The Orie market sprawled before us like a living, breathing creature, awakening with the sun. Rows of wooden stalls stretched into the distance, their thatched roofs creating patterns of light and shadow on the red earth below. The air was thick with the morning's promise – the scent of fresh palm oil, roasting yams, and burning herbs all mingling with the earthy smell of rain-kissed soil.

"Look," Mairo whispered, touching my arm. "The dye women are already setting up."

Indeed, the indigo dyers had claimed their usual spot near the stream, their hands and wrappers stained deep blue like the night sky. Their cloths hung like captured clouds, dancing in the morning breeze. Beyond them, the blacksmiths' fires were coming to life, sending sparks into the dawn light like early stars.

We made our way through the growing crowd, our shoulders occasionally brushing. Each time it happened, I felt that small point of contact like a spark from the blacksmith's forge. Mairo seemed to notice too – her golden eyes would flick to mine, then away, a slight smile playing at the corners of her mouth.

"Eh! Is that not the best cassava I've seen since the festival of new yams?" A trader called out, her wrapper as bright as her voice. "Let me see what you bring to market today!"

I adjusted my load, very aware of how Mairo's hand steadied my elbow as I set down our goods. The trader – Nne Obioma, I knew her well – crouched to examine our crops.

"These yams," she clicked her tongue, picking one up. "They're too small. And in this season? I couldn't possibly—"

"Too small?" Mairo cut in, her voice carrying that hint of court precision that always surprised me. "Look at how the skin shines. These are the yams that grew where the morning sun first touches the earth. Their size speaks of sweetness concentrated."

I bit back a smile. Who knew my friend who claimed to hate market politics could spin words like the finest palm fiber?

"Even so," Nne Obioma countered, but I saw the interest spark in her eyes.

As they haggled, I watched Mairo. She'd shed that haunted look from earlier, coming alive in the market's energy. When she laughed at one of Nne Obioma's outrageous counter-offers, the sound seemed to dance over the market's chaos like palm wine trickling into a fresh gourd.

"Three measures of cowries," Mairo finally said, "and we'll throw in that perfect cassava you've been pretending not to notice."

Our eyes met over the pile of produce, and something shifted in the morning air. The market's chaos seemed to fade away for a moment, leaving just us, just this space where her clever words and my crops had woven together into something unexpected.

"Two measures," Nne Obioma countered, "and you tell me what herbs you used on this land to grow such yams."

"Done," I said, still looking at Mairo. Her smile then – quick, private, just for me – felt more valuable than any amount of cowries.

We moved through the market after that, from trader to trader. Each time, we fell into an easy rhythm. I would set out the goods, Mairo would spin her words, and I would close the deal. Between sales, we wandered. She showed me how to tell which honey was gathered under the full moon (the sweetest, she claimed). I taught her how to pick the best udala fruits by their scent alone.

Near the palm wine sellers, she stumbled slightly on the uneven ground. My hand found her waist to steady her, lingering perhaps a moment too long. When she looked up at me, her golden eyes held something that made my heart stutter like a novice drummer.

"The woman from Garin Gabas," I said softly, nodding toward a trader selling bright beads, "would have never let anyone see her stumble."

"Maybe," she replied, her voice equally soft, "she needed to leave that woman behind to find her way home."

The lively din of the market surrounded us – the sharp calls of traders, the high-pitched giggles of children weaving through legs, and the bleating protests of goats, all blending into the morning's bustling chaos. Somewhere, a flute player had begun a morning song, its notes weaving through the market's symphony.

But in that moment, all I could focus on was how Mairo's hand had found mine among the folds of her wrapper, hidden from the market's curious eyes, and how perfectly our calluses lined up – hers from grinding herbs, mine from working the earth. Two different paths leading, somehow, to this same moment.

"Home," I repeated, squeezing her hand gently.

She smiled, and this time it reached her eyes, chasing away the last shadows of Garin Gabas.

As we walked past the medicine women's stalls, the sharp scent of herbs pulled me back to that evening, a moon ago, when Mairo finally shared a piece of her past with me. It was the first time she'd spoken of Garin Gabas, and her voice had carried a weight I'd never heard before.

It had been a day like any other, both of us working in my compound's garden as the sun prepared to set. The cola nut tree cast long shadows over us while we pulled stubborn weeds from around the umimi outgrowths.

That evening, she'd stopped suddenly, holding a handful of uprooted grass, and said: "My father's name was Usman."

I'd stilled my hands but didn't look up, afraid any sudden movement might startle her back into silence. In all the moons since she and Rimi had arrived, this was the first time she'd offered anything about her past.

"He loved morning prayers," she continued, her voice distant. "He would wake before everyone else, and I would hear his footsteps, so careful not to wake my mother, Larai." Her fingers worked mechanically, shredding the grass. "She used to sing wherever she was. Not loudly – singing wasn't... wasn't appropriate for her position. But she would hum these little tunes when she thought no one was listening."

I remembered watching her profile in the fading light, noting how she spoke of them in the past tense, but not daring to ask why.

"My cousin Jibril taught me to ride horses," she added, then fell silent again, as if those few details had exhausted her supply of words about home. I had wanted to ask more – about her family's position that made her mother's singing inappropriate, about why she and Rimi fled, about the shadows that sometimes crept into her eyes. But I didn't. Instead, I had simply said, "The sunrise here must be very different from Garin Gabas."

She had looked at me then, really looked at me, and I saw gratitude in her golden eyes – gratitude that I hadn't pushed, hadn't demanded more than she could give. "Yes," she'd replied softly. "Here, the sun rises through trees instead of desert mountains. It's better, I think. More honest somehow."

That was all she'd said about her past, but it had changed something between us. In the silence that followed, as we worked side by side in the deepening dusk, I felt as if she'd given me not just words but more trust – fragile as a newly sprouted yam vine.

Now, a moon later in the bustling market, I watched her haggle with a trader over dried fish prices, her confidence masking any trace of the noble bearing I sometimes suspected lurked beneath. She caught me watching and raised an eyebrow questioningly.

"Just thinking," I said, "how the morning sun through the trees suits you."

Understanding flickered in her eyes, followed by that smile that seemed reserved just for me. Around us, the market's chaos continued – traders shouting prices, children laughing, goats bleating their complaints. But between us passed something quiet and profound, like a prayer at dawn.

"Come," she said, taking my hand. "Nne Obioma's sister is selling palm wine fresh from the tree, and I heard she accepts stories as part payment."

"Stories?"

"Mm. And I think I might have one or two worth telling today."

As we moved through the market crowd, her hand warm in mine, I realized that maybe some stories didn't need to be told in words. Maybe some were better written in small moments – in shared garden work, in market day haggling, in the way she'd chosen to trust me with even the smallest pieces of her past.

The sun climbed higher over the market, burning away the morning mist, and with it, the ghosts of our earlier memories. Ahead of us, a palm wine seller was already pouring drinks for eager customers, her laughter carrying over the market's din. Mairo squeezed my hand once, and then let go – not in retreat, but in the way you release something you know will return to you.

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