The village awoke to a scent no one could name—part smoke, part rot, part memory. Chickens refused to leave their coops. Old dogs whimpered. Babies wouldn't nurse. And the elders? They sat in silence, faces turned to the wind as though listening to something only they could hear.
Adamma stood before the iroko tree, its roots now veined with red. Her palm was wrapped in white cloth stained deep scarlet. Around her, the twelve daughters formed a loose circle, each bearing a mark from the night before—a burn, a cut, a dream they refused to speak of.
"The land remembers," whispered Ijeoma, her voice trembling. "And it's angry."
A voice answered from the shadows: "Not angry—awake."
They turned. The Bonekeeper, Nneka, emerged from behind the thick vines, her eyes rimmed with charcoal and something darker.
"You have begun what cannot be undone," she said. "And the spirits will come, but not all will bring blessings."
She gestured for Adamma to approach.
"There is more," Nneka said, pulling a gourd from her satchel. "The final rite. The one that calls the First fully into the world. You must bury this under your mother's bones."
Adamma's breath caught. "But… she's not buried here."
"She is. They all are," Nneka said softly. "Just not as you were told."
**
By nightfall, they stood in the old graveyard. Only Nneka knew where to dig.
It was not a coffin they found, but a pit of bones—dozens, maybe hundreds. Women's bones. Their ancestors. Their voices, stolen and buried. Their names, stripped and burned. Their memories—alive.
When Adamma placed the gourd among the bones, the earth groaned.
A wind swept through the clearing, snuffing out every torch. In the dark, the air turned thick. Something shifted below.
Then: a scream. High, long, not human.
The trees bowed.
And the ground cracked.
From the soil rose not a body—but a shadow of one. The First, fully formed, taller now, robed in blood and memory. She looked at Adamma with eyeless sockets that somehow saw everything.
"You have called me," she said.
"I seek justice," Adamma replied.
The First turned slowly, gesturing toward the village.
"Then begin where the rot began," she said. "Begin with the king."
The name struck like lightning.
Adamma turned to the others. "King Obadare?"
"He made the pact," the First said. "He sold the first daughters."
Thunder cracked overhead.
"The bloodline must end," she whispered.
And then she vanished.
**
Back in the palace, King Obadare awoke choking. His hands were covered in dirt. In his bed, a gourd pulsed with heat.
He flung it aside—but it didn't break.
It began to laugh.
—