Part 1
Amina Bello screamed when her aunt pressed a steaming pot toward her face and said her beauty had become a curse that must be destroyed. The sound shook the zinc roof of the small house in Oke-Iroko, but nobody came, because everyone in the compound had learned not to interfere with Madam Ronke’s private cruelty.

Only hours earlier, the village had been boiling with excitement. A palace crier had walked through the market beating a talking drum, announcing that Crown Prince Adewale of Ijoba-Ade would choose a wife from among the young women at the royal field after the New Yam Thanksgiving. Mothers dragged out boxes of lace. Tailors raised their prices. Girls began practicing smiles.

Biola, Ronke’s only daughter, shouted before the crier even finished.

—The prince will see me and forget every other woman.

Ronke laughed proudly and measured Biola’s waist for a glittering aso-oke dress. Amina stood near the smoky kitchen doorway, holding a basket of cassava peels. Her own dress was faded, her slippers broken, her hands rough from washing, cooking, and fetching water since she was 13.

After Amina’s parents died in a night bus accident on the Abuja road, Ronke took her in with public tears and private bitterness. In church, she called Amina “my late sister’s child.” At home, she called her “extra mouth.” Amina slept on a mat beside the stove, ate leftovers when there were any, and carried the household like an invisible servant.

Yet invisibility never came. Even with ash on her face and plain wrappers tied loosely around her waist, people noticed her. Market women whispered that sorrow had not swallowed her beauty. Young men sent messages through their mothers. Ronke rejected every proposal before Amina heard it.

Biola hated those whispers most. She was stylish, sharp-tongued, and desperate to be admired. But whenever Amina walked past the well with a clay pot balanced on her head, even old men paused mid-conversation.

Then the prince came.

He was not dressed like royalty that afternoon. Adewale wore a simple white kaftan and walked with only 1 palace guard at a distance, pretending to inspect the village roads before the ceremony. Amina and Biola were returning from the farm path, Amina bent under 2 heavy baskets while Biola carried nothing but her phone and a small purse.

Adewale stopped when he saw Amina. Not because of her face alone, but because she steadied the load on her head and still reached down to help a little boy whose oranges had fallen in the dust.

—What is your name? he asked gently.

Biola stepped forward quickly.

—My prince, I am Biola Ronke-Ajani. Everyone says I dance like a queen.

Adewale nodded politely, but his eyes returned to Amina.

—And you?

Amina felt fear crawl up her spine. If Ronke heard that the prince had asked for her name, there would be punishment. She lowered her gaze.

—Nobody important, sir.