Chapter 19

"Yeye, I only stole from her and raped her...but I didn't do more than that..." He said with a scared look.

"What did you steal from her? Let me see it." The Queen eagerly stretched an open hand towards her son.

Adewale pulled the necklace out of his pocket and placed it on his mother's hand. Immediately, the necklace touched the Queen's hand, she closed her eyes and shuddered as she spiritually assessed it. "Power..." She whispered. "So much power in this..." Then she opened her eyes and stared at her son again. "I hope you did not touch a hair on her head?"

"I did slap her after she bit off the fingers of one of my men, but my men did all the beating and set the hut on fire on my orders."

"Did she curse you all?" The Queen asked in a knowing tone.

"Yes, mother." Prince Adewale said in a trembling voice. "That's exactly the problem. She heaped a lot of curses on all of us to last several generations. How do we ward off such imminent evil?"

The Queen gave a sinister smile now. "As long as this necklace is in our possession, we are partially saved, but there's nothing I can do for your men."

"Nothing? Why not, mother?" He asked, perplexed.

"Because they have to be the scapegoats. They have to be the sacrificial lambs. Do not let them know that they are going to die terrible deaths, assure them that everything is fine."

"But mother, they are my friends, in fact, they are more like brothers to me." The Prince bemoaned. "How can you possibly leave them to their fate?"

"You can always make new friends, Adewale. With this necklace, this family is untouchable. No calamity whatsoever shall befall us, but you'll have to do some sacrifices if you are to stay alive and go undetected by Osun when she seeks vengeance."

"What mother?" He anxiously asked.

Now, Olori Bukunmi is a witch unknown to the entire village and her husband the king whom she had tied up so that he wouldn't think of taking a second wife. In fact, she was related to Osun but had been sent on exile from the river for her treachery and grievous calamity against her own kind. She had been banished never to return and her powers had been seized.

Desperate to rule on earth, she had resorted to serving a wicked goddess, precisely the snake goddess whom she had stumbled upon while she had been hopelessly wandering in the evil forest. The goddess had blessed her with some spiritual gifts which she exchanged in return for it- human babies.

The Queen renewed her powers by eating the placentas of these babies which some of the village midwives stole from birthing mothers. If the Queen wanted to expend her powers on an important task, that was when she resorted to drinking the blood of snakes.

"First, you have to lay with me so that I can fully fortify you!" The Queen said.

"What!" Exclaimed the prince in shock as he scrambled to his feet. "Lay with you?! I can't sleep with my own mother! Never!" He vehemently refuted.