As children, we hurried to grandma's hut every twilight with the full moon illuminating our paths.

One night, we flooded to grandma's hut but what fed our hungry juvenile eyes was not the usual jovial and cheerful story teller she used to be; but she lay on her bamboo bed with a wrapper covering her up to her old sagging bossom.

We could hear her breath running miles and her eyes moistened with tears which glistened the flickering fire that burns under her primal enormous pot in the center of her hut.

"Grandma, are you okay?" We chorused as fear of the unknown whooped us.

"My grandchildren, certain is death, this world I will leave but not this moment" she grasped.

With the look of fear, misery and confusion on our faces, she grinned as to assure us everything was well with her, but her depraved grin was not convincing enough to fool us that she had but few hours to live.

"Grandma, please...tell..us..a story!" Ebube, the most wildest, oblivious and bizarre kid drawled.

But I snapped at him immediately with a  jab to his right ribs as to shut his gaping talking mouth up: 

"Can't you see grandma is on her death bed?" I managed to whisper.

"My grandchildren, a story, I will tell, and you all shall promise to remember to the grave" she beamed as her fast breath sapped more of her strength.

"My grandchildren" she began.

" Time before remembering, there lived a priestess called 'Mmili' in Umuagbala, a land of warriors situated somewhere along the coast of Africa. 

It was said that, she was a reincarnation of a beautiful black goddess, and in her days, people of the land pay obeisance with cowries, kegs of palm wine, lions paws and eagle's wings for the deity to bless and prosper them and their families.

Then, there came a day when mortal pleasure drained Mmili of her immortal  sanity when she desired to be intimate with a male mortal with a thick masculine prowess whose loins drives insane satisfaction, to plant a seed which will never shrivel or die but rather a hybrid; a blood of a mortal and a goddess who will take over the throne of the land and the sacred abode of the invisible deity.

"She bore a son, but it was more like a beast, a ravaging bloodthirsty tyrant who because of his selfishness, slaughtered his own parents, drank their blood and hung their corpses on a withered iroko tree in the village for birds to feed on them.

"He turned the villagers to his footstool and his parents bones artifacts. He also proclaimed himself the king and the gods of the land.

And so no one would oppose his ruthless and bloody rulership, he massacred his parents in cold blood.

"But something unexpected happened, when the cockerel heralded a new dawn and his hideous body was found breathless in his 'obi' where he had passed the night after sipping tons of palm wine brought to him by the unknown from the known that shall become known."

"Grandma, you mouth words encoded with parables and brains of the sages of the Mmili order that my dad reads to us in his African history book, please could you break the calabash to pieces?" I interrupted.

" The bloodthirsty tyrant died after gulping down kegs of palm wine given to him by his dead mother in guise of one of his wives.

"But there was a disturbing prophecy about him surfacing once more on the face of the earth through reincarnation.

"Reincarnation?" Jedinna the oldest among us asked with bewilderment.

"Yes, my grandchildren." Grandma said and she continued:

"I won't join my ancestors yet until I put a knive through his chest. My grandchildren, the beast is here in our midst in a guise of a lad!" She raised her grotesque shaking fingers and pointed them at Ebube, the wild kid as we all babbled in fear and confusion.

"My son, it is so stunning that you don't recognize the woman that births you centuries ago whom you killed in cold blood!" She growled and we all murmur silently as our eyes popped in  bewilderment.

"Yes, my grandchildren. I am Mmili the black goddess to be reincarnated in two generations, and I am here to save the world I once destroyed with my selfish desires.

"Ebube my son, it's time to go home" she said, and in a blink of an eye, she and Ebube disappeared, never to be seen again.

#Ikemefuna.

#fiction.

©️ London Lucky Talbot 

 

After a long day in school, we hurried home so we could finish our chores before twilight and join grandma under the moonlight for her jaw dropping tales.

When we arrived her hut, with our anticipations, we curtsied by greeting her respectfully; the boys bowed their head with their hands to their sides while the girls curtsied by bending their knees. 

She blessed us and asked us to sit on her local made mat. Then, a magical ride to a wonderland we took.

" You all are welcome my grandchildren" she welcomed us with a beam as her wrinkles stretched while she struggles to smile and talk.

" Long, long time ago.." she began.

" A traveler ventured to a western forest to work for some white men so he could make some money to fend for his only son.

He went with a close friend after bidding his son goodbye and told him he was coming back with a lots of money and food.

They left at night with torchlight well gripped in their hands.

As they were going, the man walked ahead of his friend, he muttered words to him and his friend responds. This continued till they got to a tall tree when the man decided to look back and to his amazement, his friend was no longer with him. He said to himself: "but I just heard his voice now."

Fear gripped him as he saw his friend swiftly dropped down from the tree.  He flashed his torchlight on him and he saw he was lifeless; there were two little holes on his neck, one which could only have been dug by vampires fangs. 

He felt an object in a wind form running around and towards him from different angles. He yelled apprehensively for whatsoever is about to kill him to reveal itself.

The object came to a stop as he gathered his wind-like pieces to one place and the complete piece was a man in black with red eyes, paled skin, fangs and the two sides of his mouth was stained with blood. apparently, his friend's blood.

The vampire wears a face of irony as he throws him a fake smile. The man pleaded for him to spare his life; whimpering how his only son would be fatherless if he kills him. He wailed to him that he wants to live and not to die.

The vampire assured him that he will make him immortal. He agreed and the vampire swiftly grabbed him, deeped his hungry fangs into his neck and suck life out of him, he mixed their blood and fed the man some. Then he took him to his coven and watched him for days if he's strong enough to fight death and become  an immortal like him.

Days later, the man woke up in the vampire's coven and couldn't feel his body; all his bones were as strong as iron, he felt an overwhelming strength and a taste of blood in his mouth. He looked himself in a mirror and saw he was a complete transformed being, that was when it dawned on him that he was turned a vampire; his request of living and not dying.

He confronted the vampire that why would he turn him to a vampire without his full knowledge. But the vampire laughed and said: you asked for it and you should thank me for that.

He was devastated, he slowly started craving for human blood. And his fear was how he would explain to his son; he wasn't sure if he would be able to overcome the temptation of killing his own son.

We went back home in a snap of a finger, he was surprised too. He enjoys this part of being a vampire: you could reach anywhere you want in split of second.

At his sight, his son ran towards him and hugged him tightly asking him questions like: what happened, why did you not  return home for days. And crown the questions with: I was frightened and worried.

Tears rolled down his paled cheeks at those emotional questions.

He missed his son.

Then, his fear came.

While still hugging his son, his face was burried on his shoulder exposing his tempting flesh staring into his face.

He was a new vampire, it was difficult for him to master and control the urge to bite his own son but he got hold of it as he pushed him to a side and fled through the window.

He thought for days and deviced another means of survival by drinking animal blood instead of human blood. He practiced it and it worked and the rest of his days he lived in peace with his son and other humans without wanting to sulk life out of them.

That's the end of my story" grandma concluded.

" My children, you can always find solution to every problem. Go home to your parents and come again tomorrow" she said.

And we were dismissed.

©️ London Lucky Talbot✍️

It was an eclipse night, I was making merry with uncle Jude in his condominium when a text message popped on my phone screen: "come home right now, there is something you need to see!" was the message from my mum.

I dreaded sinister, but at that moment I couldn't help it but to allow it sit in my head. uncle Jude patted my shoulder and I fled to my parents house.

getting there, from afar I saw human figures silhouetting on my window through the curtains. everywhere was disturbingly dark, I looked up and I saw the moon was no longer red but was glinting at me -- which lit my way without bumping on anything as I paced.

I got to our door step, pulled the knob as the door creaked open which panicstroke me because my parents would never forget to lock the front door once is dark, no matter how oblivious my mum was or how drunk my dad was.

I walked in quietly and headed to my mum's room wondering what was amiss -- when I heard someone squeak from my room. I spun, tracing the voice half running and half pacing looking over my shoulders because now it was obvious we had an anonymous eerie company. with the blinking lightbulb over my head dangling on the ceiling, I could see the mess they'd made of the house and the walls stained with blood.

I got to my door and I could hear my mum whimpering. I hungered to open it when I heard a cat meow behind me, I abruptly spun around on adrenaline, and I saw a black cat, and in a blink of an eye it was no longer a cat but an old woman in black cloak pacing toward me smirking and grinning at the same time, and when she got closer, I could feel, see and hear a bubble of fire that moves with her -- I was horror-stricken, my body went numb and I managed to shield the bubble of fire with my elbows as I screeched, and then suddenly, silence swallowed the scene.

I squinted wondering if I was still alive, and I saw her suspended in the midair, rigid and icy, and when I took a proper look, it was my aunt, Naomi. my mouth gaped open and my eyes popped in surprise and betrayal: why would my aunt want to kill me? and then suddenly I felt a rage overwhelm me and I stroke the icy figure hard as it splinter on the floor with a clattering sounds.

with the same rage, I pounced on my door and it thudded on the floor flying dusts in the air, and I saw my mum whimpering in a corner, blindfolded and mouth-taped, she was quavering miserably which boiled my  anger the more. then, dangling feets in the midair caught my attention and i looked up, it was my dad -- dangling on a rope hanged on the chandelier hanger, his body bruised and swollen, and a long knife sticking through his belly and poking out through his back -- and i reeled and fell on my knees at the nightmare before me.

then I saw someone emerge from no where in a flash, he wore a black cloak like my aunt Naomi, and the moonlight shone through my window illuminating the gloomy room and I could see his face: it was my uncle, Jude.

he muttered some enchantment and I froze, completely numb. I struggled to break free but the unseen cold hands gripping me were too strong.

"say your last prayer, boy or you watch me slice your whore of a mother's throat!" he growled as his forehead furrowed.

"so - uncle Jude you're a -a wizard?" I stuttered.

"of course, boy. just as your mother is a witch" he said with a nasty smile.

I was engulfed with bewilderment, what the hell is he blabbing?

"but what did my parents do to you to deserve this?" I cried.

"enough interrogation, boy! you want your slut of a mother to live or not?" he barked.

sinking in confusion, I closed my eyes and I felt an unprecedented strength I had never felt before, I could feel it traveling through my veins from my head and settling in my two clenched fists.

"Arrrrrrrrghhh!" I yelled with anger and a mad wind spun in the room deafening every living thing in it.  and when silence returned, I saw him turn to a statue of ice and the invisible hands gripping me were gone.

I rushed toward my mum feeling her misery and pain, cut her loose and untied the blindfold on her eyes, tore the tape on her lips, and carried her to the bed -- crying at my dad's dangling dead body. I lay her down and she started breathing heavily and fast.

"London, I hope you're not my mad at me? -- there are things we never told you." she muttered.

"things like what, mum?" 

"sweetheart, you're destined to be a powerful sorcerer" she gasped with her last breath as her eyelids glued with a tear rolling from a corner of her eye to her ear, and from that moment, a new chapter of life flipped open for me; wizardry.

#Ikemefuna.

©️ London Lucky Talbot

 

I was burried six feet under the earth, I was only unconscious but everyone thought I was dead

I know that feeling of waking up in a casket after decades of unending slumber and realising you've been burried alive.

About 15years ago, during our every twilight tale with grandma in her hut with her antique lantern hung on her shined red wall and glistening in our petrified eyes as she tells her eerie tales. One night she had told us about not whistling in the night, not looking at mirror in the night, calling people by their names and answering names in the night -- that they could attract haunting and restless ghosts.

When she finished her tales, we were about leaving her hut and she added:

"My grandchildren, don't ever sleep with your legs facing the door but your head"

She never told us the reason behind it and we never asked because we've got enough of frightening tales.

Well, many people thought these were propestrous myths and superstitions designed to frighten children, so they doubted and never believed they could happen. I wasn't excluded though I was only a kid running around with a sagging pant and following my folks to church every Sunday watching the preacher engulfed with vibration on the podium as he spits out frightening words about heaven and hell which made us to see every tale our grandparents ever told us as myths no matter how terrifying they are.

Then I started having nightmares about my room being watched by a ghost girl, and I would wake up the next morning a and I wouldn't feel my legs; they would be rigid and dead. I never knew I was having sleep paralysis, and I had forgotten about not facing my legs to the door while sleeping.

Unknown to me, I was sexually and maritally engaged in the spirit world.

One night, after coming back from grandma's hut, I flopped onto my bed waiting for sleep to come but I suddenly heard someone crying in my room; it was a girl's voice sobbing bitterly.

I quickly grabbed my lantern closer holding it with my trembling fingers and I saw a girl in white standing on my door, with long black hair covering her pale face and white eyes sobbing bitterly.

"You invited me" she wailed.

I opened my mouth to say something but no word came out only my lips shaking.

"No one has ever wanted me, no body likes me and I've never had anyone to share moments with until I saw your interest in me" she cried sinking her face on her palms.

"N....no, I d.. didn't" I shivered.

"You did!" She cried. 

Then I remembered I'd been whistling on our way home from grandma's without noticing it, and I'd slept the night before with my legs facing the door.

"B..but you're dead" I stuttered and she nodded childishly.

She suddenly stretched out her pale hands and I took them subconsciously, and WHAM -- we were gone.

I woke up breathing heavily with my body moistened with sweat.

Damn! It was a nightmare.

Then I looked at my door and she was right there, standing like a statue and grinning sheepishly at me. 

I stood up swiftly from the bed and I looked back at it, and I saw my body lying breathlessly.

"Nothing was a nightmare" she said coldly.

I was truly dead.

When everyone woke up the next morning and I didn't, after hours of crying, I was burried. No one knew I wasn't dead but unconscious.

Then I woke up what seemed like centuries in the grave and with the heat and darkness, I knew I was burried alive.

If you're wondering how then I wrote this, well, I was a seer who couldn't avert his misfortunes, fate and destiny; I saw this horror years before it happened.

#Ikemefuna

#fiction

©️ London Lucky Talbot ✍️

 

A happy toast to all mothers out there both the pregnant ones and the nursing ones.

Mrs. Salami woke up in the middle of the night-- her stomach growling and her throat as dry as a furnace. She gave her snoring husband a side-long stare, rubbed her bulgy belly which was almost due for delivery. She jolted up sluggishly and tapped her husband on his hairy legs:

"Hhmmmm!" Mr Salami groaned.

"Get up!" She muttered.

"What is it?" He asked yawning and stretching his hands above his head as he sat up.

"I'm hungry" she drawled as she squeezed her drowsy face exaggeratedly.

"By this time of the night-- well, let me go and warm something for you in the kitchen then"

"No-- you don't understand. Is not just any food I want"

"So what do you want?" Mr. Salami muttered struggling to keep his eyes open as he kept dozing off.

"I want-- I want eba garnished with native mango and female monkey intestine" she muttered shyly.

Mr. Salami eyes popped in bewilderment mixed with a little exasperation and amusement.

"What did you say?" He asked lowering his head so his eyes would catch his wife's who now had her face burried in her palms.

Without saying a word, Mr Salami sprang up emitting toxic air from his posterior. He tucked his hands inside his underpants scratching himself intensely with closed eyes until he dropped another thudding and enormous gas from his butt that sounded like a faulty generator:"kporrrrr kprooorrrrr kporrr".

He strode across the room picking his boxers which was stuck in-between his butt cheeks. He glanced over his shoulder and saw his bizarre hungry wife sniffing the polluted air as if it was an aroma of what she was craving. He burst into a teary laughter almost reeling on the floor.

"Why are you sniffing my fart nau, you this hungry woman?" He laughed as he managed to say.

"It's not funny jor! But I kind of enjoy it".

So do you still want the eba garnished with native mango and female monkey intestine?"

"I think I'm satisfied with your fart." She drawled.

Mr. Salami burst into laughter again as his wife joined him.

Three years later, this clown of a couple were sleeping soundly on their matrimonial bed when Mrs. Salami woke up Suddenly, panting hard with beads of sweat seated on her forehead. Mr. Salami who seemed to have awoken by her sudden shriek asked her: 

"What is it?"

But Mrs salami giggled: "ewo chineke nnam!" 

"What is it?" He asked again.

"My love, we forgot to pick the kids from school".

There was silence for a moment, then Mr Salami broke it with his hysterical laughter as his wife joined him. They laughed so hard that their funny eyes began to moisten with tears. 

DIARY OF A PREGNANT WOMAN.

©️ London Lucky Talbot ✍️

Dining with the devil and adventuring into dark arts was the nightmare Matteo had every night.

In one of his dreams, he had seen himself conjuring dark spells on his minor playmate, Edward their neighbour's nerdy son - which result was demonically hideous; he turned him into a goblin-like creature, a devilish or rather funny looking creature with pointed nose and ears like a rabbit, with a height as short as an elf.

He enjoyed every moment of torturing this little boy in his dream, and when he woke up, he realised it was just a dream but wished it wasn't.

A part of him had started craving for dark stuffs, the hunger overwhelmed him and a 13-year-old Matteo started asking his parents to buy him satanic spells books  which to his amazement, they didn't argue; they nodded hypnotically and days later the books were bought from no where.

Then, Matteo started having nightmares after nightmares by reading these books where he saw a satanic creature in black ugly hood offer to distill in him power of immortality, and without hesitation and rather enthusiasm, he accepted it with all his vulnerable heart, and then woke up the next morning with a pair of horn poking through the sides of his forehead, his beautiful face now grotesque, his eyes as red as vampires' and two ugly fangs swording out on his upper gum.

Rather than screeching, he smirked at himself on the broken mirror hung on his wall. And without looking at his scattered bed, he strode out from his room and bumping into his parents at the door as they passed directly through him without seeming to notice him at all.

Struck with surprise, he swung his hand trying to touch them but his hands seemed to be waving only the air. He followed them quickly back into his room and, he saw his body lying dead, swollen and rotten; zillions of maggots swimming and feasting on him. Then he saw his parents clapped their mouths and eyes with their hands shaking and reeling in horror.

He lifted his gaze to his wall and saw an invisible hand scribbling some creepy words with blood: 

"You asked for immortality and immortality I've given you. Make it to the coven at once to meet your counterparts and fellow minions scattered on the face of the earth. Our adversary isn't resting, boy. Welcome to the church of Satan, Matteo. From your high lord and master, Lucifer."

"J..ESUS!" Matteo screeched as he woke with a start. It's been all a nightmare. His parents came rushing to the room, held his hands and prayed like never before.

They baptized him with anointing oil and gave him some to drink, and that ends his demonic nightmares; Matteo was saved from the demonic possession.

©️ London Lucky Talbot ✍️

Family Mystery

By London Lucky Talbot ✍️

What would you do if you find out that your spouse is a ghost?

Theresa had been seeing herself flying in the dream of the night and practicing dark sorcery, but she wakes up every morning with a broad smile; she was always happy seeing herself doing dark stuff, and wished she could do them in  real life.

One day, she got a call from Emeka, a guy who had been pestering her for a relationship. She loved him but couldn't  understand why or like the fact that she loved him.

She made up her mind and gave him a chance. They got engaged after some months of dating and a year later, they got married.

But never once did she see any of Emeka's family members pay them a visit and neither did he talk about his family.

Theresa's mind was far from this, but after some years she began to ask him questions after questions about his family, but he wouldn't say a word; whenever the topic was brought up, he would knit his brow so hard as to tell Theresa to stop bringing up the topic, but she wouldn't stop.

8 years had gone in their marriage with three kids running around the house. Theresa was curious and miserable to know about Emeka's family. So, one Christmas, he finally gave in to her. They drove to his village, and when they arrived, his family's house was two bungalows away, he suddenly stopped and pointed his finger to his family's house - that his wife and kids should go ahead of him that he would like to get his parents a surprising gift.

They left him there standing as he watched them fade from view.

Theresa and the kids got to the compound, and they were given a warm welcome then followed by a disturbing question: "who are you?"

After explaining who she was, Emeka's parents gave her a mouth gaped look, like she was saying rubbish.

"That's impossible!" They chuckled.

Theresa kept trying to explain that they came with him, but they couldn't take it anymore so, they directed her eyes to a grave in a corner of the compound:

"That's Emeka's grave." His mom cried.
"He died 15 years ago in a car crash" muttered his dad who felt his healed wound punctured and bleeding again.

Engulfed with surprise and confusion, Theresa passed out; how was she supposed to have the slightest sign that she's been living with a ghost as a husband for 9 good years when she was blinded by a mysterious and foolish love.

#ikemefuna.

#fiction.

©️ London Lucky Talbot ✍️