daughter, the goddess appeared to me personally. In my entire life I have never seen such a being before. There I was, on my bed, while she appeared to me in a flash of dazzling light, looking so unbelievably beautiful, more than anything else I had ever seen before. Her hair hung down to her feet which were encased in gold sandals, a black cloud about and behind her, covering her breasts partially. I wanted her more than I ever wanted another woman. She congratulated me on the birth of my daughter, and then she had sex with me. It was better than anything I had ever had before, and then she spoke to me for some time and then vanished from my room.
‘When I told the Brotherhood what had happened, they began to respect me more because the goddess almost never appears to any of her followers. Our Dibia told me that even he had never seen her physically, that I must be really special to her. My spiritual powers grew to unbelievable proportions, and I could do anything; I could turn into any animal I wanted to be; I could see anything that was happening anywhere and with anybody at any point in time; I could cause thunderstorms and send down the rain from the skies; I could kill by merely wishing you dead . . . I was loaded with power.
‘I initiated many people into the Brotherhood, young men that were in need of money and power. It was so easy. Sometimes all I had to do was to have sex with them, and the moment my sperm went into them, they became members of the Brotherhood. I would then tell them, and refusal to join meant instant death for the man, or madness, or a life of utter poverty. They just had to join. And now, the goddess asked for the blood of my daughter. I never thought it would happen; I had thought that since they had tried to get my wife and had failed to do so, that they would forget about my wife and her own, meaning, our daughter.
‘I begged her to allow me bring her the blood of as many people as she wanted, but she told me plainly_ she appeared before me once again_ that she would settle for nothing less than Bianca. And if I fail to do her bidding, then there would be dire consequences. I have seen what she has done to some members of the Brotherhood that had defied her wishes; they were destroyed totally.
‘So, I had to tow the line. I wept for days, but I knew that there was no other option.’
‘There is always an option,’ Reverend Ebube said, his voice ringing out clearly like bells, and the people began to scream and to clap for him, calling out praises and singing hymns. Then he raised his hand again, and a big hush descended on the crowd once again.
‘I have always been very close to my daughter,’ Nick continued, and there was a sad smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as he remembered the past times. It was as if he was talking to himself now, remembering the past in the wall of memories and reeling them off to his own self, not to an audience. ‘It was very easy for me to tell her what I wanted and to get her away from her school. Tonight was the night we had planned to kill her, and everything I had told my wife about making efforts to find Bianca was all a hoax. I knew where the girl was all along. She was to die tonight at the stroke of midnight; we were to bury her alive, all to the glory of Karashika, our goddess_ the Queen of Darkness. My daughter was to have been the ultimate sacrifice I had to give to Karashika for the wealth she had given to me, and then I would have to start impregnating other women. Once they gave birth to my children, Karashika would take them as blood sacrifices on their first birthday. I have already lined up four young women that would sire children for me, and they would have done it because of the money I was willing to be giving to them and their families.
‘Because of their greed, they have already agreed to become the mothers of my children, thinking that I will end up marrying them. Nigerian women love money more than they love their own lives, so even if I want hundred women to be giving me the children from my seed, I would have gotten them without blinking twice. It was all worked out already. If my wife had been getting pregnant, then I would have had to be using her pregnancies to further my wealth.
‘What happened as I was going with the girl to the venue, I can never tell. All of a sudden, I saw my wife, and she looked as if there were other persons dressed in white with her; that she was not alone. And then I can’t remember all what happened again, except that I suddenly had my eyes wiped and here I was, with all these people looking at me. I knew then that the game was up. A voice told me that it was over.’
‘The Lord arrested you,’ the Reverend said.
Fidelia turned around and stumbled from the church, heading for the Fathers’ Quarters, her tears blinding her. She was dimly aware of people touching her and clapping her shoulders, many of them telling her that she was strong in the Lord. It was all over now, she thought. Her daughter was with her now, safe and sound, without injuries; she had not even lost her life. The Lord had done it for her; He had shown her that truly, she had been serving a living God and not a dead god.
He was great.
And, how had she been living with a blood murderer and had absolutely no idea of it? How could her husband have been so evil, causing accidents and deaths for so many people just so that he could be rich?
She thought of all the money she had been spending, of how she had access to everything she needed that money could buy_ all she ever had to do was to tell her husband what she wanted, and it was hers. She never had to sweat for anything ever.
And it had all come at that prize: ritual deaths so the money could be flowing and their status could be maintained. Her husband had been having sex with other men, young guys who had their futures stripped away from them simply because they had been desperately in need of money and had spread their ass cheeks for Nick to insert his penis into and then grab away their futures. Or else turn them into the members of his club so they could be making blood sacrifices to the goddess too.
Oh God.
Fidelia could never forget what had happened to her daughter, neither could she get it off her mind that her husband was a ritualist, one of those men that engaged in blood money rituals, and that he had tried severally over the years to kill her without success.
The Reverend had counseled her to forgive her husband, that the Devil was powerful, but that the Lord was stronger; that He had used her to make His mark and have many people see the light. And in her heart she knew that there was no way for her not to forgive him; the point was that even though he had nearly destroyed her and his actions had left her feeling so horrified and so shocked that she never knew if she could believe in the innocence of humans ever again, she knew that she could not bear grudges against him.
He was her husband, and her vows during the day of her marriage, made before God and men, was that she had married him for better or for worse. So she made the decision to stick with him, believing that all would be well.
She hoped in her heart that it would, and believed in the Heavens that it would be so. She wouldn’t want anything to come in again to destroy her life for her. For she had already suffered more than enough for her life, and there was nothing that could be done to her now that had not been done already. It was that simple, and that was the truth of the matter for her.
OTHER BOOKS BY UGOCHUKWU KINGSLEY ANI
LOVE THE ANGEL
TRIAL OF ANGELS
THE WEDDED WHORE
SHADOWS OF EARTH (AN ANTHOLOGY)
AFFAIR WITH THE DANCER (AKA BEHIND CLOSED DOORS)
All of them are available where books are sold, at all your favorite retailers.
The Wedded Whore
The Wedded Whore is the erotic saga from Nigerian author, Ugochukwu Kingsley Ani, which was published in 2015. A compelling, heart-twisting story, it is the devastating story of a stunning singer who had been trapped in the shadows of sex clubs during her struggles as an orphaned young teenager, and now, when she had risen to stardom, a man from her past, a billionaire extraordinaire, is here to claim her and everything she owned: from her body, to her twin kids, to her heart, and ultimately, the keys to her soul. And her own ultimate struggles with the demons of her heart, to escape the awful shadows cast on her by her pas
t, and the mysterious, magical man in her life.
Read of for an excerpt of The Wedded Whore.
PROLOGUE
The room was incredibly vast and outrageously packed with men. On a raised dais were live band players, and a girl was singing. Obinna had his back to the dais but he was strongly aware of the pop song that was being sung by the most sonorous voice he’d ever heard. The voice was a very feminine voice that had the tunes right on, and the entire patrons and the women of the crowded bar were all nodding their heads to the sound of the voice.
The singing stopped abruptly. And then the music changed, from the upbeat sounds that were being belted out by the sonorous voice to an exotic Eastern beat that was seductive. The lights had dimmed. Simultaneously, all the men held their breath. Astonished, Obinna glanced around wildly so he could understand why the men were acting so strangely, and when his eyes fell on the girl who’d emerged as if conjured up from a puff of smoke, he understood the reason for the instantaneous enchantment.
She stood there, her back turned to the room, her body draped from neck to toes in a veil of shiny tulle. There were jewels ringed on her arms, so long they almost formed a percussion band; there was a snake bracelet draped around her biceps, and