Lagos did not welcome them; it consumed them. The city was a sprawling, neon-lit leviathan of twenty million souls, a chaotic symphony of car horns, generators, and the restless Atlantic tide. As the private jet touched down at a restricted hangar near Ikeja, the temperature was a stifling 33°C. The air was thick with the scent of salt air and burning refuse—the smell of Seraphina’s childhood, and the smell of the architecture’s birth.
They moved through the city in an armored Mercedes, the windows tinted to a funereal black. Seraphina sat in the back, the Parent Drive pulsing a deep, bruised purple in her lap. Beside her, Alessandro was a silhouette of coiled tension. He had discarded the Roman wool for a light tactical vest and a linen shirt, his eyes never leaving the side mirrors.
"T
