Omolade sat at her loom, the shuttle a heavy weight in her hand. The threads were tangled, the pattern obscured. She felt the grief of the village, a tangible, humming presence. The women’s keening was a low, mournful drone.
She thought of her family, of her life before Elesin. Her life was a simple, beautiful pattern. But now, all the colors were muted, all the threads were stained.
A young man, his face a grim mask of resolve, came to her. It was Olunde.
He did not speak. He simply stood before her, the grief in his eyes an open wound.
"You have come to see me," Omolade said, her voice soft and clear. "To see what has become of your father's final wish."
"I have come to see the damage," Olunde said, his voice raw.
"The damage is not to me," Omolade said, gesturing to the silent, trembling loom. "The damage is to the pattern."
Olunde looked at her, truly looked at her, and saw not a victim, but a vessel of quiet strength. He saw the same dignity that had guided his father's final wish, and his mother's sorrow. He saw the honor that Elesin had forfeited.
"My father," Olunde said, his voice a low, fierce whisper, "clung to the world."
"And now the world must mourn him," Omolade said. "For what he was, and what he should have been."
Olunde left, and Omolade watched him go. She felt a kinship with this man of two worlds, this man who had come home to find a broken home. She picked up the shuttle, and began to work on the tangled threads. She would not create a new pattern, not yet. First, she would unravel the old, and mend what she could.
Part Three
7.
The news reached Iyaloja on a wave of hushed whispers and terrified exclamations. It came with the sound of a woman screaming, a high, thin sound that tore the fabric of the morning air.
It was Olunde. He had, with a fierce and profound sense of duty, undone his father's failure. He had, in his own way, completed the journey.
A small group of market women brought the news, their faces a mix of grief and awe. Olunde had taken his own life, a sacrifice to mend the torn cosmos. He had become what his father refused to be.
Iyaloja walked slowly to the jail where Elesin was held. The constables, their faces a mixture of confusion and fear, let her pass. They did not understand the cosmic earthquake they had witnessed, only the political and social tremor.
Elesin was huddled in the corner of his cell, a figure of pathetic ruin. He had been so full of life, and now he was an empty husk.
"They have brought me news, Elesin," Iyaloja said, her voice a low, sorrowful whisper. "Your son has taken your place. The blood of the Oba has been spilt."
Elesin looked up, his eyes wide and uncomprehending. "My son? No, my son is in England. He is a doctor. He has no part in this."
"He came home for your passage," Iyaloja said. "And he found your failure. And so he took up your duty. He has become the Horseman you refused to be."
The words hit Elesin like a physical blow. The pathetic life he had clung to, the life he had fought for, was now a source of unimaginable shame. The last of his glory, his name, his lineage, had been consumed by his son's sacrifice.
Iyaloja walked away, leaving him to the darkness. She heard his low, animal sound of grief, the sound of a man who has lost not only his life, but his soul.
8.
The Pilkings' house was a mausoleum of silence. Simon Pilkings, his face pale and bewildered, sat in his chair, a glass of untouched liquor beside him.
"He… he killed himself," Simon whispered, the words incomprehensible to him. "But... we saved him!"
Jane looked at her husband, and saw the full, terrible extent of his arrogance. He had seen himself as a benevolent god, and had only succeeded in becoming a tragic fool. He had stopped one death, and his action had precipitated a worse, more profound one. He had, in his ignorance, broken a cosmic law he did not even know existed.
A constable knocked on the door, his face ashen. "The prisoner, sir. Elesin. He… he is dead. He strangled himself with his chains."
The news was a final, terrible punctuation mark. Elesin had finally made his passage, but it was a bitter, shamed passage.
Jane watched her husband, this man who was so sure of his rightness, crumble into a defeated, confused heap. He had come to fix the world, and had only broken it further.
9.
In the center of the market, the women had gathered. They did not mourn, not with the wails of a traditional funeral. Their grief was a quiet, deep sound. The young bride, Omolade, stood in their midst. She had been married to Elesin, but had never truly known him. She was a widow, not of a man, but of a cosmic order that had been shattered and then imperfectly restored.
Iyaloja stood beside her, her hand on Omolade’s shoulder.
"The patterns are broken," Omolade said, her voice clear and strong. "The threads are tangled. But the loom remains."
The market women looked at her, at the young woman who had, through a cosmic lottery, been placed at the center of their tragedy. They saw not a victim, but a new vessel.
Omolade sat at her loom, which had been brought to the center of the market. She began to untangle the threads, the reds and blues and yellows of their lives. The work was slow, painstaking. But it was a work of healing. She would weave a new pattern, a pattern that honored the dead and taught the living. She would, in her quiet way, restore the balance.
The white man’s world would continue, with its iron roads and its loud, empty laws. But the market, the heart of the village, would be healed. Not by a hero’s sacrifice, but by a weaver's patient, honest work.
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