The invitation was silk-screened and folded like a secret.
Elara unfolded it slowly, the golden edges catching candlelight from NUMA's makeshift lab. At the top, stamped in bold serif:
The Silent Hearts Foundation presents: A Gala for Legacy
Below it, a curated guest list of politicians, CEOs, bishops, wives, and a few too-perfect journalists.
All of them tied, one way or another, to the Council.
"Looks like it's your father's kind of heaven," NUMA muttered, dragging on a clove cigarette.
Elara didn't reply. Her eyes stayed on one name.
Senator Uzoamaka Diri
She slipped the invitation into her coat.
The hotel ballroom was coated in opulence. Hanging crystal chandeliers. Golden archways. Tables dressed in ivory silk. A violinist played slow, unrecognizable music that sounded expensive.
Elara stood near the back in a black dress NUMA found from some underground fashion knock-off. Her ID badge read:
Zainab Yusuf – Culture & Philanthropy Correspondent
Her press credentials had been faked to perfection — registered through a ghost outlet Khalid built in 48 hours.
She adjusted her wig, cleared her throat, and moved forward.
The room swelled with murmurs and wine. Politicians shook hands. Photographers hovered like flies.
And at the center of it all stood Alhaji Ibrahim Bello, her father — untouchable in cream silk and a soft smile.
She saw Senator Diri before she expected to — smiling for cameras, framed in emerald, her headwrap like a crown. People greeted her like royalty. She walked through the crowd with ease, grace, danger.
Elara approached from the press lane, pad in hand.
"Senator Diri," she said, voice practiced, soft. "I'm Zainab Yusuf, profiling female political leadership. Mind if I ask a few questions?"
Diri turned. "Of course, darling. But keep it brief."
Elara asked two prepped questions: one about literacy, the other about philanthropy.
Then she leaned closer and asked:
"What's your view on girls who speak out... and vanish?"
Diri's eyes flickered.
Elara pressed. "On the culture of...silence? Especially in elite spaces."
The Senator's smile barely faltered. "I think silence is misunderstood. Some things are better whispered — or buried."
She turned to leave, then looked back, voice low:
"Amara was brave. But bravery doesn't stop a train. It just makes the splatter harder to clean."
Then she walked away.
Elara's hands trembled slightly. But she kept writing.
Later, just as the speeches began and the first course was served, a waiter — too clean, too quick — passed by her seat and dropped a linen napkin in her lap.
Inside it, folded once:
"You're not the only one hunting them."
"But they're watching you too."
There was no name. No return glance.
Elara turned to look for him, but he was gone — like fog in a ballroom.
Her father was called to speak. He stood with poise, hands clasped behind his back.
"Tonight, we don't just celebrate legacy. We defend it.
We shield it from those who wish to rewrite it with envy, emotion, or fiction."
The crowd clapped.
Elara's skin crawled.
He spoke like a man anointed, not accused. And everyone — even the victims in the crowd — pretended they didn't hear the bones cracking beneath his words.
As the night closed, Elara moved toward the exit, heart pounding. Just as she reached the coat check, a man brushed past her — slipping a small envelope into her coat pocket without stopping.
She froze.
Khalid was already outside, waiting in a car NUMA borrowed.
Once inside, she opened the envelope.
Inside: a name and a location.
Adewale Olumide – Church of the Forgotten, Sura Street
Below it, in rushed handwriting:
"He was there the night she died."
The car drove away from the hotel, Lagos lights flickering through tinted glass.
Elara didn't speak.
She just stared at the note — and felt the echo of her sister's voice in her bones.
"They don't kill you. They erase you. Neatly."
But now, Elara wasn't just surviving the erasure.
She was rewriting the story.