Chapter 4

That morning, I woke up earlier than usual. With the noise from the maids moving up and down, waking that early was inevitable.

The Kele Prince and his entourage had reached Seke palace that morning for engagement after traveling for three days.

His entourage consisted of King Chani, Queen Maliwa; my aunt, Kele chief courtier Mbau kani , thirteen maidservants, and their their sixteen carrier barriers, eighty goats, fifty cows, fifty pigs, fifteen sacks of sweet potatoes and fifty sacks of maize.

Nanny had bathed me, and clothed me in a purple Musinsi and a black baki, four white dots adorned the bridge of my nose to my hairline. I had on ivory ornaments in my breaded hair...She finished me off with a black charcoal colour on my lips, the one Queen mother and other order women in the village used.

" what function is there today nanny." I asked out of curiosity with the unusual things happening around me.

" nothing, just regular maize planting festival."

" If it's just for that, why am I dressed like this."

" Don't you like the Musinsi Zae? Queen mother bought it for you..."

" I want to go and greet my parents, I told her." We children of Sekeletu​kingdom greeted our parents first, it was the most filial thing to do.

" The King said to not go today..."

" Nanny an hungry."

I lied.

" I'll​ get you some food then Princess Zae."

When she walked out of my quarters, I went and opened the door, she was talking to two maidens who where sweeping my surroundings before she disappeared behind a flowery wall. I Couldn't go out the door so I opted to try my luck with the wooden window. But lo and behold, two palace guards stood guarding that side of my premises too.

We never dressed this good for the maize planting festival at this time I knew I was getting married, the signs where poignantly everywhere. I was scared, I was only ten years old, I still wanted to stay with my parents.

When Nanny came back, she had a wooden plate with sweet potatoes and a plate with rice mixed with sour milk in one hand and a cup of water in another...

She handed me a spoon and brought a plate with the rice forward, I wasn't hungry, I had told her that to get her out of the room but I wasn't going to tell her that. I took a spoonful of the rice and even with the sour milk in it, it's taste was bland. She brought the plate to me and I shook my head and she wasn't​ going to force me. She took everything back.

I threw myself on my bed in anger... for Nanny, my parents and my four brothers, it was all their fault.

The sun was near setting in the east. It was leaving it's little orangey mild sister in its steady when Nanny came to get me from my quarters.

The whole palace grounds was filled with people from all over the Seke palace villages.

The abattoir was congested with red and white meat that we could later whiff. Beer fermented by the best in zymurgy polluted the air, all kinds of delicate edible foods where prepared for the day.

I walked to the shaded side of the ground where my father sat on his royal couch with a purple linen on it, next to him my mother on her identical but smaller couch. Underneath them on a step sat King Chani and his wife Queen Maliwa...The step after theirs accommodated my four brothers on their smaller but royal couches, and the fifteen year old boy I was to be engaged to; Prince Sepo, sat on a couch that was to accommodate two people on the other side of the step.

It was a pyramid of royal power.

He was of a darker colour than his parents but one could see he inherited his looks​ from his mother, he exuded of royalty and goodwill, He wore a golden siziba with lion cub prints on it. He looked frail and pale that his face almost looked grey, He kept his eyes on the ground and never did he once look at me...One would only blame the long journey from Kele to Seke palace. I would have sworn I had seen his face contorting to a pain only he could feel...yet...On my way to the shade.

My father called to me to greet our visitors, I went and greeted King Chani, I shook his hand and clapped, shook his hand, and clapped again, shook his hand the third time , and clapped, he then flipped my hand and spat on my palm as a blessings and Queen Maliwa did the same. I then proceeded to greet my parents who directed me to sit next to Prince Sepo.

" Let the celebration begin." My father shouted.

And with that drums where beated, tambourines​ resounded and songs of celebration from pitchy voices that left old people even more deaf where heard.

Then a woman in a weird looking cloak came in to the middle of the ground where a reed mat with two clay pots​ laid raised her wooden stick and the singing and drumming seized. She called me and Prince Sepo to her and and we walked and knelt on the reed mat. She did her incarnations, and sprinkled beer and blood on us from the clay pots before she got two ivory bangles and bringing them forward, she told Prince Sepo to put one around my wrist which he did and I did the same. Prince Sepo then summoned a Kele maidservants who came with one more bangle with her on a try. He took the bangle and helped me with it so that I had two bangles on my wrist.

"Don't take this off, you can still wear it for five more maize planting seasons."

His voice​ sounded authoritative but kind.

He then raised his eyes to me that had a thick brow and long eye lashes to them and smiled. I looked in his eyes that looked sad and I must have wanted​ to take his pain from his eyes that was in contrast with his smile. An excruciating pain stubbed my heart, at ten I experienced someone​ else's pain.

Took it for my own.

My knees gave up and I fell, but not on the ground...I was in this Prince's arms.

*********

There where murmurs among the villagers, Not only was it abominable for a man and woman to show physical affection in public but this was a fifteen year old prince of Kele palace and and ten year old Princess of Seke palace, they where engaged but not yet married.

What supprised the people about this engagement was why i was given to prince Sepo who should have been married with at least a child at his age.I on the other hand was not yet a woman, i was still a child...The people had seen it strange but no one would say anything if they didn't want to die.

A month prior to

Kele palace was built atop a large mountain they called Kelemachi mountain, unlike Seke palace which was on a floodplain. Kele palace had only three of their villages at the foot of the mountains and where mostly occupied by worriors...The palace was well secured.

The palace was made entirely of bricks, wooden windows and thatched roofing​s and just like the Seke palace, it had a long veranda leading to the king's study, audience hall and king's private chambers.

The queen's chamber lay further on the left side of the building. The concubines, princes, and princesses had theirs​ on different premises.

king Chani sat in his study on a Marula wooded chair, the room was brightly lit with the morning sun when the queen with her tail of handmaidens stood at the door of the study requesting for an audience, the queen was ushered in by the king's aide after a consultation. She made obeisance and sat on the chair opposite him.

"Why is my queen here this morning?" he asked queen Maliwa

"I can't continue to see my child suffer like this when i can help him"

"So you want me to take the life of someone else's child, is that what you are telling me my queen?"

"....."

"And besides we are talking about your brother's daughter, my queen"

"She is just a mere princess, our son is the heir to the throne, i won't allow a concubine's son take the throne when i can avoid it"

"What makes you think, nothing will happen to that concubine's son?"

"That is not the reason am here my king"

"I know why you are here my queen."

"I have made up my mind, my king, all you have to do is send a messenger with the proposal to my brother"

"......"

"My brother won't refuse, he owes me a favour"

"He does?"

"His insistence on marrying his beloved wife, a woman with everything but a noble birth will cost him his only daughter"

The king looked as his wife who looked even more determined to follow through with the oracle's solution for her son's predicament.

"You can go to your chambers, I'll think about it and send you my response"

When the queen was gone, he stood up from where he sat and sat on another chair just at the window, he suddenly felt cold as he remembered his father's words

"My son always be a just king, never do things you will regret to a subject because Nyambe our god fights for those himself....A bad deed taken to a grave befalls your bloodline"

"I can't do it my queen" the thought with a grim face.

He was reminded of the words of the oracle

"My prince's heart and manhood are held by a woman who killed herself because my king left her after taking her virginity and promising her the seat of the queen...My prince will continue to have heart aches, he will never be able to perform sexually, the women will all die one after the other, it's a curse she placed on your heir to the throne"

"What if i change my heir" the king asked which payed him with a look of dissatisfaction from the queen.

"The same things will befall them, there is no way out, that Does not require you to shed some blood"

Prince Sepo and the queen where both present at the time of this revelation

"What is the solution then" the queen asked the oracle almost scared to ask.

"He is to marry of a royal family, she wants blood from a royal ******, when my prince marries a royal, the night of there consummation, that blood of the ****** is what will break the curse but....."

"Wait " the queen stopped her midsentence as if she knew what was about to be said. Everyone looked at her astonished

"My prince, you can leave now, wait for us outside" the queen said.

Prince Sepo stood up from where he was kneeling and walked out of a shabby looking hut.

"You can continue, but what?"

The oracle looked at the queen and king before she continued

"But that royal won't live to see the morning sun".

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