Shadow Speaker, page 13
“You’re . . . you’re overreacting.”
“Overreacting!!?” His voice was even louder than the motorbikes and cars passing them.
“Yeah, overreacting!” Ejii shouted back, her nerves frayed. “There are worse things than being called a slave!”
Dikéogu blinked and looked at Ejii. Then he looked at Onion, who had turned both his ears toward his head. “Sorry,” Dikéogu said, wiping sweat from his brow.
“Why get angry over something that’s not even true?” Ejii said. “You think the Desert Magician really thought you were a slave? He was just trying to get your attention.” But she wasn’t sure if she believed this.
“Dumb idiot Desert Magician,” Dikéogu grumbled. “He’s lucky he was the one with the dagger. I’d have skinned his neat little feet like yams and . . .”
“No, you wouldn’t,” Ejii said.
“Yes, I would,” he said.
“Okay, maybe you would have,” Ejii said. “Maybe I would too,” she said. “But, Dikéogu, what . . . what happened with your parents?”
“Just know that I’m not a slave,” he said.
“Then who are you?” she said.
He sucked his teeth. “You heard him. I’m the son of the great goddamn Obidimkpa duo, West Africa’s bringers of camelshitting news and entertainment.” He paused. “But I’m not doing some stupid exposé story on you. That remains my mother’s territory.”
“So how’d you end up in Assamakka? Please,” she said. “Tell me.”
“I hate them,” he said, baring his teeth.
Ejii felt she hated them, too, and she didn’t even know why yet. A truck zoomed past them, dangerously close. “Onion, stop for a second,” Ejii said. She climbed off and looked up at Dikéogu. “Come on.”
They walked to a group of palm trees for shade. Onion groaned as he bent his legs so he could sit down and rest. Ejii and Dikéogu stood in the shade facing each other. Ejii waited, her arms around her chest.
“What happened is weird,” he said, giving Ejii a worried look.
“I’m familiar with weird,” she said.
“We lived in a big house with servants. Had five cars, which I always thought was stupid. Fuel is expensive, I don’t know why my parents felt they had to always show off. Anyway, there was always a lot noise and activity around my parents. They own Old Naija Times and Nigerian Net. Yeah, yeah, they’re famous and influential, but they’re awful parents. You probably know my mother’s face because she’s often the anchorperson on Nigerian Net.
“Ever since the great change, all the villages in Southeastern Nigeria have gotten really tight knit. The elders got this stupid attitude. They pretend everything is the same as it used to be. They keep calling for a return to ‘ancient times.’ That’s why my parents’ called the newspaper the Old Naija Times; they want to appeal to stupid people who think like this, all stuck in the past. ‘Naija’ is slang for Nigerian, and the newspaper’s slogan is: News for the true Nigerian.
“Never mind the permanent forest that sprang up between Arondizuogu and Aba that people refuse to go into because of the weird noises coming from it. Or the fact that a lot of people in the Calabar region, near the ocean, have turned into pink dolphins. Or the birds that fly backward all the time. My parents cashed in on this denial.
“So, this was the village I was born into. Imagine if you’d been born there! They’d have taken one look at your eyes and some goat’s ass would have stolen you from your mother and thrown you into that weird forest, like they used to do with one of each pair of twins long ago. I heard more than one time that someone did that with a meta-human baby. Anyway, for most of my life, I was like everyone else, at least I pretended to be. I ignored the things I saw about myself. When the lightning started coming, I couldn’t pretend anymore.”
“So what happened at that pond wasn’t the first time?” Ejii asked.
“Ha! Not even close,” he said. “I was about eight years old the first time. I was in my mother’s garden, my favorite place because it was so peaceful and green there. A thunderstorm was coming. It was rainy season, so I didn’t give it much thought. I was just standing there looking at the yams when BAM! My mother saw it happen from the kitchen. She came running. My clothes were a little burned and I had a headache, but otherwise I was fine. My mother told me to just forget that it ever happened. So I did.
“But something bothered me about the way my mother looked at me, even back then. The moment she knew I was okay, she kind of pushed me away. Like she didn’t want to touch me. The second time I was struck was when I was ten. Same year that I saw Jaa . . . do what she did to your father. During rainy season again. I was walking down the street on my way home and BAM! My mother told me to forget about this, too, but this time she told my father. He came to my room that night angry as hell! He was cursing and sweating and breathing heavy like a man five times his weight.
“‘It never happened, you understand? Goddamn you!’ he shouted. I should have cursed right back at him. But I just nodded and set my mind to forget about it again. By this time, I also had to forget about the static in the house and the sparks that popped when I walked too fast. The third time it happened couldn’t be ignored. And by then I had a reputation. Someone with a big mouth had seen that second time. Probably that old lady across the street, Agnes. She never has enough to do. People were calling me ‘the boy that God hates.’ They said that I was sick. Slow in the head. Who could get struck by lightning and not have brain damage?
“My friends stopped talking to me and teachers punished me for nonsense. My parents were embarrassed. My father kept saying, ‘Get ahold of yourself, dammit! Control it. You can be normal if you try.’ To him it was all my fault. He thinks everyone can control everything with a little effort. In this day and age, how crazy is that?! I would squeeze my eyes shut on stormy days and try my best to not get struck. I’d ask the sky not to rain until I was inside. I was almost thirteen when the third time happened.
“I’d had a bad day at school; mean teachers, stupid classmates. For goodness sake, that second time was three years ago! Why couldn’t people just forget it? I was walking fast because the sky was quickly growing dark. I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t want to take cover in any of the neighbors’ homes. They’d just talk about me more.
“I was passing Mr. Chidi’s house when CRASH! It came down with such force that I fell to my knees! It smelled sweet and felt like warm soft water. Ejii, I didn’t do anything wrong. I knew Yahoo boys who had stolen, beaten people up, were ritualists involved in secret societies that committed huge crimes. It’s not fair, Ejii!
“Mr. Chidi was bringing in some things for a party, a few goats, yams, palm wine, beer, and such. He’s always having parties, because he’s some sort of stupid shady politician. The explosion burned Chidi’s goats to a crisp, fried his yams to charcoal, blew up his palm-wine bottles and cans of beer, and burned the back of his car! He lost his eyebrows too; they were burned off in the blast. He was lucky to be alive! But he was angry as hell, especially at the loss of his stupid expensive he-goats.
“The rain began to fall in big fat droplets and I ran home. After that, everything happened fast. Mr. Chidi had a lot of friends and he convinced them all that I was a demon and should be torn to pieces! I was at home when I heard them coming. My mother started crying and my father shouted and cursed at me to get out before they burned down his precious house! With one satchel of things, I ran down the street.
“I don’t remember leaving my parents behind . . . or them leaving me. A friend of my father’s, Segun, came driving up, splattering mud on me. He told me to get in. I remember falling asleep in his car, thinking over and over about the fact that my parents hadn’t protected me. It was Segun who took me to Abuja and sold me! I’d known that guy all my life! I called him ‘uncle.’ He was rich and always buying me things. He was the one who bought me my copy of My Cyborg Manifesto. Now I know why he is so rich. He was selling children people didn’t want into slavery!
“He dropped me off at some place that I don’t remember because it was dark and I was scared and drenched and covered in mud and hungry and angry. By then, it was almost dawn and was getting dry and dusty and hot. There were other kids my age and younger in this place, a lot of them crying. I remember that I slept standing up. We were soon packed into another truck that drove through the day and night and another day. They didn’t give us anything to eat or drink and the going was bumpy, slow, and hot. And that’s how I ended up in Assamakka.” He kicked at the sand.
“The sand-dune cats said that you are a rainmaker,” Ejii said.
“Ha! Can’t they tell the difference between a gift and a curse? Does it remotely look like I can control the lightning that keeps striking me? None of this is MY fault?!”
“I didn’t say . . .”
“Then don’t say it!” he snapped.
A woman riding a donkey passed by, followed by a man riding a camel jingling with bells. The couple was walking away from Agadez.
“So what do you decide?” Dikéogu asked.
“Huh?”
“Do you want to keep traveling with me or not? Another thunderstorm could come at any moment.”
“If you’re not afraid of my abilities,” she said, “why should I be afraid of yours?”
“I am afraid of your abilities.”
“You’re afraid of what you’ve heard, not what you know. Dikéogu . . .” She held her hands up, unable to find words. Then she stepped forward and pulled him into a tight hug. His body stiffened and she quickly let go. Without looking at her, he thrust his hands in his pockets and mumbled, “Let’s go. We only have a few hours, right?”
“I admire you,” she said, taking his hand. “What you’ve survived is amazing.” She sighed. “Your parents weren’t much better than my father.”
CHAPTER 15
Yellow Lady
I’m okay, Ejii thought as they approached the biggest stretch of human civilization she had ever seen.
It was nearing sunset and Agadez was only a mile away. The desert was crisscrossed with busy paved highways and roads populated by motorbikes, pedestrians, cars, horses, camels, and trucks. There were raffia stalls on the roadside where people sold glass and stone bracelets, jugs of pink gasoline, cheap and costly e-pals, card PCs, cigarettes, dancing bah-boo toys, spicy kabobs, and more. And then there were the items whose origins no one asked about, like the tiny lizards that would eat all the insects in your house while pooing out sweet-smelling pellets; the solar radios shaped like green plant bulbs. The whispering orchids that no one could understand.
Dikéogu and Ejii walked beside Onion. “I hate all this movement, and everything is so damn close together,” Dikéogu complained. “Who knows who’s hiding behind all the corners and walls? And how’s Kola going to find us?”
“Don’t worry,” Ejii said. “It’s all going to be okay.”
Dikéogu just grumbled, stepping closer to Onion.
It was dark by the time they entered the city, but there was still plenty of activity. Ejii heard several languages, mostly Hausa and Arabic. Agadez was an old Muslim city full of people from Arab to African, so there were many women wearing veils and burkas. Ejii draped her veil over her head.
She spotted a few children with the slave markings on their faces. Some appeared to be with their families, and she wondered if these children, too, had escaped. Onion had grown annoyed when he saw all the other camels “tied up” and silent. Still, Ejii loosely put a rope around his head and held it so that no one would think he was a wild camel.
“What’s wrong with wild camels?” Onion quietly asked.
“I don’t think people here are used to free camels,” Ejii said.
Dikéogu patted Onion on his muzzle. “You’re not a slave,” Dikéogu said.
“But the others are,” Onion said.
“That’s the world,” Dikéogu said. “Some of us are slaves, some of us aren’t.”
Onion angrily chewed his cud as a man passed riding his camel. The camel was decorated with a colorful saddle, a bright-blue-fringed saddlebag, and bells and gold decorations on each of its ankles. “He looks ridiculous,” Onion grumbled. Ejii agreed.
They stopped at a date stand and Ejii looked at Dikéogu. He shrugged and made to climb off and go to the seller. “No,” Ejii said, putting her hand on his shoulder. “I’ll do it.” She climbed down and walked up to the stand. She plucked one of the wax-lined paper bags and used a scoop to fill it with the sweet juicy dates. A short man with white Afro puffs of hair on the sides of his head sat beside the dates listening to Arabic music and watching the news on an e-pal.
As Ejii handed him the bag to weigh, it dawned on her that the man was probably watching the station that Dikéogu’s parents owned. The anchorperson talking was probably his mother. Ejii leaned forward to get a good look. She had waist-length brown-black dreadlocks and the same intense look that Dikéogu constantly wore.
“One hundred,” the man said.
“That’s too much, sir,” she said, looking him in the eye. The man broke eye contact quickly. He’d been trying to cheat her, as men often did with women or girls too timid to protest. This now irritated Ejii.
“Fifty,” he said. “My final offer. I have to close soon and you are using my time.”
“Ten,” she said, taking out some money and handing it to him and taking the bag. “These should be about five, so I am doing you a favor.”
The man looked at her for a long time. Then he smiled and folded the money. “Did your father teach you how to drive such a hard bargain?” he asked.
Ejii shook her head. “My mother.”
“Are you one of those . . . you have the strange eyes,” he said, pointing to his eyes.
Ejii smiled, as she always did when people were honest enough to ask about her eyes as opposed to making assumptions. “I’m a shadow speaker, yes,” she said.
“Most people think you all are evil, but I’ve never believed that,” he said. “I’m a good Muslim. I believe people are people.”
“And you are very correct,” Ejii said.
“Can you see my future? How to get rich? Things like that?” He leaned forward. “There are many shadow speakers who tell fortunes around here, but they cost a fortune.”
“I can only know what they tell me, sir,” she said. She listened for the shadows. Silence. Then her temples throbbed as the knowledge came to her as if from deep within her subconscious. She could smell his cologne and the scent of his two children. One liked to leap over the street’s gutters and one liked to draw. His wife shouted at him often. They were poor but she liked good things. Unfortunately, his wife didn’t realize that she was married to a good man.
“Kiss your wife more often and . . . pay the high price for the sweet dates,” Ejii said, amazed at this new change. It was as if her body had absorbed the shadows and what they could do, as if they were a part of her. Her ability had stretched and changed again and she’d lived. Praise Allah, she thought, relieved. “You should make more money, because that’s what people will buy. Not the cheap dry ones.”
The man grinned, hugged Ejii, and clapped his hands together. “Thank you!” he said. “All week I’ve been biting my nails about taking that chance! I’ll give her a thousand kisses tonight!” He grabbed Ejii’s bag and scooped more dates in. “For your husband over there,” he said, motioning to Dikéogu. Ejii bit her lip hard. There was little point in trying to correct the man. He tied up the bag and gave it to Ejii.
“Thank you, sir,” Ejii said. “Um . . . would you happen to know where Jaa the Red One is staying?”
“Ah, the Red One. Eh, can you believe it? Here in Agadez?! I was reading about her this morning, but I don’t think it was mentioned where she was staying.” He thought for a second. “Go online and you can replay the speech she made today.”
“My h-husband and I are hoping to catch glimpse of her in person,” Ejii said. She bristled, glad that Dikéogu wasn’t there to hear her refer to him this way.
“She probably left Agadez already. But you could check the two best hotels in Agadez, the Oasis and the Yellow Lady. If she’s here, she’d stay in one of those places.”
“Which is closest to here?” Ejii asked.
“The Oasis. Just go down the street and make a left,” he said. “The Yellow Lady is at the center of Agadez.”
Ejii nodded. “Thanks. Oh, one more thing. Did I turn darker as I . . . read you?”
“No,” the man said. “You looked as you do now.”
What is happening to me? she wondered as she went back to Dikéogu and Onion.
The Oasis Hotel was a green, four-story building. There were motor scooters parked in the front and Ejii could hear camels in the back.
“You’ll be okay, then?” Ejii asked Onion.
“As long as there’s hay and water,” he said. “I will talk to the other camels, too.”
She kissed him on his furry muzzle.
“If you plan an uprising, do it in the early morning,” Dikéogu said with a laugh.
“Dikéogu, stand in front of me,” Ejii said, stepping close to Onion.
Dikéogu quickly understood and moved to block what she was doing from any passersby. She reached into her saddlebag and brought out a bundle of francs notes.
“Here,” she said, handing the bundle to Dikéogu. She shook her head, knowing what he was thinking behind his irritated look. “No, no,” she said. “I’m not . . . You’re the one who knows how to get rooms at hotels, not me. So you hold the money.”
Inside the Oasis Hotel, it was bright with pink lights and the air was cooled. There was highlife music playing and several trees growing in large clay pots in the lobby. People frowned as Ejii and Dikéogu passed. Ejii knew how the two of them must have looked in their tattered clothes. Especially Dikéogu. It didn’t really matter to Ejii. If she’d been wearing clean clothes, people would have probably stared at her because of her eyes.
