He started adding the ingredients on the floor to the oil mud mixture ; as he did so he explained what he is doing to Adaeze. Because Ngozi was there, his explanations were quite ambiguous.
“This is the seven leaved Okata. It is very rare and extremely powerful. Only a few men know where it grows. Soon I will show you where”. He squeezed that and put it in the liquid.
‘‘You know what this is ?’’ He showed her some powdery stuff.
‘‘ Yes’’, she says. With a ladle he stirred the whole gue until it coagulated. Then he set it aside for it to cool a bit. He then gently started rubbing it over the sick man from his neck right down to the sole of his feet. After the job is completed, the man is quite covered from neck to heel in red muddy substance.
Placing the basin like gourd on the window sill, once again Isiburuekperi instructed Adaeze.
“Go and get me some of the oil and some of the hot medicine with it”. Adaeze comes back again with the basin. Isiburuekperi collects it from her and keeps it on the ground, then gathering bits from his ingredients on the floor he puts them in the hot pot of oil, stirs, then set it aside to cool. Isiburuekperi brought out from his bag once more another package. For some reason this package sent shivers
down Adaeze’s spine. The package is wrapped in a wrinkled skin wrapper. It had a foul sort of smell. The skin looked much like human skin. It is tied with swamp creepers. There are every kind of native pins , needles and feathers stuck all over it.
Isiburuekperi gently set this package aside; carrying it with two hands, to show its delicateness and importance.
Then he replaced all the other ingredients he had earlier brought out into the bag.
All this while he is muttering incantations to himself.
Picking up the cup of hot medicine. He stirred it vigorously with the ladle. Continuously palming it to gauge the extent it had cooled. Eventually he decided it was cool enough, and he approached the sick man on the bed, beckoning on Adaeze to follow him. The sick man is still the same, only bids of perspiration are forming on his forehead and his earlier ajar mouth is now firmly closed. Isiburuepkperi tries to get him to drink the medicine but the man is too sick to comply. Isiburuekperi simply pinched the man’s flaring nostrils shut. When the man couldn’t breathe with his nose, he was forced to open his mouth and in went the medicine as Isiburuekperi at the same time releases the nose. So it is gurgle gurgle, swallow and gulp. The process was repeated several times. The sick man is now sweating profusely and his breathing has increased in rhythm. But the man is still not conscious.
They watched him closely, then Isiburuekperi covered the man up to his neck in the thick woolen blanket.
Turning to Ngozi he addressed her : “After we have gone, take the time it will take you to go to the big market place at Amaasa, and back, then clean off him the red mud medicine. Then cover him up again and let him sleep. He will be alright by morning, but extremely hungry. Prepare some hot soup or sauce for him. He has lost a lot of liquid”
Ngozi nodded respectfully. Her eyes fixed on her sleeping husband; whose breath, though still rattles, is becoming a bit regular.
“Okay now, leave us”, Isiburuekperi commanded.
Ngozi turned to him, a little confused.
Isiburu looked at her softly, and said again : “Go”.
Ngozi left, shutting the door behind her.
“Hold on to my cloth”, Isiburu advised Adaeze.
He went to the door to make sure no one was there and to the window, where he saw peeping spectators.
“Go home, all of you. Go to your houses and stay there till I have gone. I do not want to see any one of you around when I come out. Do you hear?”.
They all scampered away. He shut the window. He looked at Adaeze and said: “ Be strong, for after this, you will not be a child anymore”
She nodded courageously.
Isiburuekperi picked up the odd looking package and held it close to his belly.
“I am Isiburuekperi, the cat who’s back never touched the ground. I am the dry meet that fills the mouth, I am the dry tortoise shell; in vain does the thunder rage against me”.
He dances round the little hut room, with his ward in tow.
“You can only go round and round me. You cannot climb me. I am Isiburuekperi, the messenger of the gods. I am the only living ancestor. He who dares me, if he is living will die, if he is a spirit, he will die again. I look not for trouble”.
Again the duo danced around the room, with Adaeze holding on tightly to the man’s loin cloth. They danced in a fast trot, and then at a slow rhythm; to a music only them can hear.
“This is the house of the living, not of the dead. I have waited here patiently for you to leave; but you have insulted me by staying to dare me; well your challenge is accepted. I am giving you twenty eye blinks, after which I will abrogate no compromise and will dispatch you with pain, you foul rejects of men and spirits”.
He started opening the package of human skin. Immediately there is a noise on the rafters of the house. They looked up. The thatched roofs were opening and closing of their own accord. It was as if someone or something was pushing them open from inside. Then suddenly with a sharp crack, the windows flew open in splinters; and a cold gust of air blew out through it.
The old man looked at the girl who returned his gaze without a trace of fear. He nodded acknowledgingly.
Isiburuekperi then opened the human skin package and held it out in front of him with his left arm. The package contains some white powdery substance, with a very strong acrid smell.
Raising his right hand, Isiburuekperi chanted a brief incantation under his breath, and suddenly straightened the right hand, and out of nowhere the little spear which is his symbol of office appeared in the hand ; jangling and vibrating. With the appearance of the spear, a total transformation took over Isiburuekperi. His eyes went totally red and dilated; his nose flared, the teeth half bared, his whole body became taut. This is not Isiburuekperi the Kings medicine man. This is Isiburuekperi the ancestor. Half man, half spirit.
He spoke. Even his voice has changed. It has become deep and guttural.
“There are powers and there are powers. The power that comes from Amadioha is the ultimate power. He who dares me, dares AMADIOHA !”
As he spoke, his tone continued increasing with each word. The last word was a scream. And with that he blew on the powder in the package he is holding. As he blew, he turned round, blowing the powder all over the room, while at the same time with the point of the spear he was drawing a circle on the floor around them. Adaeze all this while had been a bit askance about what was going on. However, what transpired soon, left her impressively scared and breathless. Slowly as the white powder settles, some strange phenomena started manifesting in the room.
Adaeze started seeing some spectral apparitions all covered in the white powder. Then she started hearing also their noises.
One particular large one was standing in a corner and the loudest noise was emanating from him.
Then Isiburu started his attack. Sticking the point of his spear outside the circle, he was chanting wildly and gutturally in some strange tongue Adaeze could not immediately decipher. As he sees any of the smaller spectres he points the spear point at it as if shooting at such a one, and shouts
“Go back to hell” or such a command and immediately that one, will disappear with a puff, a whooze, or a twinkle.
Eventually Isiburuekperi turned and faced the large devil.
“Okposhi, you know me, yet you chose to disobey he who sent me”;
He got a growl in reply.
“Well, you’ve had your chance, now you have to vamoose by force.”
The growl got louder, and the air around the raging spirit got more turbulent as if a little storm was brewing around it.
Isiburu reading the signs started his own counter incantations.
“I am the messenger of the gods. Amadioha the father of all is my master. Everything on earth and even in hell are all under Him, including you piece of devil shit. Amadioha says go – and go you must…”
Suddenly without warning the raging mass, like a hot ball of solid air, flung itself at the pair in the circle. Isiburuekperi promptly raised his spear and pointed it at the hurtling mass. It was immediately checked in mid flight, and slowly pushed back and the size started diminishing.
The howling and piercing noises coming from the formless form was disturbing.
As the form diminished so did its noise.
Eventually both form and noise disappeared totally. The quiet that followed was as deafening as the earlier noise.
The duo stood silent for some minutes; then Isiburuekperi announced;
“Let’s go, little princess.”
He stepped out of the circle and picked up his bag from a corner. That was when both of them noticed that Adaeze was still holding on to his loin cloth. She hastily released him. He guffawed. She smiled bravely and they proceeded to the door.
The last vestiges of the sun was dropping in a blaze of yellow beyond the distant hills behind the giant trees of the great forest in the west.
As they stepped out, darkness enveloped the land.
These are those little things about Isiburuekperi. When today’s story is being told in the village, some will say that Isiburuekperi’s coming out caused the darkness. The elements respond to him. He is not to be seen in the day. Some will go a step further to say he commanded the sun to go down. Some of these stories are based on a simple occasion when there was a lightening flash and Isiburuekperi had simply said:
“Let the thunder roar” And immediately there was thunder. The story had immediately gone all over the land that Isiburuekperi calls thunder at his whims and caprices.
Simple accidents and coincidences are overblown and over mystified by the simple minded villagers, thereby creating an aura of enigmatism around the Kings medicine man. However an enigma he really is. He is the boogie man of Oja.
They are walking along a village path that leads to the great square in front of the palace.
“I am sorry princess, I know that was your call and I stole it.”
“Oh, great father, I understand. I must admit, at first I was surprised at why you were interested in a simple malaria case.”
“I see, so tell, what do you understand?”
“I now know that no matter what the gods plan for us, there are other recalcitrant and interfering forces that try to change these plans. It is therefore the duty of such as you, to make sure that the will of the gods is what must happen.”
He nodded visibly;
“But I cannot be everywhere at the same time. So what if I am not there. What happens?”
“Then whatever occurs that is not the intention of the gods is an accident. It is not predestined.”
He nodded, and handed over his charmed spear to her.
“Hold on to this for me while I adjust my bag. You might as well get used to touching and carrying it.”
She took it. Quite impressed by its weight, and still awed by its wonderful appearance today.
Isiburuekperi adjusts his bag, then collects the Oji back from her “Onyeozi, next time you make contact with the Oji, he will not be so docile to you. At that instance he will duly introduce himself to you. Be prepared for the time is not long to come”
“Thank you Nna nke Ukwu.”
She seemed to be thinking. Then she says “There is still something I don’t fully understand though.”
“And what is that?”
“Why all the red mud on the sick man? He was already thickly covered.”
“Well yes. First the red mud itself contains some very strong curative powers; this however I enhanced with some other medicine, which you saw and identified. But the major reason for its application, as you speculated, is to generate heat. Unlike the blanket, its effect is instant. It blocks the body pores and the body cannot breathe. The body’s effort to find air generates instant heat.”
“It could be lethal if not removed on time.”
“Yes, on a child, but on a grown man like Oti Igba, he will be well enough soon to wash it off himself.”
“I see. Now tell me, my teacher, why is heat necessary to cure malaria?”
He smiled quietly.
“You see, malaria is a sickness that makes you feel hot while inside you are very cold. It is that cold feeling inside is a sign of its presence in the body, while the little demons of the sickness attack and eat up the victim’s blood. That is why the man suffering from malaria is always thirsty as the blood is the water stream of the body. Ironically, it is the destruction of that cold inside the body that is the cure for the sickness. When enough heat is gathered in the belly or chest or head, it explodes and spreads over the body and drives away the cold. The man sweats, and he is instantly well, though weak.”
The young girl was nodding vigorously.
“I understand now. Whenever I have malaria, after a long time I experience that explosion and heat, I sweat and get well. But father told me that malaria is important. That it is during malaria sickness that young ones grow. It makes them grow by stretching their bones”
Isiburuekperi just smiled, neither supporting nor discrediting such theory.
He simply changed the direction of the discussion. With a faraway voice, he started telling her a story.
“The white did not have malaria in the land across the mighty seas.
He came here and met malaria; and it killed them in great numbers. We gave them our medicine, but they said no, it is dirty. We told them it is the small insect that buzzes around the ear at night that carries the disease, but they laughed at us. Do you know what they said?”
“No.”
“They said it is the dirty, impure air that come out of our great and old swamp that spoil the air around, and when one breath it, one gets malaria.”
He laughed and shook his head.
“Such absolute stupidity.”
She was intrigued by the story.
“So, what happened, oh ancient one?” She knows that the story that she is privy to must have happened up to a hundred years ago. Yet Isiburuekperi is telling it as if he was there at the time, and obviously he was.
“They took our water from the swamp in their glass containers; they took bits of roots, leaves, fruits, fish, birds and everything they could get from the swamp. They took them to their big schools in their land. They looked at them for a long time but found nothing about malaria.”
“So, so, what happened?”
“They decided it is our witchcraft that causes malaria. It is black magic that we are using to kill them so that they will leave our land and go.”
“But, our people, like Mazi Oti Igba were still suffering from and maybe dying from malaria then.”
“I told you, wise messenger of the gods, despite their other great abilities, sometimes the white man displays stupidity that is almost moronic. But anyway, eventually some of their wise ones said: “For these people to survive with this sickness they must have a means of fighting it.” So, they decided to look at the mosquito and boom! it is in the insect. That is how they have developed their own medicine from our herbs and roots. The people of the land are right.”
They had got to the gate of the palace.
“Go rest, little spirit girl. Some yam seedlings are still left, and some farmlands are still uncultivated. Good night.”
He touched her on her forehead and left. She watched him for a little while and then she entered through the great gates
