After the doctor deemed Abeni completely sane, apart from the fact that she was still grieving, the white-haired girl tried to run away from her uncle a second time.

Away from the clinic, nearby hospital, brightly lit hotel and even the large village hall, and down the roads where a few nearby fabric shops lay. Dust-free shops with windows where people could buy various materials to write on, get tailored clothes like her Iya did for Abeni instead of having to make it herself, and the female ẹda could hide behind the counters. Little witnesses, a lot of space, it was possible.

But...he caught her again. Physically restraining her from resuming her search until Abeni was put behind the wooden door of thei— her decently sized stone hut on the outskirts of the village which could hold up to twenty people, with nothing more than a “Good night.”

By the time Abeni heard his footsteps fade away, her will to leave disappeared. She fell to the floor, face planted onto the smoothened gravel, laying there for the rest of the day and night despite her rumbling tummy. Cold and alone with no one to be with her.

Perhaps this was how her life was going to be from now on.

The next day, Abeni woke up with a backache, a bump on her scalp where Uncle Ibrahim hit her and a pained stomach. So, she stood and cleaned herself off with a cold shower and went to their food basket. Biting her lip when she noticed how her favourite dishes were here and heated one up on the fireplace.

Finally, finally accepting with a torturous, relentless ache in her head that Baba and Iya didn’t survive. Squashing the tiny hope she hadn’t realised she had been holding onto. Otherwise, they’d be here already, wrapping Abeni up in their arms and telling her that everything was OK. But they were not. They couldn’t come back to her, they weren’t coming back to her…and the female ẹda wasn’t either.

Abeni thought about it. The possibility of the female ẹda staying in the area overnight was incredibly low. How could she have not gotten caught? And if she had, how would there not be bloodshed already? Audible chaos? As Abeni had seen and even what the chief said, defeating even one ẹda was tremendously difficult and though she hasn’t left home yet, her quiet surroundings convinced her nothing had happened. Plus...

“What do you take me for? We will be together until we reach that village of yours.”

That’s what she said. Meaning that now that Abeni was home, the female ẹda was gone. She had to be.

But what did that mean for Abeni?

How should she live from now on?

A funeral…

She would hold a funeral.

That was the first thing that people did in times like these, right? To deal with everything. To learn to live with themselves. To be able to breathe properly again. At least, that’s what her parents told her.

So, Abeni got up off her bum in the same adire-shirt and shorts with pink at the bottom that she wore on her birthday and went to the village’s main marketplace. Armed with what little pocket money that she had left in her white purse. To brainstorm. Only now finding it frustrating that her parents didn’t take any extra food with them because even the dry edible leaves that Abeni nibbled on the moment she bought them would’ve soothed her on her travels back here.

But, of course, her parents never expected things would go like that, so it made sense. They probably planned to grab some food – that she would learn all the names of as soon as possible – on the way back anyway. Maybe from a traveller.

“Hey lovely lady! Here’s a bag of mushrooms all for one zinc! You won’t find a better deal anywhere else!”

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“Three for one! Three for one! Three for one! I repeat! Three for one!”

“You! Yes, you! Would you like a candle to light up your hut?”

Abeni clutched her purse even tighter. The moment Abeni walked away from the dry leaves stall, she was greeted by other merchants all shouting different things. Some on the floor with nothing but fabric as a stall and some selling seasonings, stones or even dead moles and small fish. But nothing about holding a funeral.

Should she ask someone? That would make the most sense. One of these adults must be able to explain how to hold one and once she knew that…

“Painkillers from the surface! Get them for cheap! Painkillers from the surface!”

“I wish I could just tell them to be quiet. They’re so loud…” Abeni mumbled to herself with a frown, knowing it would be unnecessary to use her ability here but wanting to so badly.

“What is?”

“The merchants…oh!” Abeni looked up to see a tanned male merchant with rough hands behind a wooden table with stone carving tools looking down at her with a grin, “Not you. Them,” she denied, tilting her head to the poorly dressed woman stretching over her display to pull someone her way, either ignoring the awkwardness of her actions or not caring as long as it got things sold.

“Haha! I’m just as bad, don’t you worry,” the man puffed up his chest as he laughed to himself, and Abeni found herself able to let her guard down a little bit.

“Oh…I see,” maybe this man was worth asking? He seemed to be a nice person, “Say, could I ask you something?”

“What is it, little one?”

Abeni hesitated. Was it wrong for her to tell him something so morbid so early on in the day? To share her loss with someone in a good mood? She wasn’t sure.

“What is it?” The tanned merchant pressed with a smile. But...who else could Abeni ask in this marketplace?

Later, she’d regret ever consulting him.

“I…lost my parents recently,” Abeni started, assessing his face as it didn’t change. Still holding a wide smile, “and I wanted to hold a funeral for them. But…I’ve never held one, or been to one…” The families of those who died on hunts didn’t really mention any funerals, she just knew they were buried in the graveyard, “I wanted to know if you had any advice on how to do it?”

“Hm…who did you say they were?”

Huh? “They…” He was still smiling. Had she been worried for nothing? “They were ‘junior manipulators’, you might know them! Their names ar—”

“Junior manipulators! Oh that…say, did they leave a lot behind?”

What? “What?”

The tanned merchant leant in with a cheeky smile, putting an arm around her shoulders, “Like weapons and stuff?”

Abeni shouldn’t have said that, “May-be...but, that’s not what I aske—!”

“Well? Did they—?”

Abeni felt her heart rise to her throat, heat rushing to her head. Why was he asking about that? Was this normal? “I just lost my parents. I’m not going to talk about what they left behind.”

But he looked genuinely confused, “Huh? Why not? It was inevitable that they would die. They were probably hunters. The village chief said that every time they announce a new…oh…I forgot, you’re still a child,” he sighed before leaning in even closer until she could smell his insect smelling breath, “Listen, little one. They were hunters and this is a violent underworld. Don’t be too hung up on it. Anywa—”

But Abeni scowled at him and ran away before he could continue. Running and running past stalls and buildings until she crashed into someone and felt onto the floor. She immediately grounded herself and assessed the situation. Was she in danger? Should she brace herself? But then realised that it was just a man with a familiar herb-like smell. Uncle Ibrahim.

Uncle Ibrahim who repeated the same thing as the tanned merchant had in his big green poncho. Slapping her arm a bit too hard when he brushed off her questions about the funeral and seemed mostly concerned with the fruits of her parent’s minimal past hunts. Hunts Abeni didn’t even know much about because they were a rank she still didn’t understand.

Was there anyone under and above junior manipulators? Given the word junior, it was likely, but she didn’t have enough information to be sure. No one ever told her about any of this until the day prior! And frankly, Abeni didn’t care. Because everyone, the chief, that tanned merchant and now Uncle Ibrahim, kept telling her things she didn’t want to hear and not what she wanted to hear.

Like how she could hold a funeral and that they sympathise with her. That they care for her. Was that really so hard for them to say?

Abeni felt lonely.

“That’s what I think. Why do you even want to have a fune—? Where are you going? Abeni!”

So, once she separated from her uncle after evading his queries, Abeni gripped her purse again and headed down to a stone hut still on the outskirts like hers, but on the opposite end of the village. If the adults didn’t understand her, if the female ẹda wouldn’t help her, wouldn’t stay with her. Then maybe a teenager her age would.

Maybe...

Maybe her crush would.

Maybe Martin would.

[Current Total Beings In ‘Abeni’s Army’ – 1]