Dial - Season 1 - Episode 123

4 years ago

Dial - Season 1 - Episode 123

There was a hole in the centre of the cemented forecourt, and they pushed the base of the tree trunk I was tied to into the hole so that I was suddenly upright.
In front of me was a huge veranda. There was a huge throne on the veranda, and several high-backed wooden chairs.

The king was sitting on the throne, and sitting on a low stool at his feet was Abena Adobea, looking incredibly beautiful but glowering with vengeful rage. She had changed into a sort of cloth attire that covered her whole body leaving her head.

Behind them were several gaunt and shrivelled old men in cloths, probably the kingmakers, Elders and sub-chiefs of the town.
The king, I saw, was a tall lean man with a long aquiline face and a bulbous nose. He was wearing the most colourful kente cloth I had ever seen. Abena Adobea was also in the cloth. There were gold ornaments around the king’s upper arms and down his arm. He was also wearing gigantic gold rings on each finger.

Behind me were many of the townsfolk, still chanting their angry jabbering.

A short, skinny man wearing only a raffia skirt and a tall feather hat came toward me. He was holding a horsetail whisk, and his eyes were dark orbs of wickedness as he stood in front of me. He was a fetish priest, and I had no doubt that this was indeed Okomfo Basabasa.

“Soooo!” he hissed in a terrible whisper. “You’re the stranger that wounded three of the guards, and dared lay a hand on the royal princess, our Queen Mother in the making? How dare you! Before we even hear your case, you will receive twenty strokes of lashes, as decreed by the gods!”
“You filthy bastard!” I hissed at him furiously, and that shut everybody up.
My sheer anger, my disrespectful tone, and my evident disregard for a fetish priest everybody feared now served as a balm of surprise that shook up everybody present.
Okomfo Basabasa smiled cruelly.
“You don’t know who you’re dealing with, stranger!”
“And you bloody don’t know who’re you’re dealing with, you piece of cow dung!” I shouted, overcome with such fury that he took a step back, and again I saw the shocked looks on the faces of the people.
Yao Biko, probably the wealthiest man on the continent of Africa, tied up and being ridiculed by this wicked person was more than my ego could tolerate. If I had been free, I probably would’ve beaten him to pulp.

The man saw the effect my apparent rudeness was wreaking on the people, and his tiny evil face suddenly became harder with cruel intent. He stepped back and barked out orders in their language.

The huge muscular men grabbed me. They cut the ropes binding me, and then turned me round to face the tree trunk. They used a knife to cut the T-shirt off my back, and then they tied me again to the tree trunk so that I was facing the gathered crowd.

I saw a huge man wearing only a pair of black shorts stepping forward. He was holding a horrible lash. It was made with rough leather, and had spiky metal rings around it.

My heart flipped with sudden fear. That thing lashing my bare back would be very painful, and the spiky metals would grab the skin of my back and break the skin, causing hideous wounds on my back.

This was barbaric, to say the least! These things still happened in the world? Goodness me, people were suffering atrocities not known to the rest of the civilized Ghana.
I struggled furiously, but of course I was tied solid.

The man smiled wickedly and moved behind me.

“He felt no remorse!” Okomfo Basabasa screamed. “Turn the tree round! I want him to face the royal princess as his back is la!d bare, and then he will respect customs!”
The tree trunk was rotated, and now I was looking at the king, his elders, the kingmakers…and Abena Adobea.
I saw that her face was suddenly tight with apprehension, and for once that haughty and arrogant look was peeled off her face! Her eyes met mine, and she saw the look of disgust on my face, and she dropped her eyes quickly.

“Thirty strokes now!” Okomfo Basabasa screamed. “Give it to him!”
The man with the wicked leather lash was behind me, and just as I was about to close my eyes and receive the evident torture, I saw him.

He was hazy, as if he were in spiritual form, his shape shimmering and indistinct, his face not quite clear, a little bit blurred. But there was no mistaking the batakari and the grey hair, or the incredibly rugged and handsome face!

Yes, it was him…Nana b0s0mba of Wowo!