Her consciousness slipped from her grasp, as though she were thrown into an endless void, surrounded by glowing images replaying what she could only assume was her life, her old life, and the life before.
Chapter 1
Iftherewasonething Azul could say about her father, it was that he was never caught unaware, and he was never disgruntled by the unpredictable seasons.Every year he would order the new thatching for their household an entire month earlier than necessary, and every year the village children would laugh at him.
Chukwuemeka,they would sing.You wake up three hours early so as not to miss the cockcrow.You drink your water two days early so as not to forget to drink.You have your children a year early so as to avoid unfortunate births.
She hated it as a child.She'd have a terrible, ugly scowl on her face and refuse to play with anyone.She would stomp her little feet home, bringing up dust in her wake.
As she grew older, she began to understand the kind of man her father was.
When her acquisition of the title ‘Akwaugo’ was announced, Azul was sitting idly at the edge of the lotus pond in her father’s compound, her feet dipped into the cool water.Fish swam beneath her as she fed them melon seeds to pass the evening.Her youngest sister—a thin girl with short hair like Azul’s, pale and tightly coiled—took a fan, keeping the both of them cool under the dry season’s heat.
“What will you do now?Do you think the prince will call you back?”The little one asked with a look of schadenfreude in her eyes.She stopped fanning both of them, letting the stretched leather cover her lower face, eyes fluttering shyly.Azul had met the prince by chance on the Afor market day.Their hands brushed past each other as she bartered for herbs, eyes meeting for a split second—the Crowned Prince under a hidden identity.They had spent the day together, Azul only returning late in the night.
It was like a folk tale, a poor village girl meeting a prince and having the most romantic evening, with her sister having to help her climb back over the walls into their father’s household.
The matter of men and women was something neither of them talked about often, but Kamsi was almost fifteen; naturally, she was more curious and wished to learn from the more experienced Ada what it meant to kiss a boy.
Of course, the girls were unaware that would be the last evening they would be able to sit leisurely together and eat melon seeds.
Azul’s eyes fluttered open, memory fading from her mind.She winced as her head throbbed, trying to keep hold of the dream she had, the scene she had relived with her sister, but to no avail.She found herself in a bed familiar to her.This time there was no man trying to kill her.
My name is… Azul?The words felt strange in her mind.I will simply have to get used to it… But how did I get back here?
Last she was aware, she had lost consciousness as her memories flooded back.She had no choice but to assume it was that stranger who brought her back to her chambers under the veil of night.
When she woke up that morning, there was no reaction from the servants around her.As a prisoner in the palace, she was followed at all times by at least two maids.Guards escorted her any time she stepped outside the harem, and the princesses avoided her, as she was a stranger to them.
A bird trapped in a cage, the Akwaugo of the Borjigin had been bought for the exorbitant price of 200 silver coins from the great warrior Chukwuemeka.The rumours spread like wildfire that the King had bought himself another daughter.
It was a strange concept and had certainly never been done in the history of the Borjigins, but perhaps it was luckier than simply being taken to be a wife.
After all, terrible husbands often made great fathers.
For three days, Azul had been pampered, fed, accompanied, and kept in the King's backyard, away from her family and friends.
Her meals were tasted by the royal poison tester, her clothes made by the royal tailors, and her jewellery procured from the royal treasury.
It should've been a great thing to be taken from your poor father's home and be given the title of 'Akwaugo'.But she knew, then and now, her reality; she was being positioned as a pawn.
Azul watched as the servants covered up the bruise on her neck with a band of gold.No one seemed to care; it was as if they all knew the prince's plans from the night before and were pretending not to.
If not for the pain, Azul would've thought that night was a fever dream, but it clearly happened.
"Akwaugo, the Ugoeze will see you now," a maid announced at her door.
Azul's hands clenched into fists on her lap.
The Ugoeze, the Igwe's main wife—it seemed she would be the one administering her punishment.
Taking in a deep breath, Azul looked at herself in the bronze mirror.Her beauty never did her any good, and now it would only exacerbate how the women of the Igwe's harem saw her.The more beautiful a woman was, the less pitiful she became, the less human.
The Ugoeze's chambers were grand, as befitting the mother of the tribe.Tapestries depicting the glory of the Borjigin's conquests of northeast Tarsyn hung from the walls, and incense burned in bronze holders, filling the air with the scent of Lycia and musk.
What a strange combination, Azul thought.Lycia and musk were two halves of a coin: one herb to stall one's fertility and the other to enhance it.Still, it didn't matter what strange herbs the women of the harem chose to use in their incense burners.
The Ugoeze herself sat on a raised platform, draped in layers of crimson and gold brocade.Her expression was serene, sipping tea at regular intervals with her lips in a permanent, good-natured smile.It looked as though she were merely settling a dispute between quarrelling children rather than presiding over an accusation of attempted murder.
