Oma ran through the back door as the masquerade pursued her into the forest that leads to the great river. She knew that the best thing for her at the moment was that she must not be caught. She went all out to save her head, leaving her two months old daughter, Uzoma in the wooden bed.
She kept running as her breast tangled on her chest, excreting the milk all over her blouse. She ran as quickly as she could, giving the masquerade a long space.
It is a taboo in Ihialla for women to see the masquerade. During such festivals, a gong is beaten around the community for all the women and maidens to stay indoors. Oma, a single mother who had refused to say who impregnated her, went in search of food so she could eat and feed her daughter with breast milk.
She came out of the forest, panting like a deer that just escaped the claws of the leopard. She looked behind her, the great Ihialla forest and before her the great Orji river. Going back to Ihialla is going to be a suicide mission.
My daughter!! What will become of her?
Oma thought with the heaviness of heart.
There is still hope for the calabash that isn't broken to still occupy water. May the gods keep her safe.
She ruminated over her daughter as beads of tears rolled down her cheek. Then, Oma took a dive into river Orji and swam for almost an hour to Amaala, where she started a new life.
The masquerade appeared at the bank of the river when Oma was already halfway gone. It had no other choice than to return. It would have been a big promotion if the masquerade had caught Oma in the traditional shrine of Ihialla.
As the night crawls in, Uzoma who was lying in her mother's but began to cry. She cried so hard that neighbours in the hamlet a little distance sought to see the baby that was crying so hard.
Oyiri, an old lonely widow who had been accused of causing havoc in the community because her husband, Okwuma and her two children, died on the same day. Crept out of her but and traced from where the baby was crying.
There, alone, was Uzoma. She had cried and turned pink. Oyiri removed her own shawl and wrapped the little girl in it and brought her to get but. There she nurtured the little girl.
No one heard anything about Oma afterwards. Unknown to the villages of Ihialla, Oma would come to their markets, just to find how her daughter was fairing. She knew Uzoma by looking at her eyeballs. She has a rare kind of eyeball and a birthmark behind her right ear.
The old Oyiri taught Uzoma a lot of things. The greatest thing she learnt under Oyiri was how to make herbal medicine. On her own, as a young lady, she could take delivery of a pregnant woman. She could also make medicine to fight fever.
In the early period of the rainy season, when the rain would just drizzle, the king of Ihialla took ill. It was a very serious illness and no man or woman could prepare medicine to cure the king.
When Oyiri came to know that the mind was badly sick, to the point of death, the chief-in-council refused to let Oyiri enter the palace, let alone administer medicine to heal the king.
This angered Uzoma a lot. She started looking at the king makers, the chief and the king as troublesome people? Why would they refuse her mother from entering the palace? Uzoma knew that Oyiri meant well for everyone in Ihialla.
Rather than accept the medicine from Oyiri, the chiefs would rather consult the oracles of Ihialla. The oracle told them to launch the masquerade into the streets of the community for another seven days and no woman must be allowed to leave their homes no matter what.
As the town crier beat the gong, announcing another seven days curfew, Uzoma got angrier at the ignorance that is eating deep into the fabrics of the people. She knew that some of the priests of those oracles would give a message based on the highest bidder.
The day the curfew started, Ihialla was as silent as a graveyard. All the women locked themselves in their huts, including Oyiri and Uzoma.
On the fourth day, when hunger had started deepening their eye socket, Uzoma broke the jinx and came out to look for food she would prepare for herself and the old Oyiri.
Uzoma had gathered enough vegetables and snails that would last them another three days when the masquerade appeared with a machete before Uzoma.
***First Published Here
…… To be continued.
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