The door groaned on its hinges as Ola pushed it fully open, the shrill sound slicing through the hush of the stone hall like a blade. Light spilled inward in a sharp wedge, golden and fierce, casting long, accusatory shadows across the cold floor. Dust danced in the air, momentarily illuminated, like ancestral spirits roused by the disruption.
Every eye turned to her—seven elders seated in a crescent, their faces carved by time and burden, their expressions twisted in disbelief. They had not expected her. Not here. Not now.
And certainly not with fire in her eyes.
The woman on the floor looked up. Her lips trembled, cracked and dry, a trickle of dried blood trailing from her temple. Hope flickered there, fragile as a dying ember. But the weight of fear still draped over her shoulders like a funeral cloth.
Ola inhaled slowly. The mark on her chest—the Watcher's mark—burned faintly beneath her robes. A reminder of the price she had paid. A reminder of who was truly watching.
This was no longer just about secrets whispered in alleys or names scratched on forgotten stones.
This was the turning.
"You will not bury her," Ola said. Her voice was low, but it carried, cutting through the air like the sound of steel being drawn.
An elder in black robes—the one called Nírẹ̀—stood. His beard was silver, but his back was straight, his presence commanding. "And who are you to decide what we do, girl? This woman broke our peace. She sowed unrest when she opened her mouth."
Ola met his gaze, unwavering. "Peace built on silence is no peace at all. We have lived under this curse for generations, afraid to speak, afraid to remember. That ends now."
A murmur rippled through the others. One coughed into a hand. Another shifted uncomfortably in their seat. The hall's high ceiling seemed to sag under the weight of her words.
Nírẹ̀ narrowed his eyes. "Why should we believe you? You bear the Watcher's mark. You are claimed. That makes you a conduit, not a savior."
"I am claimed," Ola said, taking another step forward. "But not broken. Not silenced."
A sharp rustle of fabric echoed as Èkóyé entered behind her, breath short but resolve unshaken. Her fists were clenched at her sides, the runes along her forearms still faintly aglow. "This curse is not just a weight—it is a chain. We cannot wait for it to rot away. It must be broken."
The hall fell still.
Ola could feel the old magic lingering here. It curled in the corners, like smoke that never cleared. This room had seen too many silences. Too many condemnations passed under the pretense of tradition. She looked again at the bound woman. Her eyes were swollen, lips bruised—but her spirit still flickered behind her expression.
That flicker was hope. Dangerous. Infectious.
The eldest elder, Orógbó, finally stirred. His voice was rough with disuse and age. "Speak your truth then. But once said, there is no un-saying. The words become spirit. And spirits... remember."
Ola stepped forward until she stood just beside the bound woman. The elders did not move to stop her.
She knelt.
"What did the river ask of you?" she asked gently.
The woman's voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper. "It asked for names... the ones buried beneath the reeds, beneath the weight of time. It asked for those we no longer speak of. It asked... for reckoning."
A hush fell over the room, heavy and alive.
"Blasphemy," hissed Elder Iráyà, her rings clinking as she raised a bony hand. "The river is not a mouth for the dead! It is a threshold. A boundary between what was and what must never return."
"She speaks true," said Iyagbẹ́kọ, stepping from the shadows. Her voice held none of the tremble of the others. "The river does not ask for vengeance. It asks for remembrance. It warns before it drowns."
Iyagbẹ́kọ's presence was unexpected, even for Ola. Once an elder herself, she had vanished years ago, after questioning the council's silence during the famine. She was thought to be dead—or worse, taken.
Now here she stood, her garments soaked with morning dew, her walking stick glinting with old sigils.
"You speak as if you understand," Orógbó said, his tone sharpening. "But you tread dangerously. There are forces in this village—ancient things that do not welcome change."
Ola turned to him, heart thudding but words steady. "And that is why we must speak. Because fear gave them power. Fear kept them fed. If we stay silent, we become their mouthpieces."
The woman on the floor raised her head, tears tracking the dirt on her face. "I heard their names. In the river's breath. I heard what they did to the children who wandered too close. The lovers who defied them. I heard his name."
A sharp intake of breath rippled through the council.
Nírẹ̀'s knuckles whitened on the hilt of his cane. "That name is forbidden."
"Then it must be spoken," Ola snapped. "Because forbidden names rot in silence. They fester. They fester and grow roots in our soil."
She rose, turning slowly to face each of the elders in turn. "This woman will not be buried. I will not be buried. And if you try—" she let the weight of her words hang, heavy and electric, "—then the river will rise. And it will not ask next time. It will take."
No one answered. But the silence had changed.
Where once it was born of control, now it was laced with hesitation. With dread.
With truth.
"I will not be the next to be punished for speaking," Ola said, her voice now softer, but resolute. "Nor will I let this village drown in its own silence."
She turned her back on them. "If you wish to condemn me, come find me."
Her footsteps echoed in the hall like a drumbeat. One. Then another. Then another.
Each one a mark on the stone. Each one a fracture in the mask of tradition.
As she stepped into the dawn, the light swallowed her silhouette.
Èkóyé caught her arm outside. Her fingers trembled just slightly as they curled around Ola's wrist.
"You've started something."
Ola looked at her—tired, yes, but alive. "It's already started."
They stood in silence for a breath. Then another. The trees rustled as if exhaling. From the distance, the sound of the river—once a gentle murmur—rose now into a whispering song.
A chant.
The village was waking.
Not just with movement, but with memory. The names had been spoken. And in a place as old as theirs, memory was power.
Behind them, the heavy doors of the hall creaked shut again, but the weight had shifted.
"What now?" Èkóyé asked.
Ola turned toward the forest path. "Now we find the others. The ones who still remember. The ones the elders buried in silence."
A distant cry pierced the air—part human, part something else. Both women turned toward the sound. The Watcher was awake. But so was something older.
"They'll come for us," Èkóyé murmured.
"Let them come," Ola replied. "This time, we won't be silent."
And as they walked down the worn path, the river beside them whispered names long buried. Names that had once built this village, and names that had bled for it.
No longer hidden. No longer afraid.
But alive.