The twins were awake before the bells.
They always were, on mornings when the world leaned too hard toward decision.
Imade had ordered the inner sanctums sealed tighter than usual after Ayo's death. Extra guards. Layered wards. Silence protocols meant to keep fear from bleeding inward. The twins were not prisoners, but the distinction grew thinner with every sunrise.
That morning, the air itself betrayed the truth.
It pressed against the stone walls like a held breath, vibrating faintly, as if the island were listening to something far away and translating it into tension.
Tunde sat up first.
He was the quieter of the two, though no one ever used that word around him anymore. Quiet implied absence. Taye was never absent. He noticed everything and stored it carefully, like a ledger no one else could see.
"You feel it," he said.
Beside him,kafe nodded, already pulling her knees to her chest. "They chose."
It was not a question.
The twins did not see visions. They did not hear voices. Whatever the prophecy claimed about them, it had not gifted them with spectacle. What they had instead was resonance—a sensitivity to intention, to the subtle shift that happened when many people leaned the same way at once.
Someone had leaned.
Far above them, in the corridors they were not meant to walk alone anymore, the stronghold stirred with constrained urgency. Boots moved faster than protocol allowed. Steel whispered against leather. Somewhere distant, a gate sigil cycled open, then closed again.
Kafe tilted her head. "That one hurts," she said softly.
Taye closed his eyes. He could almost trace it—like a string pulled too tight and then let go. "Kola," he said after a moment.
Imani sighed. "I know."
They had met Kola only a handful of times, always under supervision, always brief. But he carried his emotions openly, like banners he forgot to lower. To the twins, that made him loud.
"He's afraid," Taye added. "And angry."
"And trying to be brave about it," kafé said.
The door sigil chimed softly.
Imade entered alone.
She had dismissed the guards outside the inner threshold—not because protection was unnecessary, but because this conversation could not be overheard. She moved carefully, as though each step carried weight beyond stone and bone.
The twins rose instinctively.
"You don't have to," Imade said.
They stood anyway.
Imade looked at them for a long moment, then allowed herself to exhale. Leadership, she had learned, required the discipline to carry more than you showed. With the twins, that discipline had limits.
"Something has changed," Tunme said.
"Yes," Imade replied.
Kafé frowned. "Someone left."
Imade did not correct her. "A group did," she said. "Against orders."
Taye absorbed that in silence. Imani's fingers tightened in the fabric of her sleeve.
"Because of Ayo," kafe said.
"Yes."
"And because of us," Taye added.
Imade met his eyes. She did not deflect. "Yes."
The truth sat between them, unadorned.
Kafé's voice wavered, just slightly. "We didn't ask for this."
"I know," Imade said. "And you should never have to apologize for existing."
"But everyone keeps moving like we're a destination," kafe said. "Like if they get us somewhere specific, everything will stop."
Imade knelt so she was level with them. "That is exactly what we are trying to prevent."
She placed a hand flat against the floor, feeling the wards hum beneath the stone. "The prophecy tries to turn you into endpoints. Into answers. We are fighting to keep you as people."
Taye considered that. "People still make choices," he said.
"Yes," Imade agreed. "And that frightens those who prefer certainty."
A distant vibration rippled through the chamber—not violent, but wrong.
Kafé stiffened. "That wasn't here."
"No," Imade said. "It wasn't."
She rose. "You stay here. Both of you."
Imani shook her head immediately. "You said we're not prisoners."
Imade hesitated.
That pause told them everything.
Above, beyond stone and ward, Kola's group moved through terrain that should not have been empty.
The path they followed was visible, mapped, patrolled. That was the cruelty of it. The enemy had not hidden.
They had stepped aside.
Kola felt the absence too late.
The forest ahead thinned unnaturally, trees spacing themselves with geometric precision. Birds did not scatter. Insects did not hum. The world felt edited.
"This is wrong," one of the scouts whispered.
Kola lifted his hand. Too late.
The veil dropped.
Not as a wall, but as a shift—reality folding inward, light narrowing, sound dampening. Sigils flared underfoot, not trapping them, but isolating them.
Far away, Seyi felt it.
The abyss did not shout. It pointed.
"They've sprung it," he said, already moving.
Imade turned sharply. "How bad?"
"They're not dead," Seyi replied. "Not yet. But they're being repositioned."
"Toward what?"
Seyi did not answer immediately.
"Toward attention," he said at last.
Inside the inner sanctum, the twins felt it too.
Kafé gasped as the pressure shifted, like gravity briefly choosing a new direction. Taye grabbed her hand.
"They're pulling on us," Kafe whispered.
Imade froze.
Seyi's warning echoed in her mind: The enemy doesn't move us. It makes us move ourselves.
Imade made a decision she had been dreading since the prophecy first surfaced.
She broke protocol.
"Come with me," she said.
Kafé's eyes widened. "You said—"
"I said I would not let you be endpoints," Imade replied. "That means you cannot remain unseen forever."
Taye swallowed. "Are we safe?"
"No," Imade said honestly. "But you will be present."
As they moved through corridors never meant for them, the stronghold reacted—not resisting, but adjusting. Wards bent. Paths shortened. The island itself seemed uncertain whether to stop them.
Somewhere beyond perception, something ancient leaned forward.
Not in hunger.
In recognition.
The twins reached the overlook just as the sky shifted again, clouds aligning into that same impossible geometry.
Kafé squeezed Taye's hand. "It's listening," she said.
Taye nodded. "And waiting to see who we are."
Below, forces converged. Above, fate held its breath.
For the first time, the twins were not merely protected.
They were aware.
And the storm—long predicted, long edited—had finally noticed them noticing back.