When Gods Bleed (8 page)

Chapter 6

Obi and his wife had passed through the river. Though they saw no one behind them, they maintained their pace. The areas after the river were muddy; they stopped to eat on a few dry patches. As they traveled
, Amina stopped once to vomit. He was positive she was pregnant, but being the proud woman she was, she refused to let him carry her. It was not until she sprained her knee that he forcefully put her on his back and continued the journey.

The farther he went, the more he felt guilty for dragging his greatest asset into such a quest. He wondered why he left everything he had and started this journey with this priceless human being. His thoughts raced, looking for a reason why the Ifa priest would lie to him, but there was none. As he kept moving, there were only two things he was sure of
: the first was that the direction he was traveling in led to his mother’s province; and secondly, he was not interested in being King, prince or anything that was offered. He just wanted to go back to his way of life.

Dawn approached and he wondered if the people of Utagba would accept him during this crisis. He had nowhere else to go. There was also the possibility that they were not aware of what was happening. The thoughts were getting too heavy for his mind to carry, but he was consoled by their nearness to the boundary between Utagba and Abogima.
He found a shelter underneath a pile of boulders and they spent the night there.

As he slept he heard his wife scream his name, “Obiana.” He opened his eyes to see his wife dash out of their shelter. He quickly got up and followed her to see what was wrong. He
saw the hyena running with their food bag. The scene was funny to him, but his wife had a different view of the scenario so he started chasing the animal. The hyena swerved around the trees as it ran. Just when Obi was about to grip the animal, his legs seemed to become glued to the muddy waters. The more he tried to struggle, the faster he sank. Amina had trailed her husband and looked horrified when she saw that his predicament scared him. She walked in circles like a mad woman, seriously confused.

“Amina, relax,” Obi s
aid, and it seemed to make her a little more composed. “Look for a thick and long branch and stretch it to me.”

She scanned the area and found a branch. She stretched it to her husband, but it was not long enough. She removed her wrapper and threw it to him, but it, too, was not long enough.

“Cover yourself,” Obi said, sinking slowly.

“There should be something we can do. Please help me think!” Amina cried.

“There is something I always wanted to tell you, but I was too proud.”

“I don't want to hear anything you want to tell me of that sort now. You can tell me tonight, tomorrow, or even the day after that, but I don't want to hear anything of that sort now.”

Her voice was now firm, but when she looked at her husband covered up in mud to his chest she started screaming and crying to the wilderness.

“Please
, somebody help me! Is there anybody out there? Please help me!”

When she
realized it was to no avail, she started entering the quicksand to join her husband.

“What are you doing?” he shouted
, only his head sticking out of the loose wet sand.

She ignored him and continued
moving toward him.

“Listen to me for once in your life. I beg you with my soul, please do not join me in this my tragedy.”

She ignored him and was still approaching him when a man with pale white skin ran over to where they were and stretched a branch to Obi, pulling the husband and his wife out.

After they
settled on dry land, Obi shook Amina violently by the shoulder screaming, “Do not ever do that again! Why do you think I was happy to live? It was because of you. You are my life and if you live, then my life was worth something.”

“Without you I also have no life worth living,” she replied with no remorse.

He was about to slap her when the white man cut in. “Please, such violence is unnecessary.” The man spoke their language fluently.

Then Obi finally acknowledged the presence of the third party. “Kind sir, how can I repay you for your kindness?”

“Please forget about it. My reward comes from my God,” the man replied.

“Which god might that be?” Obi inquired.

“The one God up in heaven.”

“I take it that you are a missionary,” Obi inferred.

“Yes I am, but we will talk on that topic later. There is a stream in front of us; you and your wife can wash up there. I live just across it and I insist you be our guests tonight.”

“No sir, your kindness is more than enough. We do not want to encroach into your home.”

“Nonsense. Let us go.”

The missionary led them to the stream and then into his home.
They lived in a small hut with an attached house made up of rafia branches. The attached house was built for a congregation, and opposite the entrance was two sticks crossed together. As Obi and Amina studied these structures, the white man and a woman of his complexion, apparently his wife, approached them.

“It’s church,” the wife said with a very unclear dialect.

Both man and wife gave a bow to show respect for their guests. They led them into their home and offered them something to eat, but Obi and Amina politely refused. It was very dangerous eating in a man's home when you did not know his background. The white woman insisted on pressuring them, but their refusal was adamant.

The woman seemed to
be hurt that they rejected her meal.

“You’ll have to forgive my wife
,’’ the husband said. “We are not used to people coming to our homes to visit, except on the seventh day when some people sneak here from the province.”

“Come to think of it, I don't think we have eaten today, or have we Obi?”
Amina said.

He smiled. “We have not.”

They offered them rice and stew, which they ate and were grateful. When the meal was finished, the women took the dishes away and left the men alone.

“There must be a way I can repay you for your kindness.”

“As I said, my reward will be given to me by God in heaven.”

“You must have deep respect for your God.”

“Do you say that because I saved your life and require nothing for it?”

“And also welcoming us into your home.”

“What is your name?”

“Obi, and yours?”

“Michael.”

“Mekell.”

The missionary laughed at the pronunciation of a name he felt was easy to pronounce. “No, Michael,” he tried to correct Obi.

“What does it mean?”

“I am not sure. All I know is that I was named after an angel of God. What does your name mean?”

“Obi means heart. My mother called me Obiani, which means the heart of the land.”

“Your mother, where is she?”

“She died along with my father.”

“I am sorry.”

“Don't be sorry for me. She lived a good life and died well.” Obi tried to cover his emotions, but it was obvious the memory
touched him.

“I hardly have guest
s in my home. What kind of host would I be if I prevent my only guest from opening his mind?”

When
Obi was about to ask his question, the women came in and he stopped, which Michael noticed.

”You can ask me anything, we are all family.”

“What are you and your wife doing in this secluded area and why leave your home to come to this world where the people are different from you?”

“In my country since I was born, I have always dedicated my life to my God. That is why I became a missionary
,” Michael quickly replied. “When I first came over here with the merchants, I was forced to by the cardinal and I found this place greatly to my disdain. I stayed here for a year and quickly went home the first chance I could, but when I returned, I realized there was no room for me in that world. The only good I did was getting engaged to Mary, but she did not want to come to Africa with me, so I left her. After three years I went back to report to the church in my world to ask why they stopped sending amenities. They told me that they had cancelled the project in these parts and reassigned me back home, but over there was no longer my home. This was my home. So I decided to come back. Due to a force greater than I was, I went to see Mary, expecting her to already be married, but she was engaged.”

He held tight to Mary’s hands and, though he was in tears, he continued
.

“She was still engaged to me after all those years. This time she did not hesitate when I asked her to follow me. We got married and came over here. We were spreading the word about our God in small villages, but we heard they started to kill people who joined our religion. We decided to come here, near the boundary between Ozuoba and Utagba, so the people who come here are not really noticed because of its seclusion from the populated areas.”

When he finished, nobody had anything to say. The hosts noticed how tired their guests were and led them to where they would spend the night.

As Obi slept, he dreamed of coconut trees all around him. Then one of the fruits landed on his forehead and cracked a little. He picked up the fruit and opened it. The Ifa priest's face came out of the coconut and he screamed, “Leave now.”

Obi woke up immediately and told his wife to hurry up so they could leave. She got up and started getting ready quickly. He knew he was not worthy to have this woman as his bride and wondered why throughout the journey she never asked him the reason they were running or where they were going. When she was getting prepared, he took out his knife and took out his back tooth. As
Michael slept, Obi walked to where he was. If he had his way, he would not have woken him, but it was against their society’s etiquette to leave your host's house without thanking him. Such things led to the birth of enemies. In a soft voice he called to him, so his wife would not wake, “Michael, Michael.”

“Yes?”

“I am sorry to wake you, but I have to go now. People are after me.”

“Stay here, we can hide you.”

“No. Our people say, ‘The day a snail leaves its shell to find another one, it can never go back to the former.’ When these men come here, deny me, or else they will hurt you.”

“Don't worry about us. There is something about the white men here that always make them not touch us.”

“Please take this.” He placed his gift in the missionary's hand.

Michael opened his hands and saw Obi's tooth and he was puzzled.

“It means I owe you and when I repay your goodness I will ask for it back.”

Michael was still puzzled by the gesture, he wanted to say something but both man and wife were on their way.

*

They were walking very fast and when Amina's foot started to hurt, he carried her on his back. They had been traveling from the night into the day. When darkness was finding its way again, he saw the boundary to Utagba about a thousand paces across a river from him, but then they heard the horses’ hoofs. He could see Utagba, but he knew they could not make it there before the horsemen caught up with them. He found a space within a group of hard rocks, so he squeezed his wife through it. There was no room for two, so he climbed up a tree away from where his wife was.

The
re were nine men, eight were armed fully on horseback. They rode up to the area with fires on sticks for better illumination, then one of them shouted,  “Halt.” He was not dressed like an Omee and he was not armed. As they stopped, he picked the sand and rubbed it. Obi now knew he was a pathfinder and hoped he was a bad one. The man kept his ear to the ground and slowly started walking toward Amina's hiding place. Obi tried to hold him back with his eyes, but the man kept getting closer and closer to where she was. He was still touching the ground and seemed to be tracing where Amina was through something on the ground. Then he reached the rock where she was hiding. All he had to do was walk around the rock and his victim would be found.

Obi jumped down with a loud landing. Immediately all the attention was on him
; he started running in the rain. Six of the Omees chased him, the other two stayed behind in case of any surprises. Obi was always as fast as a man could ever be, but horses were faster. During the chase, the general who followed the Omees stopped his horse and fired an arrow. The flight of the arrow echoed in his ears as he got to the mouth leading to the river, so he dodged, using his hand to block the destination of the arrow into his heart and he dived into the river. The Omees got to the mouth of the river and started firing arrows at him underwater until he disappeared. The Omees tied their horses to trees and swam across to the other side of the river.

As
Obi got to the other side of the river, he saw Utagba in front of him, but he deviated into a house. He had no intention of entering Utagba while his wife was curled up between rocks. Before he approached the house, he pulled the arrow from his hand; the blood gushed from it profusely. He tore a piece of cloth from what he was wearing and tied a bandage around it to prevent himself from losing excess blood. He looked behind him to see a trail of blood, but he hoped for the rain to wash his trail away. He searched the house for a weapon, but there was nothing he could use to defend himself. He had dropped all his weapons during the chase; the only thing left on him was his knife.