Ora the rising sun

By Chioma Adaora

"Uga Azi, an age of destruction and ignorance is here. Alamuo would fall by the sword of the son of her soil, Omenike. Nze Okoye knows that Kambili is among those chosen to destroy Uga Azi and so he had trained her for this time. When Omenike kills Nze Okoye and his wives, he takes Kambili as a captive. But Kambili is rescued by Ikemefuna, the v

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ukiyoto Publishing
• Release date: Mar 15, 2023
• ISBN: 9789360491321

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Ora the Rising Sun

Chioma Adaora

Ukiyoto Publishing

All global publishing rights are held by

Ukiyoto Publishing

Published in 2023

Content Copyright © Chioma Adaora

ISBN

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated, without the publisher’s prior consent, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

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Dedication

I would like to thank my ancestors for the seed of Igbo civilization they planted and to pay gratitude to my Chi, personal God for awakening me into realizing who truly I am, who my ancestors are and for guiding me through this path of life.

Contents

The Hole

Escape

Captured

A Slave

Years On

Bees And Butterflies

New Life

Boston

The Rising

About the Author

The Hole

A

globe of orange sun gradually swallowed the dusk from the orient saving dusty, brown leafs from more showers of dew. Birds perched from tree to tree trumpeting the presence of harmattan. Today is Orie and just last week, the scanty ọnwa ngwu November rain gave way for dust to sweep through mild wind and for the skin to look white and lips dry in all Igbo land which Alamụọ is one of. Igbo people are those who have been since time. In the ancient story of Igbo creation, Eke nnechukwu was curious about the secret chamber Chukwu, her husband, created for his experiment. So when Chukwu was away, Eke went into the secret chamber and then there was an explosion. When Chukwu returned and met his wife lying dead, he lifted her onto his laps weeping. His tears became oshimmiri mighty sea which Eke resurrected from as Ala earth.

Five Igbo ancestors known as Ndị Egede came down to earth and started Igbo. These ancestors are Agbaja, Nri, Ịsụ, Idu and Ọrụ. Agbaja is the ancestor of the Agbaja people who are the earth people and are dị masters in agriculture. Nri, the ancestor who built the Nri nation made up of priests. Ịsụ, dị in metal and blacksmithing, Idu the ancestor of the Idu people great at military and Ọrụ, the masters of the sea. Alamụọ is in Agbaja.

Kambili loved the harmattan season for its dust which smells like nzu when mixed with water and because it was a time they rarely visited their farms. She scampered happily behind her father through a tiny path that led to their barn, her hands sweeping through leaves in the nearby bush so they gave off the nzu smell. A pleasant smell of something you know wouldn’t taste good. Kambili knew this because she had eaten the dust before. Yesterday was Eke, Kambili had finished her chores while her mother was away for the Eke market. She became so idle that she decided to play with the dust at the kitchen entrance. It was then she had the taste of the sweet smelling dust. Now, she just felt more okay with the dust browning her palm and her thick hair which received some of the dust-blessings each time she bent to scratch her scalp. Nze Okoye stopped before his barn and stretched out a hand to Kambili who giggled and skittered to him because she had seen the flower he was hiding behind. He always did that each morning they walked together to the barn. He would secretly pluck a flower and hide it behind his back for her to guess what flower it is before sticking it into her hair and raining praises on her.

Achala ugo m. He would proudly watch her shy away as he praised her.

Afterwards, they would inspect his barn before walking back to their compound. But that Orie day was different. Nze Okoye stuck a sunflower into his daughter’s dust-blended hair then pointed dramatically at the merciful morning sun which permits one to look at it unlike that of after morning. 

Can you feel this sun rise in you Bili m? he asked in Igbo with his beardless jaw as shiny as a rock smeared with oil and his rigid nose and assuasive brown eyes coalescing his face with mushy austereness that puts one in a state of dilemma whether to run away from him or not.

Someday the rising will come. He walked towards the sun as though to meet with it and stare directly into his loving eyes.

Nna m the sun rises everyday. Kambili stammered with her eyes widely confused as she flashed them between her father and the sun.

Nze Okoye chortled and began to brush his teeth with a chewing stick he had between his teeth. As he walked further towards the sun admiring his loving tenderness and yet his corrosive sparks that would befall the destroyers of earth, he imagined the time when Ụga Azị would end, when Ọra would spark in those he has chosen like his daughter. When Igbo would wake and realize her true self. He sniffed some air as though there were little to take from and spat at a distance some spit crammed with grits of his chewing stick. Just then an udara fell from a tree by his left. Kambili watched him amble towards it with his hands crossed behind. He loves to walk that way whenever he is on a serious matter or when he is in a deep thought. Just a month ago, he got the Nze title which follows a very rigorous process that only a righteous man can travel. He was among the few young men who worked to the top from the scratch. Even though his father was a prosperous farmer, Nze Okoye never asked him for yam seedlings because he wanted honor and so did what men of honor would do by borrowing yam seeds and paying back when it was time to pay. 

Nze returned with warming smiles.

You will be as the sun someday, he said as he handed the udara to his young daughter. You will rise in the minds of our future. Ụga Azị, the age of wickedness, ignorance spiced with lies and delusions is upon us, Another Udara fell and rolled to Nze Okoye’s feet. He chuckled and picked it.

Let’s go back. He was already walking back. Kambili jogged to meet his steps.

We have fallen, Nze Okoye continued. We will be taken to foreign lands in chains. Our minds would be caged with delusion that our ancestors are evil and backward. Shrines would be burnt by our own people and our artifact would be taken away to foreign places. A time of destruction is here. A time we would call ourselves inferior and our destroyers superior. Ndị Mbu na kwa Ndị Egede knew about this time and we the few people who would stand strong should remain as strong and wise as they were.

What would happen to you and I, Nna m? she asked with benign stares.

Nze Okoye squatted before the child and squeezed her chin playfully, "The sun and the moon holds tomorrow Bili m. I bu nwa Anyanwụ You’re a child of the Eye of Light. You would destroy destruction not as flesh, not by yourself, but as your Chi with Ọra beside you."

Nna m. I am scared.

Nze Okoye chortled and stood to his feet then placed the udara into her shivering palm and continued walking. The courage will come. Rachaa ụdara gị.

...

14 years later

A flurry of nauseous air wobbles into the hole, surging pangs of agony over her brown eyes. Hole. That is what Kambili calls her tiny cell which looks like a rat’s hole. She is obviously a rat now as her tranquil world had crashed before her eyes just eight days ago. The era of Ụga Azị her father had been telling her about has come and now her life has become a passage for wretched joy which sometimes pinches her memory with her happy experiences and a passage for sorrow which appears like incessant thorns of torture that whips her till tears rain down her eyes and blood and corpses looms in her memory. She hits her head frettingly as though that could stop her pain and take her back to the days when her father’s compound was a merry ground. She had watched fellow titled men like her father flood Nze Okoye’s obi, an open-walled hut at the center of their compound, raining praises at one another and nudging their back hands three times then ending it with a palm shake — a form of greeting among Igbo men of might, wisdom and compassion. Kambili enjoyed watching them from behind her mother's hut window which was directly facing the obi as they sat drinking fresh palm wine from large kegs. Though it was a taboo to eat from a new yam before it is celebrated and before Ala, the goddess of earth, is glorified for blessing the land with good harvests, Nze Okoye loved to celebrate his bounty yam harvests with his friends before every ikeji new yam festival; they don’t eat yam, but drink and eat well prepared bush meats from Nne Ikenna’s pot. How bush meats tasted felicitously spicy in her hands remained a mystery no one was able to uncover. Before the celebration began, Nze Okoye presented orji bitter kola to his friends. They performed its rituals which involved praying in the name of their ancestors and the Gods of the land before breaking the Orji and distributing it as the ritual permits. Onye wetara orji wetara ndu, they liked to quote this proverb which means that he who brings kola brings life. When they had finished eating the orji and were giving their tongues the sweet taste of Nne Ikenna’s bush meats, they told stories of their youthful years with giggles. As the palm wine was shared to them, Mazi Ukanaonu talked about how Okafor had not gotten a match for producing good wines before and after his exile from Alamụọ. Okafor was a conversation everyone only had with their chi(s) personal Gods because he brought shame that may never be wiped from the clan for generations to come. So whenever his wine was talked about, silence followed. No one would have ever believed that Okafor could kill an ant. He always made good jokes to his customers and was a good father to his son, Ikemefuna. Everyone believed that he was also a good husband to his wife until he killed her. Even though his son returned to Alamuo and rose to fame by becoming a great and a formidable warrior, yet blood seemed difficult to wash away, especially the blood of an innocent woman killed in her home.

When the men left, Kambili ran to her father with an embrace, had a taste of some left over wines, praised Nduka the tapper, sat on the floor and massaged Nze Okoye’s legs while he told her the story of a monkey who helped a widow in her farm. After the day’s work and the widow thanked the monkey, the monkey asked her whether she would recognize him if she saw him again and the widow said she would. So one day, while jumping from tree to tree, the monkey fell into a hunter’s trap. It was the widow who saw him and set him free. That was how the monkey knew that the widow recognized him.

Nze Okoye liked to tell Kambili stories in Proverbs and often let her explain its meaning. Not because it is said in Alamụọ that whoever is told the meaning of a proverb, his mother’s bride price is a waste. But because he saw her no different from Ajah, her wiry step brother who was as hardworking as Nze Okoye and was keen that his respect should come from his hands and not from how great his father is. Ajah could eat all the meat in the kitchen but would never add flesh. He took after his late mother in so many ways and that included being inventive. His mother, Nwakaụba, was a popular woman known for making special clothing designs. She had dared to use charcoal on her materials and came up with a design she called nwanyị nji meaning black woman. Very sadly, the design faded with her death because no one could replicate it. On the outside, Ajah looked strict like his father, but was very kind and jovial to Kambili. He would buy her wrappers and a new nja (a spiral brass worn round the ankle by ancient Igbo women) a few days to each Ikeji and joke with her to come back with a man. A joke he usually took seriously whenever Kambili lamented on how not ready she was for marriage even when she was way past the marriageable age and should be a mother of at least two children. Kambili was expecting a new wrapper from Ajah before the calamity struck. 

Now, she is in this dark hole so tiny that it could size only bitter memories that come at will to keep her company leaving no place for even a tinge of happiness. Not when Nne Ikenna’s lifeless body visits her with warning stares that splashes guilt on her conscience as though she caused it all. As though she shot the arrow that drenched her life like hot desert-sun drenches liquid.

Go get him! Not me. Not me! It is Omenike! Kambili screams in Igbo yet Nne Ikenna wouldn’t leave her memory. She lies there in her head with her blood sailing into the ground. Kambili places her wilting face now paraded by hot tears between her pale knees, yet Nne Ikenna wouldn’t go away. Her eyes are an organ of pain, her body, a twine of dust and blood, yet even with the pains she warns Kambili to run. Kambili slaps her cheek sorrowfully, she didn’t grant the last will of the woman she called mother. A pang of guilt revered by regrets blows over her eyes and she pokes them open breathing heavily. If only she had listened to the last wish of this dying woman. If she had killed those snakes that night at Agbọ’s compound, if she had killed Omenike before now.

If...

She bursts into tears hitting her hands on her forehead. If I can find courage again.

She weeps as the tumults overpowers her eyes and ears again with images of the fire burning on houses and trees, its fuming redness and yellowness groveling them to a rubble. Then there was smoke splodging the sky, satisfied by what they had consumed. Kambili was stuck behind her mother’s window which made kpa kpa sounds as it swung against the mullion. Her eyes were red with tears as arrows hurtled around scavenging her father’s compound. Then she saw the gentle beast matching in with boisterous laughter and macheting every head that tried to stop him. At that moment, fear gripped her and as she made to run from the back window, an arrow hit Nne Ikenna on her head and another on her neck. She stood there watching as she fell to the ground which already had swarms of human bodies that  had run into the compound for safety. As Nne Ikenna battled with death so as to let her speak her last words, she forced a smile at Kambili and said, "Gbaa ọsọ Kambili run Kambili." Then her breath varnished away. Kambili stood there silent, with only heavy breaths and legs. Too heavy for her to run. Instead her rage rose like the rising kpa kpa sound of the swinging window.

The tumult fades off, darkness befriends Kambili’s eyes again as her teeth clatter in pain, sorrow is her friend and weakness her closest neighbor. Her courage is gone. Everything her father taught her has vanished. How would she explain to him that truly she is afraid? Afraid of what and whom? She cannot tell. Maybe it's because she has come to realize that her own kind of courage was folly after all. That daughter who thought she was like her father proved to be nothing like him. If she were, she would have been wise enough to know that what she saw that night under the full moon at Agbọ’s compound was a bad omen and she would have told an elder so as to prevent the coming evil.

This cricket begins to chirp again, this time in a closer range to Kambili than usual. Maybe it's chirping from behind the old wooden door of Kambili’s cell or it is in the empty cell next to hers. Regardless, all that Kambili wants now is for the chirpings to cease dragging her into the nest of surrender and to quit punching her bones with thorns from roses until they crack and she growls uncontrollably. That’s what the cricket always does to her. It enjoys her growls and would pause after a while like a hag satisfied with blood before continuing its chirpings more closely and loudly. It would laugh at her when she dropped her head to her chest in surrender. Then would stop satisfactorily and become her comforter while she sobs herself to sleep where she would dream of Omenike smashing every head he passes with his machete.

Kambili jacks from the bloody dream to find the gentle venom standing lordly at the now open door of her cell like a slender candle gleaming terror. He is indeed blessed with bounteous charms that are generously splodged on his reddish-pink lips and on his black eyes which are smoldered with great vile, treachery, and an unscrupulous quest for power. Who could believe that his gentle smiles are born from a heart full of evil thoughts. Who could think that this man can cause blood flow like a river and fire blaze with furry in Alamụọ. Omenike, the son of Umuajah clan born of a jolly flute player. He is nothing like his father, Okemiri whose Ọjà flute is a holy stick which when he blows into spreads regales of him as a young boy or sometimes, tells the tales of his dear wife. Most times when he is alone he plays a special tune which he says were to drive off evil from his household. It seems he was the only one who knew his son too well. He had played a tune of how a coconut fell on his left leg at the time his wife birthed Omenike and then he knew that this child was none to resist evil even when he could. When the child was taken for Afa divinition, the Dibịa priest had spat and had pleaded with Ala to let good grow in the child because he had seen what chaos he came with. Omenike despised his father a lot. He called him lazy and weak. He worked so hard never to be like him. At fourteen, Omenike had three large barns. At twenty, he already killed a cow to celebrate Ala. After his father’s burial which he killed two cows for, he was given the Ogbuefi title.

Omenike picks the cricket as it tries to jump onto his leg and throws it into his mouth.

"Ọtọka It’s juicy." He laughs ridiculously as he chews the cricket then runs his slender palm over his spiky hair. Everyone who sees him smile would be trapped to fight for his innocence. When you hear him talk, it's as though he throws honey into the air that digs into one's brain and condemns every doubt that he could be evil. Sometimes Kambili wants to fear him, many times she wants to believe that Omenike