BETHROTHED (5)

ZIBA

She saw the smoke before she got to the hut.

Papa Sunny rushed past her toward the village square, his face pale with terror. All around, people staggered and screamed, some injured, some bleeding, some already broken. Her heart began to pound violently against her chest as she adjusted the brown cloth filled with plates on her head and quickened her steps.

Before she arrived, she already knew.

The herdsmen had reached the village. Huts burned fiercely, flames licking the sky. Lifeless bodies lay scattered on the ground. Mothers ran about, screaming their children’s names. Detached body parts lay where life once was. The air was thick with smoke, blood, and anguish. And then she saw it.

Her hut.

Her hut was on fire.

The scream that tore out of her did not feel like her own voice.

“Mama!!!”

Her tall, athletic frame and dark-chocolate skin reflected briefly in shattered glass as she raced into the half-burnt hut, coughing violently as smoke filled her lungs.

“MAMA!!!”

The voice echoed again, sharp, broken, desperate. Panic, fear, and horror shaped every sound that escaped her mouth.

Then she heard it.

A faint cough.

It came from the smoky corner of the hut where Mama Ziba loved to sit in the cool of the evening, reading her novels and boasting to Ziba about how she had been a bookworm in her younger days. Now, that same corner held her mother’s helpless body.

“Mama, what happened? What can I do? Mama!!!”

Ziba struggled to push away the wooden beam they had recently fixed to stop the roof from leaking. It rested heavily on her mother’s chest. As she strained, their eyes met, and they both understood the unspoken truth.

Mama was dying.

Mama Ziba coughed, blood spilling from her mouth, yet she smiled weakly at her daughter.

“Come here, jare,” she whispered. “For once… I am glad you stayed longer at the stream.”

Tears rolled down her blood-stained face. Ziba sobbed uncontrollably, her heart wailing louder than her voice.

“Shhh… take this,” Mama Ziba said faintly.

Ziba searched frantically. “Mama?”

“My hand, Ziba,” she coughed again, blood following. “My left hand.”

Ziba grasped her mother’s hand and noticed a purple linen cloth tightly wrapped around something.

“I have it, Mama,” she cried.

Mama Ziba smiled, her eyes softening as her breath faded.

“I love you.”

“Mama, no! Mama, please! Mama, don’t leave me!”

Ziba screamed as chaos erupted all around them.

“Who dey inside? Dem dey come back oh!”

She didn’t care. Death felt easier than the emptiness spreading inside her. Suddenly, a strong hand wrapped around her waist and yanked her out of the burning hut just as it collapsed, swallowing her mother and everything they owned in flames.

She clutched the purple linen tightly as a heavy, muscled shoulder lifted her and ran. He ran and ran until she saw a small boat at the riverbank, packed with people, bodies stained with blood, dirt, pain, and despair.

As she was helped into the boat, Mama Rufus pulled her close, rocking her gently.

“My daughter eeeh,” she cried. “Your Mama fight oh. She fight.”

Through her dazed tears, Ziba saw Papa Sunny running back toward the village, searching for anyone else who might have survived, determined to bring them to safety.

She woke up abruptly.

Her bed was soaked with sweat. Her eyes darted around the room, bags, clothes, books, a faded poster of the University of Tenja on the wall.

Reality crashed into her.

She was in school.

Ziba exhaled shakily, her chest tightening as the truth settled once again.

She was all alone.