The compound was too quiet. Outside, the neighborhood generators continued their relentless mechanical prayer, but within the walls of their home, the air had the heavy, artificial stillness of a tomb.
Femi sat on the floor of the parlor, his back against the door. His dark stone blade lay across his lap, its etched patterns pulsing with a faint, rhythmic ochre light that matched his heartbeat. Beside him, Lola was pacing, her footsteps silent. She had changed into a dark hoodie, the hood pulled low, but she couldn't hide the violet static that occasionally flickered in the depths of her eyes.
Their mothers lay in the bedroom, still encased in the protective, stone-like clay Femi had molded around their lower bodies. They were breathing, but it was a deep, unnatural sleep—the kind of sleep that happens when the soul is pinned to the flesh by force.
"We can't stay here, Femi," Lola said, her voice tight. She stopped pacing and looked at the shattered window. "The messenger said Chief Adeyemi is watching. If he's a billionaire, he has eyes everywhere. CCTV, police, area boys... he probably owns this street."
Femi looked at his blade. "He doesn't own us."
"He doesn't need to own us to kill us," Lola snapped. She sat down abruptly, her bravado momentarily slipping. "Femi, I'm scared. Not of the gods. I'm scared of... her." She gestured toward the bedroom. "If she wakes up and she's not my mother... if she's just some spirit guard... what do I do? Do I still love her?"
Femi reached out and took her hand. His skin was rougher now, smelling of wet clay and iron, but his grip was steady. "Seventeen years of holding you when you cried, Lola. Seventeen years of scolding us and feeding us. A spirit doesn't do that just because it's told to. There was love there. Even if the memories were given to them, the life they lived was real."
Lola leaned her head on his shoulder, and for a moment, they were just two teenagers again, caught in the terrifying transition of growing up—only their puberty involved celestial warfare.
A soft, metallic chime echoed through the room.
It didn't come from a phone or a clock. It came from the air itself. Femi gripped his blade, and Lola stood up, her fingers sparking.
A holographic projection shimmered into existence in the center of the parlor. It was a high-resolution image of a man sitting in a leather chair, silhouetted against the glittering skyline of Victoria Island. Chief Adeyemi.
"Children," the projection said, the voice smooth and distorted by a metallic reverb. "You've made a mess of my associates. The Salt-Man was expensive to recruit. And Obaluaye's messenger is quite cross about his tea."
"Leave us alone," Femi said, his voice dropping into that deep, resonating tone of Obu.
I'm afraid I can't do that," Adeyemi chuckled. "You see, the Council sent you here to be forgotten. But I? I see potential. Why return to a heaven that fears you? Why serve a father who shackled your soul to a mortal woman's womb?"
The image shifted, showing a live feed of their street. Dozens of black SUVs were turning the corner, moving silently without headlights.
"I am coming to collect you," Adeyemi said. "Don't fight it. The Hunter is already on your roof. If you resist, the Wardens—your 'mothers'—will be the first to be extinguished. I don't need them alive to harvest your ase."
The projection vanished.
Above them, the zinc roof groaned. Something heavy and sharp was dragging itself across the corrugated metal—the sound of claws on a chalkboard.
"The Hunter," Lola whispered.
Femi stood up, his stone blade glowing a fierce, angry orange. He looked at the bedroom door, then at Lola. The time for hiding was over. The geometry of their lives had been a circle, keeping them trapped in a cycle of ignorance. Now, it was time to break the line.
"Lola, the roof," Femi commanded. "Blow it open."
"What?"
"If we stay inside, we're trapped. We fight them in the open air. Your territory."
Lola's eyes went wide, then settled into a hard, brilliant violet. She understood. She raised both arms, her palms facing upward. She didn't just summon a breeze; she summoned the weight of the sky.
Hold on to something!" she yelled.
Femi slammed his blade into the floorboards, anchoring himself.
Lola let out a roar of pure, unfiltered power. A vertical pillar of wind erupted from the center of the room. The zinc sheets of the roof were ripped away like paper, screaming as they were hurled into the night sky.
The moonlight flooded in, and there, perched on the remaining rafters, silhouetted against the bruised purple clouds of Lagos, stood a figure draped in shadows and animal pelts. He held a bow made of human bone, and his eyes were twin pits of endless, predatory dark.
The Hunter had found them.