THE LAST RANGER

Chapter Two: Nuru

Nuru Ogechi of the Anuk tribe, situated to the south of the Kingdom of Namer, in Akoro, walked through the narrow hallways of her father's palace. She passed a hand across the marble walls, feeling the cold touch of it, fascinated by the paintings on it. Colourful images of the Numen gods adorned them: Dark skinned women with skin that shorn like brass, covered in blue veils, all manner of gold rings and necklaces and earrings and bracelets about their voluptuous, curvy bodies. Dark skinned men with bodies that looked as if it had been sculpted from stone, rock-hard abs and thick muscles were tattooed with all manner of symbolism. Powerful feats of fire bursting from their palms, lightning being called down from the heavens, earth stones and wind being manipulated, water being control and use at will, and even the injured being miraculously healed with just a touch.

               Amazing, Nuru thought. She still couldn't get over it, no matter how many times she'd seen this painting. She wished that one day she would be able to perform feats like these magnificent beings.

               They were gods and goddesses. Deities to the people of Namer. But not all tribes in this Kingdom shared the same belief. It was mostly just the Anukian and the Nabian tribes that worshipped them. It was their religion. Their faith. Sewed into them from birth. And even at twelve-years-of-age, it hadn't left Nuru.

               Nuru averted her gaze from the paintings, saw that her Papa's room down the end of the hall was slightly opened, slits of daylight seeping through the crack in the door into the darker hallway. She ambled on over, slowly, on tentative feet. She did that a lot. Sneaking about the palace and eavesdropping on everyone.

               But who could blame her? She was an only child, and always bored as hell in this mansion.

               It didn't make it any better her Papa being the Oloye to the Oba of Namer. Meaning she had to sit through hours and days––even months––of boring discussions between the Oloye, Ogboni, and Balogun. All three monarchies would usually meet at Nuru's father's palace and flap their tongues about whatever the Oba's plans for the Kingdom of Namer were.

               Today was more so, in that it seemed rather interesting than usual, so Nuru snuck up to the open door, pressed her back against the cold wall to the side, and listened intently, her eyes peeking in through the slight crack in the door.

               'Let the Oba know that my tribe's foot soldiers should be on their way back now from Nakara, with the captured Gbenga and Yejide Berko of the Naba tribe in tow.' Her father, Victor Ogechi, a round man, with a deep grey beard that contrasted with his oily dark skin, was thirty-two-years-of-age and Baale to the Anuk tribe. He was a very popular man, no doubt that's why the Oba made him one of his Oloye, and showered him with riches beyond his wildest dreams, which included this very palace Nuru grew up in.

               'They should arrive anytime soon,' he smiled at the other two men in the room, that cheeky grin of his that Nuru knew so very well. It meant "I am the shit, the top dog," and Nuru found it very amusing, seeing as he's not really, only an underling for the Oba. But she'll let her father have his moment, before reality really sets in.

               'Good work, Victor,' a man with an Aso Oke Hat and a dashiki suit said. The outfit signified he was a Nabian. The hat was slouched to the right side and was just above his ear. A previous Nabian house worker for her father (the Numen gods rest her soul), who had been caught in the act of fornication with another member of the Anuk tribe inside her father's house, and both of them executed––wrapped in fibre ropes and set on fire like animals––had once told her that slouching the hat right signified an unmarried man and to the left side indicate a married man. 'Oba Adisa will be proud of your accomplishment, even at the detriment to your tribe. Accept our sincere apologies.'