Children of the Shadows: Unearthing the Ritual

By C.C. Uzoh

With her only son murdered in a banned sacrificial ritual, Nkem flees with her young daughter, Obiageli, to find her king and bring her abusive husband to justice. However, it quickly becomes clear that the powerful, oppressive, and malefic king had allowed the brutal ritual to continue—including the sacrifice of his own son—and Nkem becomes the hunted. As Nkem tries to find sanctuary, aided by the king’s sympathetic head henchman, Odera, her dead son, Dike, reaches out to her from the spirit world to comfort and protect her in any way he can. Children of the Shadows: Unearthing the Ritual is the first in a trilogy that explores an ancient ritual still practiced in some African countries to this day and one woman’s fight for justice and peace for the innocent child victims.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Feb 29, 2020
• ISBN: 9781645368960

C.C. Uzoh

Author C. C. Uzoh, is a Nigerian-born British who originally hails from southeastern Nigeria where he draws his knowledge of the rituals portrayed in this book. The trilogy, which will continue in Children of the Shadows: Firmness of Purpose to conclude in Children of the Shadows: The Never-ending Fear, is intended to raise awareness of this barbaric practice, which while illegal under the African Charter, is still being pursued in the twenty-first century. He lives with his family in Kleinburg, Ontario, Canada.

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About the Author

Author C. C. Uzoh, is a Nigerian-born British who originally hails from southeastern Nigeria where he draws his knowledge of the rituals portrayed in this book. The trilogy, which will continue in Children of the Shadows: Firmness of Purpose to conclude in Children of the Shadows: The Never-ending Fear, is intended to raise awareness of this barbaric practice, which while illegal under the African Charter, is still being pursued in the twenty-first century. He lives with his family in Kleinburg, Ontario, Canada.

Dedication

My inspiration comes first and foremost from Jesus, the author and finisher of my faith, and all the glory be to God in the highest.

I dedicate this book to the children who are special to me: Orla, Naeto, Ary, Adaorah, Lauren, Mimi, Urenna, Korinne, Kamsi, and Eli who were children at the time of writing this book; as well as all the children of the world. You are all capable of greatness.

Then Jesus called for the children and said to the disciples, Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children…

-   Luke 18:16

Of all the things you choose in life, you don’t get to choose what your nightmares are. You don’t pick them; they pick you.

-   John Irving

As arrows in the hand of a mighty warrior, so are the children of one’s youth. Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them; he shall not be ashamed when he speaks with the enemies at the gate.

-   Psalm 127:4–5

Copyright Information ©

C. C. Uzoh (2020)

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher.

Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Ordering Information

Quantity sales: special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address below.

Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication data

Uzoh, C. C.

Children of the Shadows: Unearthing the Ritual

ISBN 9781645363521 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781645363538 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781645368960 (ePub e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020902286

www.austinmacauley.com/us

First Published (2020)

Austin Macauley Publishers LLC

40 Wall Street, 28th Floor

New York, NY 10005

USA

[e-mail]

[phone]

Acknowledgment

My overwhelming and never-ending gratitude goes to my family:

My lovely wife, Tammy.

My parents and my life-long teachers, Engr. Ray, aka Eseluenuego, who has forever been the stalwart of the Uzoh family in its entirety; and retired teacher Marie-Pauline, aka The Original Mrs. P, who continues to lend her teacher’s wisdom to students as a school proprietress. You patiently clarified for me certain aspects of the base knowledge regarding this book’s premise. You taught my siblings and me: how to truly love, how family is second only to God, and how to not sweat the small stuff.

My children, Orla, aka My Princess; and Naeto, aka Tha Naeto Boy. You have always been there, showering me with pure love and stealing unexpected kisses; according me the much-needed time and space, in spite of your desire to ‘play with daddy all the time,’ to enable me to stay focused on this exceptional project.

My sister, Chinwe; and my brothers, Obi, aka Obyno; Chez, aka Obele Agu; Ik, aka Irishman; and Chux, aka Nwachinemelu. You all extended your unadulterated love, prayers, and full support in more ways than I can recount. I love you all.

I also extend my thanks to my most cherished beta readers Adrian King and Daniel O’Connell. Your suggestions were well taken and appreciated.

To Patricia Abbott, MD, who so reinforced the need for me to pay a great deal of attention to details, you are a great educator!

To my editors, your contributions have been exceptional. To Mary in particular, you saw this story’s potential early on and remember this: ‘you made my year’ in 2018!

Dear Reader

Thank you for your interest in Children of the Shadows: Unearthing the Ritual. The book in front of you is the first in a trilogy that tells a didactic story, which is based loosely on facts, about the evil some men do, and how one affected woman, Nkemjika Odimegwu, begins the fight to bring justice to their innocent child victims.

I hope you enjoy reading my first novel as much as I enjoyed putting pen to paper.

With best regards and thank you,

C. C. Uzoh

Author’s Note

Whilst some of the described occurrences are factual, references to all names of people, clans, villages, and majority of the events are fictional.

This book affirms the value of—and inviolable right to—life and also emphasizes its impermanence and fragility.

Map 1: Akagheli Village (with neighboring Agudagu seen westward)

Map 2: Akagheli Palace

Prologue

Time had flown by since we arrived at the desolate fastness in no man’s land. It was far away from my home of seventeen years, which I’d left behind for good. Any thoughts of going back to my village filled me with more dread than that of coming across any vicious wildlife, as alluded to by Odera.

A hilly terrain, part semi-dry greensward and part sandy, swept all around us. Loose brown sand shifted under my buttocks as I perched on a sandy hillock close to a cave mouth. Centered within the savannah-like expanse, that natural cavern was backdropped with patchy windblown evergreen African ebony trees growing amongst termite mounds.

As my agony pushed me to ask God why, I at once recalled that ours is to live, die, and not to ask God why.

Absorbed in deep thought, I gazed at the sky—hazy, orange, and rich with red hues, and had, moving across it, a rack of eastward middle and high clouds. With the sun just dipping below the visible and cloudless horizon, a collection of crying predatory birds circled overhead.

Looking down below the screaming hawks, there were lizards skittering through the grass around a cloud of flies buzzing amongst rotten fallen purple jackal berries. I ran an eye over my wristwatch—less than an hour of daylight remained.

I dawdled over completing the final cornrow on the hair of my little girl who sat between my splayed legs. Focusing on anything, for longer than a few seconds, had proved difficult since I fell to my unending agony.

Oh, that Dike could be here with us.

My mind oft-times drifted back to the last straw that led us there.

Two years on either side, and everything might’ve been different!

Gawping into the distance, Dike, my only son, loves us, he exists for us, and we’re his, I mused.

You whisper this every time, Mama.

Her pellucid tone cued me. Speeding up, I completed the Dutch braids; again, pondering how to tell her.

Wreathing my arms about her neck, she turned to look up at me still hopeful for a meaningful answer. I bobbed my devotion to the only way I’d, at the time, come to know to keep green the memory of my son; to help me banish all negative thoughts.

I speak like this as my way of remembering him, my voice trailing off as my optimism that he was with us took on a tinge of the realism of the finality of his predicament.

Burning with curiosity she followed my eyes, peering into the distance, and, I thought, trying to figure out what my focus was on. Wheeling around to face me and cuddling close to my slender body, I still don’t understand, Mama. Why do you have to remember him by those words? Where is he now? Why does he come and go? Why doesn’t he stay? He looks very different—why is that? Where is Papa? Why have we been going from place to place? Did our house burn to the ground in that fire? Are we going to be able to go back home? What about my school?

With an ironic beam of satisfaction on my face, I planted a light kiss on the top of her head. Resting the side of my face on it, I stared at dust whirling in eddies of whistling wind.

Of all the many things, good and bad, which I considered might betide me; for all the habitual dolor that my life turned out to be, which did drive me to many negative thoughts, I didn’t envision my current plight.

Though I’m glad that I live to be able to fight another day, still I harbor an intense sentiment that with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again, to the point that I’m certain, therefore, that the battle to denounce the wrong meted out to Dike has only just begun.

I want to be able to look to—and hope for—a future where things would be better in my community and far-off, for every first-born son.

Having said all these things, I would leap at the chance to turn back the hands of time, to live again in a time in which these things aren’t in occurrence, for I wouldn’t desire, for anyone, the nightmarish events that you’re about to discover.

My name is Nkemjika Odimegwu and this book narrates the beginning of the entire story—an account consisting of extraordinary events that occurred over two sunrises, to which I, my nearest and dearest, as well as many of the Children of the Shadows individually bore witness.

---

Aka, jackalberry tree.↩︎

Chapter 1

The First Sunrise

Friday, January 16, 1998

It seemed like a typical morning as I arrived at my compound. The plastic jerricans in each hand dripped water because I filled them to the brim. Doing so convinced me I’d return home with the maximum amount of water possible. I needed a wheelbarrow to collect more water, which would’ve also reduced my rest stops, but my husband was unhelpful in that regard, and buying one had to wait until I met other more pressing needs.

My blouse and wrapper were in respective muted tones of gray and dark blue. My worn flip-flops caused the soles of my feet to ache. I should’ve gotten new ones, but it was the least urgent on my scale of preference. I reserved my only other footwear for special occasions. They were gifted and barely two weeks old at the time.

As far as my wrapper allowed any view, my feet and legs were dry and covered in the mid-January harmattan dust. The winds, which had been blowy overnight, had died to a whisper. Despite that my chicks, hens, and roosters frisked about the raw earth ground that formed the floor of our compound, it was neat as a pin. I’m house-proud but wasn’t a fanatic about it. A tidy home means a tidy mind, my mother had often said.

My mind had been ridden with angst since October 14, 1981 and not because my home wasn’t as tidy as my neat-freak mother would’ve liked.

God bless her soul.

It was the day I bore my first child.

Our compound was surrounded mostly by untrimmed hedges and brushwood, though it was also enclosed hit-and-miss by straggly victory gardens, which I hadn’t the time to tend those days. Three unequal-sized huts, which had bare clay walls and roofed with thatch of palm leaf mats, were spread across the front two-thirds of the compound and added to our enclosure’s rustic look.

There was low hanging, non-lifting patchy fog that all but shunned the first light from the rising sun, betokening a day of so-so weather.

I trudged past the first hut. It was the biggest of the three. Being the oldest also, it had cracks and gaps in its circular wall that were plugged with grass and straw and was incompletely caked over with clay. It was the only dwelling in our yard when I moved in seventeen years and two weeks to that fateful day.

Hoping that the dissonance of crowing roosters didn’t swallow my voice, I called, I’m back, my husband, but there was no reply from him.

Standing there repeating myself when I had a lot on my plate, was what I didn’t want to do; and I loathed having to enter his room with him in it. If I tried right away to recall the last time that I was in there with him, I’d have said it was the night Obiageli was conceived.

Making my way around to the back of the compound, I headed for a doorless, long open shed where I stored grocery and cooked food. Adjacent to my kitchen was a shed-like outhouse of cinder blocks with its door and roof made of the same zinc sheets as that of my kitchen’s roof.

Wearied of the sameness of my life and oppressed by a secret worry, I recalled my husband’s earlier command, ‘We are going to the farm much earlier today,’ and the morning, for me, was no longer as per usual. I had to abandon my routine.

He’d crept up on me as I set out for the communal well to drum his orders in my ears. I’d beseeched him to stay with Obiageli until I returned. She was still asleep at the time, and it was dark and even foggier.

In haste, I set the jerricans on the kitchen floor beside an almost empty plastic drum that was surrounded by jerricans that contained no water. I’d planned to pour the water into the drum later that day. Time was short to do it at that moment. I lit up the fire-pit to heat up a medium-sized aluminum cooking pot that stood atop rocks that surrounded that rough stony depression in the floor.

Had he informed me last night about this early-morning farm business, I’d have made better plans for this morning, I grumbled to myself in an undertone, opening the pot. I must be a pathetic wife not to be able to get my husband to communicate better with me, let alone show me love.

By chance, I’d cooked some vegetable soup the previous night, which I stirred with my long wooden ladle. Nodding once to its fresh aroma, I replaced the lid.

Sitting down on a stone, I lifted a metal pot lid off a nearby wooden mortar, condensation dripping from the underside of the lid. Holding my breath instinctively for a second as an odor escaped, my sense of smell adapted fast to it. Setting the lid down on the floor without much care, it made a clang that startled me a little.

I’d been so edgy those days—being tired all the time wasn’t the only reason.

As I scooped out dollops of slightly lumpy, stretchy, white-colored, dough-consistency cassava fufu into two separate wide green banana plant leaves, I was tormented by worry that he’d nag me about the fufu not being smooth. This could happen when it’s prepared in haste. Fufu was the only food he’d have for breakfast on a day of harvest, which I, in the general run of things, would’ve had time to prepare had that morning been a usual one. With trembling hands, I set them aside on a mat on the floor and removed two small vacuum-insulated plastic coolers from a cabinet.

****

Before long, my heart sped up as I heard my smallish, plump and waspish husband shuffle out of the biggest hut. Seeming old before his time with a bald head, his usually hard, stony eyes were red, faded, and tired with dark circles. His forehead was high and his round face, which always had a scowling mien, still sported a bush of unshaved, on the whole, gray facial hair as of early that morning. Standing with a stooped posture, his bearing also indicated years of strife.

Close behind him, I heard my teenage son, who boasted a shag cut hair, stalk out of the same hut. His childish face with scanty never-shaved facial hair seemed to have grown sterner over the previous two years. As he slapped his slippers against the ground, I could tell that he wasn’t a happy camper.

Mama Dike? Now that you are back, Obiageli will no longer be alone, so, we have to be on our way, my husband yelled with a petulant demeanor, his tone lacking vitality.

I couldn’t remember the last time he called me ‘Nkem.’

Lifting my voice, I hear you, Papa Dike, my husband, thank you for staying with our daughter. I’m packing morning food for you and Dike to take along. Please give me a little bit of time. I’m just warming up the soup.

And then with my voice sinking to a whisper, Why is he still so angry? I’d thought that getting older would mellow the rigid edges around his anger. Is he upset because he had to stay home for his own daughter who adores him even though I don’t know why she does?

Rising, I walked out of my kitchen toward the front of the compound with the intention of pleading with him to give me time. I stopped dead in my tracks on seeing him clasp Dike’s left arm in a vice-like grip with youthful agility, which was for the most part the case when he was frustrated.

Changing my mind about accosting him lest he displaced his anger on me as well, I hid behind the last hut and peeked from my position. I could hear Obiageli’s snore, but no longer fretted about it. The doctor had said it was due to adenoids and nothing serious—that they’d shrink, though they were best removed if they were causing problems. But we couldn’t afford the cost to remove them.

Come on, let’s go, Papa Dike snapped.

Seeing how tense Dike felt staring at the calloused right palm that was tight around his left arm, which attempted to drag him along, I was in a heightening state of fluster.

Papa, but why the hurry? Where’s the fire? It is not possible that we are late for our own farm, Dike shrieked, and twisting himself free from his father’s grasp, he continued, You have never been this in a hurry for work; we have never left home this early for the farm; you do not want to eat morning food, you do not want to let me eat morning food; you do not want to wait for Mama to give us food to take to the farm; you do not want us to ride on your bicycle. How do we get the energy to walk about two kilometers? What of the energy to even do any harvest work? Are we doing all-day fasting or what? What did I do to deserve this type of punishment?

Dismayed by what he probably believed to be utter disrespect from his son, Papa Dike stopped at the double and tugged off his left flip-flop sandal. With athleticism and precise targeting, he struck Dike’s body with the rubber slipper in an indiscriminate manner, and tried as he might, Dike succeeded only a little in his attempt at dodging the wayward smite.

There were clear dust imprints in red earth of the footwear’s under-surface on the back of Dike’s head; his neck; the sides of his face as well as the backs of his baggy white silk long-sleeve shirt that was open at the neck and billowing light brown khaki trousers.

Pointing the footwear at Dike, "I have told you to never question me in my house—let’s go! You stupid boy," Papa Dike roared.

I am not stupid, Papa, Dike riposted with a cracked voice. And I have the right to ask questions about things that concern me.

Looking up at Dike for a moment, Papa Dike cast him a withering look and then expelled a hiss. Replacing the slipper, he kicked out at a rooster that wandered about in his path. As the bird clucked and flapped away, he hurried onto a bush path, grabbing his caftan that was a deadly, flat shade of gray, lifting it up so that the hemline didn’t trail along the wet sprouted weeds on the walkway. A track that was also lined on either side by tall elephant grass that waved in the breeze, and even taller African cherry trees with overhanging dew-laden leaves, fruits, and flowers at various levels; all of which dropped or fluttered to the ground at irregular intervals

Flouncing and scuffing his feet boyishly, a reluctant and furious Dike plucked a low-hanging stem of cherries and continued on his way, close behind his father.

Glancing back at his son who stuffed himself with several of the small, round, and dark red stone fruit, Continue dragging your feet like your mother— Papa Dike barked. If you like, don’t hurry up.

Disconcerted by Papa Dike’s act of violence against Dike, wondering why he had no atom of respect for his first-born child, it escaped me how impatient my husband can be, and how he moved those short legs of his so quickly. Running back into the kitchen, as I saw them leave, my resolve was to gather their food whether or not the soup had warmed up to my taste.

****

Exiting the kitchen whilst carrying a substantial polyethylene bag in my right hand, I hastened toward the last hut. Lifting the reed mat that hung down from atop the doorway, I entered the room.

Lying on the smaller of the two mats on the raw earth floor, Obiageli was snugged up to her neck by a faded thick cloth that served as a blanket. Her head of shiny curly black hair, which was spread out into a thick clump, rested on a makeshift pillow of a jute sack of rolled up items of old clothing. I didn’t get the chance to plait her hair all that week. It’d been a busy week for everyone in the village. I’d never let it go longer than a day before I styled it.

Obiageli? Obiageli! I shook her—the fastest way to rouse her. Wake up, my daughter. I must take morning food to Dike and Papa before they’re gone too far. Your food is in the kitchen. Wash your mouth, wash your body, eat, and get ready for school.

Hurrying out of the room, I drew to a halt in the doorway and stood there for a long moment to let my eyes dwell on my daughter who was still foggy with sleep, whom I was about to leave alone again. I’ll soon be back, okay, my child?

Struggling to keep her eyelids lifted, she half-arose from the mat and stretched. Then she rubbed her eyes, which I’d been told were as dark and as deep-set as mine although more limpid.

Yes, Mama, she mumbled, sinking back onto her pillow.

Smiling, I blew her a kiss. Making haste, I was on the bush path in no time. Trotting unabashedly with a bag that gave off a fufu odor that most people found objectionable, I headed for the T-junction where a wooden post showed two arrowhead signs—a leftward pointing Market Road and a rightward pointing Farm Road.

---

White, dough consistency food that is part of a staple cuisine in regions of West Africa and made by boiling and then pounding starchy vegetables, especially cassava.↩︎

Chapter 2

The sun, still rising, collaborated with the interfering high clouds; giving the entire landscape a saffron hue.

Outside of my compound, I scuffed along on the winding Farm Road. There was still greenness around me despite the harmattan and the omnipresent dust. My gaze, for the most part, was on the path’s parched and cracked surface lest I stubbed my exposed toes on half-buried stones that dotted the way. There were cigarette butts and bottle tops trodden into the road while squashed plastic bottles and empty cans of beer and soda were visible at the edges of the earth track. Also peering into the distance time and again, after each bend, I hoped to catch a glimpse of my husband and son.

I was distracted for a moment as a flock of canaries fluttered their wings, hovered, wheeled around, and dived into the overhanging treetops, alighting on branches.

Noting that my routine had never placed me that way at that time, I made the third bend in the road to overhear the continuous swishing of broom bristles against the ground. I exchanged a wave with Mrs. Idame, my not-so-close neighbor on the right.

She’s just beginning to sweep her yard around this time! Little wonder she’s always late to the market—does everything at her own time. Perhaps if she awoke earlier, she’d be done sweeping latest at a quarter past six like me. Maybe she prefers to do it around now when there’s more daylight. I’ve got to do mine with my lantern, then quickly go to fetch water so that I’m at the front of the queue at the well and before my husband wakes up to start causing trouble—at least by then, I’m done with the two most back-breaking chores of my morning. It’s Mrs. Idame’s prerogative anyway. I should mind my own business—everyone can’t be as tolerant as I am. I wish I had a more understanding and supportive husband like hers.

At the next bend, I waved to Mrs. Iheme, another not-so-close neighbor on the left who fed the chickens in her pen from a feedbag.

No wonder her chickens are always fat, and customers can’t get enough—she feeds them bagged feed! I’ll surely find out from her, at the market, where to get the feed she gives them—though she can be a snob at times, especially when she’s swamped by customers. Anyways, I don’t have the time to ask her now.

I greeted another not-so-close neighbor on the right who brayed with a pestle and mortar on the side of her yard.

Mrs. Ogbuagu doesn’t do her pounding in her kitchen. From the height that she drops the pestle, what she pounds might be hard but it’s possible that her kitchen ceiling is low like mine. Perhaps I could do mine outside, too, instead of working in cramped conditions—that would surely be nice!

Ahead, I heard the raucous laughter of children coming from the next compound on my left. Peeking in as I passed, I saw no-one.

Udo, Uche, and Adaobi are clearly happy. Who wouldn’t be if their father is prosperous?

Looking skyward and with praying hands, I saw as some of the clouds rolled past to allow the sunrise to glare with a bit more seriousness, though not strong enough to have bothered my eyes or exposed skin.

God, money is of no account to me, but please bless us and let fortune smile on us, too, soon, so that Dike can go back to school and Obiageli can have her operation.

Arriving at the stretch of dirt road that was flanked by a forest of thickets and coppices, all the competing emotions that I’d tried to keep at bay, by minding the businesses of my three not-so-close neighbors, came flooding back.

They can’t have gone far since they’re on foot—good thing that he didn’t go with his bicycle today. But I wonder why. How will he drag the wagon with his harvest? Well, whatever his plan is, I hope I’ll see them soon, give them their food and return to my daughter.

Fighting to make sure the cacophony—of dogs barking; goats bleating; chickens clucking; roosters crowing; robins chirping; crickets chirring; flies whining; squirrels scrapping, chattering, and scrabbling; lizards skittering; and the burbling of a nearby creek—didn’t drown out my thoughts, I began to think aloud, expressing my little mutter of disgust.

"When will he become a reasonable man, eh? When will all this disregard for me, for our family, end? He seems to enjoy making my life hell. He has made me too-too tired of being with him. Doesn’t he know that I’ve got his afternoon food to cook before I take Obiageli to school and then go to the market to sell? He knows it’s the only market day of the week, and it’s best to set up my stall early—to catch the early and frantic customer rush. If I don’t manage to sell all of his last week’s harvest today, he’ll be on my case again—that I let all of his hard work go to waste by letting the crops perish. He should’ve at least allowed my Dike to eat, even if he didn’t care much for his own