Chapter 8

Iditan scoffed, staring death at me before shifting her gaze away.

Succeeded in what? Making a fool of me? I passed a glance at the two of them.

“That’s more like it. I knew you could do it.” Oniko came towards me.

 “You planned this?” I asked.

He smiled warmly. “We are hard pressed for time and it will have taken us months to get you to where you just got to a few weeks.”

I frowned, angry at being played around. The cuts on my body slowly began to heal, itching as my torn clothes also come together.

“Now, all you need to do is try to replicate what you felt when you sparred with Iditan until you fully ignite your fighting spirit, and that can only come with more practice,” Oniko continued.

“Everyone come together.” Oniko waved us towards the shade under the trees.

“Wow! You should have seen yourself. You were so awesome.” Chike came up to my side, smiling wide. “I’m now scared at the thoughts of having a spar with you later.”

Oniko rounded up with us after commenting on our strengths and weaknesses—Iditan excluded—before dismissing them for the night. Like every other night since I started training, I spent the next thirty minutes alone with Oniko learning to wield my magic. This time, he taught me how to infuse magic in my attacks since I had already perfected the ability to morph into any animal; a bird, a mouse, a goat. Morphing was very easy actually, I only had to think about what I wanted to be and draw magic to make the change.

When I got back home it was 2:30 a.m. still very dark, although I had spent over six hours at Olofi after arriving there by 12:00 a.m. I slept off immediately I fell upon the bed despite the magic of Olofi that kept one refreshed and strengthened.

The following night, Iditan was not around. Oniko gave me some exercises, instructed Chike and Ramatu to spar, and he left us. Chike broke the spar some minutes later despite Ramatu’s protests that they continued, and came to join me.

“Hey,” Chike smiled wide, showing his yellow teeth.

“Hey.” I stopped what I was doing and smiled back as he took a seat before me. Ramatu joined us a moment later, grumbling.

“You’re such a spoilsport,” Chike turned to her. “We can’t just be training every other day, we also need to cut ourselves some slack.”

Ramatu scoffed, but she didn’t reply.

I studied the two of them, Chike especially who was also a black witch like Iditan but looked nothing like her. He was always jovial, so unlike the evil witches the blacks were renowned to be. Ramatu on the other hand was a stickler for rules and order from the little I knew about her, a typical red witch.

“You seem to be having a hard time with the devil’s spawn,” Chike began.

I raised an eyebrow. “Devil’s spawn?”                   

“Iditan of course. That’s what they all call her.”

“Why don’t you say that in front of her, or better still in front of the black matron who spawned her?” Ramatu coldly interjected.

Chike chuckled. “You know I’m not that brave.”

“Wait, the Black matron is Iditan’s mother?” I cut in, shocked. I couldn’t imagine that wicked old crone who nearly made me choke to death on fear the first day I saw her having a child as young as Iditan.

“Yes, she took her in as a child.”

“Wow!” hearing this made Iditan seems all the more mystifying. “Tell me more,” I pressed.

Chike frowned for a moment and shrugged. “The rumors were that her parent abandoned her during birth and the black matron took her in sensing then that she was a very powerful witch. When they later found out that she was one of the guardians and not a mere witchlord the black matron began bringing her to Olofi as soon as she could walk, now making her transport her all over Africa as a show of power.”

“Chike!” Ramatu hissed.

Chike turned to her, smirking. “It’s the truth isn’t it? While others travel through the void to get to other places both far and near, the black matron uses Iditan to open portals directly down there which is taxing in itself, and I’m sure the reason why Iditan is not here right now is because she has escorted the matron to one of those meetings.”

I drank every of his words, surprised at the many things I still didn’t seem to know.

“I think that’s enough now, let’s talk about some other thing,” Ramatu cut in.

“How about we talk about your crush on her boyfriend, Ahmed, then?” Chike said.

“You—” Ramatu stood up, glaring daggers at Chike.

Chike chuckled at her reaction.

“Who is Ahmed?” I eyed the two of them.

“He is also a witchlord, a white witch, and his father is on the council of elders,” Chike explained with a slight frown on his face. “Ahmed also joined when he was barely more than two. He and Iditan were the only witchlords then.”

I raised my brows. “How do you know all these? And why is Ahmed not here now?”

Chike shrugged. “My grandmother is also on the council, and despite the fact that my own powers as a witch lord came in late, a year ago about the same time as Ramatu here, I used to come here once in a while. Ahmed on the other hand is currently in Italy with witchlords from other countries, shadowing the ancient vampire covens there to learn their contributions to our current straits.”

“Are we just going to gossip all night? If Oniko meets us like this he won’t take kindly to it.” Ramatu cut in again. “We—”

“Then go train all by yourself.” Chike waved her away, dismissively.

“Toke!” I jolted as I felt a sharp call from far away. It was Oniko.

“Yes?”

“Meet me at the forest outside the ancient training grounds right now.” His voice was insistent and urgent.

“I have to go.” I turned to Chike, standing up sharply.

I held the thoughts of flying in my mind, drawing my magic, and in a second I’m in the air, an eagle soaring into the sky.

I didn’t meet Oniko when I got outside the forest, but the vice captain of the Nighthawks, Damola, and two other younger nighthawks. She was a young woman around eighteen, slender, with the gentle poise of an average Sunday school teacher, and I heard that she took on the post of vice captain about three months back after her father who was the then vice captain and some other Nighthawks were ambushed and killed by cursed ones. Since then she has been after the cursed ones with a vengeance, leading the nighthawks into majority of their battles.

“We got information of cursed ones sightings from one of our covens and Oniko has gone first with the red matron and others,” Damola explained. “I’ll be taking you there now, it’s time you saw for yourselves what we are up against.”

 I was going to battle! My eyes widened, and my heart began to race fast.

Damola brought out a brown feather. “You know what this is?”

I stared at the feather in her hand. Although I sensed magic on it, I saw nothing else. “A feather?” I stated the obvious.

“This is a token. If any witch gives you their token, then it can make it easier for you to find them and open a portal that can bring you directly to where they are or a little ways off from their location.” She explained. “As a witchlord you can open a portal to anyone or anywhere if you know them or where you are heading to, but it is best to use a token.”

I received the feather as Damola passed it over.

“Oniko said you must be the one to open a portal to take us there,” Damola said.

I’m not new to opening portals since I used one to come to Olofi and back every night, but it was my first time trying to use a token to open one. I closed my eyes, sensing the magic in the feather. I felt Oniko, it was his token. I instinctively drew magic, picturing opening a door with him just behind it. I opened my eyes as the portal opened a second later, feeling proud of getting it at first try.

“Wait!” Damola stopped me as I tried to step through the portal. She chanted softly and waved at the portal. I felt her magic entering into it, shaping and strengthening it, making me see how fragile the portal I had made was.

“Now we can enter safely without getting lost in the void for some twenty or so years,” Damola said, leading the other two nighthawks beside her in.

We were thrown into the middle of the battle as we got through the portal, I had opened it too close to the battle. The fight was on the streets before a small bungalow building, and there was a tiny fog of magic over the area which screened of the sounds from getting out and made all the humans in the vicinity asleep.

“Get far away from here, to safety!” Damola commanded as soon as we stepped out.

One of the two nighthawks Damola brought suddenly screamed as a hand pierced through his body, ending his Life. It was so sudden, so unexpected. Damola screamed and fell upon the cursed one in rage. The other nighthawk morphed and took to the air immediately.

The sudden death I just witnessed made me unable to move. I stood there, lost in terror, a perfect prey for the enemy. When my mind finally cleared a little, I nearly puked at the sight that hit my eyes—seeing everything clearly even through even under the thick cover of darkness.