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There was persistence in the lore that once darkness falls after a day has died, depravity becomes a part of the air and the moon hangs low enough to cut its beholders. Sometimes it is whole and round, like the Sultan's belly after tasting blood. Sometimes it is new and hollow, like the Sultan's eyes after tasting solitude.
When it came down to the marrow of nightfall itself, the reflective pearl in the sky did not matter nor did the amorality insinuated with twilight because one's fear ruled over them above all until dawn. Fear of the dark's savagery ruled them every time, their minds only being awarded relief when the sun rose to chase away their nightmares.
Arzam's reign over Kalthura was similar yet different in its base essence because his nightmarish hukmarani knew no end. There was no hope to be held out for an illuminating vessel lending its light, no hope to be held out for a burning vessel to chase away the terror. Finding cover from Sultan Arzam Hyderi's wrath was a futile attempt and the body lying limply across the back of a surrounded mare knew it well.
His time had come.
The worn man was not as afraid of death in name as he was afraid of death at the Sultan's hands.
The newcomer was encircled by many a mare and rider. Around him was the remaining half of the troop Arzam had taken with him to Gulzaan for subjugation. The intention of laying siege to the capital and having fear spread like a wildfire across Sherquli horizons never drifted away from the Sultan's mind until he had caught sight of the Malka-to-be. It was then that his plans had to change, take on a different shape. To ensure he would always wear the face of victory, Sultan Hyderi had left half of his men unassumingly roaming the streets of the other mulk after he was done with his deliberate slaughter of Zartasha's guards.
The aim was to have plenty of eyes and ears and enforcers within Gulzaan, most importantly around the shahi mehal, for his soldiers would not let a baghi breath escape their Sultan's notice. Arzam ordered it so, as a way to shift his attention onto a more precious ensnarement. The Sherquli shehzadi had become a marker of his madness, the immobile man soon realized after the Sultan had commanded his men to take a closer look into the inner workings of Sherqul.
There, the middle-aged man became careless with his loose lips and keen ears. He came into contact with Sherquli talks that would do well with Arzam but instead he chose to withhold the whispers he heard.
What he had forgotten about having fellow warriors roaming the same outskirts as he was that even he was not spared from their scrutiny, from being watched and heard.
On a warm evening in Gulzaan, Owais found him plastered to a cracking wall of brownstone, overhearing a foreign conversation that criticized their Sultan's way of ruling. Kalthura's spymaster and head of militiamen knew not to be quick in questioning his comrade, Adnan, for he wanted to see how the man would reiterate what he had heard.
Dusk turned to dawn, then came the new day. The following dawn turned to dusk, then came the next night. After three days' worth of time, Owais understood that Adnan would not utter a word about what he had lent ears to but instead, he asked the spymaster a question.
"Have you ever thought about going against the Sultan?"
Owais briefly shut his eyes and let out a firm, "No."
Adnan, in turn, did not recount the conversation he had heard to Owais. His silence became his biggest mistake and mistakes were given the darjah of grave sins in Kalthura.
Owais sent out a message to Sultan Arzam Hyderi soon after, describing the situation and asking for his master's permission to make their return.
Arzam's response was singular and affirmative but there seemed to be a sort of hunger attached to his scrawl.
Owais cornered the man who he and the rest of the soldiers now considered to be treason personified. They gave him nothing but the sickening caress of what he would face when they dragged him back to Qalmazar. The following moments were only bruises and capture but they were gifted to Adnan in good spirit; if he was already weakened before the Sultan began his onslaught upon him then perhaps his life would leave him with more ease.
And now, the troop had arrived like hungry dogs who stood before their master, eager to please, with drool escaping an open mouth around a bloody catch. That night the catch was Adnan, a man whose soul had recently found solace in rebellion.
He turned his aching neck, the mare's coat prickling and fine against his face when he heard footsteps that rang loud in his ears. A deafening quality overtook Adnan when the Sultan strode towards Owais and asked in a voice that was no less than a booming thunderclap, "Why have you returned with an incapable soldier of mine?"
Arzam was well aware of the reasoning in advance but his question was only meant to remind the man of what would befall him in the moments to come rather than to truly seek an answer. Owais knew his Sultan well enough to still produce a rapt answer, "He betrayed you, Hukum. His ears have heard words against you and he did not tell us."
Neither the Sultan nor the spymaster made a move to acknowledge the other half of Adnan's crime against him. Arzam wanted no public inquiry regarding his reign of terror because a simple mind was better than one fed with prompts of rebellion.
As if the animal could also feel the weight of the spymaster's heavy declaration, the mare shook the traitor off its back, throwing him onto the ground and laying him down at Sultan Hyderi's feet.
Arzam did not respond to Owais, instead, he took hold of Adnan's shredded kurta by its collar and widened his eyes in a way that was nothing short of insane. There was a frantic gleam in his cinnamon eyes, and it seemed bright enough to swallow the traitor alive. The Sultan whispered, "Not a soldier of mine anymore, then."
The ragged man knew to remain silent because the Sultan's anger was brimming but Arzam would only unleash it when he was standing in the centre of his throne room. His mehal was where he would rule out most of his punishments, if it was not too dire of a matter, for if it was then it called solely for the cold cement flooring of his dungeons which would endure blood and sweat better. Exerting his power in a place that felt most like home seemed to comfort the Sultan and the shadowed walls, scintillating gemstones, and carved metals that were the Hyderi mehal was Arzam's home.
The supreme ruler of Kalthura gave the rest of his men a look and they immediately knew what he had asked of them. Some soldiers had to retire to their quarters, some had to accompany him to the throne room, and some had to prepare the Sultan's means of punishing Adnan.
With that silent command given, Sultan Arzam Hyderi clutched the traitor's coarse hair from its root and began marching into the mehal whilst dragging the man along with him, reducing his state to that of a rag doll's.
When Arzam had entered his throne room, his hand left Adnan's head causing the apathetic man to fall onto the floor entirely and for ripped tufts of his hair to fall around his body, as if to frame his misery.
Sultan Hyderi took large steps towards his throne where there was a warm pail left awaiting the supreme master whilst Kalthuran soldiers took their positions and lined the outermost circumference of the room once more.
It was sudden.
The Sultan was in front of Adnan as a withstanding form of destruction and anger. His large palm swiftly took ahold of the traitor's jaw and he kept pressing and stretching and pressing until he heard a snap.
After loosening Adnan's jowls, Arzam took note of his open mouth, his pleading eyes, and blanching skin.
The more he looked at him, the more the supreme ruler of Kalthura became enraged. The audacity of the mere soldier in front of him had the Sultan furious.
On his knees, on the brink of exhaustion and subservience, Adnan seemed to be at his rightful place.
When the other men saw their Sultan's hand lifting the pail they had left him and bringing it closer to the traitor's face, they averted their gazes for no one wanted to see what happened next.
They stared at the jagged corners of the walls, they stared at the smooth flooring beneath their feet, and they stared at the jewels lining the chamber's doorway but they knew not to dare a glance at the mezzanine wrapping itself around the highest portion of the throne room. It was as if the obsidian railing beckoned fools to look to it once for it allowed a glimpse at the happenings of exclusive areas within the Hyderi mehal.
Sultan Arzam Hyderi brought his face close to the traitorous soldier and a false sense of despair cloaked his words, "Why did you question my reign, my dearest? Why did you have to do this to yourself?"
The ends of his erroneous question floated up into the air along with the Sultan's faux condolences, making it heavier. Heavier than it already was because of the increasing sweat and urine and fear.
It was the sweetest of scents to Arzam.
A sigh left the Sultan when he caught a whiff of it and then boiling tayl was being poured down Adnan's throat.
The traitor's eyes were wide open at the sensation of being burned from the inside out. He was forced to drink the scalding liquid that was slowly becoming the bane of his existence.
He knew his death was near. Adnan was suffocating, he felt fire touch his veins. He was wheezing and it turned him red. Yet, all he could do in retribution was sputter out a few drops of tayl from his nose.
The supreme ruler of Kalthura walked back to his throne and sat down. He would patiently wait until the offender's suffering had passed, he would savour the moments until the wrongdoer had given out.
All things besides Adnan's feebly drowning gasps were quiet: the Sultan, the breeze, the other soldiers. All things but the isolated rustling of Zartasha's clothes and the chiming of her jewellery as she was evading the head of shahi Kalthuran maids, Rifat, who was waddling behind the shehzadi with a thaal in hand.
The thaal housed red fabrics, rich assortments of accessories, and mehendi. Arzam had ordered his maids to diurnally greet the Malka-to-be with elaborate thaals as gifts in order to prepare her for the idea of marriage. It was the Sultan's way of wooing his shehzadi.
The trays had previously consisted of heaping jewels, anklets, rose and jasmine-infused oils, maang tikkas, and inky breadths of clothing but never a surkh garment with henna to accompany it. Zartasha knew what those items implied when combined and so, that day she panicked and wanted an escape from her room.
It was overwhelming; not the idea of marriage nor the man proposing said idea of marriage but rather figuring out how a marriage with him would benefit her aspirations.
Upon witnessing the sounds of a shahi woman in the mehal, Arzam's men stiffened but let no other bodily change become visible. Sultan Arzam Hyderi's lips curved upwards at the realization that Zartasha was freely moving about his home. Adnan, being in his last moments of life, thought of the noise as his last saving grace so he tilted his neck to give his left ear more room to hear Zartasha's movements.
The problem with looking for peace in people, searching for relief in others was that it always disappointed if not endangered one's sanity even more.
That was what the dying traitor did, he called the angel of death upon himself faster because as soon as Arzam saw what Adnan was doing, his ghussa knew no bounds.
He stood up with a sway that seemed cosmic and the Sultan feverishly looked around the room for something of substantial weight and edge. Resting under a split stained window, he found heavy iron rods.
He grabbed one by its blunt end and moved towards the traitor whose back laid half on the floor and half suspended in the air because of his pained state.
All the supreme ruler of Kalthura could take note of was his raised ear towards the upper floor ledge that looked over the throne room and he was upon Adnan, spitting out a warning that was already in vain, "You betrayed me with your mouth and you are paying for it but you think you are worth hearing what is not meant for you?"
Shaking his head side to side as a way to answer himself, Arzam chanted, "No, no, no," he only told the traitor, "You do not hear what your Sultan does not permit you to."
With that, the sharp end of the metal rod was shoved into Adnan's ear and with such brutal force that it easily cut through his head's squelching matter and cartilage, coming out of his right ear clean.
The middle-aged man then realized that not all women were grace for the one he chose to turn towards in his last moments was his demise instead.
Heaving, Arzam let go of the weapon and let it crash onto the floor. He shifted his gaze upwards where he saw Zartasha leaning over the railing and quietly watching as the Sultan had delivered a man to his death.
She stopped running from the aged woman behind her for a short duration of time and decided to follow the clanging noise that resounded in her ears.
The shehzadi sensed the chamber's opulent blackness from a distance. What she saw when she approached the rails of the mezzanine froze her blood and chilled her spine.
She kept staring and staring and staring; at the floor that was lacquered because of the foreign liquids splattered across it, at the tortured corpse laying upon harsh granite, at the large tyrannical man standing in the centre of the room.
He was looking at her and in that moment, she was truly frightened.
Frightened that he would spot her posture and understand it was not one of fear but rather of chattering approval.
Arzam saw her thrilled eyes turning away from the scene and he followed by roaring for one of his ghulaams to take the dead away. Then, the Sultan left to find his shehzadi.
âââââ
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