The double doors opened, and ten pairs of eyes turned to me. I found Dayo’s, and Sanjeet’s hand formed a viselike grip on mine. The sunstone burned on the bare skin of my chest, and I steeled my limbs, restraining the beast. You can’t kill him here, I reasoned with the monster inside me, using her devilish logic against her. Everyone in this room has a Hallow. They would kill you before you could finish the job. Wait.
Utter silence. Then Ai Ling crowed at Mayazatyl, “You owe me seven gold coins. Tar doesn’t have a pikin, after all.”
Then everyone except Dayo engulfed me with hugs, teasing and bombarding me with questions. Kirah forced them to give me air, but I didn’t want it. I wanted nothing more but to be buried in my siblings’ chaos, deep within their love where I belonged.
“You look amazing,” I hiccupped, swiping at tears. “All of you.”
They truly did. Attendants had dressed each of them in the clothing of their home realms: individual creations of silk, wool, or wax-dyed cloth. In tribute to the emperor, however, all of them wore elements of Oluwan. My brothers looked imposing in onyx circlets emblazoned with the Kunleo seal, and my sisters towered in Oluwan geles, starched pieces of fabric that bloomed around their heads in bright folded patterns.
“You look like you’re about to fall over,” Kameron snickered at Emeronya, who scowled, adjusting the massive cloth headdress on her small head.
“Mayazatyl’s just as short as me,” Emeronya pointed out.
“The difference,” Mayazatyl sighed, “is that I look splendid.”
We laughed as she flirted with her reflection. The lounge belonged to Olugbade’s council, and jewelry and sashes draped a dozen floor-length mirrors. Servants had brought oranges and cream cakes, but the baskets lay untouched; excitement must have killed my siblings’ appetites. Several carafes of palm wine, however, lay open around the room.
“I’ll need some of that,” I said, and Sanjeet placed a goblet in my hand. Dayo lifted his cup to me from across the room, with a desperate stare that twisted my stomach. He wore an immaculate Oluwan agbada: a pale gold kaftan with heavily draped sleeves, winking with sunstones and raised white braid. Judging from the bags beneath his eyes, he had slept no better than I had.
I’m sorry, he Ray-spoke. I know sentencing your mother today will be hard—
Let’s not talk about it, I replied, avoiding his gaze, then said aloud, “Can we start?” I shivered in my thin robe. “I’m tired of being naked.”
Attendants signaled for a wizened griot to enter the chamber, and my dressing ritual began. The griot sang a parable about the triumph of justice, keeping time on a hand drum while, one by one, each of my council siblings handed me an item of clothing.
“As High Priestess, I will lean on you,” said Kirah, handing me part of my gown. “So as High Lady Judge, you may lean on me.”
“As High Lord General, I will lean on you,” said Sanjeet, handing me a bangle. “So as High Lady Judge, you may lean on me.”
“As High Lady of Castles,” said Mayazatyl, painting a dot on my brow, “I will lean on you . . .”
Soon all eleven of my siblings had murmured the vow of support, and I stood fully dressed before the semicircle of mirrors, not recognizing my maze of reflections.
My empire-cloth gown was so white, I was surprised it did not chill my skin. The fabric wrapped snugly around my frame and stopped beneath my arms, leaving my collarbone bare. An avalanche of cloth unfurled in a train from my shoulder blades. A necklace of polished cowrie shells draped in strands across my breast. Dots of paint, Swana-style, scattered the bridge of my nose, and arched over each eye. The tall points of a spiked halo headdress gleamed in my hair, ivory spears framing my face like moonbeams.
High Judge Thaddace would escort me into the ruling. When he arrived at the lounge, I curtsied, barely able to bend beneath the stiff fabric. I noticed then that we matched; instead of the plaid wool of Mewe, he wore an empire-cloth tunic, bleached white clashing uneasily with his pale complexion.
He offered his arm. When I laid mine on top, he leaned down and murmured, “There is no justice . . .”
“There is only order,” I finished tonelessly, and he nodded with approval. We left the lounge, Dayo and my council following in a silent procession.
I heard the Imperial Hall before I saw it.
The rumble of thousands: courtiers, commoners, royalty from all twelve realms, dialects colliding through the cavernous gilded chamber. Sandstone gleamed beneath the domed ceiling’s skylights. Twelve onyx pillars loomed overhead. Each was chiseled in the shape of a man or a woman, one for each realm of Aritsar. Their features were hauntingly detailed, and their bodies thick as cedar trees, several stories high. Together, the giants supported the Imperial Hall dome on their stone shoulders.
Usually, the hall held twelve thrones. Today there were twenty-four raised on a multilevel dais: a united front of emperor, prince, and both imperial councils. Olugbade and his council were already seated. All of them had dressed in the ghostly white empire cloth.
The rest of the hall was standing space, with people teeming on the floor and on tiers and balconies that stacked all the way up to the ceiling. Drummers and dancers lined the hall, leading the crowds in a chant as I walked toward the dais. The song was deafening, and to understand the words, I had to read the crowd’s lips. Kwesi Idajo. Seneca Idajo. Jiao Idajo. Mawusi Idajo. Helene Idajo. Obafemi Idajo. Thaddace Idajo. The names and title of every past Anointed High Judge, culminating at last with one phrase, over and over: Ta-ri-sai Idajo. Ta-ri-sai Idajo. Ta-ri-sai Idajo: Tarisai the Just.
My council took their seats. Then I climbed the great dais, my train rustling with each step. When I sank into the wood-carved throne by Dayo’s side, the crowd hushed to a hiss, like the icy Obasi Ocean. I looked straight ahead, holding my ivory-crowned head high, as a thousand gazes bored into my skin.
I cleared my throat, and winced as the sound ricocheted. Quetzalan architects had fashioned the dais from the same echo-stone used on the Theatre Garden stage. Dayo reached to give my arm a reassuring squeeze . . . and then thought better of it, folding his hands in his lap. Even now, the monster inside me hungered to hurt him, scanning the dais for easily accessible weapons. Again, I convinced her to wait. The world is watching. Too many contingencies. Then I swallowed and forced the rehearsed words up my throat.
“As heir to Thaddace of Mewe,” I said, “High Lord Judge of Aritsar, I invoke my right to preside over this hearing. Who brings a case before this court?”
“I do,” said Olugbade, also as rehearsed. He sat on a throne behind me, so I was spared seeing the pleasure on his face. “I, Olugbade, King of Oluwan and Oba of Aritsar, accuse Lady X, a Swana woman, of treason against the empire.”
More whispers, then booing and jeering, as from the entrance guards marched a figure in chains down the Imperial Hall. They had cleaned her up, I noticed, which on their part was a foolish mistake. Even in a threadbare wrapper, hair matted about her head, The Lady was stunning. Her posture was perfect, muscles taut beneath her weather-scarred skin. Chains clanked as the guards shoved her, forcing her shackled legs to buckle and kneel a few hundred feet from my dais. But she held herself erect, like a warrior—or an empress.
“The accused is before you, High Judge Apparent,” Olugbade intoned, barely containing the smugness in his voice. “You have reviewed the evidence. The punishment for treason is death. Shall you accept this case for your ruling?”
I stood, as he expected me to, and assessed the The Lady. She ignored my gaze, expression as blank and cold as her bust in the Bhekina House study. I heard Dayo shift in his seat next to me, and remembered my grim promise.
“No,” I replied to the emperor’s question. “I will hear another case today.”
The crowd hummed with surprise. Before Olugbade or Thaddace could interfere, I announced hastily, “According to the ancient rites set in place by Enoba the Perfect, a High Judge Apparent may hear any case that she sees fit. I remind
the court that the First Ruling, once passed, is irreversible. Who else brings a case before me?”
“I do,” cried a voice from the entrance. Amid a cacophony of murmurs, Keeya the merchant marched into the hall, brandishing her new son, barely three months old. Captain Bunmi and her Imperial Guard cohort, whom I had asked to protect Keeya on her journey to court, escorted the mother and child.
She stopped at the dais beside The Lady, who turned her eyes on me with brilliant curiosity. Keeya bobbed a curtsy, her waist-length cornrowed braids sweeping the floor. She held herself with dignity before the twenty-four looming thrones, though her voice shook as she said, “Please hear my case, High Judge Apparent.”
I gave her a smile of encouragement. “Whom do you accuse?”
Keeya took a deep breath, then pointed at Thaddace where he sat, speechless, on his throne. “His Anointed Honor, High Lord Judge Thaddace of Mewe.”
More gasps, and an enraged scoff from Olugbade. I held up a hand for the crowd’s silence. “With what do you charge him?”
Keeya held up the baby in her arms. “Causing discord between a husband and wife,” she said. “I want to give our son a Swana name: Bopelo. It has been in my family for generations, and I dishonor my ancestors by failing to pass on their legacy. But my husband disagrees. He fears that unless our newborn son has an empire name, he will never become a successful merchant. Anointed Honor Thaddace’s Unity Edict has caused all of this. If he had not requested that Arits give up realm names, I would not be fighting with my husband—and my son would have a name besides Baby.”
Shocked silence. Then the crowd began to buzz with laughter. It was ludicrous for a commoner to charge a High Lord Judge with causing her marital disputes. But according to the scrolls I had dug up in the Imperial Library . . . it was perfectly legal.
“I accept your case,” I said. “At this point in a ruling, a High Judge is supposed to ask for evidence. But I don’t need to. The evidence is all over Aritsar.” I turned my face up to the tiers of commoners and nobility, returning their wide-eyed stares. The crowds were grouped by realm, a semicircle of nations around the room.
I pointed through the hall’s towering arched windows, where bonfire clouds still stained the horizon. “The sky is burning with your stories,” I said. “The lives of your ancestors, the legacy of your children, vanished in smoke. Does unity cause strife between wives and husbands? Does it make an old woman weep in the streets? Does it make generals take up arms against their own people?”
Uneasy murmurs. I addressed the section of commoners and nobility from Swana, switching from Arit to their native tongue. Then I faced another part of the hall, repeating the phrase in Nyamban. Then I swallowed hard and faced another, and another, until I had addressed the crowd in Moreyaoese, Sparti, Biraslovian, Nontish, Quetzalan, Mewish, Oluwani, Djbanti, Dhyrmish, and Blessid. “Uniformity is not unity. Silence is not peace.”
The crowd was quiet now. I could feel Olugbade’s rage simmering behind me, ready to burst. I did not have much time. Quickly I switched back to Arit, bellowing so my words could not be undone. “I, Tarisai Idajo, rule in favor of Keeya of Swana. Peace comes when stories are celebrated, not erased. Henceforth, the Unity Edict shall be revoked”—I persevered over a sea of gasps—“and replaced with the Imperial Griot Games. Every twentieth moon, all realms must send their best griot to perform the stories of their people at the capital. The most talented griot shall be rewarded from the treasury, and all performers shall receive imperial titles, for their stories bring great honor to the empire. Let the record be sealed. My First Ruling is passed.”
“No,” Thaddace and the emperor roared in unison, leaping to their feet. But they were drowned out by a sound that made the hair stand on my arms. A sound that set my heart swelling in my chest, and my legs trembling with joy and fear.
Cheers. From every side of the Imperial Hall, people were cheering, pumping fists and stamping feet, chanting in a deafening din: Idajo. Idajo. Tarisai Idajo. Beside Keeya, The Lady turned in a slow circle. Her eyes widened to moons as she watched my name on the lips of thousands, and when she looked at me again, an expression that I had never seen before transformed her features.
Wonder.
A hand clamped around mine, sending a thrill to the monster inside me: Dayo. Heart pounding, I looked up at his face expecting to see disappointment. I had purposely misled him the night before. He had thought I would kill The Lady.
But he only looked worried. “You need to get out of here,” he whispered. “Now.”
“Let go of her,” Olugbade snapped at his son. “Guards. Guards!”
Sanjeet leapt to his feet, shielding me with his arm, and in a fluid movement my council siblings joined him, surrounding me and Dayo as we hurried down from the dais. “After them,” rasped the emperor, but when I looked back, Thaddace was restraining him.
“They’ve done nothing illegal,” the High Lord Judge said, and then gestured at the crowd and hissed, “The world is watching, Olu. It is not the time for rash decisions. Let them go.” He shot a sharp look my way. “We will sort this out in private.”
Captain Bunmi and her cohort escorted me, Dayo, and Keeya through a side door, our council siblings in tow. Keeya pressed her infant to her chest, protecting his ears from the noise still blaring from the hall.
“You can return to your village in a few months,” I told her. By then, I hoped, no imperialist vigilantes would be searching for the commoner who had dared challenge Thaddace. “For now, I’ve arranged a safe house in the Swana capital. Captain Bunmi will escort you. Your family will meet you there; I’ve made sure they will want for nothing.” I began to tell her where the house was, and then stopped, aware that palace walls had ears. I squeezed her hand instead, sending my memories of the safe house into her mind. “Thank you, Keeya.”
Her face glowed. “Thank you,” she said with a grin. “I think Tegoso will not question what I name our babies again.” She winked as Bunmi’s cohort led her away, raising her son’s tiny hand. “Wave goodbye, Bopelo. Goodbye to the High Lady Judge.”
CHAPTER 30
My council siblings, giddy with excitement, insisted on my return to the Children’s Palace.
“You don’t need to be alone now,” Mayazatyl pointed out. “You’re done studying. Your ruling’s over.”
I shook my head. Nothing was over. The ground shivered as Idajo, Idajo continued to echo through An-Ileyoba. Then the sound surged, and all I heard was drumming, pounding in my ears: It was always inside.
My blood ran cold as pieces of a puzzle came together in my mind. “I have to go,” I said.
Escaping from my council siblings’ protective huddle, I dashed across the palace, ripping off my ivory crown, unhooking my train, and discarding my slippers as I ran. Sanjeet was hard on my bare heels. “You can’t be alone,” he barked. “Not now. It’s not safe.” I ignored him, not stopping until we both reached my room in the north tower.
Aiyetoro’s drum lay by the window, next to The Lady’s mirror. I snatched it up, then looked around wildly. “I need something sharp.”
At my own request, I had not wielded a weapon since the night I had stabbed Dayo. Puzzled, Sanjeet unsheathed a dagger from his belt and handed it to me. Then he watched as I sliced open the head of Aiyetoro’s drum.
Several pieces of crumpled journal paper, thick with the rounded handwriting of Old Arit, toppled out . . . and then two objects clinked onto the stone floor.
Hands shaking, I picked up the jewel-toned masks and turned them in the light. They were shaped like the heads of lionesses, and each was carved with a word: Obabirin. Iyaloye. Empress. Crown Princess. Both masks roared with the memories of beating hearts, the strident voices of Kunleo girls, of Raybearers who refused to be silenced.
The obabirin mask had several stripes, representing the council members anointed by The Lady and her birth immunity. The iyaloye mask had only one stripe. Bright red, for the immunity I had been born with: burning.
“There have always been four,” I whispered. “Two rulers and two heirs. Raybearers. All of them.” An image flashed in my mind: the mural in the ceiling of Aiyetoro’s library. Overlapping gold discs. Two suns, surrounded by linking hands—a united Aritsar.
Sanjeet’s expression was calm. “After what just happened in that hall,” he said, leaning down and pressing his lips to mine, “if anyone doubts you, they’re a damned fool.”
“You shouldn’t kiss me,” I giggled, manic with nerves. “I’m still cursed. Still dangerous.”
“Very,” he said. “Very, very dangerous. And all of Aritsar knows it.” He kissed me again, and I trembled with laughter, heart thudding in my chest.
“Thaddace will challenge my ruling,” I said when we parted for air. “It’ll take him a while, but he’ll find a way to reverse it. I haven’t accomplished anything.”
“You’ve won the people’s hearts.” Sanjeet traced my brow, where my cloud of hair, unfettered by the ivory crown, now sprang around my face. “Not to mention the Imperial Guard. They remember what you did for Captain Bunmi, and they were miserable enforcing Thaddace’s edict. No matter how the emperor sullies your name, Aritsar won’t give up the hope you gave them today. Not without a fight.” He smiled and touched the crown princess mask with its mark of iyaloye. “You should call it. Say its name.”
I sucked in a breath, remembering how Dayo’s mask had flashed with light. It was the last test: the ultimate proof of a Raybearer.
“All right,” I murmured. “Iyalo—”
Then footsteps padded on the tower landing. Sanjeet held me close, putting a hand on his scimitar hilt—but it was Kirah who burst through the door.
“The emperor,” she panted. “He’s sentenced The Lady to death. He’s taken her back to Heaven, where she’ll be executed on the hour.” Her pupils were dilated, and tears spilled on her round cheeks. “I’m sorry, Tarisai.”
A warrior blocked our way at the bottom of the staircase to Heaven. “Pardon, Anointed Honors,” he stammered at me, Sanjeet, and Kirah. “I have orders from the emperor. Everyone authorized to facilitate the execution is already upstairs. If you like, you can watch downstairs from the courtyard, with the rest of the court—”
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