18°41'34.2"N 12°55'10.6"E

  Bilma, Niger

  23.05.2024 – 01:15 UTC +01

  “You can leave us.”

  I turned around and looked at the gunmen. After hearing only the others’ hearts, it was my heartbeat’s turn to become faster in my eardrums, as the gunmen reluctantly headed to the stairs and elevator. I knew I had caused something big, something important, but the Calling in all its wisdom had now subsided. I had to make my own choices from that point onwards.

  “You too,” the tall woman – Kabiru had just called her Aisa – commanded the rest around the table. The three men stood up and left. They were dressed impeccably, much like the guests on the lower floor. One of them winked at me as he passed by and headed to the elevator.

  It only took five minutes until it was just me and the tall woman in the room. And Kabiru’s body, contorted by the poison.

  “Tsk,” the woman said, “poor Kabiru. All he had to do was listen.” She kneeled and grabbed the bottle with the tampered liquor. She stood up and stared right at me.

  “You want some?” She asked. I looked at her, perplexed, as she poured some of it into her glass and promptly drank from it. “Ah, it also tastes vile. This would never have worked without you.”

  I tried to piece everything together. I had not dared speak a word, hoping my Calling would soon take over again and get me out of where it had led me.

  “I thought you spoke Arabic?” The woman asked me.

  “Yes, I do,” I responded, “and I thought this was poison.”

  “It is,” she said, pouring it on the floor next to her, “so sharp at the tongue.”

  She walked up to me. Funnily enough, I felt a kinship with this towering woman, her imposing way, long hair, and dark skin. All these men feared her and obeyed her. No, it was not kinship. It was respect.

  “Why was he holding the bottle?”

  “Desperation,” she answered, after a moment of thought, “I am sure the others had warned him not to take such a chance. I could hurt him in ways he could not. I hail from the mountains. And where are you from, f??lé?”

  “Libya. I am nothing more than a passerby.”

  She sneered at my answer.

  “Oh, you are definitely more, f??lé,” she said, calling me to what I guessed meant flower in Kanuri. “What is your name?”

  “Khalida.”

  “Hm. Alright f??lé, I think that would do. My name is Aisa.”

  Even though she shared her name, I somehow felt she was not expecting me to use it to address her directly. She walked back to the table, her hands eagerly toying with a lighter and the long cigar.

  “What do you want of the lions, f??lé?”

  “My Curse led me here. I had to meet him. I had to meet you.”

  Aisa brought the long cigar to her mouth. She inhaled, almost unnoticeably so, until she puffed a big cloud of smoke away from us.

  She waved her hands as if she said: Well, here I am.

  I decided to choose my words carefully.

  “I do not intend to stay long in Bilma. This is but a temporary delay to my plans. I will look for a safe passage to the South. In the meantime, I had to reach your side.”

  She puffed a long cloud of smoke and sneered again.

  “I am not sure what your endgame is, little flower, but I have no Curses to offer. No power you do not already wield. I am but a woman too rich and too criminal to be safe company.”

  “Nevertheless,” I interrupted her, and for the first time during the conversation, I took a few steps towards her, “you need me.”

  She kept eye contact for a few seconds before turning to the crystalline window of the balcony. Its blue color cast long shadows on her expression.

  “I do f??lé. I need someone of your talent. Can you find people? The same way you found me. Gulung arange, speak, I am listening.”

  “Sometimes. If I have something of theirs. A drop of blood, ideally,” I answered.

  Aisa said something, just to herself.

  “I used to have a witch I employed. Yahaya. She did the odd job for me. Mostly making sure no harm would come my way. But she has disappeared after a trip to the south.”

  I felt my skin crawl. The Calling had a plan when leading me here.

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  “And you want me to take her place?” I guessed.

  “Wouldn’t that be convenient for you? No. I want you to find her. Learn why she is hiding from me. I know she is back in town – but avoiding me.”

  “Do the Ngam Kúrà use the Cursed so often?”

  She looked at me. “Just me. Nobody else knows. But I need you to find Yahaya. I have good reason to think some powerful people will soon want me dead.”

  I turned back to look at Kabiru’s body. He had already started turning pale, and an unnaturally quick rigor mortis had tensed his limbs.

  Aisa scoffed.

  “I do not mean him. But we can’t discuss this more now. I must save face and appear at the party. As the Lioness. Here,” she said, and gave me a metal card. There was an address carved on it, a postcode to be exact, and a name.

  Cúró Jòró

  The men that I had previously incapacitated around the room started shuffling around, moaning as their blood pressure was normalizing again.

  “What is this?” I twisted the card in my fingers, while my eyes trailed her moves.

  “The Inside Cliff. Where she lurks. You can start from there. A witchling like you can see and access things I cannot, nor my men.”

  “And what do I get if I find her?” I asked, to Aisa’s amusement.

  “You get to walk free in Bilma after attacking my club. Do well in this job, and the next one can pay handsomely.”

  She stepped over Kabiru, acknowledging him no more than stepping over an inconvenient pebble. I averted my gaze from his face, covered by dark foam.

  Aisa walked past me and through the room, and the blue light reflected on her dark skin, illuminating her slim-fitted dress. Her dark eyes were calm, still, betraying no intention, scanning me before turning away. She turned her back on me as she headed towards the elevator. “But if I see you again in the Dáwù Fált??, I will remember what you did to my men, and I will order them to shoot. So, before you find Yahaya, do not show your face.”

  She pointed to the stairs on the side of the elevators.

  “The lift is for VIPs, little flower.”

  After going down nine stories of the building, undisturbed and lost in my thoughts, Aisa’s men led me to our car.

  I awkwardly commanded one of the Banadiq to release the unconscious men from the trunk. No one dared say anything. Aisa had already informed everyone to let us go unharmed, I guessed. We got into the car and left. No one said anything.

  My driver circled through Bilma for almost an entire hour to make sure no one was following us. The unnecessarily long drive was unbearable and silent. I could sense the three men wanting to know what had happened, but after what they had witnessed me do at will, they were too scared. I could sense their blood curl.

  I was also scared. I flipped the metal card that Aisa had given me and hid it in my purse. I had to discuss this with Qadir and get his opinion, and only then would I choose if I gave in to my curiosity. The postcode on the card taunted me. Who was Yahaya, and why had my Calling led me to this Aisa?

  There must have been a reason, and I had started doubting whether this had anything to do with Qadir’s current predicament. I plucked the Baobab’s flower from my hair. It was enough theatrics for a day.

  ? ? ?

  “I thought I would find the culprit if I gave in and let it lead me,” I said to Qadir the next morning. The first thing I did when I woke up was to join him for breakfast in his room.

  “And?” he asked.

  “I got into a bigger mess. Brother, this Curse. It is too unpredictable. Too powerful. You know, how we usually can feel the Nabd? Put someone to sleep? While I obeyed the Calling, the Curse grew. I held the whole room’s hearts hostage.”

  Qadir put down his spoon slowly. He swallowed the sweet cereal he always had for breakfast.

  “Did you say room? How many people?” I was not sure if he was excited or scared.

  “There were many. Brother, I…” I looked outside the window of the hotel room. The Baobab tree’s branches were sitting still, a light, warm breeze going in the room as it passed through its leaves. Why was I chosen by such a Curse? “It was amazing. So much power… But brother. I do not know why. I thought if I let loose, it would simply lead me to solve your mystery. Take my anger out on the petty thief that did this to you and walk away.”

  “Maybe it did. Maybe to find them, you had to do… what you did.”

  “What does it matter? The questions are more than the answers. I do not know why my Calling sent us driving to N’Djamena, and I do not know what it wants me to do here.”

  “It wants you to grow strong. You saw it, as you told me. Whole rooms, obeying your Curse. What’s next? A town?”

  I turned to him. I needed someone to ground me and understand me, but more often than not, Qadir failed to do so. His Curse was dormant for most of his life, and he had way weaker control over the Nabd. And more than anything, he did not know what it meant to give in to the Calling. Being terrified of yourself and what it might make me do. So far, it was only things I agreed to, at least partially.

  “I think it has other plans. I think I need to let it lead me. Maybe we are meant to stay in Bilma a bit longer.”

  “Fine by me,” he said, trying to cheer me up. But we both knew better; he had no choice. He knew that if my Calling decided to take me away and head South, as it initially did in Libya, I would have to leave him here to heal.

  In a sense, we were both happy it did not. But I felt something had changed; somehow, my Calling’s plans had changed. And I was but a pawn.

  “In the afternoon, I will have to go for another field trip. Alone this time. Please rest, okay?” I said and kissed his forehead. He looked at me with wide eyes. He knew he could not change my mind.

  “Just use your phone if you need anything!” He shouted at me as I walked away. “I can send the Banadiq to get you from anywhere.”

  ? ? ?

  A taxi could take me to my destination in ten minutes, but I chose to walk. In my backpack, I carried three of the books I had brought along from Fezzan. Tracking a witch was bound to be a mission riddled with hexes.

  I held the bloodied handkerchief in my pocket, just in case. The pulse of my prey was still audible, as far as always. Yet, my Calling was nowhere to be felt. I was alone that morning, with only one lead. Aisa’s metal card.

  After an hour of walking around and trying to orient myself in this new part of Bilma, I realized the address of the Cúró Jòró did not exist. I looked at my phone, contradicting what I saw around me in an alleyway between two buildings covered in vines.

  Every time I would go through the alley and into the next street, the location on my phone would flip, as if the location system was malfunctioning.

  I looked at the metal card again. The letters were clearly the postcode address of a building that my phone indicated to be here. But here was I, looking at a wall.

  A thought crossed my mind. I remembered Aisa’s words from last night.

  A witchling like you can see and access things I cannot