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Christopher Chidi Edeh, no 1 old otta road, Lagos (2026)

11/02/2026

Title: The Great Roof Conference of Umu-Compound

If you look carefully at this house, you’ll notice something very important.

Those round trays on the roof?

They are not there by accident.

This is the headquarters of the most serious organization in the village — The Emergency Roof Committee.

It all started one windy evening when the roof began making suspicious noises.

“Kpa-kpa-kpa-kpa!”

Papa looked up from his chair outside and said, “This roof is planning something.”

Mama replied, “Planning what? To travel?”

But that night, the wind blew so hard that one side of the zinc lifted slightly like it wanted to wave goodbye.

The next morning, Papa called an emergency family meeting in the middle of the wide red yard.

Agenda:

1. Stop the roof from relocating.

2. Do not spend money.

After three hours of deep discussion (and one argument about who forgot to close the window last week), a brilliant idea was born.

“Bring the trays!”

Not just any trays — the strongest, most respected, veteran trays in the kitchen. The ones that had survived pounding yam, washing rice, and one unfortunate Christmas goat incident.

They were carefully placed on top of the roof as “temporary permanent weights.”

From that day on, the trays became silent heroes.

Whenever the wind tried to show off, the trays would sit there proudly like:

“Try it. We are waiting.”

Even the house seemed calmer. The small wooden window stopped shaking dramatically. The walls stood straighter. The red earth compound looked peaceful again.

Visitors would come and whisper, “Why are there plates on your roof?”

Papa would clear his throat.

“It is advanced engineering.”

Meanwhile, Mama would be inside shouting, “Who took my rice tray from the roof? I want to serve food!”

The children learned an important lesson that season:

In this compound, nothing is ever wasted. If it can’t be fixed, it can be balanced.

And somewhere on that roof, under the cloudy sky, those trays continue their duty —

Protecting the house from wind, From storms, And from expensive repairs. 😄

09/02/2026

Chapter 13: The Name He Could Not Remember
A DESPERATE GHOST
Jumoke found me sitting on the cold ground, still holding the dead lantern.

At first, she did not speak.

She just stood there, breathing hard, as if she had been running for a long time.

“You’re alive,” I said, my voice weak with relief.

She nodded slowly.

“I thought the forest took you,” I added.

Her eyes narrowed.

“The forest almost did,” she said. “But something… pushed me away.”

A strange silence settled between us.

The trees no longer moved. Even the wind seemed afraid to pass through that place.

Jumoke stepped closer.

“Why are you sitting like that?” she asked softly.

I swallowed.

“I think… it’s over,” I said. “The forest said the debt is paid.”

She stared at me for a long moment.

“Paid?” she repeated.

“Yes.”

“With what?”

I opened my mouth to answer—

And stopped.

A sharp confusion stabbed through my head.

“I… I don’t know.”

Her expression changed instantly.

Not fear.

Not relief.

Something worse.

Recognition.

“Say that again,” she whispered.

“I don’t know,” I repeated, frustrated. “It said it took something. Someone.”

My chest tightened.

“But I can’t remember who.”

Jumoke took a slow step back, as if my words had struck her.

“Someone?” she said, her voice trembling. “There were three of us.”

My heart skipped.

“No,” I said quickly. “It was just you and me.”

Her eyes widened.

“No,” she said firmly. “There were three.”

A faint ringing began in my ears.

“That’s not possible,” I insisted. “We came here together. Just us.”

Jumoke shook her head, breathing faster now.

“You’re wrong.”

The way she said it—so certain—made my stomach twist.

“There was someone else,” she continued. “Someone who carried the second lantern.”

I looked at my hand.

One lantern.

Cold.

Lifeless.

“I don’t remember that,” I said quietly.

Jumoke’s lips began to tremble.

“They walked behind us,” she said. “They kept complaining about the forest being too quiet.”

A strange ache pressed against my chest.

Like a bruise I could not see.

“Stop,” I muttered. “You’re confusing me.”

“I’m not!” Her voice cracked. “They held your hand when the storm started!”

The ache grew sharper.

A flash—

Warm fingers.

Laughter.

A voice calling my name.

Then—

Nothing.

Gone.

I grabbed my head as pain shot through my skull.

“Why can’t I remember?” I groaned.

Jumoke’s eyes filled with tears.

“Because the forest took them,” she whispered.

The words hung between us like a curse.

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “If someone was that important, I would know.”

“You did know,” she said.

My breathing became uneven.

“Then tell me their name,” I demanded. “Tell me!”

Jumoke opened her mouth—

And froze.

Her face went pale.

“I…”

Her voice failed.

“I can’t,” she whispered.

A cold wave rolled through the air.

The forest rustled.

Watching.

Listening.

Waiting.

Jumoke clutched her chest.

“I know their face,” she said, terrified. “I know their voice.”

Tears slipped down her cheeks.

“But their name…”

She looked at me, shaking.

“It’s gone.”

My heart dropped.

The forest had not only taken them from me.

It was still erasing them.

Slowly.

Patiently.

Like wiping footprints from sand.

A faint sound drifted through the trees—

A child’s laughter.

Both of us turned sharply.

“Did you hear that?” I whispered.

Jumoke nodded.

The laughter came again.

Soft.

Lonely.

Familiar.

My chest tightened with a grief that had nowhere to land.

“I feel like…” My voice broke. “I’m forgetting how to breathe.”

Jumoke grabbed my hand.

“We have to leave,” she said urgently. “If we stay, it will take the rest.”

“The rest of what?” I asked.

She looked straight into my eyes.

“Everything that proves they ever existed.”

A sudden gust of wind swept through the forest.

For a split second, I felt another hand slip between ours—

Small.

Warm.

Desperate.

Then it vanished.

I gasped.

“Jumoke… someone was here.”

“I know,” she said, crying now. “They’re still trying to come back.”

The laughter echoed once more—

Then turned into a faint, broken sob.

The trees went still again.

And deep inside my chest—

Where a memory should have lived—

There was only a hollow space…

Shaped exactly like a person

I could no lon

09/02/2026

Chapter 12: The Forest’s True Choice
A DESPERATE GHOST

The silence after the light was worse than the darkness.

For a long moment, I could not feel my body—only the slow, hollow echo of my own breathing.

Then the forest returned.

Sound first.

A distant rustle of leaves.

Water dripping somewhere unseen.

And a low, grieving wind that moved through the branches like a whispered prayer.

I was lying on cold earth.

Alone.

“Jumoke?” My voice came out cracked. “Jumoke!”

No answer.

I forced myself up, my muscles trembling as if I had just woken from a fever dream. The stone still stood before me, but its glow was gone. The carvings were dull now—dead.

Like the forest had already taken what it wanted.

My heart began to race.

“No… no, no, no.”

I turned in circles, searching through the trees.

“Jumoke!”

Only echoes replied.

Then I saw it.

At the base of the stone—something small, half-buried in the damp soil.

Her lantern.

The glass was unbroken, but the flame inside was gone.

Cold.

Abandoned.

My chest tightened until it hurt to breathe.

“She can’t be…” I couldn’t finish the sentence.

The wind rose suddenly, spiraling around the stone.

And the voice returned—quieter now, almost distant.

“The offering was not the girl.”

Every hair on my body stood up.

My throat went dry.

“Then who?” I whispered.

The carvings flickered once—like a dying heartbeat.

“The forest does not take the willing.”

A chill slid down my spine.

Images rushed back—

My step toward the stone.

My choice.

My acceptance.

If it didn’t take me…

And it didn’t take Jumoke…

Then what had it taken?

The answer came slowly.

Like remembering a name I had tried to forget.

My memories.

I staggered backward as a sharp pain split across my head.

Faces—blurring.

Voices—fading.

There had been someone else.

Someone important.

Someone who was supposed to be here with us.

I clutched my temples.

“Who… was with us?”

Nothing.

Only emptiness where a memory should have been.

Panic surged.

“No—no, that’s not possible. There were only two of us. Just me and—”

My words stopped.

Because I wasn’t sure anymore.

The voice drifted through the trees one final time.

“A life is more than flesh.”

The forest had not taken a body.

It had taken a person.

Someone erased so completely that even grief had nowhere to land.

My knees buckled.

A name hovered at the edge of my mind—

So close.

So important.

And gone.

I grabbed the lantern, my hands shaking.

“Jumoke!” I shouted again, desperate now. “If this is some kind of trick—answer me!”

A branch snapped behind me.

I spun around.

There—between the trees—stood a figure.

For one wild, hopeful second I thought it was her.

But the shape was wrong.

Too tall.

Too still.

It stepped forward, and moonlight finally touched its face.

My breath left my lungs.

It was—

Me.

Not a reflection.

Not a shadow.

Another version.

Its eyes were empty, like the forest had hollowed them out.

When it spoke, the voice was mine—but layered with the forest’s whisper.

“The debt is paid,” it said.

My hands trembled.

“What did you take?” I demanded. “Who did you take from me?”

The double tilted its head, almost curious.

Then it smiled.

“The one you loved most.”

The world seemed to tilt.

A sudden, crushing grief slammed into my chest—

Deep.

Ancient.

But with no face.

No name.

No memory to hold onto.

I fell to my knees, gasping.

Somewhere, far beyond the trees, I heard a faint cry.

Jumoke’s voice.

Alive.

Calling for me.

Relief and devastation collided inside me.

She survived.

But someone else—

Someone I would never remember—

Had not.

The double began to fade back into the shadows.

“Wait!” I reached out. “Tell me who it was!”

Its final words drifted through the leaves like falling ash.

“If you remember… the forest will come back for the rest.”

Then it was gone.

The wind died.

The forest stood silent once more.

I stayed there for a long time, clutching a lantern that no longer had a flame, mourning someone whose name had been carved out of my soul.

And the worst part—

Was knowing…

Whoever the forest took—

I had loved them enough…

To lose them forever.

--

09/02/2026

Chapter eleven
A DESPERATE GHOST

---

Chapter 11: The Price the Forest Demands

The forest did not welcome us.

It watched.

Every step we took sank into damp earth that smelled of old rain and something… older than rain. The trees were too tall, their branches twisting like fingers trying to remember how to grab.

Jumoke walked beside me, her lantern trembling in her grip.

“You feel it too, don’t you?” she whispered.

I nodded.

The silence here was not empty—it was listening.

We had crossed the boundary hours ago, yet the deeper we went, the darker it became. Even the moon seemed afraid to follow us.

Then the wind stopped.

Completely.

The forest exhaled.

And the path vanished.

Where there had been a narrow trail, there was now only a circle of blackened soil. At its center stood a stone—smooth, ancient, carved with symbols that hurt to look at for too long.

Jumoke stepped closer.

“No…” I reached for her wrist. “Don’t touch it.”

Too late.

The moment her fingers brushed the stone, the ground shuddered.

A voice rose—not from the air, not from the trees—

From inside our bones.

“A life for a life.”

Jumoke gasped and staggered back. The lantern fell, its flame dying instantly.

Darkness swallowed us.

I tried to speak, but my throat locked.

The voice returned, heavier this time.

“One must remain.”

Cold spread across my chest.

I understood.

The stories were true.

The forbidden forest never allowed two people to leave.

Jumoke grabbed my arm.

“You’re not thinking—” Her voice cracked. “We can run. We can still—”

The trees shifted.

Roots burst from the ground like snakes, circling us.

No path.

No escape.

Only the stone.

And the choice.

My heart pounded so hard it hurt.

Jumoke shook her head slowly, tears catching the faint glow that now seeped from the carvings.

“You have to go,” she whispered. “You’re the one who knows the truth. If you die here, everything ends.”

I wanted to argue.

To refuse.

To break whatever ancient law ruled this cursed place.

But the forest tightened around us, as if impatient.

“Choose.”

The word thundered through my skull.

Memories flashed—

Her laughter the first day we met.

The promise I made.

I will never leave you behind.

My hands trembled.

“If there’s another way—”

“There isn’t,” she said softly.

Then, to my horror, Jumoke stepped toward the stone again.

“No!” I pulled her back.

The ground split open beside us, revealing darkness so deep it seemed endless.

The sacrifice.

That was how the forest collected its price.

Jumoke looked at me—not afraid, just… sad.

“Not everything is meant to be survived,” she said.

My chest tightened.

The voice roared once more.

“NOW.”

The forest began to close in.

Branches lowered.

Roots coiled around our ankles.

I realized something then—

The forest did not want just a body.

It wanted a decision.

A choice willingly made.

My choice.

I swallowed hard, tasting fear like metal.

“I won’t let you die,” I said.

Jumoke’s eyes widened.

“Then we both—”

“No.”

For the first time since we entered the forest, I stepped forward.

Toward the stone.

Toward the darkness.

“If a life must remain,” I whispered, “let it be hers.”

The carvings flared.

The ground trembled violently.

Jumoke screamed my name as roots released her and wrapped around me instead.

Cold crept up my legs.

The voice softened—almost satisfied.

“Accepted.”

The forest began to pull me down.

Jumoke lunged forward, grabbing my hand with both of hers.

“You promised!” she cried. “You promised you wouldn’t leave me!”

I forced a smile, though my vision was already fading.

“I didn’t,” I whispered. “I’m the reason you’ll make it out.”

The darkness rose to my chest.

Her grip tightened.

For a moment—just a moment—I thought the forest might take us both.

Then the roots snapped apart.

A burst of light exploded from the stone.

And everything went silent.

When the light faded—

I was no longer sinking.

And Jumoke was no longer beside me.

The forest had made its choice.

Just not the one I expected.

---

09/02/2026

Chapter ten
A DESPERATE GHOST

Deeper Than the Roots

---

CHAPTER TEN

The Forest That Breathes

We did not run.

The forest would not allow it.

Once we stepped fully inside, the trees shifted behind us. Branches crossed. Paths folded into themselves. The way back disappeared like it had never existed.

Jumoke held my hand tightly.

Her palm was cold.

Too cold.

“Do not let go,” she said. “If you do, I will forget myself.”

We moved slowly. Every step felt watched. The ground rose and fell like a sleeping chest. Roots pushed against our feet, testing our weight.

Whispers slid through the leaves.

Not voices.

Names.

Mine.

Hers.

I felt them brush my ears, crawl under my skin, asking questions I did not answer.

Ahead of us, the children stood between the trees.

They did not move.

They did not blink.

Their eyes followed Jumoke.

“She belongs,” one of them said.

His mouth did not move.

Another child stepped forward.

“The bird is waiting.”

Jumoke gasped and bent forward, clutching her shoulder. The mark burned brighter, spreading like ink in water.

“It hurts,” she whispered.

I pulled her close.

“Fight it,” I said.

She shook her head slowly.

“It is not hurting me,” she replied. “It is opening me.”

The trees groaned.

Above us, wings beat once.

The sound knocked the breath from my lungs.

Feathers drifted down, warm and damp, sticking to our skin.

“You came to take them back,” the forest whispered.

“You came too late.”

The ground cracked open before us.

A deep hollow yawned wide, glowing faintly from within. Inside it, I saw memories moving like smoke—children crying, elders chanting, a boy tied to stone and left to scream.

Jumoke stared into the hollow.

“I can free them,” she said.

My heart slammed against my ribs.

“How?”

She turned to me, tears sliding down her face.

“By taking his place.”

The forest fell silent.

Even the whispers stopped.

Somewhere above us, the bird shifted.

Waiting.

I understood then.

The forest did not want blood.

It wanted balance.

And it was ready to be paid.

---

End of Chapter Ten

31/01/2026

CHAPTER EIGHT
A desperate Ghost

The Night of Empty Mats

The disappearances began quietly.

No screams.

No storms.

That was what made it worse.

The first child vanished before dawn. A girl named Kemi. Her mother woke to prepare the morning fire and found Kemi’s mat empty. The wrapper she slept in was still folded neatly beside her pillow.

At first, they thought she had gone to the river.

She never returned.

By evening, two more children were missing.

Both marked.

Both gone without sound.

The palace compound fell into panic. Mothers searched the forests until their feet bled. Fathers dragged lanterns through the farms, shouting names into the night as if the darkness could answer.

The elders ordered silence.

They said fear feeds the storm.

But fear had already grown too large to control.

Jumoke sat beside me, shaking.

“They are leaving,” she whispered.

“Who is taking them?” I asked.

She shook her head slowly.

“They are walking.”

---

That night, I forced myself to stay awake.

The moon hid again behind thick clouds. The compound was darker than usual, like the night itself was holding its breath.

I watched Jumoke carefully.

Her mark pulsed under her skin, faint but alive. The three lines had spread across her shoulder blade, branching like cracked glass.

Suddenly, she sat upright.

“They are calling,” she said.

Before I could stop her, she stood.

Her movements were slow.

Calm.

Like someone walking toward a familiar voice.

I grabbed her arm.

“You are not going anywhere,” I said.

She looked at me, tears forming in her eyes.

“I am not choosing this,” she whispered.

Then I heard it.

Not a song.

Footsteps.

Soft and many.

Coming from outside.

I pulled Jumoke toward the door and opened it slowly.

Children were walking across the courtyard.

Dozens of them.

All marked.

All silent.

Their eyes were open but empty, reflecting nothing—not the moon, not the lantern light, not even each other.

They walked barefoot across the wet earth, their steps perfectly steady, like they were following a path only they could see.

Mothers screamed and ran toward them.

The children did not stop.

Fathers tried to grab them.

The children slipped through their arms like smoke.

I watched one boy walk directly into a thorn bush without reacting. Blood ran down his leg, but he never slowed.

“They cannot feel pain,” Jumoke whispered.

The mortar stone began to hum.

The sound vibrated through the ground, crawling into my bones. The blood stains on its surface darkened as if fresh blood was rising from inside the stone itself.

The children gathered around it.

They knelt together.

And then, they began to sing.

Their voices were small.

Broken.

But together, they formed the same terrible melody we heard during the storms.

The singing bird’s song.

The wind rose suddenly, spinning around them in violent circles. Dust lifted from the ground. Feathers fell from the sky though no bird was visible.

The children stood again.

And one by one… they walked toward the forest behind the palace.

No one could stop them.

Mothers collapsed.

Fathers shouted until their voices broke.

The elders fell to their knees, whispering prayers they should have spoken many years ago.

I held Jumoke tightly as her body trembled.

“They are going to him,” she cried.

“Where?” I asked desperately.

“To the place where he waits,” she said.

As the last child disappeared into the darkness of the trees, the wind stopped instantly.

Silence returned.

But it was not empty.

It was full of something watching.

Jumoke collapsed into my arms.

“They are building his home again,” she whispered weakly.

Far inside the forest, a single note echoed.

Soft.

Lonely.

Calling.

---

End of Chapter Eight

--

31/01/2026

A DESPERATE GHOST

---

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Child Who Was Left Behind

The truth came from Jumoke’s mouth.

But the voice was not hers.

It began on a night when the moon turned red behind heavy clouds. The air smelled like rust and old rain. No one in the palace slept. The children with marks had grown weak. Some could no longer speak. Others stared at empty spaces like they were watching something walk past.

Jumoke sat beside me, trembling.

“They are louder tonight,” she whispered.

“Who?” I asked, though I feared the answer.

“The ones inside the storm.”

Her mark glowed faintly in the darkness. The three lines had spread across her shoulder, stretching toward her neck like roots searching for water.

Then she froze.

Her breathing stopped.

Her head tilted backward slowly.

When she spoke again, her voice was deeper. Older. It sounded like dry leaves scraping across stone.

“The bird was not born,” she said.

“It was made.”

My chest tightened.

I tried to shake her, but her body had become stiff, like something else was holding her upright.

“Who made it?” I whispered.

Her lips moved slowly.

“You did.”

The oil lamp shattered beside us without being touched. Darkness rushed into the room like water flooding through broken doors.

Then Jumoke began to speak again.

---

Long before the palace was built… before the mortar stone… before the compound had walls… there was a famine.

The land stopped breathing.

Crops died before they touched the sun. Rivers turned shallow and bitter. Children cried until their voices broke into silence. The people of Oke-Ayaba begged the gods, but the sky stayed closed.

The elders gathered.

They called for an offering.

Not food.

Not animals.

Something the gods could not ignore.

A child.

---

Jumoke’s fingers dug into the floor as she spoke, her nails splitting against the clay.

“They chose him,” she whispered.

“A boy named Adetola.”

He was the quietest child in the compound. He spoke little but listened to everything. Birds followed him. Even snakes avoided him. Some said he was born already carrying the smell of the spirit world.

His mother begged.

She cried until her voice turned into coughs of blood. She clung to him as the elders dragged him away. The father stood still. Tradition was heavier than love.

They brought Adetola to the mortar stone.

The same stone that still drank blood.

They carved three lines into his shoulder.

The first line was for hunger.

The second was for silence.

The third was for obedience.

They said the gods would take him quickly.

They lied.

---

Jumoke’s voice cracked, but it continued.

“They left him alive.”

They tied him to the stone and covered him with feathers taken from sacred birds. They sang prayers until their throats tore. They waited for the gods to descend.

But no god came.

Night fell.

Rain began.

The elders ran back to their homes, leaving Adetola alone in the storm.

He screamed.

He called for his mother.

He begged the sky to open.

The storm answered.

But it was not a god that came down.

It was something older.

Something that feeds on abandoned prayers.

---

Jumoke’s body shook violently.

Her eyes rolled white.

I tried to hold her, but her skin burned like fever.

“The storm entered him,” she gasped.

“It filled his mouth… his lungs… his bones… until he could not remain human.”

The feathers melted into his flesh.

His arms twisted into wings.

His voice broke into song.

Not a song of beauty.

A song of betrayal.

When the storm ended, the boy was gone.

Only feathers and blood remained on the stone.

But the next storm came with a voice.

A singing voice.

Calling for mothers.

Calling for children.

Calling for the home that left him behind.

---

Jumoke collapsed forward, choking.

Her eyes returned to normal, but tears poured down her face.

“He is lonely,” she whispered.

“Lonely?” I shouted, shaking with anger and fear. “He is killing children!”

She looked at me slowly.

“He is not killing them,” she said.

“He is collecting them.”

The room grew cold.

“So he will never be alone again.”

Outside, thunder rolled across the sky though no clouds were visible.

Far above the palace, wings spread across the darkness.

And for the first time since the storms began, the singing bird cried.

Not in hunger.

In memory.

---

End of Chapter Seven

30/01/2026

A DESPERATE GHOST

---

CHAPTER SIX

The Voices Beneath Her Skin

Jumoke stopped sleeping.

At first, I thought it was fear. Everyone in the palace slept poorly after the children were marked. Mothers burned herbs through the night. Fathers sat outside with machetes they knew would never help.

But Jumoke’s wakefulness was different.

She listened.

Even when nothing was speaking.

She would sit upright in the dark, her head slightly tilted, her eyes searching corners where shadows gathered. Sometimes her lips moved slowly, like she was answering someone standing beside her.

“Who are you talking to?” I asked one night.

She did not look at me.

“They are whispering,” she said softly.

My stomach tightened.

“Who?”

She finally turned toward me. Her eyes looked deeper than before, like someone had dug a small hole inside them.

“The ones inside the song,” she said.

The oil lamp flickered.

I forced a laugh that did not sound like mine.

“You’re just afraid,” I said.

She shook her head slowly.

“They are afraid,” she replied.

The next morning, Jumoke refused to join the other children at the river. She sat beside the mortar stone instead, tracing the cracks in its surface with her finger.

“Can you hear it?” she asked me.

“Hear what?”

“The crying,” she whispered.

I heard nothing.

But her finger stopped at the dried blood that still stained the stone. She pressed her marked shoulder against it and closed her eyes.

Her body stiffened.

Then she smiled.

It was not her smile.

It was too slow.

Too wide.

I grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the stone. Her skin was cold—so cold it burned my palm.

“Don’t touch it again,” I said.

“They said it remembers,” she replied calmly.

That night, the voices grew louder.

I could not hear them.

But Jumoke could.

She began to speak while she slept. At first, it sounded like normal dreaming. Broken words. Soft cries.

Then the language changed.

The words became older.

Stranger.

Her voice deepened, stretching into sounds that scraped against my ears like stones grinding together.

I shook her awake.

She gasped and sat up, clutching her throat.

“They are many,” she whispered.

Her mark had changed.

The three lines on her shoulder had spread slightly, the skin between them turning grey. The edges pulsed slowly, like they were breathing.

“Do they hurt?” I asked.

“No,” she said.

“That is what scares me.”

Later that night, the palace dogs began to howl.

One by one, their voices rose, long and broken, until the sound filled the compound like a warning no one understood.

Jumoke stood suddenly from her mat.

“They are calling me,” she said.

Before I could stop her, she walked toward the courtyard.

The moon hid behind thick clouds, leaving the palace wrapped in heavy darkness. The mortar stone glistened faintly, wet though no rain had fallen.

Jumoke knelt beside it.

The air grew colder.

The shadows around her lengthened, stretching toward her body like fingers reaching home.

“Stop,” I whispered, terrified to speak louder.

She placed her palm on the stone.

Immediately, she gasped.

Not in pain.

In recognition.

“They are trapped,” she said, her voice shaking. “Inside the song… inside the bird… inside the storm.”

The wind rose suddenly, circling her like a living thing.

I ran forward and grabbed her waist, dragging her away from the stone. As her hand broke contact, she screamed—not in fear, but in loss.

The wind died instantly.

We collapsed onto the ground together.

She began to cry.

“I can hear them all,” she sobbed. “They are begging me to open the door.”

“Door to where?” I asked.

She looked at me with terror that finally felt human again.

“To the place where the bird was born.”

Above us, hidden somewhere in the darkness, wings unfolded.

Slow.

Patient.

Listening.

And for the first time, I realized something far worse than death.

The bird was not only hunting.

It was teaching Jumoke how to listen.

---

End of Chapter Six

22/01/2026

# A DESPERATE GHOST

Chapter 4
Blood on the mortar stone

Morning came without light.

The storm was gone, but the fear stayed. The palace compound smelled of wet earth and death. People moved slowly, whispering, afraid to speak too loudly—as if the bird might still be listening.

Jumoke did not leave my side.

Neither did I leave hers.

We stepped out of the kitchen together. The ground was soaked. Footprints filled with muddy water led away from the palace building. No one followed them. Everyone already knew where they went.

The elders gathered near the old grinding stone.

The mortar stone.

It was older than the palace itself. Women once used it to grind pepper and yam. Children were warned never to play near it after sunset. They said spirits liked the sound of stone against stone.

Now, the stone was wet.

Not with rain.

With blood.

It ran in dark lines along the cracks, thick and slow, like it had been poured there on purpose. Flies gathered already, buzzing softly, fearless.

Someone had been placed on the stone.

Or something had been taken from there.

I felt Jumoke’s hand tighten around mine.

“Don’t look,” she whispered.

But I did.

Because the bird always leaves a message.

On the stone lay a necklace.

I recognized it.

Everyone did.

It belonged to Adebayo—the palace drummer. The man whose hands called spirits awake with sound. The man who screamed in the night.

The elders said nothing.

They never did.

One of them stepped forward and poured palm oil over the stone. Another muttered prayers that sounded broken, unfinished. They did not clean the blood completely.

They never do.

Blood left behind is a warning.

As we turned away, I noticed something carved into the side of the mortar stone.

A mark.

Fresh.

Three lines.

The sign of choosing.

My chest tightened.

Because the bird does not mark the past.

It marks what is coming.

Jumoke looked up at me.

“Is it over?” she asked.

I shook my head slowly.

“No,” I said.

The stone was still warm.

And somewhere, far away—or maybe very close—the singing bird was learning a new voice.

---

*End of Chapter Four*

---

# # CHAPTER FIVE

# # # The Marks on Their Skin

The marks appeared three days later.

At first, no one spoke about them.

Fear has a way of closing mouths.

It was a child who noticed it first.

A small boy named Sola began to scream while bathing in the river. His mother thought it was a snake bite. Others thought it was a boil. But when they pulled him out of the water, everyone saw it.

Three thin lines.

Cut deep into his shoulder.

Not bleeding.

Not healing.

They looked burned into his skin, black at the edges, like something hot had pressed against him in the night.

The elders said it was nothing.

They were lying.

By evening, more children were marked.

A girl behind her ear.

Another on the back of his knee.

One across the chest, close to the heart.

Always three lines.

Always fresh.

Always silent.

The children said the same thing when asked.

“I heard a bird.”

“I felt cold.”

“Something touched me.”

None of them saw it.

That was worse.

Jumoke had not slept since the storm. I watched her closely—too closely. Every time she scratched her arm or shifted her clothes, my heart jumped.

That night, I heard it again.

Not the song.

A flutter.

Soft wings brushing the roof.

I sat up slowly, afraid to breathe.

Then I heard Jumoke whisper my name.

“Do you feel that?”

The air grew cold.

The oil lamp flickered, then went out.

In the darkness, something pressed against the wall. I heard it carve.

Slow.

Careful.

Like writing.

Jumoke screamed.

I struck the wall blindly, shouting prayers I barely remembered. The pressure lifted. The cold faded. The night returned.

When the lamp was lit again, Jumoke’s wrapper had slipped from her shoulder.

That was when I saw it.

Three lines.

Still red.

Still smoking.

Marked into her skin.

She did not cry.

She stared at me and whispered, “It chose me.”

Outside, far above the palace, a bird laughed.

Not sang.

Laughed.

And I knew then.

The bird was no longer hunting blindly.

It was preparing.

---

*End of Chapter Five*

Christopher Chidi Edeh

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