THE STEWARDS OF IGBILE-LAND. (SYNOPSIS)

The story is told of Waju.
Waju was tired of the running, but he was not afraid of it. He had known many years of life without roof or shelter with his mother and brother. Over the years of being on and off the road, He had learnt to understand foreign languages and customs, to harden his stomach against many days of hunger, to call a clump of moldy leaves a bed anywhere night found him with his mother and brother, home.
He was not afraid of the road. But he was tired of it. And when he asked his mother if a day would ever come that they would stop running, she'd smile and say nothing.
Perhaps he asked too often; perhaps his mother was as tired as he was, but the day did come when an old abandoned hut sheltered them for more than a night... then a week... then a roof and many repairs later, and Waju found that they were still there a full season later. But every single night of that season, they slept with their belongings packed, ready to hit the road running.
When the day did come to run, they heard the call too late.
A prince, a princess, and a chief -foreigners with an urgent mission- invaded the place thed come to call home of some sort without warning.
The trio was on a mission that couldn’t afford to fail. They sifted the village in search of the one they called 'the Steward's Son'. They described him as a runaway. Young, traveling with his mother -they called him their champion, one that they would do anything to recover. One on whom the fate and future of their people -the people of Igbile-land- depended.
But another entity had also come into the land seeking the Steward's Son. A silent menace with hard eyes -hard, cold, and merciless.
An expensive assassin whose services could only be afforded by a dynasty’s ransom.
He had never bungled an assignment and already, many men lay dead between the place he had begun and the doorstep ahead of him -the doorstep of the Steward's son.
He had a name in an unfamiliar tongue; and a title in the circles where his legend had spread. They called him "Idakeje -Idakeje ti o l'esi". "The Silence that has no reply".
The Silence had come for Waju.
But, even before the Silence, even before the prince, the princess, and the elder, an older Evil had long tailed Waju and his male ancestors before him.
The Evil had followed them on the road and off it. He watched in the shadows and lurked just behind the divide between sleep and consciousness.
With the impatient patience of one who had no choice, one who would not be denied, he lay in the playground of dreams and day-visions.
This ancient terror troubled the Waju till the boy was beyond his voice; then he turned his seduction to the younger son of his former Steward.
He existed in an isolated plane of transcendental sleep -neither in this world nor in the next. He was Lost, Mostly forgotten, but defiant of the war the deities waged against him for daring to aspire to become a deity himself, and if not, a demigod.
He longed to walk the earth again and He needed to regain his great and terrible power. He was waiting for his window to the plane of mortal men to be re-opened... even if for just a moment his thirst for blood and hunger for human flesh was an eternal agony.
It all started with a kingdoms need for a champion against their foes, but it has become something more evil.
An Evil from which Waju, his Mother and brother have been running from since he was a boy without success, because one unfortunate night, Waju and his family heard the call to run a little too late... and their lives would be changed forever... by a cursed legacy -the sacred and unique duty of "THE STEWARDS OF IGBILE-LAND".

Abike & the Ologbojo

(contributed by Sola)

Abike’s Mother to Abike.

Her mother was a woman often frowned upon. She had four daughters, each from a different man.

Abike was the child of her first marriage, her ‘only true husband’, she would often say. The man had died of illness while their marriage had still been young. This was the tragic event that set underway a search for acceptance and a sense of belonging that would persist in a travel from village to village, from the arms of one kind of man to the next, and inadvertently shape young Abike’s view of a woman’s life.

Damilare, her second and last husband, had been a violent, abusive, man; more given to his love for palm-wine than work or family. The man was also cursed with far-reaching-feet. He could wander away from home without a word for several weeks at a time. It was on one of such unwitting travels, that Abike found her mother sitting outside, staring at the moon, a habit of soundless tears well underway.

She held her mother. For several hours of embrace nothing was said. That night, Abike learnt and inherited her mother’s strength against the odds of fate in a single sigh, muttered against the wind, gentle but set in flint “All that any woman has in this life is her children”.

Her mother left Damilare’s house that night. She took her four daughters with her, and they walked far away from anything and anyone they’d ever known. Throughout the journey, Abike saw that her mother never once looked back.

Her mother became a woman of many crafts and many occupations, she made hair, she picked fruit, she worked the fields with the men, ground cassava with women... a hard life had made her mother more than malleable; it had made her indestructible... By example, she taught her daughters about strength, dignity, and self-sustenance.

They lived in many places as the times and seasons required, but it was in Igbile-land that they finally found a home and a sense of belonging strong enough to bring her to mother settle down. Igbile, a happy land of an uneasy peace.

It was here that Abike blossomed into a fetching young maiden. Courting men and their fathers or mothers were soon regular at their door, but the attention of the young lady had already focused on the shy advances of the young loner from the celebrated house of the Mayiduro lineage. His name was Laja. He was the second of the two sons of Kujore the Steward.

Laja spoke long and intimately with Abike. He spoke with great awe and respect of the great exploits of his famous father... with much fear and trepidation of the enormous responsibilities on the males in their lineage... with a great relief of being second born, and so not next in line for stewardship... And he spoke with timid tenderness of his love for Abike.

They married. Soon afterwards they had their first child, a boy, Waju. Life was beautiful and full of promise.

Then, came the news...

In a drunken argument, his brother had been struck down. A blow to the head from which he did not recover. And with the death of the heir to stewardship, the responsibility was now his. Abike watched the evolution of her husband from a happy, loving and content man, to a quiet, gloomy, haunted, miserable shadow of a man.

For nine years, she saw the joy ebb in creeps from him each day, until the day he feared finally came about... in the unsaid events of the dark asylum where his father hid himself, the man finally succumbed to the family curse and went the mortal way of those before him.

The news travelled quicker to their enemies than to Laja himself. Their foes were already upon them as Laja was dragged from his wife’s side in the middle of the night. Fighting was at the very door as the last of the rituals were performed and... They say... Laja’s first acts as Steward ran redder and more terrible than all his predecessors in that one spark of dawn.

Abike was witness to these things.

Wave after wave of enemy attacks met a terrifying end in Laja’s Stewardship than all of history had ever recorded. It was said that the force within him wore him well... to his expense. With each transition, a terrible rage and fearful sorrow seized more and more of his subconscious.

Abike was witness to these things.

Insanity shared their home as Laja struggled between the realities. Only his fierce and determined love protected Abike from a violence easily stoked. Laja bore his curse bravely... determined that it shall not extend beyond him. He fought the holds of his master long enough to devise a plan of salvation with his beloved. In the tortured window, they tasted a happy moment of strained romance before action was to prompt flight. In this moment, another child was conceived.

In the dark night of heavy rain clouds, Abike held her mother for the last time. For several hours of embrace nothing was said. In a single sigh, muttered against the wind, gentle but set in flint, her journey away from Igbile into the unknown was charged in her mother’s words, “All that any woman has in this life is her children”.

Abike left Igbile land that night. She took two sons –one by the hand, the other in her womb, and they walked far away from anything and anyone they’d ever known. Throughout the journey, Waju saw that his mother never once looked back.

Ologbojo – and Stewardship.

“Ologbojo ni baba Egungun,” a saying that reached far about all of Yoruba land –Ologboju, the entity feared by the most fearsome of the masquerade cults. This was the boogie man story told to scare the little ones. “Don’t go out at night,” Mothers said, “Or Ologbojo will whisk you away!” “If you disobey your father, Ologbojo will come for you when you sleep at night”.

The name was received always either in fear or caution... for good reason.

A time had passed when Ologbojo was a man. The standard for valor and power, he was in those times. He was the champion of the Igbile people. He was one who shook armies in mere loincloth and naught but a rock in his hand. Under the banner of his name, Igbile-land, a land familiar to the pillage and constant attack of roving bandits and their much larger neighbours, finally knew peace and respect.

Many stories exist of how Ologbojo came to be so powerful. Some said that in the seasons that elements took human form, a cloud of lightning lay with it cloud of thunder... and gave birth to the great man, Ologbojo, born standing upright a fully developed adult, filled with the force and wrath of both, immune to all magic, and superseding all human authority.

What was recorded by the royal historians, though, spoke of a great warrior’s quest for immortality. He was born a son of common folk –ordinary people with ordinary achievements. He was determined to have a place in history. So, he set off on what had started as a quest for recognition, but was soon to become an obsession with status... first among the people –he trained far and wide to become a great warrior, a champion in Igbile-land... then among warriors –he amassed such power, to his physique and spiritual armoury, to become a legend among warriors... then among legends –he sought to go the way by which mortals become gods... first, to be a god among men, then a transcendental being... a lower form of a god...

This ‘arrogant’ quest did not go unnoticed by the community of gods, higher and lower.

It was so that great men were elected to a place with the gods when they had achieved such mighty feats on earth that they could be counted as ‘worthy’ of the ‘higher calling’. But this fellow was a man of great power, not a man of great feats. More a warrior unto himself than a champion unto his people.

Meanwhile, the warrior, as he continually sought knowledge of spiritual things and access to even greater power, the limitations of his mortal mind were irrevocably breached. Soon, he began to struggle between realities –evolving into something somewhere between spirit and flesh. Already notorious for his violent rage fits, the warrior was now to be feared for something even worse... Madness. A madness that recognized neither friend nor foe, man or woman, child or elderly... it was a time of many casualties –sudden, horrible fatality had become a neighbour.

He could recognise only one person, his steward – his anchor to the physical realm. So it was that as he isolated himself, far his people, only his steward could rouse in him to serve his people in the time of danger.

The warrior, now referred to by the bogeyman nickname “Ologbojo”, still sought transition to godhood, even as his physical form diminished more and more from this realm. A council of gods, higher and lower, gathered on this... and charged him to serve his people until the terms of godhood were satisfied.

And so it was then that when enemies loomed, the people of Igbile would summon the Steward, and the steward would rouse the ‘Ologbojo’. And he would destroy the opposition.

Eventually though, a day came.

And the warrior they called Ologbojo lost his hold on this world. He became a revenant... lost... trapped between worlds.

When the enemies of Igbile-land heard that their champion had gone, they rallied forces to attack.

After about a year of fighting, it was clear that Igbile were mere days from defeat. In desperation, they tried at every option... then one suggestion was proffered by the spiritual consult... a ridiculous one... at first. Then the more they spoke on it, the more they were convinced... it could work.

The steward would rouse the “Ologbojo”.

The enemy at the gate advanced into Igbile-land, victory was a fact... until a single man, ordinary in appearance, came at them in slow sturdy steps. From the gates of Igbile to the dividing border... the bodies of the enemy were strewn in strips and mangled heaps.

Ologbojo had returned... so to speak.

They had sought to summon the Ologbojo through his steward in an assumption that he had achieved godhood. Instead the roving spirit had seized control of the body of his steward... and in this vessel, he again had access to his immense power. The possession however was temporary... usually just long enough to see off the immediate danger.

...................................................................................................................

Ologbojo, realizing that he might never be welcome in the company of the gods began to desire life in the physical realm. So, with each possession, he left more and more of his essence behind... with the intent of taking over the body of the steward...

The steward found himself exhibiting more and more of his former master, especially the rage and, slowly also, the madness. Day by day, the steward was consumed by his master... until, his mortality gave in, and he died.

The Igbile people, fearful of strife without a guardian, sought new vessels to take up stewardship. As it turned out, only direct male descendants of the steward could, by genealogy, become stewards themselves.

........................................................................................

Ologbojo still seeks a transition to godhood, but in the time being, he still consumes his stewards as he seeks a more permanent walk in the physical world.

Our Hero & Idakeje (Silence)

(contributed by Remi)

The Hero

He only knows of their lives is where he grew up. His mother told him comfortable lies, the type that encourages children to keep quiet when asked questions. He displays the character of the 'bondsman' or slave.

He's dependable, protective of others, wise, honest and straightforward. As he comes of age, he dreams of the deity. He thinks it's his father & his mother encourages that idea hoping the boy won't discover the truth. But when the dreams become more intense he visits the local jazz man who investigates and gets frightened out of his wits. He tells the boy he can't help him, leaving the poor chap confused. It's when the prince and the uncle begin their search that the deity begins to reveal itself to him by conversation. He thinks he's going mad until his mother comes clean with him, puts 2 & 2 together, realises what's happening, and decides it's time to find a new home.

Idakeje (

Silence).

In the early days of the villagers' migration were slaves who were considered living sacrifices to the deity that overruled justice when the leader saw fit. The camp was divided by their presence, so they splintered and the group that wanted them to serve left with these slaves. Till date, they still want to blend both settlements into one bold & strong nation, but they won't let go of the slaves.

The slaves were given a part of the forest to live in. They desire nothing of the world we know. They speak a secret language in their 'true voice' that only initiated royalty can understand. They reserve the silence for the commoners.

They are the embodiment of assassination. They can imitate anyone they hear, blend into any society very quickly, and kill with poison, misdirection, with or without weapons, and they never question orders. Silence gets his name because he has never spoken to anyone below a particular rank of royalty (this is because he's from the sect that answered only to the high chiefs, the Baloguns). He's been given a wide berth in terms of how he gets things done. He's just told what he needs to know...the how is up to him.

We know it is him if he has a scary soundtrack dedicated to his presence.

Oba Jagun & Princess Adubi & Prince Adejubelo

(contributed by Lydia)

Oba Jagun

He is a man locked in a seemingly perpetual war with his name. The war rages on, because in a deep, Dark corner of Oba Jagun the valiant there is a man who would rather fell trees for his queen's loom than wage war. Old ones still remember when Jagun the boy earned his fathers wrath when hunters led him by the ears to the palace to report having caught him freeing the game their traps had caught. He even had a sanctuary for his 'rescued' animals, and had cried for days when his father had had him followed at one time, unknown to him and declared a feast of meat from all the animals in his sanctuary as a lesson.

His love for his people is fierce, but his tolerance for revolt and sedition is non existent.

Attributes

Valor

Charisma

Wry humor

Just

Love for Honor

Physical(attributes)

Tall and stocky

skin the color of water yam.

Deceptively clear eyes

He walks with the bounce and lightness of a warrior whose sword has never gone hungry

He is about 56 seasons old

His grooming and locks reflect the love affair he has with his wife.

ADUBI THE PRINCESS

“YOU’RE AS STUBBORN AS THE GOATS WHOSE MILK YOU SUCKED FROM THE DAY

YOU WERE BORN”

ADUBI DOES INDEED POSSESS THE QUALITIES OF A GOAT. SHE COULD OUT

CLIMB ANYONE WHO DARED HER TO A CLIMBING MATCH ALMOST AS SOON AS SHE

COULD WALK.

SHE ALSO HAD A WAY OF DECIDING ON ONE THING AND STICKING TO IT WITH

AN UNSHAKABLE STEADFASTNESS THAT EARNED HER THE LABEL“STUBBORN AS A GOAT”.

ADUBI CARES ABOUT ONE PERSONS APPROVAL ALONE. PRINCE ADEGEYE HER

BROTHER WAS THE ONLY ONE WHO COULD REASON WITH HER AND HOPE SHE WOULD

CHANGE HER MIND.

SHE WAS HOWEVER RELATED TO THE PRINCE MORE BY THE LOVE BETWEEN HER

DEAD FATHER THE ONIGBESA OF IGBESA AND HIS FATHER OBA JAGUN THAN BY

BLOOD.

HER PARENTS HAD BEEN MURDERED AND HER PEOPLE ELIMINATED BY THE

BLOODTHIRSTY BULANI RACE FROM THE NORTH BEFORE SHE WAS BORN.

THE STORY OF HER BIRTH WAS THE ENVY OF FIRESIDE STORIES;

HER MOTHER THE MUCH LOVED AND RESPECTED QUEEN ABISOYE HAD RUN AWAY

FROM HER PEOPLE AND HER PALACE ON THE COMMAND OF HER HUSBAND CARRYING

A SIX MONTH OLD PREGNANCY BECAUSE THERE HAD BEEN NEWS FROM THE

WARFRONT THAT HER HUSBAND’S ARMY HAD BEEN AMBUSHED AND WERE FARING

BADLY.

WORSE, A SECTION OF THE ENEMY’S ARMY HAD BEEN SPOTTED HEADED IN THE

DIRECTION OF THEIR VILLAGE FORCING THE KING TO SEND WORD THAT SHE

ESCAPE WITH THEIR FIRST CHILD AND HEAD IN THE DIRECTION OF HER

MOTHER’S VILLAGE.

BUT THE QUEEN NEVER MADE IT THERE. SHE AND HER SMALL ARMY OF GUARDS

WERE APPREHENDED, SLAUGHTERED AND LEFT FOR DEAD CLOSE TO THE SHRINE OF

ELA.

BUT THE QUEENS ORI HAD NOT CHOSEN TO DIE BEFOR CHILDBIRH, SO SOMEHOW

SHE MANAGED TO CRAWL TO THE SHRINE AND LAY THERE HALF DEAD UNTIL HER

CHILD WAS BORN TWO MONTHS LATER.

ONLY THEN DID SHE ACCEPT THE CALL OF HER ANCESTORS.

OBA ALADEWURA WHO HAD BEEN HURRYING FROM HIS KINGDOM WITH HIS ARMY TO

HELP HIS CHILDHOOD FRIEND AND ALLY FIGHT HIS ENEMY ARRIVED TOO LATE TO A

MASSACRE, BUT THERE WAS WORD WAITING FOR HIM FROM IFA ASKING HIM TO

HASTEN TO THE SHRINE OF ELA. He got there to find THE INFANT BEING

NURSED BY A GOAT.

IRUNMOLE TOLD HIM TO TURN AROUND AND TAKE THE LITTLE PRINCESS HOME AND

RAISE HER AS HIS OWN.

HIS INSTRUCTIONS WERE TO FEED THE CHILD WITH GOATS MILK AND NOTHING

ELSE TILL SHE WAS EIGHT MOONS OLD, AND TO NEVER LET HER EAT GOAT MEAT.

QUESTIONS

WHY WAS SHE NOT ALLOWED TO EAT GOAT MEAT?

WHY IS SHE HEALED FROM ANY AILMENT WHEN SHE DRINKS GOATS MILK?

WHY IS SHE THE ONLY ONE WHO HAS EVER THROWN PRINCE ADEGEYE ON HIS BACK

EVEN THOUGH IT WAS ONLY DURING A MOCK WRESLE WHEN THE PRINCE WAS TEN

SEASONS AND SHE A SCRAGLY NINE-SEASON-OLD BUMPKIN?

HOW COME SHE’S THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN CALM THE PRINCE DOWN WHENEVER

THROWS ONE OF HIS TEMPER TANTRUMS?

TEMPERAMENT:

FEISTY

QUICK TEMPERED

KIND HEARTED

HEADSTRONG

ATTRIBUTES:

GREAT SINGER

SURE FOOTED (CLIMBS REMARKABLY WELL)

GRACEFUL

GREAT DANCER

SIXTEEN SEASONS OLD

LOVES PEANUTS (ALWAYS HAS A POUCH SOMEWHERE)

FEATURES:

SMALL FEET

BY MY MOTHER’S BREASTS/MY MOTHER’S RIGHT BREAST (MANNERISM)

A LONG SLIM SCAR ON HER LEFT HAND. (THE PRINCE MARKED HER THE DAY SHE THREW HIM)

SKIN THE COLOR OF RAIN WASHED MUD

LEAN FORM

LONG NECK

FULL LIPS

WALNUT BROWN EYES

LONG NAILS (PRINCE ALWAYS TEASES HER ABOUT IT)

Prince Adejubelo

“When your father is Oba Jagun and you are his heir, you don’t need to measure his shoes to know how large you feet must grow”- Adejubelo

Prince Adejubelo is the Beau, his mother’s headache and his father’s sore thumb. Prince Jubelo is quite debonair, and needless to say, a smashing hit with the maidens who all seem to go brainless when he’s around.

The prince sticks out for almost all the good reasons; intelligence, brawn charm and good looks.

The good looks cause his mother worry as mothers with marriage-age daughters are especially nice and are practically chocking her to death with gifts and services because of their hopes for their daughters.

And Jubelo doesn’t help. He is aware of the buzz about him and revels in it, most times leaving behind a trail of grown women quarrelling and damsels fighting each other for his attention.

But he is far more than his good looks and the charisma he inherits from his father. He is also the wrestling champion in his age group and possesses the agility of a cat. No one has ever thrown him in a match, (or at least no one knows of the one time he was thrown).

He lives to make his father proud, and prove his brawn and bravery and is always looking for ways to demonstrate his fearlessness.

In spite how seriously he takes the duty he has inherited however, where his father would opt for seriousness Jubelo would cut tension with fresh bursts of the jocular. His visits to the palace are always acknowledged with delight, and only those who know him well know better than to underestimate his seeming air of nonchalance as Jubelo’s sword has the reputation of being almost as fast up an enemy’s vitals as his father’s.

And therein lies the paradox. How could anyone with a violent temper such as Prince Jubelo possess such a charming personality? His temper is almost like a sojourn into the dark side, and only his sister Adubi can talk him out of a spell.

Little wonder then that everyone knows Adubi is never too far behind Jubelo at any point in time.

His relationship with her is confused but charged and passionate. He has found that as they both grew older, with Adubi turning from his annoying, gawky but cute tail into a stunning siren, that he is often at a loss as to how to handle his feelings for her.

Most times he doesn’t know if he wants to be her brother, protector or more and so they are always sparing and she is almost always effortlessly parrying his every thrust.

The problem as he has told himself is that Adubi does not need his protection. She has been known to leave young men with shuffling feet after a fight. And he knows it’s because they are too ashamed to talk about who won the fight.

Features

Good looking

Tall

Strong, eager voice

Slight stammer

Well toned body

“Sango’s braids” (mannerism)

Wears long braids

Attributes

Bravery

Charisma

Charming

Temperamental

Agile(great wrestler)

Seventeen seasons old

The Silent Apprentice

"...against the wind ...always, against the wind"

The grass rustles.

"Stop... freeze... every muscle... even your heart must be still"

Breeze in a graveyard. Nothing, save the distant oblivious bleating of a billy goat in a lush paradise.

His master's voice strokes his ears like a thought echoing in from a distant past...

"You are lightning... deadly... seen too late... invisible, without scent... without sound... not even the grass must feel your presence."

The silence persists. The earth moves beneath the goat, bringing it's light content bleats and content chewing of the curd even closer.

"Your arm... it extends past the tip of your fingers... past the tip of your blade... your reach is endless..."

The bleating ends.

"Tomorrow... we use a person."

My Rival, Rage

He thinks I do not know, my lover. He thinks I am able to ignore the rancid breath of the cold that kisses my skin when Oloworimi steals away from my bosom in the grey of night.

My love cowers in a corner at those times, orphaned by its obvious failure to keep Oloworimi in my arms till morning spreads her wrapper over nights beard.

He Steals away as if to keep some clandestine appointment...