The lamps burned low in the prince's study room, casting long shadows across scrolls, maps, and tablets covered with charcoal notes. Kafi sat cross-legged on the floor, still small for his age, but his eyes carried a sharpness that didn't belong to any child.
Zeila buzzed outside with the usual noise of merchants and camels, but inside this quiet room, Kafi was building something far bigger than a port city.
He unrolled a long strip of parchment.
It was crude, hand-drawn, patched together from fragments of older maps.
To anyone else, it was just lines and guesses.
To him, it was the beginning of a continent-spanning plan.
He marked three circles:
Zeila.
The Swahili Coast.
The Great Lakes.
Then he added a fourth farther west, deep inside a region few had ever seen.
Congo.
He paused there, thinking.
No armies.
No conquests.
Not yet.
Trade was the first foundation. The easiest to grow. The hardest to stop.
He wrote out his core plan in tidy lines:
1. Strengthen Zeila's trade routes.
Increase caravans. Form alliances with inland clans. Secure safe passage roads.
2. Develop unique exports.
Frankincense, salt, hides, gum.
And new crops the region had never prioritized: coffee, cotton, sugarcane.
3. Gather skilled people quietly.
Shipbuilders. Scholars. Carpenters. Camel masters. Navigators.
Not for now. For later.
4. Observe Ethiopia without provoking it.
Understand its strengths and weaknesses before making any moves.
5. Establish early ties with Swahili merchants.
Their networks stretched toward the ocean; his would stretch inland.
Together, they would open the doorway to half the world.
6. Explore the interior.
Not with armies, but with caravans.
Traders could go where swords could not.
He leaned back, rubbing his eyes. He wasn't tired; he was excited.
Every part of this plan mattered.
Every line would shape the next twenty years.
He pulled another scroll toward him, this one covered in small boxes and arrows. It wasn't a map. It was a timeline.
Year 1–3: Learn the political landscape.
Build trust with clan elders.
Introduce small reforms, nothing alarming.
Establish record-keeping, better storage, and standardized weights for trade.
Year 4–6: Expand.
More caravans.
Bigger trading fleets.
Begin small industries in Zeila.
Create secure trade partnerships across the Horn and Swahili coast.
Year 7–10: Reach inland.
Connect with the Great Lakes traders.
Send scouts to observe the Congo Basin.
Prepare the city for true growth.
He closed the scroll and tied it with a simple string. This plan was his real inheritance, the one nobody would ever see. The secret of his rebirth stayed locked inside his mind.
Some nights, he wondered if the world would even understand what he was trying to build.
But that didn't matter.
He understood.
As the moon rose over Zeila, he placed the scroll into a small wooden chest and locked it. Not from fear. From patience. Everything had its time.
Tonight was for planning.
Tomorrow would be for action.
And the future would belong to those who prepared for it early.
---
Five Years Later
The sun set behind the red hills, painting Zeila in warm gold. The city was larger now, louder, richer. Ships lined the harbor. Caravans crowded the gates. Traders from Oman, Lamu, Harar, Adal, and further south all passed through its streets.
And on the balcony of the high residence stood a young man of seventeen.
Taller. Sharper. Steady.
The childishness gone, replaced by calm confidence.
Kafi.
He looked over the city he had shaped with five years of steady planning.
Tomorrow, he would begin the next stage.
The blueprint was complete.
Now came the building of an empire.