ORIGIN - Chapter Five

The sun rose as morning pulled its way through the darkness. Echi got up as soon as the first ray of light hit his eyes. He turned to check if Olanna was still on the bamboo bed. He grinned. She was still there with her eyes closed tightly, like a memorial corpse.

“We will be late for the sacrifice if you don’t get up from this bed,” Echi said.

Olanna got up with a wry smile. She greeted Echi with the sweetest voice he had ever heard. When he spoke about the sacrifice, she did not refuse or complain. Instead, she prepared a cold bath for him to his astonishment. After he finished taking his bath, he rubbed his body with palm kernel oil and watched as the liquid rose and fell on his body. His happiness increased when Olanna prepared his favorite food, bitter leaf soup, and fufu.

After the meal, he washed his hands and stuck a chewing stick in his mouth. He took a short walk to the backyard to observe the yams he had planted some months ago, to see if they were flourishing. They seemed to be growing fatter every day, in his eyes. When he came back, he found Olanna cleaning the place where he had eaten.

“You have to hurry before the cock crows,” Echi said.

“I will soon be done with this.”

Echi strolled to Uchendu’s hut, to ask him if he could accompany them to Isiewu’s shrine for the sacrifices. He felt that the presence of another man would ease the tension when the sacrifice is being carried out. He returned with Uchendu and found Olanna sitting with her head bent. Deep inside him, he was grateful that Olanna did not consider running away again.

“Let us go,” Echi said as soon as she was done, and she obeyed.

Echi and Uchendu shuffled along the same path silently as they headed towards Isiewu’s shrine. The shrine where Olanna was to sacrifice herself for the good of Echi’s name. Olanna was behind them; she seemed lost in thought. After some noiseless period of time, Uchendu was able to engage Echi in a discussion. They talked about the impact the sacrifice would make on Olanna.

“How will you train those children?” Uchendu asked.

“My mother will help me.”

Uchendu rubbed his lower jaw with the tip of his index finger.

“Tell me the truth, my friend.” Uchendu lowered his index finger. “Do you really want your wife to die?”

Echi paused and looked back and saw Olanna trailing behind them. He turned back and drew Uchendu to a lonely side of the path where he knew she couldn’t hear their voices.

“If you have a solution to your problem, wouldn’t you take it?”

“I thought you loved Olanna.”

“What is love when there are no children to show. If your wife refuse to bear you children, will you still love her? If you are in my position, would you let your wife live?”

Uchendu did not answer. His lips were pressed tightly as if someone had placed a curse on them to be shut forever.

“When you are in a situation like this, love is not an option,” Echi added.

They kept quiet and continued their journey until they reached the shrine. They saw Isiewu cursing some ancient spirits they could not see, for failing to do the work he assigned them to do as they arrived at the shrine.

“Wait here! Your feet are unholy to enter the sacred ground of this shrine,” Isiewu instructed.

He rushed inside to get his goatskin bag and came back immediately with his eyes painted black. He gave them something to drink and told them to sit.

“Woman, drink that thing fast.” Isiewu’s voice was harsh.

Olanna was reluctant to drink the substance Isiewu gave them, but when she saw her husband and Uchendu drinking it, she drank too. When she finished, Isiewu ordered her to go inside and get ready for the sacrifice while he prepared everything needed. He heated some palm oil with some herbs and placed the concoction in a round calabash.

“You can stand up now,” Isiewu said as he entered the shrine with the concoction. “I have very simple instructions for you. It is for your own good. You must not move your body unless this sacrifice will be a waste, and the possibility of you getting pregnant will be very low. Do you understand me?”

“Yes! Eye of the gods.”

The hot concoction hit her body with sharp pain. She stood transfixed in a spot as she watched the hot fluid flow on its bitter journey around her body. She closed her eyes as it went down her back, whipping every stubborn edge that refused to allow it to gain safe passage.

“Be still. Remember, this will be a waste if you move.”

Isiewu ended the sacrifice by hitting her head with the feathers of an eagle before washing the concoction from her body with cold water.

“Eye of the gods! May you continue to live longer as you continue your good works,” Echi said as he entered the shrine.

“May it be so,” Isiewu replied.

“You will never run dry of your power.”

“May it be so.”

“May the gods continue to give you more powers.”

“May it be so,” Isiewu replied, and they both laughed.

Isiewu gave them some charms to carry home. He told Echi to bury the charm behind his barn by midnight carefully.

“Make sure that no man in this village sees you as you are burying the charm. Our enemies live among us, even in the form of crawling lizards.”

“I will do as you say. The gods will bless you for everything you have done for me and my wife,” said Echi.

“They will surely bless me because I am doing their work. I am like an empty drum that is waiting to be touched by the hands of the wise gods. I can only make a sound when they desire to hear what is within. Go in peace and not in pieces.”

Isiewu bade them goodbye with brown teeth as they returned home with a half-burnt Olanna who was not smiling.

“Are you happy now that the sacrifice has been done?” Olanna startled Echi.

“I am only pleased that we came back home safely with good news and not bad news. It is hard to sleep with some peace in mind.” 

“Are you not going to miss me when I am gone?”

“I will miss you, my wife. Is it easy to find love these days when the rain gets angry at every fall?”

Three months passed, and still, there were no children. There were no children to play around and fill the compound with their giggling and happy tears. Echi got up from one of his unusually disturbing sleep, looking worried and deserted like a goat sent to the stream with no master. He looked at Olanna’s body. The scars of the sacrifice were vivid with clear memories of a bad decision made or a good decision that did not follow the proper procedure. He turned to take a look at her stomach, already knowing what his eyes would meet. Flat, empty, and her dark skin stared back at him.

Where is the child inside her hiding? 

He got up with a heavy heart and walked towards the threshold. He stood there, thinking, till his mother came with the same constant demand for a child. As usual, she wore her angry face with a cloud of disgust in it. “You are a fool. You are a big fool, my son.”

“Mother! what did you just call me?”

“I called you a fool. In fact, you are one of the biggest fools that I have known in my entire life.”

Echi kept quiet and looked at his mother. He was trying hard not to use the wrong words.

“Mother!”

“Yes, my son.”

“I have heard all you have to say. Now, leave me alone.”

Echi’s mother sighed and looked at him, probably wondering if he knew the implications of what he just said.

“Are you sending me away from your own house?” she asked.

“If sending you away will ease the pain in my mind, then I will politely do it.”

“My first son! May my spirit forgive you for sending me away.” She propelled her fist forward towards the sky and repeated the same words again then she clenched the edge of her wrapper. “May my spirit forgive you for this act of foolishness,” she repeated, and left.