Death's Melody

🥀Chapter 4🥀: The coming of age.

  "They're missing?" Was the growl that shaked the whole den of Manoa.

  Jaxton, Jared and Jeff were all on their knees. They had failed as elder brothers to protect their siblings, regret eating Jaxton up alive. He was to be blamed for the whole incident for he had the feeling that this could happen but he ignored it.

"I asked you specifically to not leave Jubril with the pups. Tomorrow is the coming of age ceremony, where do we go from here? How do we recognize him even when we see him?" The questions flooded the trio. Their mother wasn't the easy going type like their father. She hated it the most when her children disobeyed her. She could do anything to the child that disobeyed her. But right now, the one who disobeyed wasn't even home to dance to her tune. 

"Mother, I'll go out and look for them"  Jaxton stated more determined than ever.

"The world out there is huge, where do we start looking for them?" His mother asked, Jamal in one of her arms as she paced back and forth for a solution to the current problem on ground.

"We could start by visiting the neighboring towns or even the-"

"No one is leaving this place and that is final" Their father's deep voice boomed in the den, that paused every moving thing.

"Tomorrow is the coming of age, Manoa. What about Jumal?"

"If he's the son of the soil, he'd find his way home" Manoa replied before walking to the balcony.

"How can you even say that as their father? Aren't you going to look for them? Or at least send-" She wasn't done querying Manoa before she was interrupted.

"I specifically gave orders to your husband that if any of his children goes missing, he should leave them be. Were my orders not clear enough?"  The old shaky voice of the Haruna echoed round the almost silent den, the wind gushing in with him as he walked in the door.

The trio, Jaxton, Jared and Jeff rose to their feet, wide eyed as soon as their eyes landed on the Haruna. The Haruna almost never leaves his den and has never gone to anyone's den. Theirs would be the first.

With their knees bent at thirty degrees and their arms stretched out holding each other as if they wanted to pray, they all saluted the Haruna, including Manoa, their father.

Manoa signalled his sons to leave the den for the adults to talk and they did. As soon as they left, the Haruna spoke to Manoa's wife, Umara.

The chief priest was an old man with an agile body. He was a bald man, white hair for beards and wrinkled skin like that of a rumpled cloth. But he could walk well without any aid, see well and talk clearly. He had cowries and white beads arranged perfectly on his neck which had the tiger canine teeth as decorations which Talkun had haunted the year before and given to the Haruna as a gift.

"Umara, I understand your worries. Your pup who hasn't come of age got lost in an unfamiliar world, of course, as a mother, you'd be worried and anxious. But sometimes you just have to leave things into the hands of fate, because meddling in matters that we originally shouldn't, could cause dangerous disasters" The Haruna tried to calm her down.  Her face down for she dared not look into the eyes of the chief priest.

"Let things flow in the pattern it should. When the time comes, he would come back home. But I can assure you that he would not die that easily" The Haruna assured Umara, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"As for the reason why you should let them be, It can't be explained right now but just have faith in the fate of your children" The Haruna said to her before turning to meet Manoa, giving him the eye signal that they needed to talk alone.