Spirit King: Return of the Crown

by Dashiel Douglas

  Ms. Keba slipped a trembling hand out from under the white sheet covering her. She meekly grasped D’Melo’s hand. She guided it toward her face and kissed his knuckles. Adoration gushed from her eyes like a cascading waterfall. “I’ve been searching for you my whole life,” she said softly. She lowered her gaze in profound reverence. “And fate would have it that you found me, and just moments before my great ascent.

  “Taji Anaru!” she called out, as vociferously as her weak breath allowed. “Please,” she implored the paramedics. “Permit me the honor of bowing before him.” Ms. Keba began wriggling out from under the sheet. But the paramedics eased her flat and lifted the gurney into the ambulance.

  Zara climbed in behind her.

  “The great day has come!” Ms. Keba proclaimed. “I can now die in peace.” She gazed at Zara beamingly. “I knew you were an angel. You led me to him! Please beg Ahadi (the promised one) to forgive me for not kneeling before him.”

  “Okay, Miss,” the paramedic urged. “We have to go.” Zara kissed Ms. Keba’s clammy forehead and climbed down from the ambulance.

  Ms. Keba raised her arm high and stretched out four fingers. She clenched her fingers into a fist then rested it over her heart. “Taji Anaru! Taji Anaru!” she chanted, just before the paramedics shut the doors. The ambulance roared off, sirens wailing.

  Zara whispered something under her breath then turned a curious eye toward D’Melo. “What was that all about?” D’Melo shrugged causally, seemingly unmoved by Ms. Keba’s excessive reverence toward him.

  “When I was in the ambulance, she asked me to request your—” Zara caught herself—“well actually, she said Ahadi’s forgiveness for not being able to kneel before you. Why would she do that?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s seen me ball,” D’Melo quipped.

  “How can you make jokes after something like this?”

  “Well, what can I say? She was probably delirious. I mean, she was having a heart attack or something.”

  “Maybe, but her mind seemed pretty clear . . . although, she did say I’m an angel.”

  “You? An angel?” D’Melo said playfully. “Well, that proves it. She was definitely out of her gourd.”

  “You know,” Zara replied, unamused. “I think you missed your calling as a comedian.”

  They started to meander aimlessly, the movie having completely slipped their minds. D’Melo reflected out loud on the strange episode with Ms. Keba. “Taji Anaru, Taji Anaru,” he repeated in a whisper. “It sounds so familiar. I think it could be Kipaji.” Although D’Melo didn’t know the language, he remembered how it sounded. His parents would speak in their mother tongue when they wanted to baffle D’Melo’s meddling ears.

  “But if Ms. Keba is Kipaji, I’m sure Baba would know her.”

  “Well,” Zara said. “There’s only one way to find out.”

  They headed to D’Melo’s house. On the way, D’Melo asked Zara what she had muttered to herself when Ms. Keba was driven away.

  “Oh, I didn’t know you heard that. It’s a Nečzian thing. Whenever something important was happening in my life, my mom would whisper ‘Edu.’ It always made me feel like everything was going to be alright. Essentially, it means good luck, but in a way of calling on something greater than yourself for help. Whenever my mom was taken to the hospital, I’d whisper ‘Edu’ to myself. And she came back every time.” A rush of sorrow washed through Zara as she remembered, except the last time.

  Baba was in the backyard tending to his vegetable garden. When he burrowed his hands into the earth, he was momentarily transported back to Kipaji. Growing food was something he and Diata, D’Melo’s mother, cherished doing together. They loved rising with the dawning sun to harvest the fruits and vegetables that grew in the cool, moist air of Amanzi Mountain.

  D’Melo and Zara squeaked through the rickety back-porch door. “You two are home a little early, aren’t you?” Baba said, as he wiped an itch from his nose, leaving a soil smudge on his cheek. “Dinner won’t be ready for another couple of hours.” He squinted up at them through the blinding sunlight. “Zara, I’m making something special for you! A traditional Kipaji dish called Wanjiru Joma. It’s a stew with onions, potatoes, corn, and an assortment of beans in a spicy tomato sauce. How’s that sound?”

  Zara perked up. “It sounds like I’m going to have a delicious ballet of flavors pirouetting on my tongue!”

  D’Melo flipped his palms upward. “Can’t you just say, ‘That sounds good?’”

  Zara creased her lips, Whatever, dude.

  “Baba,” D’Melo said. “I need to ask you something.”

  “I’ve been waiting for this moment,” Baba beamed. “The answer is yes! You have my permission to marry this lovely young lady.”

  “No, Baba!” D’Melo said, flustered. D’Melo glanced at Zara, who of course was playing it up. With a hand on her hip, she batted her lashes at D’Melo over her shoulder. “Baba, that’s not what I was gonna ask.”

  “Why not? She’s tall enough for you.” Zara flattened her hand on her head, as if measuring herself. Baba nudged his glasses up the bridge of his nose, inspecting Zara. “She’s a bit on the skinny side, but she’ll put on some padding after a couple of babies.”

  Zara’s tune now changed. Her mouth hung open, Huh?

  “You talk about her all the time,” Baba continued, much to D’Melo’s chagrin. “It’s obvious you—”

  D’Melo’s eyes shot open nearly wide enough for them to pop out of his head. “BABAAA! Please. I beg.” He seized Baba’s face. “Pull yourself together. I just want to ask you about something someone said to me.” D’Melo explained what happened with Ms. Keba.

  Baba sobered in an instant. “Are you sure she said, ‘Taji Anaru’?”

  D’Melo nodded.

  Baba slid off his gardening gloves. He plunked down pensively on the 10-gallon plastic paint container he used for compost.

  “So, ‘Taji Anaru’ is Kipaji?” D’Melo asked.

  “It is, son.” Baba scrutinized D’Melo peculiarly before lowering his gaze, like Ms. Keba had.

  “Do you know Yande Keba?”

  Baba was quiet, searching his brain. “It’s a Kipaji name, but it doesn’t sound familiar.” While Baba knew most of the Kipajis on the East Coast, there were a number whom he wouldn’t know. Many of them had fought with the rebels against the Malungan government. When the rebellion was quashed, they had to leave Malunga or risk being executed. After relocating to their new country, they kept a very low profile. Most even changed their names.

  “Zara,” Baba said. “You were with Madam Keba most of the time. What can you tell me about her?”

  “Umm….” Zara brought herself back inside Ms. Keba’s house. “Well, she was really calm for someone who was dying. She had a deepness about her; the way she looked at me. Actually, she wasn’t really looking at me. She seemed to be looking into me, as if she was trying to figure out something about me.”

  “What about inside the house?” Baba wondered. “Did you notice anything different?”

  “No, not really. I was only in her bedroom, and it seemed pretty normal.” Suddenly, Zara’s voice rose. “Oh, wait a second,” she said. She closed her eyes to focus her memory. “When I was waiting for the paramedics, I noticed a small fireplace in her living room. But it wasn’t really a fireplace. It was more like a fire pit. It was way too small to heat a room. It was only this high”—Zara dropped her hand to just above her knee—“and about a foot wide. It was made of a rock I’ve never seen before.”

  Baba reached for his phone as Zara continued.

  “It was reddish-brown with tiny crystals embedded in it,” she said. “A slab ran across the top with engravings. They looked like—”

  Baba showed Zara his phone screen. “This?” he guessed. It was an image of a deep purple flag with a diamond-shaped crest at th
e center. Golden rays emanated from the quadrantal crest. Each quadrant held a unique symbol. Clockwise from the top, the symbols looked like water, fire, mineral, and air.

  “Yes!” Zara exclaimed, tapping the image. “These symbols were engraved in the stone.”

  “And was there a tall weed-like plant somewhere nearby?”

  “How’d you know?” she said, astonished.

  “The plant is a variant of iboga, which is only found in Kipaji. It’s used to induce visions. It’s dried and then burned at a very high temperature. The wall surrounding the fire pit was volcanic rock, which absorbs extreme heat.”

  D’Melo realized how little he knew about Kipaji—and his father, for that matter.

  Baba continued, “Madam Keba must be a Wanaje. Every now and again, a Wanaje is born in the Choma (Fire) clan, which is one of the four Kipaji clans. Wanajes possess a special gift: they are able to see things that others cannot. So I guess in English “Wanaje” would be something like “seer.” Wanajes are highly respected in Kipaji. They often act as special advisors to the Umoja Council, the elected leadership of Kipaji.”

  Zara suddenly shuddered. Baba noticed tiny bumps on her arm.

  “It looks like you have cutis anserina,” he said.

  Zara’s face flushed red.

  “Don’t worry,” Baba chuckled. “It’s just a fancy name for goose bumps. Are you cold? It’s ninety degrees out here.”

  “I’m fine. It’s only a chill. It’ll go away in a minute.” Baba rubbed Zara’s arms to warm her.

  “Baba, you still haven’t told us what ‘Taji Anaru’ means,” D’Melo said. “Ms. Keba kept saying it over and over.”

  “‘Taji Anaru’ literally means, ‘Return of the Crown.’” Baba went on to explain, “Legend has it that over two thousand years ago, Kipaji was established by a great king. He unified the four tribes that now make up Kipaji—the Amanzi, Choma, Joto, and Upepo. It was said that during his nineteen-year reign, Kipaji was at the height of its glory. The king infused the culture of Kipaji with a philosophy of life called Ubuntu. It’s an acknowledgement that we are who we are only through other people. It’s the pinnacle of human cohesion.

  “So, by saying ‘Taji Anaru’, Madam Keba was probably expressing that you helping her was like Ubuntu—a return to how it was at the time of the Spirit King.”

  D’Melo frowned. “Why have you never told me about this?”

  “You’re forgetting that when you were young, I recounted many stories about Kipaji. But you scoffed at me. “I think your exact words were, ‘Baba, you can’t really believe these fairy tales. Why are Africans always making up such ridiculous stories?’ After that, I thought it would be best to wait for you to become open to Kipaji. But you never did.”

  D’Melo lowered his eyes, ashamed. “I’m sorry, Baba. I’m open now. Could you please tell us more about the seers?”

  Baba continued. “The last Wanaje left Kipaji before I was born. So I have only heard stories about her. This particular Wanaje had a vision of the Ahadi, the promised one. She said that he was lost and needed help finding his way back to Kipaji. The Council members dismissed her as a heretic. To point out the error in the Wanaje’s vision, the Council reminded her of the king’s final words:

  “The seed of the will of the Great Spirit has been sown in this hallowed land. Our purpose has been served, allowing for the sun of our existence on this earthly plane to set. In our absence, you must remain ever vigilant against the evil of discord. But if the darksome night descends upon this land once again, rest assured, we will return unto you from the Walipote. And with the power of the Great Spirit, we will march together in serried lines to hasten the dawn of the light of unity.

  “While the word ‘Walipote’ has caused some confusion among Kipaji historians, for centuries it had been widely accepted as meaning ‘Unknown Realm.’ And that had been interpreted as the ‘Spiritual World.’ But the Wanaje insisted that the king’s final words could be interpreted differently. She conceded that the word ‘Walipote’ means ‘Unknown Realm’; however, if that same word is not capitalized (‘walipote’), it means ‘a lost world.’ And because the king’s words were shared with the people only verbally, he could have used walipote with a lower case ‘w.’ So, searching her vision, the Wanaje concluded that the king would return but would be lost in a foreign world.

  “The Council didn’t buy it. It said that even if the king found himself in a foreign world, why wouldn’t he just return to Kipaji?

  “The Wanaje explained that when someone is lost, it doesn’t have to mean physically lost. The king could be lost from himself—meaning that he may be unaware of who he is. If so, he would need to be led back to Kipaji. There, he would once again unite with his twin brother, as he did two millennia ago.

  “The Council members wouldn’t listen to any more of ‘this sacrilege’, as they called it. They branded the Wanaje a charlatan. Life in Kipaji became unbearable for her. So she left, vowing not to return until she found the lost king. She was never heard from again. It was assumed that she never found the king and died somewhere in the world.”

  “So, Ms. Keba is this Wanaje and she thinks I’m the lost king?” D’Melo said, chuckling. “The paramedics must have gone way overboard with the morphine. Because obviously Ms. Keba was high.”

  Baba stared at D’Melo, suddenly transfixed. His body became limp. The paint container he was sitting on wobbled. D’Melo grabbed Baba before he teetered off.

  “Baba?” D’Melo said, worried.

  “It’s just the heat, son,” he said woozily. D’Melo and Zara helped him inside. They brought him a moist towel and stretched it across his forehead. They shuffled to the kitchen to pour Baba a cool glass of lemonade.

  “You see,” D’Melo said. “I told you Ms. Keba was delirious. The king has a twin brother, and I don’t have any sibling, let alone a twin.” He teasingly nudged Zara’s head. She swatted his hand away.

  “Well, that’s good,” she retorted. “Because I could never get used to bowing and calling you ‘Your Majesty.’”

  “After our rematch on the court, and I school you like this,” D’Melo dribbled an imaginary ball between his legs and motioned a jump shot, “you’ll have no choice but to call me ‘Your Majesty.’” D’Melo interrupted himself. “Oooh, that’s it!”

  Zara glared at him, apparently leery of what he was scheming.

  “That can be our next bet,” he dared. “If I score on you, you have to call me ‘Your Majesty’ at school for one full day.”

  Zara scrunched her face at him. “I am not calling you ‘Your Majesty’ at school or anywhere else. And by the way, there will be no rematch until you make good on the last bet, you big welsher.”

  “Hey, it wasn’t my fault you got all Wonder Woman on everybody,” he said, sliding his fists in a circular motion in front of him. “Ting, ting!” He made sounds like he was deflecting bullets with Bracelets of Submission. “Oh, and,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to ask you. Why were you naked when you came out of Ms. Keba’s house?”

  Baba lifted a judging eyebrow.

  Zara bit her lip and narrowed her eyes at D’Melo. “You know I wasn’t naked! I took off my shirt to break the window.” She turned to Baba. “I had on a very modest sports bra.”

  D’Melo hummed the Wonder Woman theme song, as he mimicked Zara in slow motion scaling the tree and smashing the glass.

  “Oh, my God!” she said, shoving him. “Baba, how do you have such a jerk for a son?”

  “Well, I guess the apple does fall far from the tree sometimes,” Baba said, smiling. “And a rotten one, at that.”

  Zara cupped her mouth at D’Melo. “Oooh, scorched.”

  As Baba delighted in their playful banter, his emotions swirled like a mighty tornado. He began to piece together the possibility of D’Melo being the lost king. The thought of his son as the King
of Kipaji was as monumental as it was preposterous. But, what if it’s true? His heart sank mournfully. He realized that D’Melo would never live the life he had always dreamed for himself. His world would be turned upside down and inside out. He would never find a moment’s peace. The eyes of the world would scrutinize him with laser intensity. Even worse, his life would be in perpetual jeopardy. Pernicious forces would prey upon him incessantly, either to bring his power under their control or to take his life so he didn’t hinder them from achieving their corrupt desires.

  Baba’s eyes misted as he observed how joyful and easy D’Melo and Zara were with each other. Then his stomach knotted in anguish as the Spirit King’s covenant to never marry rushed to mind. So if D’Melo is the Ahadi, he and Zara would not be able to share a life together. And, perhaps worst of all, D’Melo would never have what he had desired most: children.

  Chapter Five

  The Nightmare

  After dinner, as had become customary, D’Melo escorted Zara home. A welcome breeze rustled the amber and scarlet-tinged trees, creating an autumn ambience. D’Melo and Zara padded along the leafy sidewalk wordlessly, replaying the day’s events in their minds.

  Zara broke the silence, pondering out loud about Ms. Keba thinking D’Melo was some sort of king. “As much as I hate to admit it, you were right,” she said. “Ms. Keba must have been delirious. At one point, her eyes glazed over and she said something about not letting the blood drop. It was so bizarre!”

  “I wonder how she’s doing,” D’Melo said, concerned. “Maybe we should stop by the hospital.”

  “She’s gone, D’Melo,” Zara said delicately. “She died soon after we got to your house. Remember when Baba told me I had that strange disease—goose bumps?”

  D’Melo scratched his head, How did having goose bumps tell her that someone died?

  Zara answered his question without him having to ask it. “It wasn’t the goose bumps that alerted me. It was the peacefully frigid sensation that swooshed through my body. I’ve had similar feelings when people close to me have passed away. Ms. Keba died happy though. Thanks to you.”