It began with a pull — not a voice, not a sound, but a quiet insistence that bloomed deep in Iyi's chest like the slow unfurling of a fern. It was a familiar call, ancient and intimate, stirring just beneath his skin.
By dawn, he knew where he had to go.
He packed lightly: a bar of soap wrapped in palm cloth, a pouch of dried herbs, and a bottle of spring water. The city still slept, its breath soft and heavy. Kola, his young helper, had not yet arrived at the stall. Iyi scribbled a note and tucked it under a tin can: Gone for a journey. Keep the stall clean. You are ready.
The road to the outskirts stretched long, littered with echoes of Lagos's contradictions — rusting rooftops beside rising hotels, barefoot children chasing dreams through alleys shadowed by new construction. But Iyi did not pause. His path was not forward — it was backward. Back to a place where his spirit had once broken… and begun to mend.
The herbalist's hut was not on any map. It was tucked deep in the bushland behind a forgotten grove, where the air tasted like old smoke and stories clung to the trees. It took him nearly five hours by bus and foot. But when he arrived, he recognized it immediately.
Only now, something had changed.
The hut stood — still round, still humble — but overgrown. Vines curled like fingers around the roof's edges, and the doorway hung half-covered in reeds. The air was still, heavy with the scent of wet earth and unspoken words.
Iyi approached slowly.
"Agba Oye?" he called, softly.
No answer.
He stepped inside.
Dust motes danced through beams of sunlight slanting from the roof. The shelves, once lined with calabashes and scrolls, now sat mostly bare. A single stool lay overturned. Cobwebs veiled the corners like forgotten prayers.
But on the central mat, where once sat the old man with cowrie eyes, there was something new.
A bundle — tightly wrapped in ochre cloth, sealed with a river-stone.
Iyi knelt beside it.
His hands hesitated. This place had taught him that not all gifts were to be taken lightly. Some carried weight. Some changed you forever.
But the call had brought him here. And the river had always whispered: To heal is to receive, and to receive is to risk.
He opened the bundle.
Inside lay a dried sponge — blackened but whole — wrapped in a string of small cowries and soaked in a scent that made the hairs on his arms rise. It was the scent of memory. Of fire. Of passage.
Beside the sponge was a folded note.
"For when you must choose between your voice and their applause."
Iyi exhaled shakily.
The sponge was not for bathing. It was not for cleansing. This was a witness. An object forged for ritual, for discernment, for judgment.
He understood then: Agba Oye was gone. Not vanished, but ascended. The hut was no longer a sanctuary, but a shrine.
Iyi lit the small clay lamp on the altar and sat on the mat. The silence pressed in, but it did not suffocate. It listened.
He held the sponge in both hands.
"You gave me three," he said aloud. "One for survival. One for surrender. One for silence."
He looked around the empty hut, the place where his soul had once been stripped bare.
"This fourth," he said slowly, "is for voice."
Outside, wind rustled the trees.
He sat in stillness, letting the sponge rest on his lap, the scent soaking into his skin.
And as he closed his eyes, he remembered: the boy who hungered, the spirits who tested, the market that watched, the river that bent backward.
He remembered the scream of the burnt coin, the offer of gold-rimmed power, and the dream of voices hidden in fire.
And in the silence of the herbalist's hut, he made a vow.
Not to rise.
Not to conquer.
But to serve.
To speak only when the words healed.
To build only what the ancestors would bless.
To leave behind a name that need not be shouted to be remembered.
When he opened his eyes, night had fallen.
The lamp still burned.
He stood, gently rewrapped the sponge, and placed it inside his satchel.
Then he bowed low before the empty mat, whispered a prayer for Agba Oye, and stepped out into the night.
The stars blinked above him, quiet and vast. The forest did not follow him — it simply watched.
He walked down the same path he had arrived on, only now, he felt different.
Lighter.
Not empty.
But clear.