The book A Fledgling Abiba by Dilman Dila is a work of fantasy that follows the journey of a young girl named Kuri, who possesses rare spiritual gifts in a world where magic and ancestral worship are often suppressed by modern religions like m’Ondetta. The story explores themes of identity, destiny, and the blurred lines between good and evil as Kuri seeks to understand her heritage and find her father.
The Awakening of the Abiba
Kuri is a scrawny orphan living in the city of Muwaawa under the care of her abusive and fanatical m’Ondetta aunt. Her mother, whom she calls Maa, was an abiba (a spiritual healer and practitioner) who was killed under mysterious circumstances, leaving Kuri homeless and without a mentor. Kuri possesses the gift of lakwopo, which she interprets as being “someone who steals remembrances” by looking into people’s eyes, and she has the ability to “fart flames” when her internal “lava” or spiritual energy erupts.
The narrative begins during a massive storm in Muwaawa, which Kuri senses was sent by something angry. She is relegated to the kitchen of her aunt’s boma, doing all the cooking and cleaning for twenty-one people, while hiding her “demons” to avoid further exorcism torture at the temple. One night, she is visited in a dream by a corpse in a red bark-cloth kanzu who asks for her help in her mother’s language. Despite her lack of training, Kuri feels it is her destiny to answer the call. She retrieves her family’s magical winnower, the kobi, which allows her to fly, and escapes her aunt’s home.
Encounter with the Musezi
Kuri follows the scent of onions, which she realizes is the “powerful juju” that brought the dead man out of his grave, to the foreigner’s zone of the city. There she meets the walking corpse, who has yellow eyes and the stench of a demon. She discovers the man was a cattle trader who was murdered, and he is being summoned by a musezi (a cannibalistic sorcerer) named Kasokosoko sangala enkoko.
Upon stealing the musezi’s memories, Kuri is overwhelmed by the “rotten meat” of his past, including his enslavement of spirits and his meeting with her mother six months before her death. She is captured by the musezi and bound by charmed snake-ropes. In captivity, she meets the musezi’s wife, Mama wa Jjajja, who is also a victim of her husband’s evil. Kuri learns of a wor-yamo an evil ancestral spirit that leaves a dark yellow mist which is the “invisible master” controlling the musezi and shrouding his memories of her mother. Kuri eventually uses her fire and the kobi to set the musezi’s shrine and storeroom on fire. In the ensuing chaos, Mama wa Jjajja attacks her husband, and they both perish in the blaze while Kuri flees.
A New Life and the Kawuka Cure
Kuri spends a moon living as a scavenger until she meets Mwima, a bookkeeper for a wealthy merchant. Mwima is hiding her daughter, Kirabo, who is suffering from kawuka, an “incurable” disease characterized by rashes, boils, and a yellowish maggot swimming in the eye. Kuri becomes their maid and uses the memories she stole from the musezi to prepare a cure for the girl.
However, Kuri faces a moral dilemma: the recipe for the medicine includes an enslavement spell that will make the patient her slave forever, and she cannot find an antidote. With Kirabo nearing death, Kuri chooses to administer the medicine, effectively saving the girl but enslaving her. As Kirabo recovers, she becomes pathologically attached to Kuri, prompting Kuri to use a secondary spell to compel the girl to be less dependent. During this time, Kuri’s own powers grow, and she continues to have dreams of a “yellow mist-cat” from the wor-yamo, which she fears is a sign of her own impending entrapment.
The Palace and the Jagwok
Mwima, noticing Kuri’s intelligence and ability to read ki’Nubi scrolls, takes her to the palace to seek an apprenticeship. Kuri is attached to a jamuka (a princess-investigator) and uses her lakwopo gift to solve cases. She becomes involved in a murder case where the suspect, Mukajjanga, claims he was assisted by a “fire-boy”.
While investigating, Kuri meets Woko, a mysterious woman who reveals herself to be a jagwok a “person of the dog” whose mission is to hunt evil spirits called kifaro. Woko is able to “turn off” Kuri’s fire and claims to have known Kuri’s mother. During an interrogation in the jail, a kifaro inside the prisoner attacks Kuri, but Woko saves her using a bird-like wing. Woko later informs Kuri that her mother, Maa, is being punished in the “other side” for a “mistake” she made.
The Quest for the Green Eagle
Woko and Kuri travel to the shrine of a mulogo named Jjajja Kalori to find the source of the kifaros. They find him dead, killed by a demigod who can slay the immortal apolupolu birds. Kuri realizes that her father was a Muchwezi (a demigod) based on a song her mother used to sing about dancing with one on the Mountains of the Moon.
Kuri’s life in Muwaawa falls apart when Mwima discovers her fire powers and, fearing the “fire-boy” legends, asks her to leave. Kuri returns to the streets and eventually sets up her own healing practice (dwaliro) in a boma owned by a woman named Abio. She cures hundreds of people of kawuka, but each cure sinks her deeper into the yellow mist of the wor-yamo. Woko returns and reveals that kawuka is not a natural sickness but a type of kifaro created by a demigod to force humans back to ancestral worship.
After an encounter with another mulogo, Jjajja Timba, which turns out to be a trap, Woko is lost and Kuri is severely injured. Kuri retreats to a forest to heal and communicates with animals to learn how to defeat the demigod. An elephant tells her she needs a weapon made from the red horn-feather of a green eagle. Kuri travels to the “Forest That Sings” and meets Min-Liech, the mother of elephants, who eventually directs her to the eagles’ realm. Kuri successfully plucks the feather and fashions a knife that can kill a Muchwezi.
The Underwater Kingdom and Reunion
Kuri travels to the Lake of Wamala and performs a ritual with black hen eggs to enter the underwater kingdom of the demigod Mugasha. She is captured by the Gatekeeper, Bukuku, and taken to a prison cave where Woko and other jogwok are held. There she meets a blind monkey-like Muchwezi named Magezi Yafoyo, who reveals himself to be her father.
With her father’s telepathic guidance, Kuri uses her blood, spittle, hair, and fire to create an ash that opens the cages. She frees the jogwok, and together they lead a revolt against Mugasha, who is killed. After the battle, Kuri reconciles with her father. He explains that Maa had hidden Kuri from him after a “lover’s quarrel” where he had been unfaithful. He also reveals that Maa was deceived into using bad medicine by the musezi, which led to her punishment, but Woko confirms that the ancestors have now recognized Maa’s innocence. Kuri finally finds a sense of peace, though she wonders if she will be as happy in the underwater world as she was with her mother.
