It must’ve been a tough assignment for you to finish it at this time.’

‘Yes, it was, hey,’ Kganya said, softly.

She had just arrived home at six in the evening. After leaving the library with Lethabo, they didn’t come home at once. They had strolled the mall, window-shopping, while talking about what they had learnt from the library. In all they had talked about, they weren’t sure what to do next.

‘Go freshen up, dinner will be ready soon.’ Ntombi beamed at her.

Kganya didn’t go to the bathroom but went to her bedroom instead. She approached her wardrobe and opened the drawer, where she took out a black plastic bag. She then retrieved her reed mat under the bed and unrolled it on the small space between the bed and the study desk. She kneeled on it and unwrapped the plastic bag. She took out her white and yellow shawl that matched with the beads on her wrists, ankles, and neck, and wrapped it around herself, covering her blue jeans. She then wrapped her head with the yellow doek. Lastly, she took the bushy incense, placed it on the small plate, and lighted it with one strike of matches.

The incense started burning; after a minute, the fire dissolved and was replaced with a thick, grey smoke.

‘Oh, my Elders, it is me, your child, Gogo Kganya. I humbly come before you to ask for advice on what to do.’ She picked up the plate that had smoking incense on it and moved it around her face, so she was engulfed in smoke. ‘I was shown a vision, where a corpse was escaping from its grave, and I have since learnt that the person who was buried there was a very dangerous wizard.’

Kganya suddenly felt dizzy. She set the plate down, and the world around her started spinning. She didn’t dare open her eyes until it stopped. After a couple of seconds, the spinning ceased, and the silence took over.

She opened her eyes slowly, and she was met with darkness. She was in the same kneeling position, but not in the same place, for she had transcended to the Spiritual World from the Physical World. There was a figure standing in front of her, but she couldn’t see it clearly because of the darkness. The figure turned around and started walking away. Kganya followed close by.

The figure stopped a few distance away, and Kganya caught up with it. When she turned to look at it, it started dissolving into dust. The dust whirled around her and started growing momentum. Kganya instinctively brought her hand to her eyes, as if to shield them from getting blinded.

It got quiet again, and Kganya put down her hand. 

In front of her, there was a scene that was way too familiar to her. There were tombstones all around her, and one grave was opened in front of her, with a mound of soil next to it. She was standing at the same cemetery she had dreamt about and visited with Lethabo a couple of days ago. Two men were busy with a coffin on the ground. Just like in the nightmare, she saw too well the living corpse of Zumba Mbazo escaping from the coffin, slapping the man Kganya now knew to be Senzo, who fell to the ground, and it pushed George out of the way. The corpse of Zumba ran-jumped to the gate, where it turned and saw the homeless beggar staring at it wide-eyed. It grabbed the beggar as if it was about to plunge its teeth into his neck, but it just dissolved itself into a black gas-like substance and sunk itself inside his mouth. The beggar was now standing alone, with his hands lowered by his sides and his face rigidly looking up. Another figure arrived at the gate, and Kganya saw that it was Senzo.

Senzo looked left and right but didn’t see where the ghost had vanished. He ignored the beggar standing next to him.

The dust started whirling again, erasing the scene in front of Kganya. Calmness and quietness reigned again. Kganya was shown what she had asked, and she bent her knees a little and softly clapped her hands twice, and said, ‘Thank you, my Elders.’

The world around her started spinning, and that tinge of dizziness enveloped her again.

She was back in the Physical World, kneeling on her reed mat in her bedroom as before. She opened her teary eyes and saw that the incense was ashes now.

She stood up and rolled her mat and put it back under the bed. She took off her shawl and doek, folded them neatly back into the plastic bag and put it in the wardrobe drawer.

Her mind was reeling from what she had just been shown by her ancestors in the Spiritual World.

The spirit of Zumba Mbazo had possessed the body of that beggar living outside the cemetery. So that day, they were not talking with the beggar but with Zumba Mbazo himself?

Kganya asked herself these questions as she robotically picked up the plate with the incense’s ashes and opened the bedroom door.

Two voices were coming from the living room. Who was her mother with at this time?

When she stepped into the living room and saw who her mother was talking to, Kganya dropped the plate and it shattered all over the floor.