Bound by ancestry - Chapter 5: Chapter 5

The morning air was heavy with dew, and birdsong came muted beneath a thick fog that blanketed Umuguma. It was as though even nature held its breath for what was to come. Inside Mama Ukamaka’s compound, Adaeze and Chidubem sat by the hearth, their eyes not meeting but hearts heavy with the same tension. The final seal awaited them, and neither one dared say aloud what they feared.
“Ihuoma’s Grove is not marked on any map,” Mama Ukamaka said, breaking the silence. She sat before them, a calabash in her lap filled with palm ash. “It’s not a place you find. It’s a place that finds you.”
Chidubem leaned forward. “Then how do we get there?”
“You must follow what is most buried in your heart,” she answered. “The path reveals itself to those willing to face truth—not only of the land, but of themselves.”
Adaeze reached for the staff, her fingers trembling. The pendant pulsed softly in her pocket. “We’re ready.”
Mama Ukamaka looked at them, long and hard. Then she nodded and placed her hand into the ash, drawing three lines across each of their foreheads.
“For clarity. For courage. For cleansing.”
They left the compound without farewell. The village, too, remained silent as they walked through. Doors did not open. Windows did not creak. But Chidubem felt the eyes—curious, worried, even fearful—watching from behind curtains.
They took no known path. Adaeze closed her eyes and let her feet guide her. The staff, held firmly in her right hand, buzzed faintly with unseen energy. The pendant grew warmer. They followed its rhythm, one heartbeat after the other, through dense woods and over narrow streams until the forest itself began to change.
The trees grew taller, their branches weaving into a canopy that dimmed the sun. Flowers neither had seen before bloomed in colors too vivid to be natural. Strange scents drifted through the air—spice, smoke, sorrow. The forest had swallowed them whole.
Then they saw it.
A circular clearing. Trees bent inward, their trunks knotted into faces—eyes shut, mouths stitched. In the center, a well. Not like the one before, but older, its stones covered in moss and ancient Igbo carvings.
“This is Ihuoma’s Grove,” Adaeze whispered. “I feel her.”
They stepped into the clearing.
Suddenly, a loud thrum filled the air. The well shimmered. And from it, light poured outward, forming a ring around the clearing. The grove had awakened.
Then a voice—not a whisper, but a roar.
“You carry blood and burden. But will you carry truth?”
A figure emerged from the far end of the clearing. It was Adaeze. Or something that looked like her—same face, same posture, but eyes filled with shadow.
Behind her, Chidubem gasped as his own double stepped forward. They stared at their reflections.
“What is this?” he demanded.
“The trial,” the real Adaeze said. “The seal guards itself with mirrors of the soul.”
The doubles spoke.
“You are not ready. You doubt. You question everything. You seek truth only to feel important.”
“You think your family’s mistakes make you special. They make you blind,” the other Chidubem spat.
Adaeze stepped forward. “I know who I am. I am the voice of the guardian. I do not carry power for pride, but for peace.”
The mirror Adaeze hissed. “Then prove it.”
In a flash, the mirrors attacked. Chidubem blocked a strike from his double, the two locking eyes. The fight wasn’t physical. Every move struck memory, every dodge tested will. Visions flooded Chidubem’s mind—his childhood, his grandfather’s silence, the pain of not knowing.
“I wanted the truth!” he shouted. “I needed to know who I was!”
The double faltered.
Adaeze stood still as her mirror raised the staff. At the last moment, she stepped forward and embraced her reflection.
“I know your pain. I accept it. But it no longer owns me.”
With a cry, the reflection shattered like glass, light bursting from it. Chidubem’s double screamed and vanished into dust.
Silence.
The well pulsed again, brighter now.
From its depths rose a stone pedestal. Upon it rested the final seal—an orb of obsidian, carved with a spiral surrounded by wings.
Adaeze picked it up.
And the grove transformed.
The trees straightened. The eyes on the trunks opened, calm and kind. The stitched mouths smiled. The air smelled of rain.
“You have passed,” the voice said. “And now the land will rise.”
They turned to leave, but standing at the grove’s edge was Igwe. He no longer wore his cloak. His eyes were wet.
“My ancestors tried to stop this,” he said. “We were wrong. Protect it well.”
They walked back to Umuguma, no longer afraid.
The three seals rested in their hands. The staff gleamed with purpose.
And in the hills beyond, the earth trembled.
The guardians were waking.