At first, it seemed like coincidence.
A newborn in Ìlérò, who hummed before she cried.
A toddler in Ijèbú, who tapped perfect rhythm against stone without ever touching a drum.
And in Obade, a child born under a cloudless sky who spoke a full sentence before her mother had whispered her name:
"She is rising again."
Word spread slowly—then like wind in dry grass.
The river had remembered.
And its memory was being reborn.
The Midwives Speak
In a gathering held under the roots of the oldest baobab tree, midwives from across the region met.
Not in fear.
In wonder.
"They don't scream," one midwife said. "They arrive… listening."
"Some of them are born with marks," another whispered. "Symbols from the old myths—on their backs, their palms."
"And when they sleep," Iyagbẹ́kọ added, "they dream together."
Dreams of the Drowned
The Riverchildren, as they were soon called, began recounting dreams.
Not childish fantasy.
Shared memory.
They spoke of queens crowned in silence.
Of fire rituals once erased.
Of songs that had never been sung aloud, yet emerged from their lips fully formed.
Kẹ́hìndé—now Keeper—watched over them quietly.
He did not teach them.
He only observed.
For they already knew.
Gifts Without Teaching
Èkóyé tested one boy by placing an unstrung drum in front of him.
Without touching it, the child began to hum.
The drum vibrated.
Rhythm emerged from its core.
No hands.
Just memory.
Rerẹ́ called it "inherited resonance."
"The Archive taught through instruction," she said.
"But the river teaches through inheritance.
Not of blood—but of breath."
The Child Called Echo
One child stood apart.
A girl found floating in a reed cradle at the edge of the mist.
She bore no name.
No parents came.
But her voice—when she spoke—repeated anything spoken to her with added truth beneath it.
If you said, "The river flows," she would respond, "Yes, but it also waits."
If you said, "The queens are gone," she would murmur, "Their footsteps are in your throat."
They called her Echo.
And Echo began to walk between villages, pausing at sacred spots, humming fragments of the Old Myth like breadcrumbs left for the future.
The Elders Fear, Then Listen
Not all welcomed the Riverchildren.
Some elders feared disruption.
"If the children come knowing what we have only begun to remember, what role is left for us?" one asked.
Iyagbẹ́kọ answered simply:
"To guard what they bring.
Not to direct it.
To protect it from forgetting—again."
A New Circle Forms
On the banks of the same ceremonial platform where the Naming Ritual began, the children gathered.
Uncoached.
Uncalled.
They arrived in silence.
Then began to move—not like dancers.
Like water.
Each child mimicked a different flow:
A slow spiral.
A tumbling wave.
A pulse of stillness.
Together, they formed a river with their bodies.
And the people watching?
They did not clap.
They did not weep.
They simply knelt.
The River Speaks Again
That night, the river's edge glowed with a soft blue fire.
Not burning.
Just becoming.
And from it came a voice—not queen, not elder, not ancestor.
A child's voice, filled with both age and innocence:
"You remembered us.
Now, let us remember you."
And the water laughed.
Not mockingly.
Joyfully.
As if greeting its own future.
Final Lines
The Riverchildren are not answers.
They are openings.
Not born to lead or obey—but to echo a world where rhythm is not taught, but known.
And in their footsteps, the next story begins.
Not in silence.
But in listening returned.