The Truth that wasn't there

Fifteen

The questions in your mind abound, but you should know, Owondiki, that you cannot receive every answer, right now. However, in the interest of our shared future, I will attempt to offer answers that are immediately necessary. Answers that can guide you on the path to your destiny, because as you must have realized, you are no ordinary girl, regardless of how ordinary your origins may seem.

Of the things you will do, this is only the beginning. The past few weeks must have seemed arbitrary and random in their occurrences, but they were necessities, building blocks for the time ahead of you. I assure you, meeting a vindictive young woman in a prison was hardly less relevant than meeting Jera Franklin. And while Jera Franklin's purpose in your life has been obvious, it is time you learned that everyone else you have ever met, every class, every meeting, every moment that has ever occurred to you, will one day bear fruition, to the benefit of this great nation.

Even though the question of who I am remains, I doubt you are truly ready to grasp the extent of my identity, in relation to you, Jonathan Mbeteli, or Jera Franklin. In order to protect our future and preserve the past, we will refer to me as Jera Franklin does.

For now, I am Jonathan Mbeteli and I am pleased to make your acquaintance.

In your quest for knowledge, you found valuable information that the clans were willing to share with loyal commoners like yourself. For that reason, you were afforded the childhood and upbringing that you were given. Do not fault me for never doing anything about it until this point. It was necessary. All of it was necessary.

There may come a time when you curse my name for the things I will put you through, but Owondiki, you cannot lose sight of the goal. You cannot forget. You cannot let the things of-

Her phone beeped in her bag, breaking Owondiki from the words she was engrossed in. Putting her thumb between the pages, she retrieved her phone from her bag to find a message with a link to Jera's live.

Looking from one to the other, she wondered which she should prioritize. On the one hand, she had Jonathan Mbeteli's diary that entailed his motivations and all this talk of Owondiki's destiny. In the grand scheme of things, who didn't want to read about how important they might one day be? On the other hand, Jera was making history.

The liberation had to be true. It had to be real. Owondiki had seen those children in the fountain, floating there, dead and gone for two thousand years, but never buried. Their bodies were still fresh like they'd only just drowned.

She'd felt the sting of the water when it rejected her advances. The prosperity of the clans was real. The land's sole obedience to only those with the blood of the clans was real. As real as their divinity. As real as any other story.

For generations, they'd managed to fool commoners and the rest of the world into thinking none of it was real. That their place as privileged leaders was simply a result of status and information and knowledge. While that may have been true, their power also came from nefarious actions. Like drowning their own children. Or imprisoning ancient beings. Or tying up destinies and burying them on the borders of Jiki lands.

After all, if the prosperity was true and the fountain existed, and if the divinity was true, then who knew what other horrible things in folk tales were just a part of Jiki history that was erased?

With Jera's publicity and the noise she was no doubt about to make of the liberation, after months of no rain, if a single drop fell, no one would question Jera again. No one would misunderstand the truth of the clans. Out in the open, for all to see, Boboyile's reality would be exposed.

Owondiki clicked the link to the video, choosing to do both. She could watch and listen while reading. There was no law against that.

As the video loaded, the fountain appeared, the bio-luminescent stones at the bottom of the fountain shone up, illuminating the walls around and the ceiling, as the waves and splatter of the water made the light dance around. The sound of the fountain was heard in the background, but the people around stood, carefully keeping quiet as Steven pulled a baby from the water.