Alala

“You have never crossed?” the priestess asked.

“Yes,” I replied.

Confusion entered her eyes. “Lying won’t do you any good, Wumi. It won’t do you any good. You come from a noble line of dreamers. Obatala’s favorite seed, scourge of the Onibode , keeper of the dead" the priestess said, coming closer. Too close.

“You will burn, stay back!” I shouted. My energy was growing again, it made my locs glitter.

“Oh, your energy. Is that why your dada is shining? Tell me, child, who taught you how to draw from your temple? The art of calling is a guarded secret among the Osugbo of Ore, how did you learn it?” the priestess asked, drawing back. Her white gown had begun to tinge at the edges.

“It is a long story, mama, a long story I don’t want to share now. Just tell me what the alphabet means. I have to cross today,” I pleaded.

“Then tell me,” she said, her voice calm, close to whispers. “When you are done, you will cross. You know how this realm works, Funmi, mo fun o. The moon is still young, the doors of onibode will never close as long as it’s up there in the sky, sho gbo?”

“I didn’t learn it,” I said, rubbing my wrists together. “It came to me.”

“You take my kindness for granted. When you are ready to cross, come back. I spent years building this house of memory from the ground, I learnt the language of the dreamers by heart day and night , and I hoped that one day a dreamer will cross from this memory house. All you have to do is to tell me how you learnt the art of calling . I have nothing left to say Omo mi, the priestess said and stood.

“Why is the story of how I acquired the art of calling this…” I stared at my locs, they were glittering again. “This curse so important? You are the keeper of memories, why is it so important to you? What do you need fire for!” I thundered. This time, threads of fire crawled out of my locs and made for the priestess.

“Stop them! Stop them! If I die, you won’t cross. You know that!”

“Then read it! Let me cross! Tell me what the alphabet says!” I said, waving my hands. The threads stood still in the air, waiting for my next order.

“I can’t,” she answered, her body quivering. “The fourth law of this realm states that: he who seeks must give. I didn’t write that law, Obatala did!”

“I can’t bring myself to say it. Do you draw thoughts?” I asked.

“Yes, but as you can see, my hair is gray now. I can’t hold them. If I enter your mind, I might get lost in it and you will become wild the moment that happens. It’s best if you tell me.”

I heaved…

*

Alala, dreamers, were the last thing Obatala created before he returned to the land of the gods. They were the finest of women who were gifted with the ability to visit the past in their dreams and alter it six times in their lifetime. Through their powers, they became the lords of lands, sought after by every being on earth. Kings, princes, and generals worshiped in the corridors of their house of memories, the sacred places where the art of crossing to the land of the dead through dreams were permitted by Obatala.

My mother came from the last line of Alala, the female dreamers that survived the great purge the disciples of Onibode, the keeper of the land of the dead, waged against them after the death of Obalufon in Ife. It was said that the killings started from the oldest memory house in Ife, where a circle of fifteen gifted dreamers tried to snatch the spirit of Obalufon back from the claws of Onibode. The priestess watched in horror as the disciples marched into the house with sharp daggers, overpowered the guards, and began the carnage. They slit the throats of the women in their sleep, and despite the shouts from the priestess that the women were in the service of Obalufon, the disciples of Onibode didn’t stop till they got to the last woman. They burnt that house of memory, and from there, they marched on other houses of memories in the city.

The disciples of Obatala fled the city with some dreamers after it was clear that they were outnumbered. The few who fought back were killed and their corpses fed to wolves. The disciples of Onibode celebrated for days after the purge, for they believed they had put an end to the art of crossing, whom their god, Onibode, forbade.

After their festival, Obatala struck the house of Onibode, its priests and disciples, with an epidemic that lasted three months. It was taboo to touch the seeds of Obatala. The disciples of Obatala did not return to the city for a century after the purge, while the rest of the dreamers died, save for my mother’s ancestor, Iyunyemi. She didn’t practice the art after the purge, but she wrote the instructions on a piece of cloth that became her family heirloom. Since she didn’t cross till she died, the power began to fade from one generation to another until it disappeared, only to return in Amope.

*

I couldn’t grasp the extent of the pain my locs brought to my mother until my eighteenth birthday, when she broke down in tears after the party had ended and the house was empty save for me and her.

“Why did they decide to visit me this way?” she said, her voice laced with pain. “The locs ended with Amope. They said it ended with her.”

“They” was my mother’s word for her family, her people. She had fled from them as soon as she clocked twenty, believing that a distance between her and them would shut her away from the spirit of Alala. I wasn’t permitted to reach out to them or even visit Ife. When I got my first phone, she scrolled through my friend list on Facebook one evening. And when she found out I had a friend from Ife, she called me to her room.

“You want to bring doom to me?” she smacked the phone on the ground. “Why are you trying to expose yourself to the hawks, you this foolish thing?”

“Maami, I don’t see reasons why you should still believe in superstitions,” I said, drawing close to her on the sofa she was sitting on.

“But these locs, these things on your head,” she said, touching my hair, tracing it from my forehead to the place where it flowed to my shoulders. “My grandmother, Amope, had it. It’s a sign that you have the power of Alala bottled in your body. When it’s time, you will burn what you love the most… she killed my husband on his birthday, she killed your father,” she said, holding her face in her palm.

I rested my back on the sofa, weighed down with questions. With my left hand, I rubbed her back as she cried.

I lived with this knowledge from that day and it followed me everywhere like a presence. Though hidden in the darkest place of my heart, it ebbed out of it every now and then like a voice, whispering that it would manifest one day.

That day came yesterday when my locs came alive . Maami was in the kitchen grating pepper and singing Ebenezer Obey’s: “Imasiko.” I was reading news on the destruction of a shrine somewhere in Ondo where a native doctor failed to save a woman from Abiku spirits after years of being her priest.

Suddenly, my locs stood straight on my head, and my body began to quiver. Then in split seconds: spasm of pain surged through me, and I screamed in pain. Maami rushed into the room. She lifted me from the bed I was sitting on and shook me. But I was not the only one in my body; Alala’s spirit was in control. My locs shook and fire, small flames like a lit match fell from my locs that had begun to glitter and they fell on her skin, breaking it’s surface. My mother’s scream was the last thing I remembered before I fainted. I woke up three weeks after in the hospital, and after recovering from the minor burns, I traveled to Ife, to my mother’s people, seeking answers.

*

“So you killed your mother?” the priestess asked and stood from where she was sitting. “If this is why you wanted to cross, you have my blessings, child.”

“What of the alphabet?” I pointed to the shred of white cloth on the ground where Iyunyemi had written the ways of the art of crossing on.

“Oh, that? I knew what they said before you came into this place. I spent years building this house and learning the alphabet of the dreamers. Why did you think your auntie sent you here?”

I shook my head in wonder. “Come with me,” the priestess said. She led me into a room in the house that had what looked like a pool, except it was a big pot fixed into the earth. Figurines of fishes, stars, and white strips of clothes hung on ropes fastened to the ceiling. A mirror was fastened to the statue of a seated woman close to where her breasts ought to be was placed close to the pot.

“Go into the water,” the priestess said and pointed to the pot. I stood still, my gaze on her. Fear crept into my body.

“Kill your fear, my child, go into the water, every dreamer does this.”

I walked to the pot and climbed into it. The priestess went to the only window in the room and threw it open. The silver of the moon flooded the room.

“Say after me: The door of Onibode lies on the palm of Obatala for he made it so.”

As the words slipped out of my mouth, my eyes closed slowly till everything was black.

I found myself in a room. It was adorned with glass and onyx. The floor glistened and reflected my form as though it were made of glass. Music came from somewhere outside the room, and if you listened carefully, you could hear the voice of an old man in it. I followed the voice, and it led me to a corridor.

Now I realized it was a palace because of the beads that adorned the walls and the statues in kingly attires on the thin corridor. When I entered the room, I was before Onibode, the keeper of the dead. He was seated on a white throne made of the purest silver, and behind his throne was a white curtain.

“Welcome, my child,” he said and smiled. “You are welcome to my palace. Come, sit, I won’t take your soul,” he said and laughed, then waved to the floor before him where a stool formed.

“Where is my mother?” I asked.

Onibode laughed and stood from his throne.

“This is my palace, child. Seat. Even if you are the greatest dreamer in the history of Obatala’s creation, you will sit when I address you.”

“Where is my mother!” I screamed, and my locs stood straight, then it released threads of fire that stood before me, ready to attack.

“I see you take pride in this little gift of yours. Don’t challenge me to a duel; you won’t return to the land of the living.”

I shook my hands, and the flames flew straight at him; he waved his hands, and they died before they reached him.

“Enough of this!” He thundered and clenched his right hand into a ball.

Pain surged through my body. I fell to the ground.

“The dreamers who came here hundreds of years ago in service of Obalufon did not return to the land of the living. What makes you think you possess a power greater than theirs?” He said and came closer. ‘’I have waited years for you, the last of the dreamers , and here you are!”

He clenched his right hand again. The pain that surged through me this time was different; it felt as though a spear were thrust through my back. I screamed, and the room was filled with light. Threads of fire crept from locs and flew into the heart of Onibode. He released his clenched hand and fell to the ground.

“Where is my mother?” I asked.

Onibode tried to stand, but I sent another thread of fire that landed on his arm; he recoiled in pain.

I came closer and stood over him. “Where is my mother?”

“Go to the corridor. You will find her spirit departing for her body,” he replied and rubbed his chest.

I ran out of the room into the corridor. Now it was longer. At the other end, a woman was about to open a door, then she turned and smiled.

“Mother!” I screamed.