Badr had never believed in superstitions.
He'd been raised in a palace where souls were managed by numbers, prestige was measured by titles, and problems were solved by a council decision or a digital signature. Even "White" to them wasn't a plant you packed into a cheek—it was a sovereign reserve logged on blue screens, protected behind layered locks.
And yet… as he stared at Azzam sitting across from him, Badr felt something that couldn't be filed or explained in a report.
Weight.
As if the air in the room had become heavier by one degree. As if gravity around the sofa no longer obeyed palace laws, but the laws of another man.
*I know this body… but that look has never lived in this face.*
Badr sat on the edge of the opposite chair. He wasn't truly sitting—he was leaving himself an escape angle, leaving his heart room to hammer without showing.
Across from him, Azzam lounged in a midday pose: leg crossed over leg, head propped in his hand with lazy, royal carelessness. The **bajma** filled his cheek with a dignity that inspired fear, not admiration.
He chewed slowly.
Each movement of the jaw announced something that didn't need words: this man wasn't asking for his place.
He was taking it.
Azzam spoke in a calm, hoarse voice:
"Now… you'll tell me."
He didn't ask.
He didn't request.
He declared.
And something inside Badr went cold.
*If I refuse… I'm the next corpse.*
***
The rope hadn't been a mistake.
It had been a decision.
Weeks ago, everything had been running the way things ran in Chen's four families: cold, elegant, and bloodless on the surface.
A political marriage project.
Azzam… engaged to the Duke's daughter.
It hadn't been love. It had been an alliance. The Duke's daughter meant influence, resources—an unwritten permission to reach higher layers of the city, summits that opened only for names that shone.
And Azzam—despite his weakness—had been the right piece on the chessboard. Younger. Easier to control. Less demanding.
Then the cousin entered—the one who always smiled in meetings, shook hands firmly, spoke of "family honor" while counting profits in his head.
He wanted the girl.
He wanted the position.
So rumors began.
A small scandal, then a larger one. A leaked file. A forged message. Fabricated footage—because in Chen, even truth could be manufactured if you paid the right price.
Then came the silent decision: wash the shame.
One clean solution:
the rope.
Azzam dies "by suicide"… and the family stays clean before the Duke. The marriage transfers to the "suitable" cousin. Everyone is told politics is merciless, and honor is heavier than life.
And Badr?
Badr hadn't stopped it. He hadn't shouted. He hadn't opened his mouth.
Worse—at the dirtiest point inside him—he had waited for his brother to die so he could be spared the complications of politics.
*I stayed silent… because silence was easier.*
***
Badr raised his eyes to Azzam again.
The comparison insulted logic.
The old Azzam would tremble under a harsh stare. His voice wavered. His gestures hesitated. His eyes searched for permission before they moved.
But this…
This one chewed White with cold composure and issued orders like he had built the palace.
Even the accent had changed. Roughness in the shape of words, and terms that had never belonged to noble Azzam's vocabulary: *taqreeha. bajma. kayf.*
*When the tongue changes… the mind has changed.*
And Badr didn't dare form the next sentence:
*That means he isn't my brother.*
***
In Chen, the violet seal wasn't a children's story. It was a file you opened only in sealed halls.
And activating it with royal-grade White… was a myth reserved for top commanders: measured doses, extreme purity, protocols that prevented the body from burning out or the soul from deforming.
So how had Azzam gotten it tonight?
The night of the rope.
The night of the blast.
The night he returned with violet eyes.
Badr felt as if every heartbeat was readable.
Not mind-reading.
Intent-reading.
As if those violet eyes could see the direction of a lie before it formed.
His hands went cold.
***
Azzam asked quietly:
"Who wanted the rope?"
Badr tried to evade.
"What rope? You… maybe you dreamed—"
He stopped.
The violet eyes held him with a steadiness that didn't allow games.
Azzam said, low:
"Don't change the road. Tell the truth."
Something cracked in Badr's chest.
He lowered his head a fraction.
"It was… a family decision."
"And who pushed it?"
Badr hesitated. A name in Chen wasn't just a name—it was a network. Saying it meant opening a door that wouldn't close.
But he understood the door was already open.
He forced it out:
"Our cousin… he arranged the scandal. He convinced the council that 'washing the shame' was necessary… that your death would protect the deal with the Duke."
Azzam's face didn't change.
As if the information went into a box in his mind and the lid closed softly.
Azzam asked, "And the marriage?"
Badr swallowed.
"They were going to give it… to him."
A short silence.
Then Azzam asked, even lower:
"And you… What were you?"
Badr searched for a word to polish himself. He felt any polish would kill him.
So he gave the truth raw:
"I was… silent."
Azzam looked at him for a long time.
Then said, without visible anger:
"Silence… is a rope too."
***
Azzam said, "You'll obey me now, Badr."
Badr didn't ask why. He didn't say no.
He nodded slowly. His utilitarian mind did the math: obedience meant life. Resistance meant the same ending—only quieter, and unseen.
Badr asked in a faint voice, "What do you want?"
Azzam touched his swollen cheek as if settling the bajma into place.
"I want to know when the four families meet."
Badr hesitated, then answered:
"Tonight. Right after the blast. An emergency council. Everyone's in the upper hall."
Azzam said, "You'll take me."
Badr opened his mouth to protest—then shut it.
***
The path to the upper hall ran through corridors lit by soft neon that hid cameras in its corners. Servants bowed without lifting their eyes. Automated guards stood like statues with a pulse.
Badr felt like he was walking behind his brother toward judgment—only this time the court wasn't the family.
It was him.
Azzam—Al-Muqarraḥ—walked with cold steadiness.
The violet seal in his neck sent short pulses whenever he neared a strong surveillance point, as if drawing invisible lines so he wouldn't misstep. With each pulse, the body felt more compatible: breath steady, steps confident, presence thick.
They reached the massive double doors.
Gloss-black metal carved with old Persian script, its lines lit by threads of electricity that moved like living ink. When the doors opened, cold air poured out—heavy saffron mixed with the scent of burnt oil.
Azzam stepped in… and paused for a beat.
To him, the hall wasn't merely a council chamber.
It was a temple.
A ceiling so high it swallowed sound. Rings of circular light hung like halos above the heads of those who claimed the right to rule. The walls were giant screens displaying the city map: towers, summits, breach points—red marks blinking where the explosion had hit.
In the center stood a long table of polished black stone, as if it had drunk old blood and now shone only with coldness.
Four sides. Four platforms. Four crests.
Faces that weren't servants or soldiers—faces used to giving orders and calling it public interest. Necks with a shimmer beneath the skin, modified eyes, metal fingers hidden under silk.
Al-Muqarraḥ was struck.
Not by the wealth—
but by the balance of cruelty and beauty. As if an entire civilization had decided to decorate its knife instead of hiding it.
He walked forward without haste.
Badr tried to steer him toward a side seat, a shadow fit for "the younger heir." But Al-Muqarraḥ didn't go to the shadow.
He went to the front.
To the Grandfather's chair—the seat of the clan's old authority.
He looked at it for a fraction of a second.
Then sat.
He sat **mukhazzen**, as if the bajma granted extra steadiness. He sat like a man returning to a place stolen from him, not a boy receiving an honor.
Then he lifted his gaze.
Slow. Cinematic. Uninterested.
He let his eyes travel over the faces one by one: a man with a modified silver eye, a woman in an embroidered cloak, an elder with a half-transparent mask, a young man with a smile like a knife.
He didn't ask their names. Names didn't matter yet.
What mattered was: who decides, who follows, and who merely thinks he decides.
A man on the opposite side spoke in a calm metallic voice:
"How did you get here, Azzam? We were told you're recovering."
Al-Muqarraḥ replied evenly:
"Recovery is for the sick."
A slight pause.
"And I… woke up."
Whispers stirred, then were strangled by watching eyes.
A new report rose on the screen behind them: contamination levels of the green dust, purity ratios, reserve losses, and the deployment of special units.
A woman spoke in a soft voice sharpened like glass:
"More important—who breached the summits? Who has the nerve to steal sovereign White?"
He didn't answer immediately.
He looked up at the ceiling, its patterns, the light placement, the hidden cameras. He read the hall like a massive trap smiling politely.
Then he touched the base of his neck beneath the collar—lightly, as if absentminded.
The violet seal pulsed.
One pulse—different this time. Not a warning.
A response.
As if something in the hall had reacted to the seal. As if there was another seal present, or an old protocol embedded in the Butlls, or someone carrying the same chemistry without admitting it.
Al-Muqarraḥ lifted his eyes slowly.
And smiled—a small smile that meant nothing to them…
But inside him it was an admission: the game was deeper.
He said calmly:
"Maybe… someone who knows the value of White better than you do."
Silence fell.
And behind him, Badr felt that the hall—despite its size—had become narrower.
Because Azzam was no longer a survivor of a rope.
He was a question sitting at the head of the table.
And another question whispered beneath the skin of his neck, in a cold pulse:
*You are not alone here.*