The Abiriba hills stood like ancient sentinels, cloaked in mist and crowned by centuries of mystery. No traveler climbed them without offering libation to the spirits that whispered through the wind-carved stones. To reach the sacred plateau, one had to pass three marked thresholds — each watched over by the unseen.
Uzoaru and Nwanne stood at the base of the path, the morning sun stretching their shadows across the red earth. Their clothes were dusted with ash and leaves, their eyes sunken but alert. Days of trekking, surviving beasts, rivers, and whispers had worn them thin — yet something stronger than rivalry now tethered them together: survival.
They said those who climbed the hills met visions of their own truths. And that not all returned sane.
As they stepped into the first threshold — a narrow path carved into the rock — the silence became heavier. Birds ceased to sing. The wind stilled. Nwanne felt her skin prickle, her thoughts beginning to turn inward, as though a hand was peeling back her defenses.
Then came the first vision.
Uzoaru stumbled, suddenly seeing herself in her father's compound — her mother on the ground, weeping, clutching Uzoaru's hands after the prince's illness."You will lose yourself if you tie your heart to a man of kings," her mother whispered in the vision, "Choose the path where your soul breathes."
Uzoaru blinked hard. The voice echoed as if it had come from inside her.
Nwanne, meanwhile, saw her own reflection in a pool of water that hadn't been there before. In it, she was dressed in white — a bride — not to the prince, but to the faceless man she had taken comfort in when Nwabueze had fallen."Why do you chase a crown not forged for your head?" the vision asked."Because it should have been mine," she answered aloud, trembling.
By the second threshold — a twisted banyan tree — the weight grew unbearable. The maidens fell to their knees, gasping as ancestral voices rose around them. They weren't speaking any known dialect, yet the meanings sank into their bones.
"You seek love. But do you offer truth?"
"You seek the crown. But can you carry the cost?"
Their eyes met — and for a brief moment, their animosity gave way to mutual terror. They were not just chasing a prince anymore. They were confronting the spirits of Abiriba — and of themselves.
At the third threshold — a stone platform surrounded by ancient carved masks — they were made to speak their truest desire aloud.
"I want him healed," Uzoaru whispered. "Even if he never chooses me."
"I want to be chosen," Nwanne confessed. "Even if it costs everything."
A wind surged, warm and heavy like a mother's breath, and passed over them. The masks on the rocks shifted — some turning away, others staring more intently. And then, silence again.
The path cleared. The plateau awaited. They had survived the hills.
But something in each of them had changed.
Something that would soon determine what the crown — and the curse — would demand next.