CHAPTER ONE: THE ONSET

Laura took a deep breath, summoned courage, and began to walk. Her first walk on the string was slightly shaky, followed by her second.

"I know I can do this, all I have to do is take one step at a time, and that's it," she convinced herself.

But by the time she got to the fifth step, she lost her balance and fell again.

"Laura! Are you alright up there?" Carolyn shouted on hearing the noise coming from Laura's room.

"I'm fine, mum, I slipped, but I'm alright.

"Why can't I do this? I know I have superpowers, Aaaah!" Laura lamented bitterly.

She tried to walk on a rope effortlessly without falling or instead was supposed to have been suspended in the air for a while without falling outrightly.

Laura was perceived as a troubled child, some people assumed she was mentally disturbed and called her all sorts of weird names, but that never stopped her from believing she had superpowers to explore.

When Laura was a toddler, she could talk to photos too; she affirmed they were alive and interacted. Well, of course, they were; She was a mysterious girl, so it wouldn't be unusual for her to talk to people in the photos, but unfortunately, no one believed her.

It frightened her parents into thinking she had a problem, so they enrolled her in different therapy sessions to help guide her mental health.

Laura's parents; "Carolyn and Maxwell" were American. Carolyn was African American, and Maxwell was American White.

Carolyn being African-American meant having an African root, of which she was perfectly aware. She was also familiar with her African country, culture, food, mother tongue, and name of the village she came from.

According to rumors, Carolyn's grandmother "Ezenwanyi" was a powerful native goddess known as "Mami Wota" in southeastern Nigeria.

Mami Wota meant a queen in the marine world who wields an imaginable power, especially possessing people, lifting, and placing curses.

Her grandmother was so powerful that all the villagers feared her and her household.

No one dared to speak out against her in any way.

She was also said to have married and given birth to all her children in her marine world and then brought them into the physical world, except for her marine husband. She gave him perpetual punishment to stay hidden forever just because he disobeyed her. While some claimed it was Ugenu, the village seer fathered her children. The rumors lasted because no one ever saw her pregnant or living with a man, but they kept seeing the babies that she pretended to be hers.

Carolyn's mother, "Gracie" could not live with the stigma and fought so hard to flee her home and the negativity surrounding her family's name.

Gracie was able to find a way to go to another country, an entirely different continent, all thanks to the help of a missionary she met in the village.

It was somewhere she believed her mother's tracking spell would never reach.

Gracie often wondered if she would ever be free of the curse her mother had probably placed on her for running away.

Although she may have escaped stigmatization, she didn't quite succeed conquering her mother's spiritual grip.

Meanwhile, When Carolyn was born, she grew up to become a quiet and curious child; she frequently asked her mother many questions about her father and extended family. The questions were rather difficult for Gracie to answer, particularly those concerning her father, "Carolyn's grandfather." It was a question that she had no answers to because when she was younger, just about Carolyn's age, she also troubled her mother to reveal who her father was.

However, Ezenwanyi never answered that question. It was from rumors that Gracie heard her father was trapped in the marine world for disobedience. Well, she saw it as An uncanny and funny story, something to be laughed off. Well, she finally had to give up on the quest.

But Carolyn, on the other hand, didn't let it slide. By the time she became an adult, her inquisitive nature had grown up with her; she certainly wasn't going to take no for an answer. She needed answers about her identity as well as her family history.

Unfortunately, Gracie had no other option but to yield. She told her some things she knew about her past and family history.

And then made Carolyn swear to keep it a secret because she didn't want anyone from her past to know where she was or people around finding out who they were, just to avoid getting stigmatized again.

The news was pretty shocking to Carolyn, she knew there was a secret, but she didn't expect it to be that deep and frightening.

Nevertheless, she wrote down everything her mother said, including the address of her hometown, her biological father, and all the stories related to her grandfather and grandmother, because she wanted to avoid forgetting a thing.

Also, ever since Carolyn learned about her father, she became interested in visiting Nigeria to meet him and other relatives.

The revelation of her history, particularly the stories of her grandfather and grandmother, equally sparked a desire to see things for herself.

Nevertheless, Carolyn still enjoyed some revelations about her grandmother Ezenwanyi. Her favorite story about her grandmother was when her mother "Gracie" was little; Ezenwanyi took her across the stream to fetch some firewood in a neighboring village.

Suddenly it started raining before they could get done. It took Gracie and Ezenwanyi some minutes to return to the stream, and this time the water level had increased to the level it could swallow Gracie but not for the height of Ezenwanyi. Unfortunately, there was no other route to take, and it was getting darker too.

Ezenwanyi thought about what to do because the rain was hefty and the night was fast approaching. There was no shelter around to shield them from the rain. So she did something magical; she resulted in singing to the stream as they walked past. It was then that Gracie noticed an extraordinary thing. She saw the water level was decreasing with each step they took.

According to Gracie, the song was in the native dialect; it appealed to the river gods to stay still and grant them safe passage.

It was a terrifying experience while at the same time a relief to Gracie.

Carolyn also remembered another story, the story of how ghosts roamed around the compound late at night. It was believed they were her ancestors who were still hovering around their usual spots.

However, apart from wanting to meet her father and other family members, these strangely frightening stories fascinated her more to visit her hometown.