WOMEN OF OYIN

The village of Oyin sat quietly beneath a sky that had not wept in weeks. Its earth was dry and cracked, its air heavy with the smell of smoke and sunbaked yam leaves. Yet its people moved with pride — heads high, steps sure, their hearts anchored not in the skies above but in the ground their ancestors once walked. The people of Oyin did not fear the gods, they obeyed them. And in this obedience, they built their world — a world where men ruled and women bled in silence. From the tall iroko tree that stood in the village square to the narrow footpaths that wound between mud huts, the law of the land was unwritten but deeply known: a woman is not born to speak, but to serve; not to choose, but to be chosen. It had always been this way, or so the elders claimed. They said the gods themselves had handed down the order — that a girl’s life belonged to her father until it passed to her husband, like a goat bought at market. So, in Oyin, a girl was not born — she was claimed. By the age of three, her father would have accepted the bride price from a man three times her age. By thirteen, she would kneel before a husband she did not choose, wearing beads too heavy for her small neck, her smile a taught string about to snap. And if she could not bear a daughter by the second year of marriage, her husband's family would march back to her father's compound, return the bride price, and leave her shamed — a vessel unfit for lineage. The men called it order. The women called it fate. No one dared call it injustice. Not aloud. Except for one. That morning, Adesewa stood just behind the tall woven mat that hung at the edge of the village square. Her bare feet curled in the sand as she watched another girl — no older than twelve — be led by the hand to her husband’s stool. The girl’s face was blank. Her mother wiped her eyes in secret. The men clapped and shouted proverbs, pleased with the match. The drummers played louder, as if to drown out the cries they all pretended not to hear. Adesewa said nothing, but her fists were clenched at her sides. “She is lucky,” an older woman whispered beside her, voice low. “The man is rich. She will not suffer from hunger.” But Adesewa only stared ahead. What use is food when your soul is starving? she thought but didn’t dare say. She was fifteen — too old to not be married, according to the whispers. Her own father had begun refusing greetings from certain men, signaling she was soon to be given. Adesewa felt it coming, like rain in the wind, sharp and bitter. Her mother, Iya Abeni, had started boiling herbs at night and humming songs with no joy in them. The village of Oyin was alive with tradition — but for its daughters, it was a life spent waiting to be given away. Adesewa turned from the square, her eyes burning. The drums echoed behind her like a warning. The men cheered, the elders blessed, and somewhere beneath it all, a young girl’s childhood died.