The flight back to Lagos gave Elian something he hadn't had in months: uninterrupted time to think. Thirty-five thousand feet above West Africa, surrounded by the quiet hum of engines and the soft chatter of fellow passengers, he let his mind drift over everything that had happened.
Accra had been a triumph. There was no other word for it. The connections made, the respect earned, the frameworks proposed—they'd shifted something fundamental. For the first time, his movement had a continental dimension. For the first time, the coalition couldn't contain him in a single country.
But triumph brought attention. And attention, he'd learned, brought danger.
His phone, even in airplane mode, felt heavy in his pocket. Fifty-three new messages had arrived in the hour between his panel ending and
