to strike again. I was sick of these sentiments coming out of even the people that I loved. All it took was getting them angry. This is what made my mother and Mwita different from everyone else, even Aro. In their deepest rage, no such insults ever came from their lips. Never.

  Fanasi threw me to the ground. Mwita grabbed my arm before I could leap at Fanasi. He dragged me away. I let him. His touch had taken the spring from me. I needed Mwita on this journey so much.

  “Get a hold of yourself,” he said, looking down at me with disgust.

  Still breathing heavily, I turned and spat sand from my mouth. “What if I don’t want to?” I gasped. “What if that helps nothing?”

  He knelt down before me. “Then you keep doing it,” he said. He paused. “That is what will make you and me different. Different from the myth of the Ewu, different from those we’ll face in the West. Control, thought, and understanding.”

  I spat out more sand and let him pull me to my feet. Fanasi took Diti to their tent. I could hear her sobbing and Fanasi speaking softly. Binta sat outside the tent, listening and looking sadly at her hands in her lap.

  “You know why Diti is so angry,” Luyu said, walking up to me.

  “I don’t care,” I said, looking away. “There are more important things!”

  “You should care, if you want us to get to where we’re going,” Luyu said angrily.

  “Luyu,” Mwita said. “The state of your clitoris is small in comparison.” He motioned to his face. “Imagine being marked in this way. No matter where she and I go, that nonsense Diti spewed about Onyesonwu being used to “living like an animal,” that kind of thought is on everyone’s mind, Okeke or Nuru. We’re as hated as the desert.”

  Luyu looked down and mumbled. “I know.”

  “Then act like it,” Mwita snapped.

  The rest of the day was tense. So tense that Fanasi and Luyu thought it better that they go into the town tomorrow morning. It wasn’t the best time to leave me, Diti, and Binta alone with just Mwita there to break up a fight. But it was the best plan.

  An hour passed. Diti and Binta stuck close together, washing and sewing clothes. Fanasi and Mwita sat in the center of the tents, to keep an eye on us crazy women. Mwita was giving Fanasi lessons in the Nuru language. He’d also offered to teach Diti, Binta, and Luyu. Only Luyu agreed to eventually learn. Luyu hadn’t left my side since the fight.

  “You have to practice,” I said. We sat outside of my tent, facing the town. I was trying to teach her how to meditate.

  “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to clear my mind of all thoughts,” she said.

  “That’s what I used to think, too,” I said. “Have you ever woken up and for a few seconds not known who you were?”

  “Yeah,” Luyu said. “That’s always scared me.”

  “You don’t remember because you’re in a temporary state where you’ve cleared everything away and all that is left is you. Think of how you make yourself remember who you are when this happens.”

  “I remind myself of things,” she said. “Like what I’m supposed to do that day or what I want to do.”

  I nodded. “Yes. You fill your head with thoughts. Here’s something scary: If you don’t recognize yourself, then who is the one who reminds you of who you are?”

  Luyu stared blankly at me. She frowned. “Yeah, who is that?”

  I smiled. “I couldn’t sleep for a week after Mwita pointed that out to me.”

  “Any ideas about how to cure us of our forced chastity?” she asked after a moment.

  “No.”

  We were quiet again.

  “Sorry,” Luyu said after a while. “I’m selfish.”

  I sighed. “No. You’re not.” I shook my head. “All these things are important.”

  “Onye, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for what Diti said. I’m sorry that your father . . .”

  “I refuse to call him my father,” I said looking at her.

  “You’re right. I’m sorry,” Luyu carefully said. She paused. “He . . . he recorded it. He must have kept it.”

  I nodded. I didn’t doubt that at all. Never had.

  We ate dinner in silence and went to bed while the sun was still setting. Mwita watched me as I unbraided my long bushy hair. It was salted with sand from Diti’s bout of stupidity. I planned to brush it out and braid it into a large thick long braid until I got a chance to rebraid it into the many tiny braids I preferred.

  “Will you ever cut it?” Mwita asked, as I brushed.

  “No,” I said. “Don’t cut yours either.”

  “We’ll see,” he said, he tugged at the hair on his face. “I do like this beard.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “All wise men grow them.”

  I couldn’t sleep. “You’re used to living like an animal in the sand,” Diti had said. Her words burned inside me like regurgitated bile. And then the way Binta had crept after her. Binta hadn’t spoken to me since the fight. Delicately, I moved Mwita’s arm from my waist and slipped away from him. I retied my rapa and left the tent. I could hear Luyu snoring in her tent and Fanasi’s deep breathing in his. I heard nothing when I got to Diti and Binta’s tent. I looked inside. They were gone. I cursed.

  “Let’s just leave our things here while we go get them,” Luyu said.

  I squatted near the cooling rocks, brooding. Had they really thought they could sneak away and be back before we missed them? Or maybe they hadn’t intended to return at all. Stupid, stupid idiot women, I thought.

  Fanasi stood with his back to us. Where I was angry, Fanasi was distraught. He’d given up so much for Diti and she didn’t even take him along.

  “Fanasi,” I said, getting up. “We’ll find her.”

  “It’s still early,” Mwita said. “We pack everything, including Diti and Binta’s things, and go find them. When we do, we move on, no matter the hour.”

  Fanasi insisted on carrying most of Diti’s things, at least what she’d left. She’d taken her backpack and some small items. Mwita carried Binta’s rolled-up tent. We used the light from the town to make our way over the low hills. As we walked, I sang softly to the breeze. I stopp
ed singing. “Shh,” I said, holding up a hand.

  “What?” Luyu whispered.

  “Just wait.”

  “I’ve got my palm-light handy,” Mwita said.

  “No, just wait.” I paused. “We’re being followed. No noise. Relax.” I heard it again. Soft padding. Just behind me. “Mwita, your light,” I said.

  The moment he flipped it on, Luyu screeched and ran to me. She tripped over her feet and ran into me hard enough to knock me over. “It’s . . . it’s . . .” she babbled, scrambling over me as she looked back.

  “Just wild camels,” I said, pushing her off me and getting up.

  “It licked my ear!” she shouted, rubbing vigorously at her very wet ear and hair.

  “Yeah, that’s because you sweat all the time and you need a bath,” I said. “They like salt.” There were three of them. The one closest to me grumbled low in its throat. Luyu cowered close to me. I couldn’t fully blame her after the animal tribe attack we’d suffered.

  “Hold the light up,” I told Mwita.

  They each had two large humps and their fur was thick and dusty. They were healthy. The one nearest to me gruffed some more and took three aggressive steps toward me. Luyu whooped and scrambled behind me. I stood my ground. My singing had attracted them.

  “What do they want?” Fanasi said.

  “Shh,” I said. Slowly, Mwita moved in front of me. The camel approached him, bringing its soft face to his and sniffing. The other camels did the same. Mwita had just established his relationship with me to the camels and they understood—the male protects the female. He is the one to negotiate with. I admit it was good to have someone step in front of me for a change.

  “They mean to travel with us a way,” Mwita said.

  “I figured that,” I said.