United by Blood

Achala was one of eleven towns in the kingdom of Otama. According to history, these towns were not always unified under one leadership and therefore one realm. It was the mid-eighteenth century that war came upon the independent communities in Otama and threatened to annihilate them. The bodies of the young men killed in the battle were being brought back to their towns and, even though the tradition of the land demanded that no indigene of Otama must be buried outside the boundaries of the kingdom, many that went to fight in the war did not return. The people from these regions were renowned warriors and hunters, but the forces that came against them was too high. The army of the opposition had exotic weapons that spit fire and those who survived the battlefront had stories of the magic that their enemies used to defeat them.

At the beginning of the war, the people of Otama thought it wise to hold the enemy forces far away from the towns to protect their wives and children. As the war dragged on from weeks to months, the battleground moved closer to the homes of the Otama people as their military personnel dwindled. The enemy forces were being led by the great King Malifo Agbodenebo II whose ambition it was to build an empire that would span the whole of land bound East of the Niger. He had conquered sixteen kingdoms at the time, and as he conquered more territories, his army and power grew stronger.

At that time, each of the eleven towns brought out their best warriors to fight in the war, but as they continued to lose soldiers, it became incumbent that the different communities came together. The ikoro was a giant slit drum made from wood. The ikoro of the people of Otama was made from an iroko tree that was as old as time. According to folklore, the iroko tree could not die. The ancestors of the Otama people had found it at the settlement when they first went there to live. The tree would often lose a branch and kill a member of the community. It took a while before the people realised that the branches did not fall on someone unless the person had committed a heinous crime of some sort. But before they understood that, they had cut the tree and made an ikoro out of it. The ikoro was called a Talking Drum. They only began to realise that the iroko tree was unusual when, after cutting it down to the stump, it started to grow again from one of the surface roots. At the time of the great war, the iroko had increased back to its former glory, and the ikoro at the base of the tree was the only evidence that the tree was not the first that stood there when the community was established that many years ago. The ikoro was so heavy that it could not be lifted from the time it was carved to the time of the great war. Because of the sheer size and weight of the drum, a hut was built around it right on the spot on which it was carved.

The iroko was located at the point of greatest vertical extent in the whole kingdom, and the sound of the ikoro could be heard from all corners of the Otama kingdom. So when the elders determined that their collective enemy could not be defeated by scattered effort, the custodian of the ikoro and the chief priest of the deity that lived in the tree, Ichie Amandianaeze was advised to beat the drum. The Ichie was an old man, but his age did not affect his weight or wrinkle his skin. He was a burly man. He carried the heavy sticks used to beat the drum, stood very firmly on the ground and began to beat the drum.

"Kuru dum, kuru dum, kuru dum," the drum spoke. Every man and woman in the kingdom knew what it meant for the talking drum to speak. The drum was used to announce danger and emergency. Therefore the sound of the drum meant that women and children should retreat into their homes and stay away from the threat being announced by the drum, while the able-bodied men were to gather from all corners of the kingdom to the iroko tree. There, a solution to whatever problem that prompted the talking drum to speak would be found. The Ichie beat the drum twice again for good measure. It was sunset in the kingdom, but before darkness took over from the day, men, both young and old began to trickle in and gather around the iroko tree.

Among them were young men that had never been to war, wounded soldiers, elders that had seen wars but were too old to fight and there were the leaders of each town in the Otama kingdom who, hitherto had not come together in that manner. There were also chief priests of all the deities in the domain, each one ready to be of service and help dispel the fear that took hold of the entire community since the beginning of the war. The rank of all the kings and chief priests were equal; therefore none of them had superiority over the others, so when enough people had gathered, Ichie Okoro Onunaekwuruoha began to speak. He was aged one hundred and twenty-three years old at the time and was the most aged man in all nine towns. In spite of his age, he always insisted on everyone addressing him as Onu and he was still very physically active. One of his thin shoulders was wrapped in a white Asoke wrapper, leaving the other shoulder and arm wholly exposed. As he began to speak, his voice was powerful and seemed to originate not from his frail-looking body but from somewhere behind the iroko tree that stood tall behind him. He informed his people of their impending annihilation.

"In all my years in this surprising place called life, I have never seen anything the likes of which our community is facing today. For this reason, I am as handicapped as the rest of you concerning what can be done. The reason we are all here is to find a way to save the lives of our people, all our lives. Every opinion is welcome," Ichie Onu said.

The crowd was so silent, you could hear the rustle of clothes and people shifted around. Then from the back of the group, a man came forward. He walked with a smooth gait even though he held a walking stick. In his right hand, he held the long walking stick that looked like a long javelin with what sounded like small bells that made clinky noise. As he walked closer to the tree, the almost-full moon revealed a portion of his face. The skin around his left eye was painted white, signifying that he could see in the physical with one eye and in the spiritual realm with the other eye. He was the chief priest of Amadioha, the thunder god of Obodoeshi town. When he stood in front of the crowd, he began to speak.

"We have the best warriors in our kingdom, yet the forces of Agbodenebo has continued to defeat us. And I ask, is the barber bad at his job or is his blade simply not sharp? I think the answer should be clear to us all now. But in case there are people among us to whom I must bare my teeth after eating the dry nuts of the breadfruit, I say to you that our battle is not physical because our enemies are not physical. Therefore, we must fight our enemies spiritually or if you will, with magic!" he said as he looked from left to right at the crowd in front of him. Nobody spoke.

"Great Eye of the Gods, I have always known your council to be wise, but you speak in parables, my good friend. How do we begin this journey?" he asked.

The chief priest told them of a sage deep in the woods on land far away across the Niger river. The chief priest had only seen him once in the past but did not see his face. No one knew if it was a man, woman or an apparition but he had a reputation for having solutions to impossible problems. The people deliberated on this matter for hours until they decided that they had no choice but to visit the sage that the chief priest spoke about. It was almost daybreak when men were sent to travel to the sage. A delegation of twelve men, one from each town and the chief priest was sent to the sage.

They travelled all day and the next night before they arrived at the edge of the river. They found a fisherman that took them across the river. It was midnight before they reached the peak of the mountain where the sage lived. It was dark, and they could not see far in front of them. Suddenly they heard a voice in front of them.

"Come no further, Nwokorie the son of Ogedi, the eye of the gods. What do you want with me?"

The delegates froze. The chief priest had encountered the sage once before, but he was not sure that the sage was still alive. He came all the way on a dare, but he was shocked to learn that the sage was not only there but was as perceptive as ever. He told the sage why he and his men had come.

"Go home to the land of your forefathers, eye of Amadioha. On your way, where the place where the river meets the river, there you shall find a mortar which to pound the first of your firsts and with it, your problems are your enemy's! Now leave me in peace," the sage told them. The chief priest tried to seek an explanation, but he received no response. They moved further in search of the sage, but there was no one there. They dropped the gifts they had brought for the sage and started the trip back home. When they reached the river, they saw a tributary where the red river joined the black river, and there were a big mortar and a pestle. The first man that tried to carry it fell into the water and drowned. The chief priest decided to go. The closer he got to the mortar, the more he realised that it was closer to the water than it seemed and the current of the river faster than it appeared. He stopped short of the mortar, stretched his walking stick and pulled it to him. When it was near enough, he lifted it and took it home. He was not sure of the meaning of the message the sage had given them. When he and his companions arrived, the elders and the kings were already assembled at the iroko tree, each one looking like he had not slept since he left them.

When he informed the elders and kings of what the sage said, they understood. They explained to him that the sage had been in each of the king's and elder's dreams informing them that one of them must sacrifice their firstborn who must be pounded in the mortar into a pulp. This pulp would be diluted with water and poured on the ground all around the kingdom. That was the only way to win the war. Among them all, only Madueke of Achala town offered his son for the sacrifice. In his prime, Madueke was a fearsome warrior, but he had grown old and tired of living. He had lost his first two sons in the war and had only that one son left.

After the men did as the sage instructed, they waited, but nothing happened. The war continued until their enemies were almost upon them. They thought that it was the end of their lives but, when the last of their soldiers retreated back home as they were chased by the enemy forces, something completely unexpected happened. As soon as the soldiers of Otama crossed the gates to their kingdom, the ground at the boundary of the kingdom broke and separated the territory from the rest of the world through a very a vast valley. The army of Agbodenebo did not see the valley in time, and they fell in. Each time the soldiers attempted to invade Otama from a different route, the same fate befell them until they lost most of their army and the remaining ones lost heart.

For his great sacrifice, Madueke was crowned the King of Otama kingdom, and his leadership unified the eleven towns. That was how the family of Madueke of Achala became the rulers of the eleven towns of Otama until this day. When Ichie Madueke died, his daughter ruled, then her son and later, grandson. The story of the great war and how the people of Otama gained the victory that unified them, has been told in many different ways, but this is the correct version of the events that transpired.

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## Images are original images by the author

Authored by: @churchboy

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