Meri Pehchan

•the truth•

Disastrous, absolutely disastrous was what King Zaid thought to himself. His mouth flooded with a bitter flavor, his teeth clenched tightly and ground against each other. His fingers tightened on the metal hilt of his sword. Observing the deep silence of the garden with his furious eyes Zaid determined his risks. The highest form of humiliation had been served to him at the hands of his disowned brother. The very one that had disrupted the way of their life years ago, it seemed he had still not had his fill. He launched forward, the sharp tip of his blade gliding through the grass and carpets, slashing them.

"How could you Akbar?" He roared.

He placed his sword at the centre of Akbar's neck. Between the two brother's was a distance of not more than two feet and twenty eons. Increasing the pressure Zaid sighed on seeing a fresh drop of blood ooze out of from his pale skin. Fear crippled those around them, they had not anticipated this.

"Z–Zaid listen we — we should talk it out," Akbar breathed.

His fingers nervously gripped the front of his worn out shirt. He took deep breaths ignoring the sharp pain in the centre of his throat. His legs stiffened a feeling of weightlessness drowned him, vision blurring and mouth drying as he imagined this to be the last minutes of his life.

"We can not! You have crossed all limits. By first marrying my slave girl and now by marrying your daughter of to my daughter's man!" He snarled.

"King Zaid it seems we have been a bit too kind. You have forgotten that none of my son's received any proposals and nor did we forward any, do not foolishly display your power by harming innocent life," King Shah Hassan intervened.

"You should stay out of this. It is our private matter!"

"This involves my wife so I assume I have a right to intervene," Fadahunsi quipped.

He was humoring the delusional king. Smirking he walked from behind Samra and stood between the King and his vizier. With a push of his hand he separated the two, taking hold of the sword by its blade the cool metal warmed up at his touch — like dead comes to life. He turned it in his hand as if it had no weight and were thin air, his muscular body moved forward just the slightest his sharp teeth bared at the king.

"I suggest you get your army together or you might not see the rays of Sun tomorrow," he whispered.

"You'd be foolish to start a war over a worthless habshi!" He gritted.

King Zaid's eyes were full of unwavering strength although the twitch in his upper facial muscles and spasm in his left palm told a different story altogether. Raising his hand, Fadahunsi brought it on to the man's shoulders pressing in with the gentlest of pressures, watching his facade crumble the cracks like tectonic plates widening by the second.

"
جز آن آه مستی عشقست هيچ مستی نيست
همين بلات بس است، ای به هر بلا خرسند
خيال رزم تو گر در دل عدو گذرد
ز بيم تيغ تو بندش جدا شود از بند"
He recited for the old man.

[There is no drunkenness but that of love.
Love is enough misery, even for you.
If thoughts of war run through your enemy's heart,
Fear of your blade will cut him, limb from limb.]

As King, Zaid had learnt many languages of which Persian was the first and foremost. It was beyond necessary considering it was the Persians that had rule over more than half of the continent and even more so due to the fact that they were the masters of the Silk trade route. Realization dawned on him and he fiddled with his hands. His status put him behind thick walls, he could not show that he had accepted defeat so openly, nor could he mourn for such a large population depended upon him. He was vulnerable from whichever way he looked at it, and his only answer would be to agree to war.