The Tuck Plantation was an expansive, ominous compound that stood behind a set of sharp, black wrought iron gates. A large, white, looming mansion, it was three stories worth of dread. It had a wide front porch, held up with long, ribbed columns and about 5 short stairs that lead up to the front door. The place emanated a sense of melancholy and foreboding. This particular plantation specialized in sea island cotton and rice. Picked and mined by about 700 slaves. The wealthy Tuck family owned interests in several vessels as well, which shipped cargos of tea, sugar, rice, tobacco, and sea island cotton. There were several shops- from shoemaking to carpentry- of many kinds on the island, where several of the slaves were trained by indentured artisans. The Tuck plantation provided orchards where grapes and peaches were grown too.

Slave master and Doctor John Lee Tuck, IV and his younger brother Butler Roswell Tuck had inherited the plantation fifteen years earlier after the death of their father, who, in turn, inherited from their late grandfather, a Revolutionary War veteran and prolific writer. Butler was a compulsive gambler and sexual deviant, who used parts of his inheritance to indulge his depraved vices of gambling, drink, prostitutes, and sex (usually forced onto some of the female slaves on the plantation). He later died of syphilis, making Dr. John Lee the sole heir. The Tuck fortune also included plantations in North Louisiana, along the Mississippi River.

A ruthless and extremely patriarchal family with origins in Philadelphia, the Tucks made a fortune off slave labor, and was vocal advocates of said trade. The Tuck men were infamous for having fathered several children by female slaves, none of whom they freed… most of whom were kept on the Louisiana plantation. John Lee opted to operate the plantation on St Simons (risking the threat of malaria). He lived extravagantly with his wife Francine - (a pampered southern belle and only daughter of a prominent family in South Carolina, who met John’s acquaintance at a costume gala at her father’s estate)- and their 6 children- five sons and one daughter (most of whom were away studying at University).

Dr. Tuck was a pale, wiry man of average height with thin lips, which always seemed to be perpetually drawn in a tight line. A doctor and impeccable dresser, he looked the part of his family’s net worth. He wore his dark hair parted on one side, and slicked to his head. His eyes were often cold and devoid of any emotion. Upon meeting his wife Francine however, his expressionless eyes came to life. Her fair southern beauty- porcelain skin the color of fresh milk, glossy raven hair… styled in ringlets that fell to her shoulders, and icy blue eyes- were the main attraction that particular evening. Francine, who’d never seen John Lee before, was instantly drawn to him. While she didn’t find him physically appealing, his arcane demeanor piqued her interest. Upon hearing his family had yank roots in Philadelphia (and vast amounts of wealth), Francine (who was a hard nut to crack), was instantly smitten.

That night, during a walk through her mother’s massive garden, John Lee asked Francine- (who was 16 years his junior at 23) - to marry him. She played hard to get for all of 2 seconds before accepting his proposal, much to the delight of her parents, and to the chagrin of all other suitors who attended the party that night. Her parents gladly gave their daughter’s hand, without reservation.

The Tuck mansion sat atop the St Simons Island plantation in all its grandeur, overlooking slave quarters. While they lived excessively- traveling and eating like British royalty, luxuriating in the wealth that slavery provided them- the slave quarters were abhorrent and inhospitable. That plantation seemingly bred malaria-carrying mosquitoes. This made it open season for the slaves worked out in the fields, many of whom died due to the malaria, if not from poor malnutrition and heatstroke.

The small cabins, in which they lived, were filthy. Many of the slaves lacked simple luxuries such as chairs, tables, and utensils- having to feed themselves with crude wooden spoons. John Lee would consider these conditions reasonable and quite comfortable, as he never missed the opportunity to brag to his social circle, about how well he treated his slaves. Those who worked in the mansion were slightly luckier, in that they received castoffs and had access to working utensils and essentials of the like. Mama Sugar would make sure to salvage any cutlery, clothes, medicine, and all other necessities that were taken for granted in that house and carelessly tossed away. She would take her booty back to the slave quarters and distribute them throughout, those in dire need first on her list. House slaves were under Francine’s heavy scrutiny, and could not get away with such deeds, but Mama Sugar, due to her age, largely went ignored. Francine trusted her, to a guarded extent. Many of the older servants usually went about their tasks unnoticed, as if they didn’t exist, because they weren’t considered threats to Francine’s (or John Lee’s) sensibilities.

Ophelia however, failed at obscurity. John Lee would stalk her (unsuccessful at most of his rape attempts thanks to Mama Sugar’s hovering presence). He’d usually just get away with verbal assaults. Grinning at her and then sneering in contempt of her. Francine begged John Lee to send Ophelia to the plantation in Louisiana, but he flat-out refused. He’d scoff at his wife’s plea, telling her to “mind” his decisions.

Francine did her own deal of stalking… plotting and scheming numerous ways to get Ophelia shipped to Louisiana, with the rest of the “half-breeds” as she liked to refer to them…

“Lee, can’t you send her to New Orleans, or sell her?! I’m almost certain she has been stealing items from my vanity table. I find small things missing practically everyday!”

Francine would whine.

Lee would simply suck his teeth at his wife for her incessant whining and insubordination of her “wifely” duties.

“Francine, I am trying to concentrate. Can’t a man work in his own home and handle his own business affairs the way he sees fit?! A woman’s place is certainly not to meddle in her husband’s affairs!”

“John, I wouldn’t be surprised if she were stealing from our library. Just the other day Margaret thought she saw her sneaking from there…”

“Enough!!” John would yell.

Francine knew not to push her husband too far. She’d heard of his father, John Lee Tuck, III. Her husband had inherited his father’s nasty temperament. Shopping in town once, she’d also heard a condensed version of the night John Lee III had went crazy in the slave quarters and killed his slave mistress. About a year after that incident John Lee III and his wife had died a mysterious death while sleeping via asphyxiation, but was later changed to “death by natural causes.” Francine knew that raising her husbands ire would end in dire results. It wasn’t from lack of trying, on her part. She begin to enjoy harassing and mocking Ophelia. Francine would strike her for the smallest infractions- in Mama Sugar’s absence, for while she generally stayed out of the old woman’s way, something about Mama’s presence unnerved her. She’d heard rumors of the witchcraft that Mama Sugar reportedly dabbled in. Probably some sort of African voodoo, Francine thought. While no one actually witnessed her dabbling in anything suspicious, Mama Sugar’s refusal to attend Christian services came under suspicion. There were also odd incidents; Like the time a White overseer forced two field hands to flog a pregnant 15-year-old slave girl, who’d been accused of working too slow. The overseer demanded that the two field hands hold her wrists and face down, as he ripped open her dress and beat her with a long, thick leather strap. The faces on those two men were deadpan. One of them looked away, as he held the young woman down. While they seemed detached from what had been demanded of them, their eyes told a different story.

Needless to say, the young woman’s eyes rolled back in her head, as she was beaten relentlessly. Mama Sugar came out to the fields to see what the commotion was about, as she was trying in vain to watch from the kitchen window of the main house. The whole time she stood there, her eyes held fast on those two field hands. Suddenly, as if they were hit with a bolt of electricity, the two men reeled back. Breathing hard, they retreated from the young woman.

“Come back here and hold this girl down, you filthy degenerates. I’m not done!” the overseer yelled. But neither man moved.

“You want me to whip you too!! I said…”

Just as suddenly, the overseer started convulsing into a fit. He collapsed and continued to shake feverishly, once his body hit the ground. No one moved to help him. Mama Sugar simply stood there, turning her glare back to the field hands disapprovingly. She ignored the overseer, who continued to shake on the ground like a dying fish, on land.

His fit over, the overseer slowly lifted his hulk off the ground, breathing heavily. Glaring at the slaves, who’d stopped working to watch the spectacle, he had the unmitigated gall to feebly lift his strap, to resume his beating… alas, his attempt was in vain. As he lifted the piece of leather above his head, his arms stopped in midair, as if some unseen force grabbed them and held them there. The strap flew from the overseer’s hands. He reeled backwards, against a tree, as if he had been punched in the stomach, and slowly slunk to the ground, the wind knocked out of him.

About a week after that bizarre incident, the overseer suddenly fell ill. The pallor of his skin had a grayish undertone to it, but attempted to work through his sickness. Simply believing he had “a touch of the flu.” It was scorching hot outside, one particular day, but he’d been complaining of cold chills… notwithstanding the sweat that dripped from his forehead and stained the armpits of his work shirt. His lips were pasty and some form of small, white blisters formed in the corners of his mouth. The field slaves would watch him suspiciously, wondering what his ailment was, hoping it wasn’t contagious. But that overseer still worked… weakly swinging his leather strap at any slave he caught staring at him.

Day by day, the overseer underwent significant changes. He got worse. Bald patches showed, where hair used to be. His lips were cracked, pink, and bleeding in spots from peeling. His gums were bloody. One day, he simply collapsed, dead. Another overseer came running over with John Lee and Francine. The dead overseer, Denver Collins, was dragged to a nearby shed behind the main house. John Lee, a doctor, examined him. He was flummoxed, as he didn’t know what killed Denver. It wasn’t malaria. John Lee didn’t know how to diagnose the overseer’s death.

Many slaves rejoiced later on that evening in the quarters, for Denver was a mean bastard, no one knew what he had come down with. All fingers pointed to Mama Sugar, not in condemnation, however… but in veneration. What they didn’t realize, was that something even bigger than Mama Sugar, was at work.

3

Mama Sugar was aware of the talk amongst the other slaves… the whispers of her alleged voodoo practices. That she’d been responsible for Denver Collins demise. Although she feigned indifference and rolled her eyes at the accusations, she was worried. Mama was never one to underestimate the intelligence of humankind, most of the other slaves. She was fully aware of the forces at work. While she was sent to St Simons Island to carry out a mission (part of which was not to enlighten everyone as to her identity and her intentions)- she was not responsible for Denver Collins’s death. She’d been unsuccessful at protecting Charity, simply because those presiding forces instructed her to let things unfold as they would. Charity’s demise (as violent as it was) would eventually lead to her ascending to something bigger and better. Charity wasn’t supposed to find that book, not at that point and time anyway. Mama thought that hiding it in the Tuck library would secure its concealment. Usually, no one ventured into the library, certainly not the Tuck family. The massive room went unused for years. General John Lee Tuck, II was an avid reader and found success as a writer. When he inherited the estate, he was pleased to be the proud owner of the library and all its rare books. As a young boy, he would spend hours upon hours in that room, greedily consuming the floor to ceiling shelves of literature.

While General John Lee loved the arts and literature, and was quite the book connoisseur, (many of his books and screenplays were catalogued in the Tuck library), his offspring and their subsequent children weren’t interested in books and literature. The slaves, certainly didn’t dare venture in there. None of them could read or write, and so had no reason to. These were the primary reasons why Mama Sugar hid the hundreds year-old- book - (the key to what would be the biggest plantation insurrection on St Simons Island)- there.

In 1619, Mama Sugar (a woman of West African descent)- was known as Ababuo Izegbe. She was captured and sold into slavery. She was killed during a slave revolt, on the Dutch ship transporting African and West Indian slaves to Jamestown. Several Dutchmen managed to drag her below the vessel where she was brutally beaten, raped, killed, and later thrown overboard. That was her mortal life. Shortly thereafter, her spirit had soared to an elysian paradise, where people of color (from Brazil, the West Indies, and various parts of Africa) roamed free and contentedly. Upon retrieving her broken corpse, a large bird, which later transmuted into a man, carried Ababuo into a forest where the sun peeked through the trees. There he buried her. She lay for a year, before coming back to life, fully restored. She could feel her newly possessed powers, coursingv through her body. Initially, Ababuo was confused as to who she was, or what had happened to her previous life. She had no recollection of her death or the bird/man who’d brought her to the strange forest and buried her. She roamed the forest for months, living off of lush fruit, acquainting herself with her newfound energy, and then it all came back to her…

The bird/man returned to her, he extended his arm, and led her to her final destination. .. Since then, Ababuo had lived several lifetimes, until finally reincarnating herself into the body of an elderly (and sickly) African American slave. Ababuo’s mission was clear, free the slaves from the Tuck plantation, and lead them to their ascension. She was to prevent as many casualties as she could. Those were the instructions given her, by Elemi, the bird/man. Before taking over Mama Sugar’s body, Elemi taught Ababuo the sacred traditions of magic and Yoruba culture. Since taking over Mama Sugar’s body, and working on the Tuck plantation, this magic was used thusly. As Mama Sugar, Ababuo was always discreet, careful not to draw unwanted attention. She helped save many lives, but also witnessed the loss of many. …

Mama worked on St Simons Island long enough to see four generations of Tuck men inflict pain and terror in the hearts of many who lived on their plantation. The fact that this family had no conscience to speak of, made it easier for them to proceed as they did. Mama saw the torture and imminent death of many slaves, some had even committed suicide or killed off their own offspring, to prevent them from being sold. The day she saw that young, pregnant slave girl, Sarah, being beaten almost to death, a nerve had been struck within her. Since Charity’s violent death, Mama grew extremely protective of the younger slaves, especially the children. She always considered Charity to be special. She watched her grow into a bright, young woman. Charity embodied the same qualities her mother exhibited. Charity’s mother was raped, of course, by General John Lee, II, and was killed after trying to escape. Charity’s mother was a special woman. Her name was Adia, and she’d been sold to General John Lee, fresh from the West Africa. Adia was born with what was called a veil, or special vision, rather. She seemed to be able to look right into a person’s soul. Due to her strong and defiant nature, Adia had been bought and then sold quickly a number of times, before being purchased by General John Lee. She was able to see right through to his black heart, and grew leery and afraid. She succumbed to her new master, who had eventually impregnated her with his seed.

After giving birth to Charity, Adia’s defiant nature resurfaced. She became vocal against her enslavement (and that of others on the plantation). Raped, again, while

picking cotton, Adia looked her master dead in the eyes, and spat in his face, cursing him in her native tongue. She lost a finger, as a result. Despite being brutalized and punished, repeatedly, Adia was intent on helping free her people from that rotten plantation.

Mama had tried to reason with Adia. She told her that their time would eventually come if she would just be patient. Adia disagreed of course. She looked Mama right in the eyes, and told her in her thick, West African accent, “I know who you are… Mama Sugar, or should I call you Ababuo?” Mama Sugar’s breath caught in her throat.

Adia continued, “I have a daughter, born of his filthy seed, and you tell me be patient? You tell Him, the one who send you, that time is running out. I won’t wait much longer”

Mama Sugar was at a loss for words. Indeed, Adia grew impatient, and tried to escape with five other slaves. She was captured and killed, along with three others. Two of them were beaten. Their lives were spared, only because they divulged the information demanded from them. It took 30 lashings to get the information out of them.

Mama mourned Adia’s loss. A week later, Adia came to Mama, in a dream, and assured her she would return for Charity. When? Adia didn’t say. Mama mourned Charity’s death harder than any other… then she remembered Adia’s words. She knew that Charity was safe, with her Adia, awaiting the day she would make her return to rescue Ophelia, and to help collect all the others. Mama Sugar pulled the book from under the bed. She would have make preparations or the biggest homecoming ever. She knew that the time for the mass exodus was quickly drawing near. She smiled to herself.

4

For the past year, Ophelia had been communicating with a woman, who had claimed to be her mother. She didn’t know what to make of the apparition that came to her. She took solace in her new “imaginary” friend, for she helped Ophelia’s days on the dreadful plantation, tolerable. She was sworn to secrecy, however. So Ophelia told no one. Not even Mama Sugar, with whom she shared everything. Contacting Ophelia was forbidden, by Elemi, Charity knew this. But she couldn’t wait… she so desperately wanted to be near her daughter. She had waited for years and then a growing impatience had finally set in. Charity went in opposition of Elemi and reached out to her only daughter.

Ophelia itched to share her secret with Mama Sugar, but she knew that she would lose the mysterious woman forever if she did. The woman told her that she’d never leave the Tuck plantation if she made anyone privy that she’d been communicating with her. Ophelia wanted to be away from the Tuck family, and so kept her mouth shut. She had always had questions regarding her mother’s death. Mama Sugar simply told her that her mother died of malaria shortly after she was born. She generally relayed good stories to her, about her mother… what a strong and determined woman she was.

Charity first appeared before Ophelia in the Tuck library, during her secret, late night read-ins. At first Ophelia was afraid of the strange apparition, clothed in flowing, white fabrics. She didn’t know whether to run or stand there and stare. Charity appeared as a fragrant gust of warm wind, that filtered throughout the library like incense smoke. Now Ophelia came to welcome that deliciously warm and fragrant breeze. She knew it was her mother, coming for a visit.

Mama Sugar told her stories of talking animals and such, before, but she took them for tall tales, before meeting with her mother. Charity taught Ophelia how to pronounce the words in the books she’d sneaked from the shelves. Ophelia’s grasp of the words and phrases became flawless in no time. The shapes and the sounds of each sentence rolling off her tongue, as if she had been born, knowing how to read and write. Charity told her daughter stories of lush, green trees fragrant with delicious, ripe fruit, and clear blue skies. They were similar to the stories Mama told her. Charity told her daughter that such a place actually existed and that she would be able to live there soon. Ophelia considered any place that wasn’t on or near the Tuck plantation, paradise.

Ophelia never made Mama Sugar aware that she had been sneaking back into the Tuck house and into their library, learning how to read. As soon as Mama was sound asleep, she would silently tip-toe out of the cabin, and make her way to towards the mansion. Ophelia started dreaming wide awake, dream-lost during the day. She couldn’t stop thinking about her mother. Emancipation from the plantation tasted better than any left over meal Ophelia ever tasted, from the Tuck’s unfinished plates. Her reveries didn’t go unnoticed by Francine, of course. She watched Ophelia like a hawk, eyeing a field mouse. One afternoon, while mopping the floor, Ophelia felt a sharp, stinging slap across her face. Francine slapped Ophelia once more, red handprints served as the judgment of Francine’s supremacy … and wrath. She wasn’t done. Francine grabbed Ophelia by the arm and yanked her up from the floor, where she’d stumbled after being slapped.

“You little piece of nigger trash! You stole my brush from my vanity table, didn’t you??”

“N-no ma’am, I didn’ steal it… I…”

Francine slapped Ophelia once more, catching her in the mouth this time, and drawing blood.

“The very house I let you occupy and you steal from me!?? My grandmother gave me that brush, you dirty, nigger whore. You’re just like your whore mother!!”

Ophelia sobbed and pleaded with Francine.

“Look at you! working so slow! You think just because you’re a half-bred animal, you can work like this??” Francine screamed. The woman’s fury flamed like a bonfire.

“You steal my brush and then you insult my authority by working at a leisurely pace! You wait, I know juuust what to do with li-ttle nigger harlot like you!”

Francine made last threat through clenched teeth. She grabbed Ophelia by the arm and dragged her through the kitchen. She stopped in front of a narrow door right before the entrance of the sitting parlor. As she reached for the knob, Francine suddenly flew backwards, her slender frame flying over a divan in the parlor.

Shocked, she stood up, nursing her elbow, cheeks flushed and red. Her eyes were big and round, two big saucers, staring at Ophelia incredulously. Breathing heavily, she said, in a shaky voice,

“How dare you? How dare you hit your mistress? You just wait until my husband gets home. He’s going to send you to the very hell where your mother lies.”

With that, Francine’s head swung wildly from side to side, at a rapid pace, as if she were being met with feverish slaps. Ophelia stood there, transfixed, as Francine writhed on the floor of the parlor, helpless, arms thrown over her face. Ophelia watched her mistress undulating like a dying worm, body wrenching from side to side, bloody scratches appearing on her clear, porcelain-white face.

Mama Sugar had just reached the mouth of the mansion’s gates when a darker-skinned young woman who worked on the plantation, named Amelia approached her, breathless.

“Mama, theah’s som’n wrong up at the main house! I was on my way from hangin’ the laundry, and I heard thrashin’ and what-not up in the house! Miss Francine was screamin’ and carryin’ on!”

Mama Sugar ripped open the wrought-iron gate and trotted up to the main house with Amelia, dropping the basket of groceries she’d been carrying…

Francine continued to writhe on the floor, screaming like a banshee. Just then a round, burgundy colored pillow from one of the couches, lifted in mid-air, covered Francine’s face, and started smothering her, drowning out her shrill screams for help.

Ophelia hid behind a large plant, watching the whole spectacle unfold. William Lee Tuck, Francine and John’s eldest son, visiting from University walked into the parlor to see about all the ruckus, his mouth fell open.

“Mother! what’s wrong! What’s going on, what are you doing??”

John averted his gaze to the plant, behind which Ophelia hid. He demanded to know what was going on.

“What the hell did you do to mother!?!”

William lunged at Ophelia, then suddenly, he flew backwards as if hit by an electric current. William convulsed on the floor, white froth and vomit spewing from his mouth, then suddenly, he laid there, lifeless… his dark blue eyes vacuous and glazed over.

Ophelia peeked from behind the plant, she fixed her gaze on Francine. The pillow still covered her mistress’s face, but she’d stopped writhing around and simply lay silent.

Mama Sugar rounded the corner of the parlor, Amelia at her heels. “Good lawd” Amelia whispered, her mouth hanging open. Mama Sugar looked over at the plant, at Ophelia. She felt a gust of warm air and then slowly extended her arm toward Ophelia, who was shivering. Amelia eyed her suspiciously as she came from behind the plant nestled herself under Mama Sugar’s warm arm.

“It’s time.” Mama Sugar said, as she comforted Ophelia, slowly stroking the girl’s hair.

Dr. John Lee had been at a slave auction on mainland Georgia. He’d returned home that night to find his wife and eldest son lying on the floor of the parlor, lifeless. His eyes darted around the room quickly trying to find the answers as to what had happened. He walked over to Francine’s body, and knelt beside her. He picked up one of her hands, and shook his head before noticing the familiar looking, gauzy white material draped over her face. It was the scarf Charity had worn on numerous occasions when she worked around the mansion. How could he forget Charity. John IV was a precocious young man, who eyed her up as lecherously as his old man did, as she worked.

That was the same scarf Charity had tied around her head the night he helped his father dig her grave that night… except, it was splattered with her blood.

John Lee yanked the scarf from his wife’s face. Her ivory cheeks, splotched with red. She looked as if she were merely asleep and flushed with fatigue. Dr. Tuck clenched the white scarf in his hand, angry tears spilling from his eyes. The scarf, which had been uncontaminated seconds before, became soaked with blood. He dropped the scarf in disgust and ran outside, screaming and summoning several of the overseers who’d lived in nearby cottages on the main property.

Yelling a barrage of obscenities, Dr. John Lee ran in the direction of the slave quarters, four overseers following close behind.

Mama Sugar was hunched over the big black book with Ophelia, back at her cabin. She had just opened it up to the first page when Dr. Tuck kicked in her door, armed with a machete- the same one his father had used to butcher Charity years before. Ophelia jumped up and hid behind a rickety wooden chair on the other side of the room. Mama Sugar stood up, looking her tormentor in the eyes. Dr. Tuck stared Mama down motioning for assistance from the overseers who had accompanied him.

“You’re a dead woman,” he sneered, taking a step forward. He turned slightly to the left, and saw that neither of the overseers had moved. They were surrounded by hundreds of slaves. He instructed the overseers, two of whom were armed with rifles, to start shooting, but the rifles wouldn’t fire. Dr. Tuck glared at Ophelia, Mama Sugar made no move, she continued to stalk him with those steely gray eyes of hers.

“Stop staring at me!” Dr. Tuck yelled. Suddenly he lunged at Ophelia with the machete, then stopped his assault dead in its tracks.

Dr. Tuck dropped his arm, for he spied Charity standing over her daughter, her white garb drenched in blood.

Terror-stricken, he looked at Mama- who continued to glare at him- then he looked at Charity once more. Dr. John Lee dropped the machete and turned to run towards the door. Once outside, he had nowhere to run, for he was surrounded by multitudes of slaves, all of whose eyes glowed a phosphorescent gray color. Dr. John Lee’s eyes searched the mass of dark bodies for his overseers, but they were nowhere to be found.

He tried to push his way through the human wall, that’d surrounded him, and made his way back into Mama’s cabin. Picking up the machete where he’d dropped it, Dr. John Lee lunged for Mama Sugar, swinging the large knife at her. Mama simply stood there glaring at him. Dr. Tuck plunged the machete into Mama’s chest, and yanked it free. His mouth agape, grunting in horror, the blade of the knife came away clean. Mama glared at him angrily, unharmed by the knife.

Charity made a move toward Dr. Tuck, and then disappeared, as he looked on in terror. Fear shone in those deadpan eyes of his. A sudden gust of warm air hit him square in the chest, and the machete flew from his grasp and landed on the floor, on the opposite side on the room. Charity re-appeared, and stepped toward Dr. Tuck at a brisk pace. She closed the gap between she and the tormentor, until she was nose to nose with him. Charity stared him right in the eyes and smiled. She took two steps back, looking across at the machete, lying on floor.

The knife rose from the floor and hovered in the air. Gasping, Dr. Tuck saw the knife flipping towards him, fast. He had no time to move out of the way. The knife plunged into Dr. Tuck’s heart. It moved out, and then drove into his chest, again. The unseen force continued to hack away at Dr. Tuck until he lay on the floor, nothing more than a bloody heap.

Charity and Mama Sugar helped Ophelia onto her feet and headed towards the door. Outside, they stood in the midst of all 700 slaves. Big black wings grew from Mama Sugar’s back. She took flight into the big, Cimmerian sky, Charity and Ophelia ascending behind her.

Thereafter, wings grew from the backs of each slave as they took off into the sky one by one… a mass of large, black birds.

They left the Tuck dynasty on St Simons Island, to burn. A colossal inferno, it was. Every slave stopped in mid-flight to see the mansion collapse to the ground in a crumpled pile, windows shattering from the heat of the flames… and then they looked upwards continuing on with their journey.

Epilogue

St. Simons Island, Georgia 2002

“…Rich with culture and African influence, the Geecchee people, also known as the Gullah, held onto that their African traditions, culture, and languages, reaching out to family members back at home. St Helena Island, and coastal Georgia are known as direct links to Africa. Let’s head further down this way, and I will show you all where the infamous Tuck Plantation insurrection took places…”

Fifteen-year-old Amil broke away from the tour group, preferring to wander off on her own. She wasn’t much for guided tours as she liked to formulate her own conclusions and learn at her own curiosity. She didn’t even understand why her parents made her come. She wanted to spend the summer, before she started her junior year of high school, in Atlanta with friends, not on some historical trip with her family.

Amil was certain her parents would note her absence, so she took off exploring with whatever time she could get away with. If she was caught, she would simply say she was looking for the restroom and got lost. She shrugged and continued to wander further, deciding to catch up with the tour group later.

Forty-five minutes later, Amil decided to catch her breath under a tree for shade. Her light, pecan colored skin begin to burn slightly from the heat. She decided that she had officially lost the group completely and hoped she didn’t miss the ferry back to the mainland. Pouting, Amil began to dig into the soft earth, her hit something hard. She used both hands to unmask what she’d unearthed, completely. She pulled a big black book from the dirt and brushed it off. OLODUMARE.

“Hmmm, what’s this…” Amil turned the book over in her hands searching for an author’s name. She opened the book and noted brown figures on the first page. Unsatisfied, Amil flipped pages of indecipherable words, coming across a page of more stick bodies, with big black wings, taking flight. She felt a sudden gust of warm, fragrant air hit her in the face. She swore she heard someone whispering something too. Frowning, Amil eyes slowly looked around the perimeter of where she’d sat, under the tree.

“There you are! We can always count on you to ruin a productive family outing!”

Amil’s older sister scolded as she stood over her.

“Umm, sorry…”

“Mom and dad sent me all over looking for you, when I could be back at the group learning information for my paper! When my professor asks for my research materials, what am I supposed to tell him? Sorry, I had to look for my sister!”

“I said sorry.” Amil whispered, seeming flustered.

Sasha studied her younger sister. Usually Amil didn’t yield so willingly.

“Is something wrong?”

“Um, naw, let’s go” Amil said, shoving the black book in her knapsack.

read the prologue and chapter one here.