CHAPTER SIX : The Things Heaven Buried

CHAPTER SIX

The Things Heaven Buried

Darkness did not descend upon the gathering.

It rose.

The flames that had gone out moments earlier remained silent, leaving the ancient ones standing beneath a sky that had forgotten its stars. The black stone beneath their feet no longer reflected their forms. Instead, it showed fragments of places scattered across the mortal world: forests, shrines, rivers, villages, and roads stretching through lands whose names had changed with generations.

Then the voice spoke again.

“Must the river remember before the gods remember themselves?”

Ala did not turn.

“Show yourself.”

A quiet laugh travelled through the darkness.

“Still giving commands, Mother Earth?”

The shadows parted.

A figure stood beyond the extinguished flames, wrapped in a garment that seemed woven from smoke and the dust of ancient kingdoms. No one had heard the figure arrive. No one could say how long it had been standing there.

Even Ekwensu stopped turning the darkened metal in his hand.

Agu lowered his head slightly.

“Ajọ?”

The stranger tilted his face towards him.

“You remember my name, then.”

“I remember what your silence cost us.”

“And I remember what your certainty cost you.”

The air tightened between them.

Ala raised one hand.

“Whatever quarrel you carried into this place, leave it outside.”

Ajọ's gaze moved towards the dead flames.

“I would gladly leave it outside, if the danger had remained outside.”

He stepped forward.

The flames returned one by one, but they burned differently now. Each flame revealed a different corner of the world, and within each one stood an ancient shrine.

Some were crowded with worshippers. Some stood beneath great trees where elders poured offerings upon the earth. Others were guarded by priests and priestesses who had inherited sacred duties from generations before them.

The gods had not vanished from the world.

Their names still travelled through prayers. Their festivals still brought villages together. Their sacred roads remained beneath the feet of traders, farmers, hunters, and kings.

But devotion was not always understanding.

In one flame, a man knelt before a shrine, begging for strength to protect his family. In another, a ruler offered treasures to obtain power over his enemies. In a third, a priest stood before his people and spoke words he had learned by heart, though he no longer understood the warning hidden within them.

Ajọ watched the scenes unfold.

“The world still remembers how to call us,” he said. “But many have forgotten what their calling requires.”

“Not all mortals,” Olamma replied.

“No. Not all.”

Her voice softened.

She had walked among mortals often enough to know that a poor woman could offer more sincere devotion with a handful of kola nuts than a wealthy ruler could offer with a room full of gold.

She had seen people share their last food with strangers. She had watched mothers pray through sleepless nights and elders settle disputes before anger turned neighbours into enemies.

Humanity was not without goodness.

But goodness did not make it immune to corruption.

“Some still honour the old ways,” Olamma continued. “Some protect what they do not fully understand because they know it is sacred. We must not mistake the wickedness of a few for the nature of all.”

Ekwensu gave a small nod.

“Agreed. Mortals are wonderfully complicated.”

“Your admiration is suspicious,” Ikenga observed.

“My admiration is honest. My intentions are another matter.”

Ajaka sighed.

“And this is why meetings with you are never peaceful.”

For the first time since the bell had rung, a little laughter passed through the gathering.

It did not last long.

Ala moved towards the flames, and the laughter faded as the images changed.

The shrines disappeared. In their place rose ten towering pillars, each carved with symbols older than the first kingdoms. They stood in a circle around an empty space.

Some pillars glowed with fire. Others carried the marks of water, wind, soil, and light. One was covered in symbols that seemed to move whenever anyone tried to study them.

“These are not thrones,” Ala said. “They are reminders.”

“Of what?” asked Agwụ.

“Of the boundaries that protect creation from the desires of those who believe themselves beyond restraint.”

She touched the first pillar.

The ground beneath it darkened, and the smell of wet earth filled the gathering.

“A land cannot stand without the earth beneath it. Neither can a kingdom survive when its people lose their bond with the ground that feeds them.”

Her fingers moved to the next pillar.

A river appeared, twisting through the air.

“Water gives life, but it can also take it. The same gift that nourishes a village may swallow it when balance is broken.”

A third pillar brightened.

Wind swept through the gathering, carrying the cries of distant birds.

“Every power carries a responsibility. None exists merely to satisfy the one who possesses it.”

Agu watched the pillars without speaking.

He understood why Ala had called them reminders.

The ancient ones had not been created to rule without consequence. Each had been entrusted with a part of existence, and each part depended upon the others. When one force was twisted beyond its proper place, the damage did not remain where it began.

A wound in the earth could poison a river.

A poisoned river could destroy a kingdom.

And a kingdom destroyed by fear could send its people searching for powers they were not prepared to carry.

Ekwensu approached the empty space at the centre of the pillars.

“And what happens when a power belongs to no single pillar?”

Ala's eyes followed him.

“Then we must be careful not to mistake what we cannot classify for what we cannot understand.”

“An interesting answer.”

“You asked an interesting question.”

Ekwensu smiled faintly.

Yet his eyes remained fixed upon the empty space.

Something about it troubled him.

He had seen conflicts begin over less.

Across the gathering, Olamma returned her attention to the bowl of water. Its surface had become clear again, but the silver road was gone.

“Tell me something, Mother,” she said. “If the prophecy has been tampered with, how much of what we remember can we still trust?”

Ala did not answer immediately.

The question reached further than Olamma had intended.

For ages, the gods had relied upon memory. They remembered the first boundaries, the first oaths, the first betrayals. They remembered the names of those who had fallen and the promises made over their resting places.

But what if a memory could be altered?

What if a truth could be hidden so carefully that even those who had witnessed it began to doubt themselves?

Ala looked towards Ajọ.

“That depends upon whether the tampering began with the prophecy or with the ones who guarded it.”

Ajọ's face became unreadable.

“Some truths are buried because they are dangerous.”

“And some are buried because someone fears what will happen when they are uncovered,” Olamma replied.

Neither looked away.

Agu finally spoke.

“We are wasting time.”

Ala turned towards him.

“Then tell us what you have seen.”

“Nothing that can be proved by the flames.”

“Speak anyway.”

Agu looked at the pillars, then at the darkened bowl.

“I have seen a household that knows nothing of the storm gathering around it. I have seen a woman chosen without understanding the weight of the choice. I have seen a priest instructed to watch, and I have seen the danger of revealing too much before the appointed hour.”

He paused.

“And I have felt the earth respond to something that has not yet drawn its first breath.”

The flames trembled.

No one asked which child he meant.

They knew the prophecy spoke of the twins' return. Their arrival was approaching, and the question before the gathering was no longer whether they would come, but how the world would receive them.

In ages past, the twins had entered the world together, born into the same household or community. Often, their births had belonged to royal or noble bloodlines, where their presence could shape the fate of kingdoms. They grew together, worked together, and faced their enemies side by side. Their destinies were bound so closely that when one fell, the other followed.

This was the pattern the gods remembered.

It was the pattern they were preparing for again.

Yet the gods of Fate were absent from the gathering. No voice among those present had revealed what lay beyond the part of the prophecy they understood. They could not see the hidden turn in the road ahead, nor could they know that the coming incarnation would not follow the ancient pattern.

For now, they believed preparation would be enough.

Ala returned to the centre of the gathering.

“We must prepare for their arrival without allowing fear to govern our choices. We will not interfere with every mortal decision, nor will we turn the villages into battlefields merely because we fear what may come. Their coming must not become an excuse for us to destroy the very balance we are meant to preserve.”

“Then where shall they be protected?” Ikenga asked.

Agu stepped forward.

“Umuezuna.”

Several faces turned towards him.

“My land has known their worship since before the oldest shrines were raised. Its sacred places remain, and its people still carry the memory of their obligations. I have chosen it as the land of protection for their coming.”

“And you believe your protection will be enough?” Ekwensu asked.

“I believe it is where we must begin.”

Ala considered this.

“Then prepare your land, Agu. But do not mistake a chosen place for a guaranteed future. Protection is a duty, not a promise that danger will never arrive.”

“I understand.”

Olamma lowered her gaze.

She knew the price of silence. She also knew that a truth revealed too early could become a weapon in the wrong hands.

“Then let me send a message,” she said. “Not a prophecy. Not a command. A warning that can be carried by someone who understands the difference between fear and faith.”

Ala nodded.

“Choose your messenger carefully.”

“I will.”

Beyond the gathering, the sacred river moved beneath its ancient banks.

Its waters travelled past villages that had forgotten the names of some old stones and others that still honoured them. It carried leaves, memories, and the reflection of a moon that had watched the world change countless times.

Deep beneath its surface, something shifted.

Two lights appeared in the darkness.

They did not touch.

They did not need to.

For a moment, the river held them both.

Then the lights vanished, leaving the water to continue its journey.

Above, the gods returned to their arguments, believing they had begun preparing for a destiny they understood.

Far beyond their sight, unseen hands were already moving against that destiny.

And far below their feet, the river remembered what heaven had begun to forget.