Threads of Gold

Thirteen | تیرہ

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Zartasha's mind was abuzz, what she had witnessed set her blood aflame.

Her thoughts thrashed against one another, desperate and screeching. They hindered her senses but the shehzadi knew there was nothing she could do to calm the racing organ in her chest except try making it to her room before the distantly thudding footsteps behind her would make it to her.

She needed to be faster than her doom and her dirge. She needed to be swift in escaping the Sultan who seemed to embody those traits of her fate. He was the cacophonous song her soul often sang, she knew that much and it only gave her more to ponder upon.

Looking ahead at the dim corridors teeming with the teeth of gemstones embedded within their stone, the shehzadi realized she did not know her way back.

Before, Zartasha marked placeholders and monuments she would circle back to in case of the unanticipated prevailing. Before, Zartasha walked floors steadily with a poised spine and arrogance in her ribs. Before, Zartasha picked apart every word her ears would hear, turning over the syllables like one does chandi coins until the other's fortune becomes clear.

Alas, that was before him; before the Sultan's rashness made its home in her veins.

The shehzadi's jittery state would not allow her to remember where her chambers in the Hyderi mehal were. Frustrated at having to resort to sheer luck, Zartasha let out an uneven breath. With blood rushing in her ears, she could only murmur a quiet prayer before stepping into the right-most cavern. She hoped that the favourable direction would not lead her astray.

Again Arzam had stripped her to a woman of base impulse.

And impulse it was; coursing through her body but it was not the stuttering kind for she knew nothing of the language of fear. No, her body only recognized the conniving tongue of power. Perhaps that was why Zartasha felt a part of her awfully willing to accept the life Arzam had so viciously ripped into and offered up to her a few moments ago.

She could not seem to stop thinking and that was when the Fahim heir knew she was not safe until she found a place to shelter her thoughts.

With quick steps, she turned into a heavier part of the mehal. Larger jewels, thicker curtains, and richer door carvings surrounded her but the Malka-to-be's paces only widened with her feverish need to understand the Sultan's behaviour. Zartasha wanted to piece together the bits of him she could hone, she wondered whether mastering the king of kings was a thing of her fate.

At the idea, a smile snaked itself onto her face.

Zartasha soon spotted the doorway she was seeking but she paused before deciding to walk past her chamber's entrance. The shehzadi looked at the next one's threshold instead for she knew that her room was the first place Arzam would invade in his search of her. With her cautious thoughts, she quickly loosened a breath and let go of her lehenga's skirts ready to push open the adjoining chamber's door when she felt it.

A large hand on her shoulder, branding the skin underneath her blouse with its sheer weight and warmth.

Zartasha's smile slipped.

How could she forget herself in this world of men? A world where they were hiding in every alleyway, at every window of chance, ready to capture her and berate her choices. Where they were breathing down her neck, like Sultan Arzam Hyderi behind her.

"Where were you running off to?" His voice was a barely-there murmur on her throat yet she could hear the most primal form of glee in his words.

Arzam's mouth was a breath away from the shell of her ear, his proximity and happiness at having caught her ignited a loathing so deep within the Malka-to-be's chest that she seemed to be blinded.