Kriminels Escape

A Niri Prison is no place for Baron Kriminel.

Fout Tonné.

Iron bars mouth on every door.

Months I've counted on this wall.

Months — abandonné once more.

Simon — tell me you have something left.

Every morning — fifty pushups on the stone.

Every evening — Simon scheming y to send us home.

A banana skin. Some phosphorus. A paste mixed in the dark.

The carpenter mixes chemicals — even with our fate so stark.

He presses it against the lock. The acid eats it through.

I hear the metal groan and split. Mon Dieu — the man's genius came through.

Simon had done it again — Brain bigger than his skull.

The door swings wide. We go into the hall.

Mesyé — we begin.

Cells on every side. My soldiers and my enemies.

Kounyé — I decide who breathes.

Two years of silence — and now I know the reason why.

Two years. Abandonné. Left in Niri — meant to die.

But the Baron does not break. The Baron does not bend.

I walk out of this cage — and I will never kneel for him again.

KOUNYÉ!

Cell by cell I walk the hall. One question — nothing more:

"Who do you pledge your swords to?" — the answer is the door.

Some say. "Baron Brigid!" — They will stay and rot.

Others say "Ghede Ghadou Loa!" — They chose the man who left us here to die.

The next speak. "We are yours, Baron Kriminel. To death and beyond."

I pull the lock. I grip the hand. My soldiers — rise.

Then her cell. Brigid. Matted hair and grime.

Shadow of the woman who once tore my name.

I should leave her.

But Simon says: "The Dead Forest is our only path. We need her."

Fout Tonné. I unlock the door.

I should have left her there.

Two years of silence — and now I know the reason why.

Two years. Abandonné. Left in Niri — meant to die.

But the Baron does not break. The Baron does not bend.

I walk out of this cage — and I will never kneel for him again.

KOUNYÉ!

I grab her arm. "The truth. Kounyé. All of it."

She looks at me like something already dead.

"Ghede Ghadou couldn't let you defeat Amadioha.

It would have ruined everything he'd planned."

"We monitored you. Two years. Spies inside your camp.

He needed the Bondye weakened — you were never meant to stamp."

"The army that I brought? Peasants dressed as men.

Peasants passing as your soldiers. None of them were trained."

He sacrificed his people? Fout Tonné! His barons?

The two years of silence — strategy, not absence?

The demotion? The march? The Dead Forest? The trap?

All of it. Planned. My Loa stabbed me in the back.

The admission hit me like a sledgehammer.

Even though I expected it.

He stole my victory. My chance for glory.

They sent me here to fail — and called it duty.

Two years of silence — and now I know the reason why.

Two years. Abandonné. Left in Niri — meant to die.

But the Baron does not break. The Baron does not bend.

I walk out of this cage — and I will never kneel for him again.

KOUNYÉ!

She says: "Come back to Ghede. He will explain."

I say: "Crawl back to him yourself. I will not join that chain."

I will seek an audience with another Loa.

One who will truly appreciate our struggle.

Ghede Ghadou Loa? Ce n'est pas fini between us.

But I am done being his lamb.

Radha Rhamirez Loa. I am coming to you.

I am coming to Rada Mysters.

To do what I need to do.

Two years of silence — and now I know the reason why.

Two years. Abandonné. Left in Niri — meant to die.

But the Baron does not break. The Baron does not bend.

I walk out of this cage — and I will never kneel for him again.

Simon. Mes soldats. We begin again.

Kounyé.