I am Ahunna:  Daughter of Ana, and niece of Kamalu.  I know not who my father, is, except that he was of royalty but of lesser status than us.  He was a High King, as I am a High Queen.  My mother and uncle, Queen of Queens, and King of Kings, and my grandfather is Chuckwu, Emperor of all of Igbo land. 

It is our grandfather that made this nation strong.  We were so weak before, but he has helped us to rise above.  He has also given us many gifts in his genes.  He is immortal, and has the ability to the form of a lion.  This gift was passed on in his genes.  We are the immortal pride of Africa. 

In our adolescence, is when we succumb to the change.  Some of us as early as 12 or 13, and some not until 21.  Today, I am 12 years old.  I am looking forward to my future; but I have heard my aunt and uncle talk among themselves.  They are worried.

"He may be coming for her," said my mother.

"We have no way of knowing that," said my uncle.

"I know he is.  He said he would."

"Why would he do that?"

"It is the change...."

"What about it?"

"What if he passed genes that could make her change too?"

"Can he?"

"I don't know...I have seen him in his true form.  He's a monster!  What if this happens to her?"

"I told you not to run away with him, sis."

"I know, but he was so handsome before... What is going to happen to her?  What if she transforms into something like him instead of us?"

"Only time will tell."

I never told either of them what I had heard.  Only know, what I looked forward to in anticipation, I now look upon in fear.  What is this transformation they are speaking of?  What form did my father take?  Why did my mother leave him?  Was it really just because she didn't want to give up her class?  How could being married to a High King be any different than being a Queen of Queens?

Here lately, my mother has been staying in the form of a lioness.  She has been on the prowl for a long time now.  She spends most of her time scavenging the riverside, as if she is searching for something.  The mortal people were instructed not to interfere, that she would not harm them.  Fear always makes people instigate, and create more trouble.

A man came with my mother's bloodied body in his arms.  His skin was slightly lighter than ours, but his face was what caught me off guard.  As  my uncle greeting him, "High King Behanzin" as he lightly bowed, there was no denying it.  This man was my father.  He looked just like me.

"I told you to call me Behanzin, Kamalu.  After all, we are family."

"Oh," said my uncle in mock sadness.  "But I don't get to say it that often."

My father made a sound.  It sounded much like a growl, but in a good-natured kind of way.  I could see why my mother chose him.  He looked so strong and powerful, but also wise and gentle if he chose to be.

"What brings you here, Behanzin?" asks my uncle. 

He looks down at my mother in his arms.  "We had an agreement, but first we have to let her heal." 

My father and uncle take her to the healing part of our family castle.  I have so many aunts and uncles and cousins.  There were plenty of people to surround my mother, even as her wounds were healing.  We all heal so fast.  All of us were immortal; but my cousins.... See, every time my aunt or uncle marries and has children with a regular mortal, the genes that help us change pass on, but the eternal youth...  It gets diluted with every passing mortal generation.  Eventually, some of us will die. 

My mother was not one of those.  She healed completely before my father could even lay her down on the bed.  She began to kick and scream at him.  "You can't take her!  You can't take my daughter!"  She began to change.  The fur was covering her skin at this very moment.

"Mother..." I say.

She pauses, her body somewhere between human and beast.

My father turns, and looks at me for the first time.  "Is this my little Queen?" he asks with a smile.

"No!" shouts my mother.  "She is our High Queen, and she is next in line in our powerful lineage!"

"Your husband comes from a powerful lineage too, Ana," cuts in my uncle.

"I WILL NOT LOSE MY CHILD!"

"Why would you lose me, mother?" I ask.

My father looks from me to my mother.

"You never told her, did you?" he asks.

"Tell me what?" I ask.

"Behanzin," says my uncle, "Why don't you take Ahunna for a walk?  Her mother and I are going to have a talk."

"Don't you dare let that monster take my daughter!"

My mother completes her change.  Even as she does, my uncle begins to change too.  We are all immortal here, but my Uncle Kamalu was grandfather's first born.  He outranks all of us.  As my mother attempted to attack, he defended my father, and the rest of my aunts and uncles changed and escorted us away while the rest held back my mother.

"Does this happen often in your family?" asks my father.

"It does at least once a week," I say with a smile.  "It's mostly just family brawls that end up in playing; but my uncle Kamalu doesn't have to use his chain of command very often at all."

"Well, I suppose that is good to hear," says my father.

There were lions and lionesses on either side of us as we walked.  I had no reason to not feel safe with this man.  I suppose I should feel afraid.  He is a stranger that I never met before.  Instead I feel happy, as if I have been reunited with a long lost friend.

I notice that we are nearing the river.  I can hear it's rushing sound.

"Why are we coming here?" I ask.

Father looks at me again.  "Has she truly told you nothing about me?"

I shake my head.  "Though she has told me that you are of a lower status.  She said that's why she left you."

My father slowly exhales.  "I am a lower status, but I'm not THAT low.  You see, I too am an immortal."

"She did tell me that.  She also said that's why she chose to come back.  Our higher status meant we had a greater responsibility on her side, and that you should follow."

"Did she also tell you that there is a chance you will transform into a creature of the water?"

"A what?" I ask in surprise.

"I'll take that as a no."  My father sighs.  "Ahunna, I met your mother here on this river.  We were both in our animal form.  She was a drowning lioness at the time I had found her, but I found intelligence in those brown eyes of hers.  I chose to take her to shore."

"You mean you were about to eat her?"

"I was.  Instead....Well, let's just say that we got very acquainted with one another very early on in the relationship.  She was ecstatic to find that I was immortal.  She could finally have a child that wouldn't die.  But when I told her the possibility of you changing as I would change...."

"I see," I say.  "So this change that could happen to me, is this why we have to be near the water?"

"It is."

"How much time do I have left?"

"We don't know yet, but it is assumed that either change could happen just as if you were among your cousins."

"Did you say either change?"

"Yes, Ahunna.  There are several possibilities that could happen.  From your mother, and from me, we both know you will be immortal.  On the one hand, she will give you the ability to change into a lioness.  I will give you the ability to change your form as well."

"Do you have other children?"

"Yes."

"Children like me?"

"No.  My other wives were mortal.  When they gave birth, they all gave birth to a fixed form of the creature of the deep."

"You mean they gave birth to monsters?" I ask in fear.

"I wouldn't call them monsters, anymore than I would call your mother or her family monsters; but they do come out different.  Just because someone is different doesn't make them bad.  It's just that in their unique form, they must have water to live.  It's why I had to come back at this time."

"You plan on taking me with you, don't you."

"I may.  You are the first child I have ever had with an immortal woman, and a changeling one at that.  We have no idea what will happen, until it happens."

I look around at my family.

"Will I ever get to see my family here again?"

"Of course you will.  Even if you turn into a child like mine, so long as you have this river, you will always be able to swim to see them."

I look at my lion cousins and a smile.  I know I will miss them, but I look forward to this next adventure.

"Will you show me what you look like, father?"

But even as I ask him this, I feel a sharp pain in my legs and head.  My body feels....itchy.  Dry.  "Water," I say as I fall to the ground. 

"AHUNNA!" I hear my mother shout.

"Mama!" I whimper.  I know this will be the last time I get to see her for a long time.

My father lifts me up.  My skin, my legs and head hurt so much.  I see my lion cousins intercepting her, allowing my father and me to escape.  The moment the water greets us....oh it feels so good.  I don't even notice that I am no longer changing.  I have tentacles where my hair used to be.  My legs have split into many tentacles as well.  I should feel frightened, but instead, I feel free.

We swim downstream of the river, my father and me, in our human like, cecaelia forms.  We reach the ocean shallows, and as we near the homelands of the Dahomey, I meet one of my father's aunts.  She is Yemaya, a Queen of Queens of the ocean shallows.  She has given birth to so many mermaids and mermen of this ocean.  High Kings and High Queens like me. 

Eventually, we leave the ocean shallows behind, and I meet my grandmother, Olokun, Queen of Queens of the ocean depths below.

"My High King, Behanzin," she says as she kisses his cheek.

"Mama, why so formal?"

"I don't get to say it very often either, my son."  She turns to me, "Is this our young Queen?"

"Yes mother."

She takes my hands into hers.

"You will be the first of many," she says.

"But my mother is so angry with him right now," I say.

"Indeed, she is, but they will get back together soon.  As soon as you learn to master your gifts, you will return to your mother, and all will be forgiven with your father.  You will be an immortal child, like she always wanted."

"But what of your kingdom?" I ask my father.

"He was the first I bore, but he is not the only High King on this ocean floor.  It's why I have the title Queen of Queens or King of Kings."

"Olokun has the ability to shift her shape from male to female."

"Yes, it's true.  I have given birth to many water creatures in my feminine form, though in my masculine form, the children took on the form of bird like creatures."

"I can imagine that I will have plenty of aunts and uncles to meet either way," I say.

"Indeed you shall."

It took me 100 years to be able to fully master the gifts I was given.  You see, grandmother Olokun could see into our future.  The siblings that my mother and father would eventually give me, would either be a lion's gene, or a sea creature, just as they could get the genes to be either a girl or a boy; but I the first born, will be the only one that can master the both of them.  I would go back and forth from my father's kingdom, to that of my mother's.  I would make a habit of checking up on everyone.  In the years that followed, she grew softer to my father, and eventually let him back into her heart.  Even after I mastered my gifts, I would continue to go back and forth, both as my duty as a Queen of the ocean depths, and as a High Queen of Igbo land. 

I have not taken a mate as of yet.  I do not feel I have found him yet.  I am not aware of if he will be immortal or human.  I only know that I am not ready to be a mother yet, and simply wish to get to know my already existing family.  There are so many of us:  Sea creatures of the deep, Mermaids of the shallows, Snake people from my Aunt Mawu, the lions of Igbo, and Olokun's mate, both male and female, has given me birdlike aunts and uncles to get to know. 

Magec has warned me to stay away from the black dogs, the werewolves of his own creation, even as I was informed that Genie's will come to protect me from them.  So far, the genies and the werewolves are the only other immortals that I know of, that I am not related to and Magec's sisterhood; but I can't help but have the feeling that there will be many more people to meet in the future.