The night Adekunle was born, the moon turned black,
and every drum in Ile-Aro began to beat alone.
His mother, Morenike, held him against her breast
while thunder rolled beneath the earth, not above it.

By morning, an iroko had risen beside their home,
though no tree had stood there the night before.
Upon its trunk were carved three words:
THE CHILD IS MINE.

Adekunle grew knowing nothing of this omen.
He wrestled with boys, hunted with his father,
laughed with his sister Yetunde beside the river,
and dreamed of becoming a warrior like other men.

But strange things followed him.
Snakes curled peacefully around his sleeping feet.
Fire refused to burn his skin.
And whenever he bled, flowers grew from the soil.

On his twenty-first birthday,
the sacred iroko split open.

From beneath its roots came a voice
so deep the village walls began to tremble.

“Adekunle.”

His mother dropped to her knees.

“Do not answer.”

Again the voice called.

“Adekunle, my son.”

Then Morenike confessed what she had hidden for years:
his father was not the man who had raised him,
but Ajalorun, an ancient being beneath the earth—
a forgotten god whose name belonged to no temple.

Long ago, men had chained Ajalorun beneath the iroko
after he tried to open the gates between spirits and men.
But gods cannot break chains forged by human hands.

Their children can.

The earth suddenly opened across Ile-Aro.
From the darkness rose warriors without faces,
carrying spears carved from human bones.

Adekunle reached for his father’s sword.

But the voice beneath the tree laughed.

“That weapon cannot save them.”

The iroko roots curled around Adekunle’s feet.

“Break my chains, and I will destroy their enemies.”

Adekunle looked toward his burning village,
then toward Morenike, who was quietly weeping.

“Mother… why are you afraid?”

She looked at her son and whispered,

“Because those creatures are not attacking the village.”

The faceless warriors suddenly knelt before Adekunle.

“They came to welcome their prince.”