chinedum Ify Obikili

Many years ago, in the village of Ummuna Ala, the gods issued a decree that condemned an innocent child of only a few months old to death. He was to be thrown into a thick forest where even warriors feared to venture.
It was indeed a sorrowful period for the people of Ummuna Ala in general and for Amadi’s family in particular. An unusual quietness, seasoned with fear, descended on the land after Akirika, the village medicine man, issued a decree which had supposedly come from the gods.
The village youth had been very brutal the morning they came to take the little boy away. Ihuoma had heard every heartless word and witnessed their brutality from a concealed distance. They had marched into her father’s compound with chants of war, advancing like it was an impending battle and not a little child who was lost in deep sleep on his mother’s bosom. From where she hid, Ihuoma heard Akirika, the village medicine man, demand for her brother. And like a lamb being led to the slaughter, Ebube was brutally taken away by the overzealous youths. Ihuoma watched helplessly. She could only wish him a fast and painless death.
However, Sixteen years later the supposed dead child reappears with plenty of scores to settle. But with whom would he settle these scores? The gods? The spokesman of the gods or his father?