“Sunny,” she softly said. “Did someone . . .”

“It’s my brother!” she managed to wail. “He’s in terrible trouble! They’ll kill him!”

Sunny told Chichi everything. Recounting Chukwu’s story between tears, foot stamping, and cursing, something Sunny rarely ever did. Retelling the story to Chichi seemed to bring it alive that much more for Sunny. It was like stepping into Chukwu’s shoes. There were three reasons Sunny went to Chichi. The first was that she knew Chichi had always liked Chukwu. Chichi thought he was pretty and liking him had always been a source of argument between her and Sasha. The second reason she went to Chichi was because Chichi could keep secrets, even from Orlu and Sasha. And the third was that Chichi would be willing to break the rules and risk punishment to help Chukwu because trouble-making and daring were in her blood.

“Did you know that these damn societies were originally formed to make sure there was always academic freedom and to cure society’s problems?” Chichi shouted as she paced the floor. “People like Professor Wole Soyinka and Aig-Imokhuede started them!” She was as angry as Sunny. “Now these young people who know nothing are crippling the highest place of Lamb education?! The university is all the Lambs have! Without the university, they’d be intolerable. They have no other urge to learn. I didn’t know it was full of . . . of social disease.”

“It is,” Sunny said. “You can’t really be a top student there without having to join or at least deal with them.”

They were quiet now. Chichi stood in the middle of the hut frowning. Sunny sat in the chair looking at her sandaled feet. There was no breeze outside and it was easily close to ninety degrees, yet inside the hut it was cool as a clam. The floor of the hut was dirt, the bed Chichi and her mother shared to the right and many stacks of books to the left. They had so little, yet Chichi and her mother combined were a force powerful enough to be of great importance to the Leopard Knocks elders.

“So what do you want to do?” Chichi quietly asked.

Sunny didn’t look up. There was a storm rolling in her mind. She couldn’t get the image of her brother’s battered face out of her head. This was his life at stake and his future. “What happens if juju is performed against a Lamb?”

“You already know that,” she said. “Remember what happened when you showed Jibaku your spirit face? You only got off easy because you were a new free agent.”

“No, I don’t mean minor stuff. Serious juju.”

Chichi looked closely at Sunny, and Sunny didn’t look away. “I don’t know,” Chichi said. She cocked her head. “Why?”

“I want to make them suffer,” Sunny said, clenching her fists. It felt good to speak her thoughts to Chichi. “Not just his so-called friend Adebayo, or their Capo leader. I want to make all of them suffer.”