The Royalty Drum

A New Dawn, A New Burden

A soft mist curled through the Listening Grove as dawn light filtered between leaves. Zuberi stood alone at the grove's heart, hands folded in quiet ritual. Golden tendrils of spirit-sap wound around their wrists, pulsing in rhythm with the seed clenched in Ayanwale's palm.

Ayanwale approached softly, the Royalty Drum strapped across his back. The seed glowed gently—a living fragment of the Eleventh Rhythm's naming. Every fiber of Zuberi's being seemed both fragile and infinitely old.

Rotimi followed, eccentricity tempered in wake of cosmic stakes.

Zuberi lifted their eyes—pale as moonstone. No words, yet Ayanwale heard.

"She named me."

A breath of wind carried more than leaves—it carried memory itself.

Gathering of the Unspoken

They sat beneath Ọ̀kàǹgbá, the listening elder tree whose bark now shivered in unison with Zuberi's breath. Spirit-folk gathered in a silent ring. Even the Living Drums embedded in listening trees hummed low.

It was a rare council—no drums. No speech.

Only breath.

Ìrètí stepped forth.

Her presence commanded stillness. She held the silent cloak across her arm, knowing Zuberi would soon need it.

"I name you the Guardian of Echoes," her voice emerged from the hush. "You hold the seed and the silence—and so you guard memory now. There must be no breaking."

Zuberi inhaled, exhaled. The sap-thread coils brightened.

A ripple passed through the council—like a collective intake of breath.

Ayanwale bowed his head.

The Echo in Ayanwale

As ritual ended, Ayanwale slipped away toward the Stone Grove where the Ninth Rhythm was first released. Somewhere in the hush, he feared he heard the Eleventh's echo babbling through trees.

He pressed his palms to the Stone Grove's ancient altar. Heartbeat after heartbeat, the Ninth flowed beneath his fingers. But the echo of the Eleventh—fainter, deeper—vibrated in response. Not harmonizing—warring.

He shut his eyes.

A vision bloomed: Drums crashed under moonlit storms. Ancestral drummers wailing in looped rhythms of betrayal. A time before the Ninth and the Eleventh—before sound and silence separated.

One figure stood in the storm: a weaver woman, half-spirit, weaving threads of clay. She paused, looked at him.

Her face darkened in grief: Remember me.

A second later, the vision snapped away.

Ayanwale gasped.

He pressed his forehead to cold stone, whispering: "Who are you?"

Rising Unease

Rotimi found him at the grove's edge.

"You feeling okay?" Rotimi asked, watching cracks widen in stone beneath Ayanwale's palm.

He couldn't respond.

Because echo was answering.

Through the trees a melody drifted—one note in rhythm with his heartbeat, but layered with a ghostly second tone.

The Eleventh rhythm, unshaped yet relentless.

Rotimi frowned.

"How long until she arrives again?" he asked.

"I don't know," Ayanwale said, voice tight. "Only… I think I'm holding her, whether I mean to or not."

Flash of the Past

That night, Ayanwale dreamed again but this time he was collapsed near carved stone drums littered with ash and tears. An ancestor's altar glowed with spirit coals. Somewhere overhead, wind chanted lost names.

Baba Oro's silhouette indicted memory:

"You play the Ninth. You name her now. But will you bind her—or break her?" he asked.

A ghost-chord resonated between them. Rain fell around granite figures. The Eleventh's voice echoed between stone and spirit.

A dry voice replied from Ayanwale's lips: "I don't know... yet."

The world collapsed—light, sound, self—all unmade.

He woke alone, breath ragged.

Ritual of Binding

Days later, the council met again under a sky full of stars. The Listening Grove felt different. Leaves trembled.

Zuberi, wearing Ìrètí's silent cloak, seated themselves before the Living Drum at the Grove's center. The seed glowed in their lap. Rhythm threads stretched from their arm-mark into the earth.

Ayanwale knelt opposite. They unlocked eyes. No words—only purpose.

They began the Binding Rite: Two souls weaving memory into earth.

Zuberi inhaled.

Ayanwale struck the drum.

One resonance.

Two.

Three.

The air rang with the silent chorus—Ninth, Eleventh, even echoes of the Twelfth, reverberating through sap-marked roots.

Golden vines sprouted from Zuberi's wrist‑mark, weaving into a pattern that stitched the seed into grove soil. The Living Drum hummed life into shape. The Listening Trees glowed with sap.

But beneath them, the earth shivered.

As if something watched.

Intrusion

A scream ripped through the ritual—raw and starved. Not from either of them.

From the edge of the grove, a figure tumbled:

A boy, eyes rolling white, clutching symbols drawn in blood.

It was Kọ́lá—the mute seer-dancer.

He dropped into the grove, splattered runes telling: The Eleventh sings without restraint; the Ninth fights back.

He collapsed, skin pale as bone.

Zuberi leaned close.

A tap. Pause. A shimmer in sap. A diagnostic rhythm.

The seed glowed faintly.

A silence caved the ritual into fear.

The council gasped.

Zuberi stood, cloak swirling.

And each thread they carried snapped—loose rhythm snapped between worlds.

Conflict Ignites

The Listening Grove trembled.

The sacred soil cracked in fractal lines.

From the fissures: cold wind, rising.

Spirit dust whirred upward.

A specter emerged—tall, thin, wreathed in echoes.

Her voice within everyone:

"I AM THE ELEVENTH THAT BROKE BONDS."

She reached out—hands dripping ripple‑light.

Rotimi froze.

Zuberi stepped toward her, dagger of memory planted in palm.

Ayanwale raised the Royalty Drum.

But neither struck.

They listened.

She answered:

"I asked to be named. But naming me does not mean binding me."

The fissures widened. Roots reeled.

Zuberi placed the seed into the ground.

A single resounding pulse echoed through forest and flesh.

Three beats.

The Listening Trees responded: sap rain dripping into staff wood. The Living Drum sang deep.

And the Eleventh's echo cracked across the grove—shattering silence and song in equal measure.

Leaves rained down sap‑tears.

The Listening Grove collapsed into stillness.

Ayanwale pressed his palm to the drum.

The seed beneath Zuberi glowed bright.

The Listening Trees groaned.

In the quiet, the earth sighed one word:

"UNNAMED."

A echoes whisper followed: "Be ready."