[KULANI]
I’m back here. I am on the very same rock I woke up on after being spat out by this same river a while ago. The old me would be looking over her shoulder right now, with the most defined goosebumps and nausea-inducing knots in her stomach but after all I’ve been through, it’s understandable how I can sit here and not even turn when I hear a shuffle in the trees at five in the morning. The stories of this place are horrifying. From kids disappearing after attempting to take innocent swims here, to grown men being found dead with their intestines gone – feasted on by what nobody can describe for sure.
I see her; the owner of these waters, as the people like to call her. I am watching her swim away from me, watching her tail disappear. I never even asked for the permission to be here but she’s okay with my presence, I think. Otherwise I’d have long seen the flames of her chagrin. Sometimes she’s black, sometimes a rainbow. She doesn’t only play with colours, she’s a shapeshifter of note as well.
I sit here with a bleeding heart and a broken spirit. This is the only place I thought of when I started feeling like I’m losing the essence of me; like I’m losing myself.
She’s coming back. It’s official; I’ve outgrown that timid Kulani. She wouldn’t have sat here unfazed while the biggest snake she’s ever seen approaches her. Don’t get me wrong, I still respect and revere this beast a lot. It just no longer feels like an unfamiliar, extra-personal being. It feels like a part of me, somehow, hence I even have my feet in the vastness of this dark water while she moves about freely – in her turf. She’s the reason why people fear this place. With me, she’s the only reason why it feels safe. I am home, even though there’s zero communication from her or anybody else. It’s silent – in and around me. I asked for peace and they gave it to me, lead me to it…
‘My namesake. Ndauwe…’ I hear a voice before the prettiest woman I’ve ever seen sits beside me. I look at her and she continues smiling; as if pleased about something.
Kurhula’s great grand-mother.
‘Mandilakhe?’ I ask. I have never met or seen her before. She couldn’t come to me; her sins barred her from me. I thought Aunty Lydia was gorgeous but she has nothing on this woman. Her youthful beauty still shines beyond those wrinkles.
‘The gates are open. I’m clean and I have you to thank’
I don’t know what to say.
‘Fanisa has voluntarily set all the people she had captured in her house free. Sol is powerless at this point. All the dirt I came in dragging has been swept out of the royal house, by you’
She’s barefoot as well.
‘Before you ask me all the judgemental questions you have, please understand that I did not have a choice’
I am still quiet, giving her the opportunity to explain herself. For the hell I’ve been through because of her, she owes me that much.
‘Mavengana loved me. That man adored me as much as he hated me. And I loved him too. What was a woman to do when forced to share the love of her life with snakes that were as dangerous as her? They were just smart enough to confess and repent before they died; I didn’t…’
‘I needed to protect my lineage. To protect the gifts of my children and great-grandchildren and the only way to do that was to fight fire… with fire’
‘I admit. A lot of lives were destroyed in the process but the goal was achieved and that’s the most important thing out of this mess. Polygamy is not for the weak, especially if you’re going to be doing it with your enemies. But you wouldn’t know that because they made sure you don’t go through it the same way we did. That curse has been broken’
‘Mhan’ Xongi and Mhan’ Singi are not enemies though’
She laughs.
‘Come back to me after you’ve sat the both of them down and asked them to tell you the truth about what the foundation of their friendship is, if I can call it that if friendships can be built on graves’
What?
‘Whose graves?’
She dips her feet into the water as well. I feel like the tea that’s about to be spilt here is going to burn.
‘At some point, your father-in-law had a mistress…’ she sighs.
I am starting to wonder how many women that man had in his life.
‘He treated all of them like crap and it’s not like they did not know it. But when that woman came into his life, somehow he started softening up, to a point where he wanted to make her a wife. They saw that she was different – from both of them and the rest. She had him in the palm of her hand. The evil and severely abusive Edward turned into a marshmallow whenever Matimba was around. The could see that the smile was genuine so they decided that she had to go’
I can believe this about Mhani Hixongile but Masingita???
‘Singi was the first to try and kill Edward but she failed. She kept doctoring his meals but to her surprise, he’d wake up the next day. What she did not know about witchcraft is that the heart needs to be strong as the potion in terms of evil for it work. However, those meals are the reason he fell sick, then Xongi finished the job. Singi came into this as a timid little mouse but the environment wouldn’t allow her survival in that state. She no longer drinks the the pills she keeps collecting for hypertension because unlike her doctors, she knows very well that high blood has nothing to do with her health complications’
My jaw keeps dropping. Kurhula was right. If these people decide not to tell me some things, I won’t know or even see them.
‘If we sit here so I can fill you in on everything that has happened from way back, it will take us a month. Your heart is the reason why you were chosen because it can’t be defiled. Only light can drive out darkness. You, Kulani, are the yang to the very black shadows of my yin; the sun to my moon’
This is overwhelming.
‘History is not repeating itself; it is now self-cleansing. Kurhula is Mavengana’s reincarnate in every sense of the word’ she smiles.
‘The stubbornness. The business-mind. The protectiveness and everything else in between. He married his wife again so they can start afresh and fix all that was broken. That wife is you and you represent me, Mandilakhe. And this is why I am going to fight tooth and nail for you, for as long you live. I know your deepest desire and the mandate is for me to intercede on your behalf so that it comes true. Although you did not know me, you made sure not to let me down. Young as you are, you still did it. The ball is now in my court…’
I am a crying mess right now!
