Kai sings this time, and it is even more beautiful than anything I’ve ever heard, panged with notes of pain. Her voice cracks and I reach for her hands. She keeps going. Her last note hangs in the air like a star, and I coil one hand over the other, remembering the words my little friend whispered, and a gold bloom appears. I work my fingers around its edges and more blooms appear with each spot I touch. I place the golden bouquet in Jhamal’s fingers, winding its vines around his arms. Then several around his head, like a crown. Kai sprinkles the dirt from the Ancestors’ grave over his feet as I stake wooden torches every few steps around the burial site.

“The prayer is next, right?” she asks.

“Yes.”

“Doilekki, mis kishaq pwana yo meh,” we sing, covering him with earth. We move in sync, in silence, as saisas. When he’s fully covered, Kai’s magic glistens from her fingertips as we light the torches in a circle around the mound. I finish one side, she the other, and when done, we collapse with a sigh, sitting next to the mound. Tears well in my eyes and I let them. Kai smooths sadness from her cheek. “How long can we stay?”

“As long as we like.”

“Jelani.”

“Yes?”

“I cannot imagine a finer Ghizoni Queen.”

EPILOGUE

THE CROWN RESTING ON my natural curls is lighter than I thought it’d be.

Without my coconut oil, I was trippin’, worried my hair would be frizzed out. But the jpango tree makes an oil that’s just as good, I’ve learned. My hair is fresh, tightly coiled, and luscious in the mirror. Gold spires point in every direction from my headdress, strings of jewels hanging from their tips catch the sunlight. I tilt my chin, admiring the trail of gold paint from my hairline down my face. Colorful dots encircle my temples, and I reach to touch them.

“Ah, ah,” the woman who made up my face says, tucking away her tray of colors. “It’s not dry yet.”

Rings loop around my left ear and tiny bells dangle from my hair. White paint covers my eyebrows. I try to let my hands hang casually, but my fingers worry at one another. Silks hang from every part of me, weighing me down like a blanket. The coronation robes are layers upon layers, tucked, tied, and twisted around every part of me. I hold in a breath, an elderly Ghizoni woman pulling ribbons at my back.

“One more.”

I suck it in and my ribs squeeze. I’m seriously considering changing the traditional coronation attire to jeans and a hoodie at this point. But for today, we’re following tradition to the nth degree. I want to do it the way the Ancestors did. I want to do it right. It’s the very least I could do to honor them.