“Must she fight your battles for you?” I laugh. “Come on, Yem. If you’re going to lose, do it with pride!”
Rage flashes in Yemi’s eyes like a bull-horned lionaire ready to pounce. She clenches her staff with a vengeance.
Now the real fight begins.
The walls of Mama Agba’s ahéré hum as our staffs smack again and again. We trade blow for blow in search of an opening, a chance to land that crucial strike. I see an opportunity when—
“Ugh!”
I stumble back and hunch over, wheezing as nausea climbs up my throat. For a moment I worry Yemi’s crushed my ribs, but the ache in my abdomen quells that fear.
“Halt—”
“No!” I interrupt Mama Agba, voice hoarse. I force air into my lungs and use my staff to stand up straight. “I’m okay.”
I’m not done yet.
“Zélie—” Mama starts, but Yemi doesn’t wait for her to finish. She speeds toward me hot with fury, her staff only a finger’s breadth from my head. As she rears back to attack, I spin out of her range. Before she can pivot, I whip around, ramming my staff into her sternum.
“Ah!” Yemi gasps. Her face contorts in pain and shock as she reels backward from my blow. No one’s ever struck her in one of Mama Agba’s battles. She doesn’t know how it feels.
Before she can recover, I spin and thrust my staff into her stomach. I’m about to deliver the final blow when the russet sheets covering the ahéré’s entrance fly open.
Bisi runs through the doorway, her white hair flying behind her. Her small chest heaves up and down as she locks eyes with Mama Agba.
“What is it?” Mama asks.
Tears gather in Bisi’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” she whimpers, “I fell asleep, I—I wasn’t—”
“Spit it out, child!”
“They’re coming!” Bisi finally exclaims. “They’re close, they’re almost here!”
For a moment I can’t breathe. I don’t think anyone can. Fear paralyzes every inch of our beings.
Then the will to survive takes over.
“Quickly,” Mama Agba hisses. “We don’t have much time!”
I pull Yemi to her feet. She’s still wheezing, but there’s no time to make sure she’s okay. I grab her staff and rush to collect the others.
The ahéré erupts in a blur of chaos as everyone races to hide the truth. Meters of bright fabric fly through the air. An army of reed mannequins rises. With so much happening at once, there’s no way of knowing whether we’ll hide everything in time. All I can do is focus on my task: shoving each staff under the arena mat where they can’t be seen.
As I finish, Yemi thrusts a wooden needle into my hands. I’m still running to my designated station when the sheets covering the ahéré entrance open again.
“Zélie!” Mama Agba barks.
I freeze. Every eye in the ahéré turns to me. Before I can speak, Mama Agba slaps the back of my head; a sting only she can summon tears down my spine.
“Stay at your station,” she snaps. “You need all the practice you can get.”
“Mama Agba, I…”
She leans in as my pulse races, eyes glimmering with the truth.
A distraction …
A way to buy us time.
“I’m sorry, Mama Agba. Forgive me.”
“Just get back to your station.”
I bite back a smile and bow my head in apology, sweeping low enough to survey the guards who entered. Like most soldiers in Or?sha, the shorter of the two has a complexion that matches Yemi’s: brown like worn leather, framed with thick black hair. Though we’re only young girls, he keeps his hand on the pommel of his sword. His grip tightens, as if at any moment one of us could strike.
The other guard stands tall, solemn and serious, much darker than his counterpart. He stays near the entrance, eyes focused on the ground. Perhaps he has the decency to feel shame for whatever it is they’re about to do.
Both men flaunt the royal seal of King Saran, stark on their iron breastplates. Just a glance at the ornate snow leopanaire makes my stomach clench, a harsh reminder of the monarch who sent them.
I make a show of sulking back to my reed mannequin, legs nearly collapsing in relief. What once resembled an arena now plays the convincing part of a seamstress’s shop. Bright tribal fabric adorns the mannequins in front of each girl, cut and pinned in Mama Agba’s signature patterns. We stitch the hems of the same dashikis we’ve been stitching for years, sewing in silence as we wait for the guards to go away.
Mama Agba travels up and down the rows of girls, inspecting the work of her apprentices. Despite my nerves, I grin as she makes the guards wait, refusing to acknowledge their unwelcome presence.
“Is there something I can help you with?” she finally asks.
“Tax time,” the darker guard grunts. “Pay up.”
Mama Agba’s face drops like the heat at night. “I paid my taxes last week.”
“This isn’t a trade tax.” The other guard’s gaze combs over all the div?ners with long white hair. “Maggot rates went up. Since you’ve got so many, so have yours.”
Of course. I grip the fabric on my mannequin so hard my fists ache. It’s not enough for the king to keep the div?ners down. He has to break anyone who tries to help us.
My jaw clenches as I try to block out the guard, to block out the way maggot stung from his lips. It doesn’t matter that we’ll never become the maji we were meant to be. In their eyes we’re still maggots.
That’s all they’ll ever see.
Mama Agba’s mouth presses into a tight line. There’s no way she has the coin to spare. “You already raised the div?ner tax last moon,” she argues. “And the moon before that.”
The lighter guard steps forward, reaching for his sword, ready to strike at the first sign of defiance. “Maybe you shouldn’t keep company with maggots.”
“Maybe you should stop robbing us.”
The words spill out of me before I can stop them. The room holds its breath. Mama Agba goes rigid, dark eyes begging me to be quiet.
“Div?ners aren’t making more coin. Where do you expect these new taxes to come from?” I ask. “You can’t just raise the rates again and again. If you keep raising them, we can’t pay!”
The guard saunters over in a way that makes me itch for my staff. With the right blow I could knock him off his feet; with the right thrust I could crush his throat.
For the first time I realize that the guard doesn’t wield an ordinary sword. His black blade gleams in his sheath, a metal more precious than gold.
Majacite …
A weaponized alloy forged by King Saran before the Raid. Created to weaken our magic and burn through our flesh.
Just like the black chain they wrapped around Mama’s neck.
A powerful maji could fight through its influence, but the rare metal is debilitating for most of us. Though I have no magic to suppress, the proximity of the majacite blade still pricks at my skin as the guard boxes me in.
“You would do well to keep your mouth shut, little girl.”
And he’s right. I should. Keep my mouth shut, swallow my rage. Live to see another day.
But when he’s this close to my face, it’s all I can do not to jam my sewing needle into his beady brown eye. Maybe I should be quiet.
Or maybe he should die.
“You sh—”