THE THING DEATH TAUGHT ME

Every time we lose a king, we gain an ancestral spirit and for that reason alone we never cry about a king’s death. I learnt the hard way that tears on a great day like this would get you flogged mercilessly. This is the second ascension that I will be witnessing and for the first time in my life I have a reason to celebrate. 

I was born a slave so I have nothing to lose from defying authority and crying, I’m used to getting flogged and I have only 7 toes left, three on my right foot and four on my left foot. There’s no reason for me to cry today and majority of the slaves in the palace share the same sentiment as me, what I want to do is remove Inoke’s eyes so that he won’t be able to join our ancestors. I need to blind him so that he can miss his way and end up as a lost soul. 

As a child, all I had was my mother and anytime I misbehaved the punishment was served by her. The day I had complete understanding of this, I became so well behaved and started to blindly follow the rules. That day, my mother and some other slaves had to serve the hunters after they returned from hunting with the king. I would usually help her when she worked but anytime she had to serve the palace guards or hunters, she would never let me go with her. Instead, she would leave me with the injured slaves and slaves that only catered to the king and his bloodline. That day most of the injured slaves weren’t in the cooking area it was just slaves that catered to the king’s bloodline. Bustina was there too, she was a slave that my mother had asked me to avoid. She would always call me and ask me questions and my mother was always panicked when I relayed our interactions to her. I sat on the floor where leftovers from the king’s hut were thrown and I ate some of the leftover that was on the floor. I was too tired of waiting for my mother and I knew she was going to be hungry when she returned, so, I gathered some together to give her. Bustina saw me and asked what I was doing. I told her and she smiled, I remember thinking she would steal what I separated for my mother because her smile was very telling. Later after my mother returned, she scolded me for the food then ate it. She and I were asleep with other slaves in our room before some guards woke us all. 

They were shouting my name and my mother quickly shielded me and asked what I did, one of the uglier ones slapped her for asking and said that I was a thief and I stole food. I jumped out from her back to argue that it was food from the floor, but Bustina jumped in before I spoke and pleaded with them on my behalf. She told them that I was an ignorant child and that they could easily punish my mother instead, for not raising me in line with the rules. The idiots immediately took my mother outside, while we followed in tow. The sky was black, not one torch was lit. if you were born a slave navigating in the dark shouldn’t be a problem, but I knew that fear and adrenaline sharpened my eyesight not acclimation. My mother was tied and flogged for “theft” the flogging resulted in open wounds and they had rubbed something on all her open wounds that clearly worsened the pain.

For the first time, I heard my mother scream, it was the first time I ever heard or saw her cry. She was flogged till she passed out and it took her crying again to get me to eat. I planned to never eat so that she wouldn’t have to experience this again. That memory was etched in my mind and for many nights after that I dreamt of my mother getting flogged.  

After that incident, I discovered that Bustina was the one that reported me to the guards. My mother was well liked by majority of the slaves, so many of them tried to cover up for her and do most of her work while she was recovering from the brutality of the guards. It was during my time assisting the slaves helping my mother that I understood that Bustina was a snitch.

Bustina started to get in trouble for petty reasons. Each of those times she claimed innocence and nothing annoys the guards more than a slave that wouldn’t take a punishment quietly. Since Bustina was a slave that served the king’s bloodline strictly, she never experienced punishments that made her lose a limb. You could say she and the other slaves in her category received some type of special treatment. She wasn’t used to getting punished and since she was always the one reporting other slaves, she was hardly ever at the other end of the rope. At some point, Bustina reached a level of punishment that made her lose a limb and her place as a royal slave. In the end, she died from the wickedness and cruelty ruling her heart. 

Shortly after Bustina died, I was asked to start serving the guards with other slaves who did. My mother tried to hide me in the cooking area and opted to serve all the guards I needed to serve in my place. It didn’t end well for my mother; it didn’t end well for her because her body was thrown in the cursed river like other slaves that were killed in the palace. Nobody knows what my mother did to warrant her death and knowing the guards, she probably did nothing. I lost my will to live and I was ready to die. if I killed myself, I would be buried and my soul would ascend, but my mother would remain in that cursed river with Bustina. I just couldn’t leave her alone. 

I devised a plan to help me join my mother. If I committed petty crimes round the palace, it would take time before the palace guards would beat me to death, I would face “light” punishments first and before you know it my mother would’ve spent too long in that river. In fact, by the time I would join her she would have forgotten me. That’s why I decided I would pick a path that would guarantee immediate death. I would steal from the king. 

The king was away for the time being so going near his hut was prohibited, if I walked there in broad day light I would be caught, flogged and starved but I’m too strong so that wouldn’t kill me. I decided to go at night when I would only be caught after leaving his hut and then death would be certain. 

After I was dismissed from the cooking area, I went ahead to climb a giant tree that was close to the king’s hut, I pretended like I was picking weed at first and guards that saw me assumed I was under some sort of punishment, as usual they taunted me and tried to get a reaction. I’ve been here long enough to know that ignoring them was the only correct reaction. I spent a long time on the tree and at some point, I didn’t realize that I had slept off till I almost fell from it. 

Once the moon came out, torches were lit and the courtyard leading to the king’s hut was well illuminated almost as if the sun was still out. No guards were in sight and the only people around were slaves charged with making sure the torches stayed lit till morning. I carefully got down from the tree and strolled to the king’s hut, I waited and no one called out to me, so it meant that no one saw me. I wasn’t worried that anyone might look for me because it was normal for slaves to end up in the beds of palace guards or hunters instead of their own. I went into the hut; it was dark and for the first few seconds I stood there trying to contemplate my next move. My eyes adjusted to the sudden darkness, and I was able to make out a few figures. 

I felt around the hut slowly and finally touched what felt like a human skin, I tried to snatch my hand back immediately but then, whoever I touched grabbed my hand quickly and pulled me close. Suddenly, I felt myself being forced in a position with my back against whoever held me. My hands were secured tightly behind my back and a large hand on my neck. Whoever held me was very large and the only person I knew that was that large was the king.

“You’re the one that has been trying to kill me?” 

I remember how I felt after hearing that voice. On a good day, the king’s voice completely terrified me. It matched his looks and I swear on my life that one time when he laughed the palace roof collapsed. This time I was excited to hear it, I was excited at the thought of reuniting with my mother.

The king figured that I was suicidal and I wasn’t the assailant trying to kill him, he found some strange interest in my lack of will to live and kept me as a personal slave when he discovered I was never touched by anyone in the palace. He assured me that he would never let anyone kill me and even if someone did, he would bury me in the ground and not throw me in the cursed river. I was broken. I didn’t know how I was going to continue living when I had nothing to look forward to. 

The king and I developed a routine and I grew fond of him. In a sense he was a terrible man and I know that my mother would’ve hated him, but he kept me company and that was enough to keep me going. The king’s heir, Inoke; was a very covetous young man and he developed an interest in me when he noticed that I was his father’s property through and through. Originally, he was gunning for the throne and he made several attempts on his father’s life to speed up his coronation. His father decided to step down for him to be king and live far away with me. When the king told me this, I was happy, happier than how I felt when my mother would return from her ventures with the palace guards and hunters, I knew that this didn’t mean freedom but I didn’t feel like I was trapped when I was with my king. 

The day before the king was supposed to hand over to Inoke, he died. He died a silent death in his sleep and everyone was celebrating getting a new ancestor but I had lost my king, I had lost my lover. Inoke came to me to gloat about his father’s death and how by law he was to inherit me from his father, I knew then that it was him that killed my lover and I was going to take vengeance. 

When my mother was killed, I became empty and I was ready to join her. This time, it’s different. I had some hope that I might feel joy from within, I was already feeling some happiness from outside. It felt like I was drowning and I gave up, then my king pulled me up for some air. Then just as I took a deep breath and filled my lungs with air, Inoke shoved my head right back into the cold water and left me to drown. 

One thing I knew I was going to do was kill the king’s successor. I had decided that I was going to kill Inoke and I wasn’t going to stop there, I was going to stop him from joining our ancestors and I swore it on my life. 

Killing Inoke was an easy task, I had many options and chances to kill him. The problem was blinding him successfully before getting caught. Inoke was a man that enjoyed the forbidden, nothing pleased him more than forcing his way into something. He got bored with his wives as soon as he married them and the only kids he had were bastards produced by slaves he forced. I knew that accepting him would make me less interesting, thus making my task impossible so I resisted continuously. 

I had a few offensive nicknames given to me by the other slaves, they weren’t blind, or atleast most of them weren’t. They didn’t understand why the king kept me and why Inoke was trying to keep me too. There was nothing fantastic about me except for my ability to evade bad luck. I didn’t inherit my mother’s looks; I knew this because other slaves would pity me for it. compared to my mother’s large frame, I’m much smaller and difficult to spot in a crowd. 

The ascension ceremonies take days, 5 days and on the last day they bury the king with all the things he needs to get to the ancestors. after the priest thanks the ancestors and introduces the next one to join them, we cover the kings face so that when he gets up on the other side dust wont enter his eyes and delay him from joining the ancestors.

I had a small stone with me, a sharp stone. I tested it on myself and I was able to slash my left thigh easily. After the priest introduced Inoke and ordered us to cover his face I took the stone out from where I hid it in my waist beads, I could hear my heart beating faster and I knew that it was now or never, before the slave that was to follow him could cover his face I rushed and stabbed his left eye, I know that due to the initial shock no one would do anything yet so I quickly did the same to his right eye. 

I couldn’t feel my hands anymore and I noticed that the images around me started spinning. In seconds, the spinning stopped and I saw a headless body with my wrapper and beads on over Inoke’s body. It then occurred to me that I had just died, my head had been cut off, and even though I couldn’t find the joy I was looking for, I would finally reunite with my mother and maybe find peace… 

by OT ADESUWA