The palace of Ayetoro did not sleep that night.
Torches burned in every courtyard, their flames bowing and rising to the rhythm of the drums. Shadows leaped along the mud‑plastered walls, stretching and shrinking with each beat. The air was thick with incense and the bitter‑sweet scent of burning herbs meant to keep wandering spirits away.
Baba Adégbáyí walked beneath the great arch of the palace gate, staff of divination in his hand, Fẹ́mi beside him carrying the sacred bag. Palace guards bowed low as they passed, bronze spearheads glinting in the firelight.
Inside, the royal courtyard had been transformed.
White cloth hung from the eaves, fluttering like pale ghosts. Women of the palace knelt in ordered rows, ululating in long, rising cries that threaded themselves between the bass notes of the drums. Priests from different clans—thunder, river, earth, iron—stood in their marked places around a central raised platform where the king's body lay, wrapped in white from foot to neck.
Only his face and chest were uncovered.
Fẹ́mi tried not to stare as they approached, but his eyes were drawn again and again to the still figure on the mat of woven raffia. The late king's skin had the grayish sheen of clay left too long in the sun. His eyes were closed now—Baba had ordered them shut during the first cleansing—but Fẹ́mi could still remember how they'd looked when they found him: wide, as if surprised by something that stood where no one else could see.
The word was still there.
EJEH.
Four letters, jagged and dark on the king's chest, each stroke raised like the welt of a whip. The palace women had tried to wash it away with warm water and ash, but the blood only smeared, then darkened again, settling back into its original shape as if the skin itself had learned the letters and refused to forget them.
"Cover it for now," Baba had told them earlier. "The people must mourn their king tonight, not fall to pieces over a name they do not understand."
So they had spread a thin layer of white chalk over the bloody writing, tracing the patterns of protection around it, yet even through the chalk Fẹ́mi could still see the faint, angry lines, like something pressing from beneath.
At the far side of the courtyard, on a seat carved with the images of birds and lions, sat the queen‑mother. She wore deep indigo instead of mourning white, her head wrapped high, her eyes red but steady. Around her stood the royal council: old men with heavy necklaces, women with strings of cowries around their arms, and, towering among them, the broad‑shouldered figure of the Koleoso war‑chief.
Chief Ogunremi Koleoso—whom most simply called Ogunremi the Thunder Hand—rested his palm on the hilt of the ceremonial sword at his side. Red and white beads circled his wrists and ankles. A scar in the shape of a crooked line ran from his left eyebrow to his cheek, a gift from some long‑defeated enemy. His eyes were sharp, taking in everything.
When Baba and Fẹ́mi reached the platform, the drums shifted to a slower, more solemn rhythm.
"Baba Ifa," the queen‑mother said. Her voice carried clearly over the courtyard. "The king is dead, and our hearts are broken. We have called you to guide his spirit to the ancestors and to ask the unseen what hand has done this. Will you speak for us?"
Baba bowed his head. "I will do what I can, Iya Oba. But even the clearest mirror cannot always reflect a night with no moon."
The queen‑mother's mouth tightened, but she nodded. "Begin."
Baba motioned for Fẹ́mi to set down the divination bag. The boy knelt and placed it at his father's feet, stepping back just enough to give him room, but close enough to see.
"Bring the basin," Baba said.
Two palace attendants carried forward a wide calabash bowl filled with river water. Bits of leaf floated on its surface, and a faint blue glow coiled within it, sign that the river spirits had accepted the request for their presence.
Baba dipped his right hand into the water, murmuring a chant. He sprinkled the king's face and chest, then turned in a slow circle, flicking drops of water to each of the four directions: east for beginnings, west for endings, north for the ancestors, south for those yet to be born.
As he did, the drums quieted until only a single, low drum beat slowly, like a heart.
"We stand between life and death," Baba intoned. "We send our king along the path our fathers walked. May his feet not stumble. May his eyes find the light. May his ears hear the songs of welcome."
A murmur of assent rose from the gathered people.
"Now," he said more quietly, "we seek to know: who has closed his eyes? By whose hand has his breath been taken? Spirits of earth, of storm, of river, of sky—if you will speak, speak."
He sat cross‑legged before the opon‑Ifa board that attendants lay before him. Fẹ́mi handed him the pouch of cowries with both hands, heart thudding in his chest.
Baba's fingers moved with familiar ease, yet tonight there was a stiffness in them, a reluctance. He closed his eyes, whispered a prayer only the closest could hear, and then cast the cowries onto the board.
They fell with small clacks.
And then the strangeness began.
Usually, the cowries landed quickly and settled—mouths up or mouths down, forming patterns that a trained eye could read. Tonight, several shells did not want to lie still. They rocked on their sides, spinning slowly, the way a potter's wheel spins just before it stops. One rolled, wobbled, and came to stand balanced on its very edge, a thin blade of white against the dark wood.
Fẹ́mi's breath caught.
Another shell landed mouth‑down, then slowly turned itself over without being touched. A third slid backward along the board as if pushed by an invisible hand, knocking against its neighbors until the entire pattern was a restless scattering instead of clear lines.
A murmur rippled through the watching priests.
"Ha," one of the older men hissed under his breath. "This is not good."
Baba's face stayed composed, but Fẹ́mi saw the small muscle jump in his father's jaw. Baba reached out and steadied the shells with his fingertips. When at last they stopped moving, the pattern they formed was unlike any Fẹ́mi had seen before: a broken cross, a circle cut through the middle, three shells apart from the rest as if exiled.
Baba stared at it for a long moment.
"What do you see?" the queen‑mother demanded.
He lifted his head. In the torchlight, his eyes looked deeper than usual, as if he were seeing not just the courtyard but something far beyond it.
"I see," he said slowly, choosing each word with care, "a path split in two. A debt long owed, coming to claim its due. A hand that is neither man nor woman, neither old nor young. A power that is not stranger, and yet not kin."
"That is no answer," Chief Ogunremi said roughly. "Is our king dead by magic or by human treachery? We must know where to point our spears."
Baba's gaze met his. There was no fear in it, but no softness either. "Sometimes the spear thrown too quickly returns to pierce the thrower, Ogunremi. The shells say the one who moved against the king walks in shadow. Not fully of this world, yet not fully apart from it."
"A spirit, then," one of the priests muttered.
"Or someone who deals too closely with spirits," another added.
The war‑chief's eyes narrowed. "You speak in riddles, Baba Ifa. The people will not sleep while a murderer walks free. And when people do not sleep, they begin to see enemies everywhere."
"You think I do not know that?" Baba asked quietly. Tiredness crept into his voice. "I read what is given to me. The spirits are not children I can force to answer when they refuse."
The queen‑mother lifted a hand, forestalling more argument. "Enough. Tonight we mourn. Tomorrow we will ask more questions. Baba Ifa, cover what is written on his chest. I will not have that…that thing staring up at his people all night."
Baba inclined his head. "As you wish, Iya Oba."
He dipped his fingers into a small gourd of chalk paste and began to trace protective symbols over the hidden letters. As he worked, Fẹ́mi felt the hairs on his arms rise. He could not say why, until he noticed it:
The air directly above the king's chest shimmered, as if heated by fire though the night was cool.
Baba's hand slowed for a heartbeat.
The chalk line he had just drawn wavered. A thin thread of red bled through it, forcing its way to the surface. It crawled, silent and stubborn, reshaping itself into the beginning of a curve—one part of the first letter.
E.
Fẹ́mi's breath stuck in his throat. "Baba—"
"Silence," Baba said softly, without looking at him.
Out loud, for the queen‑mother and council to hear, he began a chant of release, his voice steady. Under his breath, his words were different.
"Back," he murmured. "You have had what you came for. You will not drink more tonight. Back, back, back."
He pressed his thumb, heavy with chalk, against the red line. For a moment it fought him, pushing up under his skin like a living thing. A sharp pain lanced his finger. Then, as quickly as it had risen, the red retreated, swallowed once more by the white.
Baba exhaled slowly.
On the far side of the courtyard, a gust of wind rushed through, scattering ashes from a brazier, rattling the hanging cloths. Several women cried out, clutching their headscarves. One of the lesser priests stumbled and half‑fell, his eyes rolling as if something had just brushed past his spirit.
"Did you feel that?" a man muttered.
"It is only the king's soul leaving his body," someone else said quickly, as if the explanation would make it so.
Baba knew better.
It is not the king that you felt, he thought. It is whatever wrote its name in his blood.
He wiped his thumb clean and finished the protective markings, sealing the name beneath layers of chalk and prayer. When he straightened, he swayed very slightly. Fẹ́mi stepped forward instinctively, but his father lifted a hand to show he was all right.
The rest of the rites passed in a blur of chanting, drumming and ritual gestures.
They raised the king's body three times, turning him toward each sacred direction. They placed kola nut and coins in his hands, broke a calabash at his feet to sever his ties to this world. Women's voices rose in long, trembling songs that spoke of his line, his battles, his judgments under the great baobab tree where he had once heard disputes.
Yet through it all, Baba felt a prickle between his shoulder blades, as if eyes watched from just beyond the circle of torchlight.
When at last the final chant ended and the drums fell silent, the night seemed too quiet, as if something hungry lay just outside the reach of sound, waiting.
The queen‑mother descended from her seat. She placed a hand on Baba's shoulder—a rare gesture.
"You have done well," she said. "But we are still blind. Tomorrow, the council will sit. I want you, the elders of Koleoso, and the chiefs of the other great families present. We must not let this…this mystery tear us apart."
Baba bowed. "I will come."
He and Fẹ́mi left the palace as the first gray hint of dawn touched the eastern sky. The drums behind them began a new rhythm, softer now, for the slow procession that would escort the king's body to the secret royal burial ground.
Outside the gate, the world felt strangely thin, like cloth worn almost to tearing.
"Baba," Fẹ́mi said at last, unable to keep silent any longer. "When you pressed the chalk… it fought you."
Baba's steps did not slow. "You saw."
"Yes. I also saw the cowries move as if a hand was playing with them. I—I heard nothing, but it felt as if someone was laughing without sound."
Baba stopped then and turned to him fully. The early light carved lines of fatigue around his mouth.
"What you saw," he said, "must stay between us for now. If the people learn that even their gods will not speak clearly, fear will devour them faster than any enemy army."
"But what is it?" Fẹ́mi whispered. "Is it a god? A curse? A…a demon?"
Baba's gaze shifted toward the barely visible shape of the river in the distance, silver in the half‑light.
"There are powers that do not fit in the stories we tell," he said. "Old hungers that learned the shape of words, old promises that were forgotten by men but not by what listened. Whatever wrote its name upon the king is such a thing."
His hand tightened briefly on Fẹ́mi's shoulder.
"The shells showed me one more sign before they fell silent," he added, voice low. "A small figure standing between two great marks—the sign of thunder and the sign of river. A child not yet grown, holding a path open."
"A child?" Fẹ́mi frowned. "Which child?"
"That, the spirits would not say." Baba began walking again. "But it means this: the matter will not be decided by elders alone. Somewhere in Ayetoro, a small hand will turn the balance. Our duty is to keep our own house strong enough not to break when that time comes."
Fẹ́mi thought of his younger sisters, of the children playing in the dusty lanes, of the restless fear in the village. His mind skittered away from the idea of one of them standing between such terrors.
He did not, in that moment, think of Ifabola.
When Baba and Fẹ́mi returned to the Ifatedo compound, the sun was fully above the horizon. The drums had quieted at last. Instead, the kingdom woke to the low, steady hum of grief—the sound of women speaking in slow voices, of men discussing what must be done next, of a people trying to live inside a wound.
Ifabola sat in the courtyard with a calabash of water beside her, helping her mother rinse leaves for morning cooking. She had slept only in snatches after the strange journey through the light‑door, and her eyes felt heavy, as if someone had hung beads from her lashes. Yet her hands moved steadily, dipping and rinsing, dipping and rinsing.
When she saw Baba step through the gate, she jumped to her feet.
"Baba!"
He smiled faintly and opened his arms. She ran into them, breathing in the familiar smell of herbs and chalk and river water that clung to his wrapper.
"You are back," she said into his chest.
"I am back," he agreed. His arm tightened around her for a long heartbeat, as if he were reassuring himself she was truly there. When he let her go, his gaze flicked over her face, her wrist with its white cloth, the faint smear of chalk still on her forehead.
"Did you sleep well?" he asked.
Ifabola hesitated. For a moment she saw again the swirling darkness, the glowing path, the faceless messenger.
Do not tell anyone…not yet.
"Yes, Baba," she lied softly. "I slept."
If he noticed the tiny tremor in her voice, he did not show it. He only brushed his fingers over her hair and turned to her mother.
"We must all be careful in the days ahead," he told her. "Lock the gates at sunset. Keep the children close. Fear makes people foolish, and foolish people do foolish things."
Her mother's mouth tightened. "Are they blaming us already?"
"Not yet," Baba said. "But whenever death wears a mysterious face, some will point at the ones who speak too easily with spirits. We are both needed and feared, ayé ó gbón." His eyes darkened. "The council will meet today. Much depends on what is said there."
He went to wash and change, leaving a trail of weariness behind him like the tail of a fading comet.
Ifabola watched him go, heart full and heavy. The messenger's words whispered at the back of her mind: The path is open to you… The blood‑written name smells its road in you…
She looked down at her hands. They were small, fingers still rounded with childhood. No calluses from spears or hoes marked them, only a faint chalk line she realized had not been there before—a pale arc across her right palm, the same shape as one of the symbols she had seen on the glowing path.
Quickly, she curled her hand into a fist.
Her mother noticed the movement. "What is it?"
"Nothing," Ifabola said quickly. "The water is cold."
Her mother nodded absently, already turning to answer an apprentice's question.
Ifabola sank back to her knees and resumed rinsing leaves. Above the compound wall, the sky shone bright and clear, as if no king had died, as if no ancient name had been written in blood.
Yet under that wide, innocent blue, Ayetoro had shifted.
In the palace, the council would soon sit, tongues sharp with suspicion and fear. In the warrior compound of Koleoso, Chief Ogunremi would be tightening spearpoints, wondering which enemy to aim them at. Along the riverbanks, whispers would be stirring among the white‑robed witches, their eyes turned toward currents only they could see.
And in the heart of the Ifatedo compound, a small girl rinsed leaves in a basin of clear water, trying very hard not to think about the doorway of light that might open again the next time she closed her eyes.