In my travels I seek out people like me, those who have no one to fend for them and in their company I am home.

So, leaving my home in the middle of the night was no coincidence, I needed to get to the Mazuri kingdom, which was a two days journey, in time for the market auctions. Every year, the people of Mazuri welcomed traders from all the kingdoms to trade freely in their land and on this day you would get the best fabric, spices, dishes and women and children dancing and laughing in the arena.

I walked all night only stopping twice to drink from my water gourd and when the sun started gracing the sky I had already made it past our kingdom and into the next. The maidens were making their way to the river early in the morning, in some homes the smoke was just rising into the sky, a sign of the early morning meal being prepared, some were making their way to the farms, others in their kindness greeted me and some smiled. I greeted them in turn and smiled back.

I loved traveling because outside of my kingdom, I was just a traveler. A stranger. A young beautiful woman making her way around their lands and they did not flinch or run away from me. I also learned not to intervene or lend a helping hand in a way that would draw such suspicion my way. People often needed help but only within their understanding of it, never more or beyond it and that was too much to bear and I learned the hard way.

Our King, having benefited greatly from my help when he was surely on his way to meeting his ancestors decided to banish me from the kingdom activities because I knew what ailed him and he did not want his secret revealed, so instead of telling his truth, he branded me a liar and made it unbearable for me to live among my people. There had been days when left to my own thoughts, I mocked the gods, cursed and insulted them for the life they granted me only to change my mind and thank them for not leaving me unprotected. The things I saw and summoned protected me from the evil anyone planned against me and how then could I mock the very gods who had given this to me?