Chapter 1

EPILOGUE

Anathi fondly called by people and known for her modest and respectful behavior was born to a family of ten,being the last and only daughter she was pampered by her father. A tragic incident led to the sudden poverty of her family and to settle an old debt she was given as a bride to Abasi,a strong, courageous and stern man. Who had no interest in marriage but was compelled by his father to get married to settle the old debt. Forced into marriage,he remained unhappy with his wife and all Anathi did to keep him happy only got him more angry. Happiness finally shone on the family on the news of Anathi's pregnancy,her pregnancy was able to soften the heart of Abasi and made him become a nice and caring husband.

Anathi sleeps soundly on the bed,Abasi is still wide awake and lies on the bed facing the ceiling lost in thoughts. Not long Anathi wakes up in pains, attracting her husband's attention,realizing it was pangs of labour he rushes her to the mid wife. Abasi paces around the corridor of the mid wife's house awaiting a report from the mid wife. After a long time the mid wife emerges out and announces the arrival of his daughter,he rushes inside to behold the good news himself. One would think he would rush to his wife to see how she was doing but his main focus was on his newly born daughter and the once stern Abasi is seen once again. He gently takes his daughter into his hands and gently kisses her forehead,he says to the little child,"mamato wamkelekile (mother welcome)" and names her Akhona after his late mother.

Chapter 1

The sun gently goes to sleep after a whole day of work, resting in the clouds and takes shift with the moon. The moon emerges from the cloud illuminating the entire sky but not as bright as the sun,do you know that the moon has no light of his own. While the sun sleeps he simply stands in front of the shinning sun, using his light to illuminate the dark sky. Sometimes the moon is unable to shine,since the sun keeps rolling from one side to the other making the moon appear full,half and sometimes he doesn't shine at all. Once the moon tried moving the sun to his side,the sleepwalking sun stands up thinking it is it's shift and starts shining that's why sometimes we see both the moon and the sun during sunset. Other times the moon is very impatient to wait for his shift and comes out blocking the sun from shinning and a serious fight starts but as always the sun wins and shouts at the moon to return back. Kim looked over my direction,after studying the sunset and asked why the moon hadn't come out yet, asking if they were having a fight. I simply told her the moon overslept and refuse to wake up for his shift. Mary slept silently on my laps while the rest of the children kept on staring in the dark sky looking for the moon, before Kim could ask another question her mom came over taking her away along with the other children. I glanced at the watch and noticed time had gone past so fast,very soon he would return. I ran quickly back home,went through the back door and started setting the table for dinner. I whistled my favourite song as I washed the dishes,not long I held the sound of a car parking outside and prayed it was mom. If it wasn't her I needed to finish the dishes quickly,while I kept the dishes on the rack,I felt a grip on my waist by an unwanted hand that gently went up from my waist towards my chest. I turned back immediately stopping the inappropriate motion, welcoming my step father with a fake concern. I told him that I would dish his food in a moment and wanted to leave his prying eyes that kept on looking at my chest immediately. While I made the motion to leave his sight,he pinned me to the wall,his eyes still on my chest and inquired where my mom was. I lied that she was around and just went out to get some things,which was far from the truth. Mom had travelled to a close city early that morning and would be back by that evening if all goes well but I couldn't tell that to him. He would used the opportunity of her absence to get what he wanted for me and I didn't the want to relive the horror again. He loosened his grip on my hand a little and I used the chance to leave him pondering in his malicious thoughts. I dished out his food, packing mine in a plastic plate and sneaked out of the house before he could notice I was gone. Hopefully before he notices my absence,mom would be around and his attention would be diverted from me towards her. I went towards my favourite spot over the river banks where my two best friends Noxolo and Annika were already sitting chatting about something I guess about school. I sat down in the middle of them, interrupting their conversation and inquired what was new in school today. They both hugged me, asking how I was doing but that didn't answer my question since I was still curious in what they were talking about. Annika answered me by telling me that they were discussing about a new student who came to school and had an encounter with Sophia the supreme ruler of the class. It was quite amusing to know that there was another student who confronted Sophia. Noxolo which I called her Noxo for short, didn't fail in giving me full details of what happened. She started off like this,"Akhona I wished you were there you should have seen Sophia's face when the new student spilt yoghurt on her shoes. Her expression showed rage and while she tried to get hold of the new student she slipped and fell flat on her face." She started laughing along with both of us while I beckoned on her to continue,she went on"Wait first...let me start from the beginning..."as she tried composing herself from laughing. "A new student Clara from another town that I can't remember came today and was introduced to the class. She sat down at your usual chair, during break Sophia and her clique came over to tell her the rules of the class, which is to always obey Sophia's rules. While she was talking the 'veggees'(spirit) of Akhona went in her, giving her the courage to rise and spoke her mind at Sophia". Before she could continue I interrupted her with my laughter and asked what she meant by the Akhona's 'veggees'. Annika replied still laughing" She was sitting on the your chair and your spirit possessed her. The tales of your confrontation towards Sophia is still fresh in our minds and no one can ever forget what you did to her ". Noxo chipped in,"Yeah Akhona you're are very famous and your chair had been kept as a memorial of you. Till today no one sat in it, we only went there to acquire your spirit by touching the chair anytime we needed courage. After all it is written whosoever is worthy to sit on the chair acquires the spirit and becomes the champion". I simply let out a loud laughter on my friends mythological story about me,to me I wasn't that brave and could only confront Sophia due to my rage that flowed in me. My anger was my strength and with it I could do anything I want with no fear. I wasn't a champion but I saw myself as a warrior that had two parts to choose,the part of victory or the part if defeat. Dad always said a warrior should never chose the part of defeat and should always chose the part of victory. His words were,"Victory till the taste of death",and that was want I believed. At times I miss the days I spent with that but that was of the past and I needed to face my current situation. Noxo continued the story,narrating how a huge fight emerge between Sophia and Clara,also didn't leave the part of how Clara won the fight and declared herself,the next commander of the class. I wasn't that relax hearing that Clara was now the commander, though it would be nice having a new person but who knows if she would be worst than Sophia. I spoke up to Noxo,"Don't you think it would have been best if we had no commander,why do we need a ruler when we can govern ourselves.". "Your right but we have to accept it like that,she was the one who liberated us from Sophia, everyone knows Sophia won't remain silent for long,so someone needs to stand on guard to protect the class" replied her. "But a commander isn't necessary,we can work together to prevent her ruling us again. After all we weren't sent to school to be govern by someone",I said. Annika kept quiet for sometime and later said,"That's true but let's just take what we see and pray for the best", indirectly signalling me to drop the argument. "Akhona when would you return back to school",Noxo said,changing the topic while Annika looked at me waiting for my answers. I sighed, thinking that I would never be able to return to school as long as I leaved with my step dad,he came up with the idea of me running a business order than going to school when I entered senior secondary. He believed it was useless to train a female child that would end up in another man's house. Mom agreed on his sayings since she too was not fortunate to school and felt too that a business was much better than school. Who won't be happy to make your own money at a early age and plan to be very rich in the later future but unfortunately for me,it was a plot by my step dad to earn extra money,ninety nine percent of my profit was given to him while the remaining one percent was mine which was due to the fact I hid some of the money or used it immediately. At times he found out about it and put me through torture. Thanks to a friend that suggested the idea of separating some of the money,I would have still been foolishly giving the money to him. Everyday I calculated the estimated profit,minus the one I would give my step dad and the one that would remain for me. At times I got much profit making my own share of the profit higher but when I incurred loss I got less than my share or nothing at all. You might be wondering what kind of business I do,I'm a food vendor,my step dad opened a supermarket for me and put me in charge of it. When beginning I was the only one selling the product keeping account but now I got some money to higher some people who would sell while I did the accounting though I did mine in a different way. I had two accounts of each of my recording,one fir my step dad and the other mine. Mine contain the original records of my total income while my step dad's had the deducted records which is simply the money I would give him. At times he whipped me when I didn't give him enough money, questioning me where was the other money but I stood on my grounds and withstand it. At the end I won ,since I had my money from the business,most times he came over to the supermarket when he 'wants me'. During the days I was the only one running the supermarket,he dragged me to a corner and fulfilled his desires,I was safe on those days when a customer comes in and would purposely delayed the customer until he got angry and left. With people now working with me,his frequent visits were reduced and only on some occasions he dragged me to store room, locking me in and got his way.

I was jerked out of my thoughts by the snapping of Noxo's fingers,I had gotten lost in my thoughts and didn't listen to whatever they were saying. Annika hugged me, knowing already what my answer was and told me that one day I would finish my education. Though it was possible but I might lose the zeal to go back,we continued chatting on other things why we both ate our food we brought along. We talked on lots of things,the fishing ports,the high class girls in the neighborhood,the upcoming events and not to mention the recent happenings in the market. Slowly it became very dark indicating it was getting very late and hopefully mom was back to save me from the wrath of my stepdad. I said farewell to my friends and went home to face the expected calamity that would befall me.