Prologue
Before the earth had names, before the rivers were mapped by men, there was the drum.
It beat beneath the soil. It echoed in the bones of the trees. It lived in the wombs of women.
In the beginning, they say the gods did not speak with thunder. They whispered through cowrie shells, through fireflies dancing in palm wine, through the hum of wind between baobab roots.
It was in this time, long before borders or ink-stained maps, that the first daughters were born.
They came from *Nri*, the kingdom of earth and sky, where yam was king and men bowed to the spirits of the land. Nri was untouched by war. Blood was taboo. Its priests did not raise swords—they raised knowledge.
It is said the *firstdaughter*, *Nkemjika*, was born when a python coiled itself three times around her mother's hut and refused to move until the child cried out. When she did, rain fell for seven days. The elders called her *EzigboNwa*—child of the gods.
But this is not her story.
This is the story of *Adamma*, born generations later in the same line, on the night of the blood moon. A girl marked not only by prophecy—but by curse.
They say when Adamma was born, the village midwife died with her mouth open, eyes wide. And no one remembered the words she was about to speak.
The earth trembled that night. The river broke its banks. And in the sky, the moon bled.
But the drums never stopped.
And so the elders buried the fear. The priests looked to their scrolls. The women lit fires. And the child grew…
But dust remembers.
And someday, every forgotten god comes home.
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