CHAPTER ONE:

“I’m tired oh! We’ve been walking around the barracks all morning and there is no single place to photocopy? Me I am tired oh!” Temidayo complained to her friend, Ademide.

“Maybe we should go outside the barracks, there should be a shop that photocopies around the palace area” Ademide suggested

“Are you mad? You know how scary that path is and by the way not just anybody can go to the palace eh!” Temidayo said obviously scared by the idea of going to the palace.

“And who said we were going to the palace? I’m also scared of that place too na. The palace is not the only place outside the barracks na we can just follow the other route” Ademide explained trying to calm Temidayo

“Ademide, shut up, no matter what route we follow we would have to get past the palace. You should know the town of Eleko so well by now girl, let’s just go back home” Temidayo said

The sixteen years old girls were looking for a photocopy shop where they could print out their WAEC examination results. It was a Sunday morning so most of the shops in the town were closed for the day, they were supposed to have printed it out the day before but they played the day away and now their parents had asked them to find a way to print out the results or else they were going to be punished.

“But you know daddy is going to hit me if I don’t print those results out today, I’m scared of my father’s KOBOKO O!” Ademide said as she shivered at the thoughts of being whipped by her father’s KOBOKO.

They finally decided to look for a photocopy place outside the barracks where they live; they lived in the barracks because both their Fathers were soldiers.

“Look, the shops here are closed, Ademide this is as far as we can go and you know it” Temidayo said this time turning back in the direction of the barrack gates

“Wait, we can search further a bit” Ademide urged

“Is that how scared you are of your dad? I’m going no further o you can go on if you want but I am not going with you, bye”

And with that said, Temidayo turned back leaving Ademide continued on the path towards the palace.

The thing with the palace was that the people were never sure of the exact location of the palace but they knew that it was around the area. They were scared that they might at a time enter the palace grounds unknowingly so the people, especially the ladies mostly stayed away from the area.

The fear Ademide had for her father’s cane was more than her fear for the palace grounds after all the people at the palace wouldn’t kill her, the most they could do was chastise her for coming into the palace without having an appointment.

Meanwhile, inside the palace’s main building the queen was having a conversation with the town’s seer. The crown prince was clocking 18 soon and it was about the time that a bride was betrothed to him. It was tradition in the royal family that when the heir to the throne was going 18, The seer would look in to finding his future bride, Traditional rights would be performed and the key to the prince’s heart would literally be giving to the bride to be. Once the bride had the key

not physically

the prince’s heart would stop beating. There was a slight clause tho, the prince and the bride wouldn’t meet one another, and the bride would also have no memory of being betrothed. It’s until the prince is ripe and ready for marriage then he would go out to the world to find his bride. He would know he had met her if his heart beats again.

“My Queen, he gods say that the bride to the heir will walk into the palace grounds on her own anytime from now.” The seer said to the queen. It seemed to be exactly what the queen wanted to hear because she smiled widely.

Still walking around, looking for a photocopy shop, Ademide came across a man wearing a red caftan, his dreadlocks stopping below his waist; he was looking down into nothing.

“Excuse me sir, is there a business centre nearby?” Ademide asked the man

This man did not say anything instead he pointed his index finger towards the right, without looking up.

Ademide took the hint and followed the path on her right.

After she left, the man raised his face up and shockingly his eyeballs were nowhere to be seen, he didn’t even have a face. It was just skin and no facial organs at all.

Skipping along, she came across a beautiful gate; realising that she was standing before the palace gates she decided to return since her efforts for the day had been in vain, she would just have to beg her father so well until he forgave her. But turning her back to the gate, she didn’t know which way to go, she suddenly saw a three way road which wasn’t there when she was coming. She knew going the wrong way would mean getting lost. She then thought it was best to go into the palace and get a palace helper to help find her way home. Turning back to face the gate, she was blinded by the brightest light of them all, her sight went dark immediately as she collapsed to the ground and passed out.