Night in Obade was no longer quiet.
Not after Aleshọ́rú sang.
Not after the ground shivered beneath her voice.
The villagers gathered outside their homes some drawn by awe, others by dread. Her song wasn't beautiful. It wasn't meant to be. It was raw, sharp, ancient. Words not sung in centuries echoed through the trees, pulling at memory like claws.
Kareem felt it in his bones.
Amaka in her lungs.
And Ola
He felt it in his blood.
The Test
The Echo Line was said to be blood-chosen.
You could not fake it. You could not train into it.
The river had to know you.
So, the test began.
Aleshọ́rú was led to the old stones where the river first touched the village.
Where sacrifices had once been left.
Where the Binding Drum had been first awakened.
She stood alone in the center.
The final drum was placed before her.
And the elders asked her one question:
"If your song calls her echo, and her echo returns...
what will you do?"
Aleshọ́rú stared into the rising mist and answered without fear:
"I will not command her.
I will not worship her.
I will listen."
Then she struck the drum.
Not once.
But three times.
And the ground split open.
Not wide just enough to breathe.
From it, mist poured, and with the mist a voice.
Not Ìyá Mú's.
Not any known spirit.
It was a child's voice.
"You took my tongue..."
Everyone froze.
Even the birds went silent.
Then came another voice. Older.
"You made me a bride to bones..."
Another.
"You drowned my name beneath your taxes..."
The voices kept coming.
A hundred.
A thousand.
They weren't screaming.
They weren't cursing.
They were remembering.
Ola's Vision
The moment the mist touched him, Ola collapsed.
But he didn't fall into darkness.
He fell into memory.
He saw himself as a boy, sitting by his grandmother's fire, asking about the strange symbols on her drum.
She had looked away and said, "We don't speak those names."
Now, he heard them clearly.
Names of girls buried in mud.
Names his bloodline had once helped erase.
When he awoke, Aleshọ́rú was kneeling beside him.
"You saw it," she said.
"Yes," he whispered. "I carry it."
She touched his chest gently. "And now you release it."
The Song Ends
When the sun rose, the mist had vanished.
And so had twelve villagers.
No trace. No signs of struggle.
Only footprints in the river mud. Leading into the water.
And stopping.
Kareem stared at the river's edge. "What did your song do?"
Aleshọ́rú's voice was quiet.
"It didn't take them.
It showed them.
And some chose not to stay."
"Why?" Amaka asked.
"They were keepers of silence," Aleshọ́rú said. "They knew the truth… and let the drums be fed."
A Warning
Just before dusk, a crow landed near the drum.
It spoke not with its beak, but with a voice borrowed from somewhere deeper.
"You've awakened what was buried beneath remorse.
Not all echoes want peace."
And then it burst into flames.
The villagers did not sleep that night.
Nor did the river.
Because now, something else was awake.