Recent content by Monifa Oya

Part 1 Monifa tightened her hold on Hugo’s side, but the weight grew heavier with each step. His breath stuttered; his legs dragged. He’s fading fast. I can’t carry him much longer. As her tongue had no strength, my mind spoke instead. Vaene… I’ve no eyes tonight. Let your wings guide my...

Part 1 Monifa turned her face toward the sound of swords clashing. Though she could not see, she could feel Zyn’s presence: a steady, sweeping rhythm. His blade moved like a river before the flood, sharp and unyielding. Even now, he flows. Fighting a Drow who feeds on her kin—and he does not...

Part 1 Monifa’s palms opened like a watering hole in an oasis—and from it, a black ball appeared. Most people would call it darkness, others a mirage; however, to a follower of Vaene, it’s a colony of unnatural bats. Normal bats fly off from the presence of humans, but those blessed by Goddess...

Part 1 Her breath fluttered, but her voice returned with new resolve—ragged, but shaped like ritual. “Then listen well, stranger…” she rasped, her hand pressing into the ground as though she could trace the web beneath it. “There is one with strands instead of soul. A spinner of traps, not...

Her shoulder throbbed like the sun at harvest—slow, scorching, relentless—until even her ears seemed to dull. But not enough. They still caught it: a breath, rough and measured. Someone nearby. At first, she thought it was the web-weaving Drow—but the air was wrong. No shift in silk, no scurry...

The world crept back in fragments—not light, but the clash of steel ringing through the threads of night. Each strike echoed like bone striking bone in an old birthing house. Footsteps whispered secrets in dust. And beneath it all, the throb of pain in her shoulder pulsed like a second...

After the darkness, the soporific Monifa was called by a calm, resonant voice. Midwife. Monifa. Open your eyes. She stirred like a newborn, her head tilting weakly before her eyes fluttered open. It was not darkness that greeted her, but a long, narrow table made of golden-brown iroko wood...

Monifa kept walking, but her steps faltered—she nearly stumbled on loose pebbles strewn across the alley. Her legs ached. Her head hung low like a wilting reed. Once I get home, she thought, I’ll draw a bath with herbs. Pray to Vaene. Burn palm oil and myrrh. Wash this night from my bones. She...

As Monifa stepped into the alleyway, thick with the sour breath of rotting food and shattered crates, she turned briefly—Zyn was not behind her. Expected due to her unrefined words. She had warned her apprentice about alleys, about what skulked where the city forgot to look, and yet here she...

Monifa listened, her expression unmoving save for the slight narrowing of her eyes. She watched for the flicker before a storm as the young woman spoke of seals and strength as though they were tools to be sharpened, used, and sheathed. But Monifa heard something else beneath it. A tremor...

Monifa’s lip twitched—more irritation than amusement—as Zyn slid beside her. She didn’t shy away. No, she let him feel the heat radiating from her side like a hearth warned not to touch. Her gaze stayed forward, fixed on the darkening horizon out the window, but her hand remained steady near the...

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––AT DAWN––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– The apothecary door opened not with a chime, but with a hush—as if the evening itself were holding its breath. Rain still clung to Monifa’s shoulders, though it had softened into a misty veil, not unlike the steam that...

The pestle sat quiet in the bowl, and Monifa’s hands stilled with it. She turned her head, not sharply, but with the slow gravity of a woman who had lived through enough full moons to know when a boy was testing his voice instead of his strength. “That depends,” she murmured, voice like dusk...

Monifa watched the boy’s giggles ripple like water over a still pond. Her expression didn’t shift much, but beneath the surface, something softened. "Dusk, then," she replied, her voice a gentle thrum, like a drumbeat muffled by cloth. "It is a good hour for walking between things—day and...

The pestle slowed, then stopped. She set it aside with a practiced touch and turned toward him fully, the firelight painting her cheekbones gold. “Sorrel seed,” she said softly, “and pink ginger. One cools the blood. The other brings heat back where sorrow makes the chest go hollow.” She...