Chapter Twenty-Four
The village square filled slowly as the sun crested the horizon, casting a soft golden light that made every face seem gentler, every roof warmer. Word had spread of Amira's call—a quiet summons carried not by messengers, but by a current of understanding that now flowed between everyone. People came not out of obligation, but instinct.
The elders stood near the steps of the ancestral platform. The children gathered at the front, some still rubbing sleep from their eyes. Mothers wrapped their shawls tighter around their shoulders, and the drummers—young boys from the river quarter—sat with quiet anticipation, their drums silent for now.
Amira stepped onto the raised platform, clothed in a flowing white wrapper. Around her waist, she wore her grandmother's sash, the one with faded thread from generations past. Her hair, unbraided, moved with the morning wind.
She didn't carry a staff or speak with any title.
She simply stood.
And then she began.
"This village has lived under silence for far too long. A silence we mistook for peace. But beneath that quiet was a memory waiting to rise."
She walked slowly along the edge of the platform, meeting eyes.
"We were told stories to make us sleep. But not to awaken. Now it's time we remember—not just the pain, but the love. Not just the curses, but the courage."
From the crowd, someone murmured: "Tell us, daughter."
Amira nodded.
So she told them everything.
The spirit child. The forbidden union. The sacrifice made not to punish, but to protect. The pact twisted over time. The voices lost beneath soil and song. The Lantern Tree reborn. The covenant rekindled.
She spoke of her grandmother, of Elias, of the visions and trials beneath the earth. She told them about the Watchers and the fire. The price almost paid. The redemption finally claimed.
As she spoke, the drummers began to play—soft, reverent beats that rose with her voice like a heartbeat. The children sat up straighter. The elders lowered their heads, some weeping silently.
"And now," Amira finished, voice trembling with power, "we begin anew—not by forgetting, but by remembering rightly. We honor the spirits not with fear, but with truth. And we raise the next generation not with silence, but with song."
Then, for the first time in many years, Amira sang.
A melody her grandmother used to hum. A song once banned for its origin in the old rites. A lullaby that was, in truth, a hymn.
The village joined her—first in quiet murmurs, then in full voices, rising into the morning like incense.
"Ọ̀run ń ró, ẹ̀mí ń sọ…
Igi ayé, gba wa l'ọ́…
Ẹ̀bọ pẹ̀lú ifẹ…
Kí a lè tú…"
Heaven is stirring, the spirits speak...
Tree of the world, receive us...
A sacrifice of love...
That we may be free...
As the final notes faded, a gentle wind blew through the square, carrying blossoms from the new Lantern Tree all the way to the riverbank.
Elias, standing just beyond the platform, caught one as it fell and looked up toward Amira with something like awe.
In her eyes, he saw not the girl who once trembled at ghosts—
—but the woman who had faced them.