Buzu Book 1 Complete Hausa Novel

A short, black Highlander SUV sped along the asphalt road, pouring forward at high speed, as though the road had been built for the driver alone. On both sides of the road there was nothing at all—only Sahara sand and scattered dry trees. Since it was night, the moon was on its fourteenth day, lighting up everywhere, while stars decorated the sky. The road cut straight through the desert, whose sand gave the place a strangely calm atmosphere.

“How many kilometers do we have left?”

The driver turned and looked at the speaker, whose face was covered with a turban, and replied, “Not more than 95 kilometers.”

“Dans quelques minutes? (In a short while?)”

“There’s less than an hour left.”

“We must arrive exactly at the time we were instructed. I’m even afraid he might wake up.”

As he spoke, he shone a light on the face of a young man lying against him, drenched in sweat, in a state that was somewhere between sleep and unconsciousness. From the way he was sweating, it was clear he was suffering in his sleep. His body did not move at all, except for his chest, which rose and fell from time to time, his breathing coming out with difficulty.

He reached out and placed his hand on the young man’s chest. His heart would beat once, then take a long time before beating again. Yet each time it did beat, it struck forcefully, as though it would tear through his chest and burst out.

Worried, he said, “Lowalli, increase the speed. Don’t let him die on us—his heartbeat is getting weaker.”

Lowalli nodded and sped up the vehicle.

At about 6:15 a.m. on Saturday morning, there was a simple room with a solid, well-laid foundation. Despite being an underground room, its decoration clearly showed its value.

From one corner of the room lay a young woman on a medium-sized mattress, stretched out asleep. Only her wrapper covered her nakedness, and with the slightest movement she could become completely exposed.

With all her strength she tried to wake up, but she could not, due to sleep paralysis—what people in Hausa, by common understanding, call dannau. According to belief, a spirit called Dannau presses a person down so they cannot move, even though both eyes are open and, as if in real life, the person can see what is happening but is unable to move.

Suddenly, as if a heavy weight had been lifted off her, she jolted upright, gasping for breath after the struggle she had gone through before finally waking from that deep, death-like sleep.

She widened her eyes when she saw how bright it already was, without having performed the dawn prayer.

As she tried to get down from the mattress, she felt pain in all her limbs, her body like that of someone who had been severely beaten, and her wrapper had slipped out of place.

She stayed silent, trying to remember what had happened the previous night. As far as she could recall, she had been folding clothes and hadn’t even lain down. From that point on, she remembered nothing. She knew she had been properly dressed, but the way she found herself now filled her with unease.

Slowly she stood up, adjusted her wrapper, and headed to the bathroom inside the room to clean herself and perform the dawn prayer.

Slowly he opened his eyes, which stung sharply because of the light flooding them, making the brightness feel like something foreign inside his eyes. The sensation was like waking up in a completely different world.

Gradually the stinging eased. He opened his eyes fully and fixed his gaze on the place around him, trying to figure out where he was.

A tall, dark-skinned man with a red turban on his head and a small cup in his hand entered the tent.

He threw the cup aside and hurried toward the man lying down.

He helped him sit up. He was fair-skinned, though not pale, with a slightly yellowish tone. He had a slender nose that matched his slim face, a small moustache connected to a neat, modest beard, and large eyes that, when he rolled them, turned red as if blood might spill from them.

As he sat up, his hair fell onto his shoulders and down his back, almost like a woman’s.

Slowly, the other man lowered the turban from his face and said, “How are you feeling?” Instead of answering, he remained silent, watching him closely.

“Is something hurting you?”

Slowly he moved his lips and said, “Where am I?”

The dark-skinned man glanced around, then looked back at him and said, “We’ve just entered Nigeria.”

“Nigeria?” he repeated.

“Yes, Nigeria,” he replied.

He fell silent, trying to remember where he had ever heard the name before.