Ikenga

The sun was especially harsh today, and even under the tent, it was sweltering hot. The humid heat blew as a wave of grief pressed down on Nnamdi s shoulders. He ran his hand over his freshly trimmed rough hair and turned from his mother to look somewhere else. For a while, he watched the women with the drums perform their burial dance before him. They wore matching blue dresses and cowry shells that clicked on their ankles. As they danced, they kicked up dust. The band had a guitar and bass player, a flutist, and three more drummers, and they played a variety of songs from highlife to traditional. Normally, Nnamdi would have enjoyed the music.

Suddenly, all the dancers missed their rhythm. The drummers lost their beat. The guitarist s fingers slipped. And the flutists missed their notes. All Nnamdi s relatives, family, friends, acquaintances the two hundred people sitting on benches, standing, and crying in the large spacious compound all looked toward the entranceway on the left side. Auntie Ugochi leaned toward his mother s ear and Nnamdi heard her mutter, This man has no shame.

His mother snatched Nnamdi s hand and squeezed hard. Keep playing, keep dancing! she barked at the musicians and dancers. A drummer beat out a floundering rhythm and the dancers moved distractedly.

Nnamdi didn t want to look. He knew who he d see. Never shy away from conflict, his father had once told him. Look it in the eye and deal with it. And his mother had stood behind his father and added, Courage, my son. Your father means you should have courage but be smart about it.

So Nnamdi turned to look. He saw a procession of ten fashionably dressed, gold- and diamond-wearing, attention-usurping women and men filing into the compound. Nnamdi tried to stand up straight with his chin up, as his father would have. But instead, fear made him slump in his seat and barely lift his head.

Nnamdi remembered his father angrily talking about these individuals. Everyone knows who they are, but people are too afraid to confront them. If anything, people treat them like Nollywood movie stars. These were the most prominent criminals in Kaleria.

That regal old woman wearing the red abada textile clothing had to be Mama Go-Slow. His father was right: indeed, she did walk like a

West African culture throughout the origin story of a memorable new superhero." Horn Book