Toyo-toyo

Gather round my children, pick up your stools and come sit close to me by the fire. While the heat warms my old bones, I will set fire to your young minds with a tale of valor, love and hope.

Before you lies Abemeji.

Like an eagle, the land rises. It stretches its wings and spreads for miles and miles, going beyond the hills, past the river from the goddesses bosom before settling to roost at the horizon where the starlit skies kisses the earth. 

The land is beautiful yes? 

It was not always so. 

Abemeji was once a land divided and kept apart by evil men who learned he kingdom's secret. You see the kingdom is made up of a variety of people who have migrated from lands far and wide. While it is home to various people. Our greatest weapon was the strength in our diversity;  where one household with ample wisdom was lacking in courage, the house with courage but no wisdom would supplement and so forth. 

Together we were strong.

This was our secret. The evil men learned of this and rather than unity, they preached tribalism, bigotry and vanity. 

In time the land was torn apart and resulted in the creation of two kingdoms. 

After separating the land, they left descendants whose only ambition in life was to continue to promote the destruction of the once beautiful land. 

Although there were no outward signs of suffering or lack. There was a gradual decay of the society from within, people lost sight of what was important and what was not, they spent their lives searching for what they felt would lead to happiness at the expense of family and friendships, they became indecisive, easily fooled and weak. With every member of of the older generation that passed on, the problem got worse as the history of their once great kingdom was gradually being erased. 

While the people of Abe who were known for their game, valuable trees and brave warriors lived in the south,  the people of Meji who had precious stones, fertile lands and beautiful women occupied the Northern regions. 

Anyone who was convicted of a crime, or caught without any justifiable cause at the boundary of both kingdoms, was made to suffer a crime worse than death; they were banished to the evil forest - a place no man or woman had ever returned from. 

It was believed that the years ago the trapped spirits of those who were wrongly accused had turned evil and caused any mortal who wandered into the forest to turn mad and feed on themselves. 

In Abe, there was a warrior called Akaworlu. Known for his bravery, skill and talent. He was revered by members of his community while merchants spread tales of his valor to neighbouring towns.

One day he went on a hunt that lasted for many months and returned with a maiden more beautiful than any the land had seen before. 

This made three men, Kayo, Showgo and Iraw who were already envious of his good fortune very upset. A situation which was worsened years later when Akaworlu's wife Dizia, gave birth to a  baby girl. Rather than pay the fine, and take in another wife who will then bear a son as was the custom of the time, Akaworlu slaughtered an animal, had a feast and wrote songs for his wife.

 Although a few years later Dizia bore two boys for the great warrior, by that time, the threee men had been consumed so much by hatred that they made a pact to  destroy Akaworlu and all held dear, even if it meant their own destruction.

Akaworlu named his daughter Mmawa, in memory of his beloved mother who had imbibed in him values and respect for life and taught her in secret how to wield weapons and engage in hand combat.  This was done in secret because it was forbidden for women to learn or do any other thing but prepare meals and fetch water from the stream. It was an offence punishable by banishment to the evil forest.

The three men suspected  Mmawa was trained in the art of weaponry but because she was obedient, humble and graceful, hard as the three men tried to provoke her to reveal her talent, by forcing people to torment and bully her, she always remained calm and resolved issues diplomatically. 

When the time for Mmawa to be wed grew close, the three men knew that if Akaworlu's family got united with another family, it would become difficult to carry out their evil plan so, a few weeks to Mmawa's coming of age party, they planned with wicked native doctor who summoned a creature to attack Akaworlu on his way back from a hunting trip. Although it was unable to kill him, he was badly wounded and was unable to continue his journey home. 

Worried about her father, knowing it was unusual for his hunting trip to last for so long, Mmawa, left her mother with her younger brothers, took her father's donkey  and went in search of him. Using the tracking skills her father had taught her, she was able to locate him on time and bring him home. 

Mmawa's father was sick for many nights. He was so sick  that Dizia was worried she would soon become a widow and began to prepare for his passing. 

They ran out of food and because the three men had been busy spreading false news and rumours about Dizia, calling her an orphan and foreign spy, people were unwilling to sell or give her food.

Not able to watch her family and sick father starve to death, one early morning Mmawa picked up her father's weapons and headed into the forest, by nightfall, her satchel was filled with enough meat and wild fruits to feed her family for a long time as well as herbs and medicinal plants her father had showed her on their many secret lessons. 

On her way home, she heard a loud cry, looking around, she saw no one. She was about to continue her homeward journey when she heard the cry again. 

It was a human being and  from the sound of it she suspected whoever it was, was being attacked by wild animals, without considering  the risk of exposing herself, she hid her satchel of food under a nearby bush and silently hurried silently towards the direction of the sound and climbed up a nearby tree. Below, she spotted wounded young man being taunted by a pack of hyenas. She pulled out her arrow and shot the animals dead one after the other. Using tree branches and vines, she fashioned a crane which she was able to use to carry her satchel of food and support the stranger. 

She took him to her parents home.  With the help of her mother and younger brothers, after a few weeks, both men were nursed back to health. 

The young man had grown fond of her. He  crafted tokens  and hid gifts around the house for her to find but he refused to tell her his name. Whenever she would ask for his name, he would sing a song which he taught her. 

When he was able to travel, he expressed his gratitude to Akaworlu and his wife and left without saying goodbye to Mmawa. 

She was heartbroken. 

For days she was depressed and refused to give audience to any suitor that came calling. Just as she was beginning to cope with the feeling of loss, the three men sent a message to her mother that she had been found guilty of stealing food and was to be escorted to the public square to be stripped and flogged in front of the members of community. When the men came to retrieve her mother, in anger, Mmawa attacked them, beating them up without the use of any weapon, thus revealing that she was indeed a warrior. 

Without letting her stand trial, the three men convinced the elders that she should be immediately banished to the evil forest or risk infecting the rest of her peers with her malicious spirit of disobedience and disrespect for tradition. 

When Akaworlu heard the news, he instructed his wife to pack up a satchel while he raced to the square to rescue his daughter before he reached her, he was subdued by a dozen warriors who had been told to lie in wait. 

Mmawa cried for her mother and brothers as she was being led in a procession towards the evil forest.  

There was a loud cry and suddenly, a ferocious beast with wings for hands and talons for feet, swooped down and disappeared into the evil forest. While people scrabbled and ran for their lives, Mmawa knelt in front of her father's captors and begged that she be given his weapons and the leather cloth he wore across his shoulders. Believing it would do her no good, her request was granted. Unknown to them, she had heard the song that was taught to her by the man she had fallen in love with coming from the belly of the beast and had somehow gotten a vision of what she had to do.

Her father saw the look on her face and understood, helpless to assist her, he nodded to her mother who was hidden in the crowd. She ran to her daughter and tied the satchel around her waist.

Suspecting they were planning an escape, Iraw one of the three dragged Mmawa away from her mother and pushed her into the dark alley of the evil forest...