"Your hands are not clean enough, Chinedu."

Master Osei’s voice was dry, like the rustle of dried maize husks in the wind. I stood before the desk in the telephone exchange, the air thick with the ozone smell of the lines and the heat that pressed against the glass of the old quarters. I was twelve years old, small for my age, and my fingers trembled so violently that the ink on the ledger blurred into a black smear. I wanted the Golden Ritual. I wanted the Master to touch my hands, to burn away the impure lineage that made me shake, so I could write the decrees that kept the state running. The Master looked at my hands as if they were contaminated meat, then turned back to his cipher wheel.

The heat in Accra was a physical weight, a heavy blanket that made noon impossible. We worked in the shadows of the exchange, the fans spinning lazily, pushing hot air against hot air. Outside, the auction of the fishing fleet was happening, the gulls screaming over the harbor, a sound that cut through the silence of the room. I watched the Master’s hands. They were steady, golden-brown, and perfectly still. He moved the cipher wheel with the precision of a surgeon, encoding the orders that sent men to the industrial engines. I believed the ritual would give me that stillness. I believed it would make me worthy.

I found the private ledger three days later, tucked behind the false panel of the filing cabinet where we stored the debt records for the for-profit schools that had just closed. The heat was worse that afternoon, the light slanting in through the high windows, illuminating the dust motes that danced in the air like tiny, suspended ghosts. I opened the book, expecting to find the list of candidates for the ritual. Instead, I found the list of the executed. My name was there. And so was Adaeze’s.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌​‍​⁠​‌‍‍‍‌​‍‍​‍‍​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌⁠​‍‍‍​‍‍‍‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​‍‌‍​​​‍⁠⁠‍‌‌⁠‌‌⁠

Adaeze, my sister. She had died of the shaking sickness two years ago, when I was ten. The state had taken her body, they said, for study. The ledger told a different story. The Golden Ritual did not cure the tremors. It marked the subject. The physical tissue consumed by the ritual was not waste; it was fuel. The state’s engines ran on the processed remains of those deemed impure, their bodies broken down and burned to power the machines that built the new Accra. The betrayal hit me like a blow to the chest, a sudden, sharp pain that made me gasp. I was not a candidate for power. I was a battery.

I sat on the floor of the exchange, my back against the cold metal of the cabinet, and I planned. I would expose him. I would forge a royal decree, using the cipher I had spent two years memorizing, and present it at the Midsummer Feast. I would force the Master to reveal his fraud to the King, and I would be free. My hands shook as I wrote the forgery, the ink bleeding into the paper, but I forced them to be steady. I was no longer the trembling boy who wanted approval. I was the architect of his ruin. He remembered, too, one hundred and nine of the Tide Clock — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.

I delivered the forged decree to the Master’s desk at dawn. The bell in the tower rang the hour, a deep, resonant sound that vibrated in my bones. He did not look surprised. He looked tired. He read the paper, his eyes moving slowly across the lines, and then he looked at me.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌​‍​⁠​‌‍‍‍‌​‍‍​‍‍​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌⁠​‍‍‍​‍‍‍‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​‍‌‍​​​‍⁠⁠‍‌‌⁠‌‌⁠

"You are clever, Chinedu," he said. His voice was soft, devoid of anger. "But you are still a tool. A broken tool is useless. You can be discarded, or you can be fixed."

He offered me the choice. Submit to the ritual and become a Golden Hand scribe, or be discarded as a failed instrument. I looked at his hands, steady and golden, and I saw the truth. He was not a monster. He was a man who had accepted the logic of the machine. I accepted the ritual, not out of fear, but out of strategy. I needed access to the inner sanctum, where the true records of the state’s crimes were kept. I would burn them. I would erase the evidence, and in doing so, I would free myself from the debt of my own existence.

The ritual took place in the basement of the funeral home parlor, a place that smelled of lilies and formaldehyde. The sexton, a man with a shotgun slung over his shoulder, stood in the corner, his eyes fixed on the wall. The heat was oppressive, the air heavy with the chemicals they used to prepare the bodies. I sat on the chair, my wrists bound, and I waited. The Master approached, holding a vial of liquid that glowed with a faint, sickly yellow light.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌​‍​⁠​‌‍‍‍‌​‍‍​‍‍​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌⁠​‍‍‍​‍‍‍‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​‍‌‍​​​‍⁠⁠‍‌‌⁠‌‌⁠

"Close your eyes," he said. He remembered, too, the Fenwhistle brass binding-ring — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.

I closed them. The needle pierced my skin, and the pain was immediate, a white-hot fire that raced up my arm and into my chest. I tried to hold onto my plan, to remember the records I would burn, but the pain was a living thing, a beast that tore at my mind. I thought of Adaeze. I thought of her hands, shaking as she held my face, the way she whispered my name when the sickness took her. The instinctual love for her, primal and beyond reason, surged through me, overriding my strategic deception. I realized, then of agony, that the ritual was a metaphor for the state’s consumption of its own children. The Golden Hands were not symbols of power. They were trophies of the dead.

The pain subsided, leaving my hands heavy, rigid, and golden. I opened my eyes. The Master was watching me, his expression unreadable. I walked to the inner sanctum, my movements slow and deliberate. The records were there, stacked in neat piles, the names of thousands of children written in neat, precise handwriting. I reached for the lighter in my pocket. My hand was steady. Perfectly still.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌​‍​⁠​‌‍‍‍‌​‍‍​‍‍​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌⁠​‍‍‍​‍‍‍‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​‍‌‍​​​‍⁠⁠‍‌‌⁠‌‌⁠

I looked at the name Adaeze Sani. I looked at the dates of her birth and death. If I burned these records, I would erase her. I would erase the fact that she existed, that she suffered, that she was taken. That would be the final betrayal. I put the lighter back in my pocket. I would not burn them. I would keep them. I would become the silent keeper of the truth, a guardian of the memory that the state sought to destroy.

Years passed. I grew up, my body changing, but my hands remained the same. They were golden, rigid, and perfectly still. I sat at my desk in the industrial court, the heat pressing against the windows, the bell ringing the hour. I wrote a single line of poetry about the wind, my fingers moving with the precision of a machine. I was no longer the trembling boy who wanted approval. I was the keeper of the records, the silent witness to the state’s crimes. I was free, in a way that no one else could understand. I had traded my humanity for a place in the machine, and I had found a strange, terrible peace in the silence of my golden hands. The harvest was counted honestly, the weight of the truth heavy in the air, and I wrote, and wrote, and wrote.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌​‍​⁠​‌‍‍‍‌​‍‍​‍‍​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌⁠​‍‍‍​‍‍‍‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​‍‌‍​​​‍⁠⁠‍‌‌⁠‌‌⁠