Some time ago, Hasheem had discovered a craving for blood—the unique, oddly sweet scent of it, the sharp, metallic taste that lingered on his tongue, even the way it dripped down his fingers made the killing easier, if not also pleasurable. He didn't always enjoy fighting, but a part of him enjoyed killing, sometimes even longed for it, other times needing it to keep the monster inside him fed and contained.

He had been craving blood for the past five days. Now, more than ever, standing in the crimson-hued Hall of Marakai, looking at the two men who had come with their tidings. Tidings that carried with it a promise of blood.

"I brought him from the west, di Amarra," Sarasef explained, made a gesture at Djari who was standing on the opposite side of the throne, "as a swornsword and blood of Djari iza Zuri, the bharavi of Visarya," he gave it a small pause to check their expressions, "the only daughter of Za'in izr Husari. More precisely, the man your superior wants to see dead."

Standing below the dais, Djari stiffened a little at those words. Still, she remembered, as she always had, to straighten her spine when addressed by title. A part of him wanted to believe nothing had changed, that she was still the same girl he had come to love and care for, but one would have to be blind to not see it, or be completely ignorant to not notice that change.

There was a severity to her presence now; a stinging sharpness, a dangerous gleam that glinted off her like a newly broken piece of obsidian. It wrapped around her like an armor fitted with spikes and concealed blades, made those around her think twice before approaching. It had been five days since he'd last seen her—Sarasef hadn't let them meet since they had been brought there—and Djari seemed to have aged ten years during that time. She had, he noticed, been avoiding eye contact with him ever since they'd stepped into the hall. He knew something about that, knew the feeling like the shape of every scar on his body, and how long they continued to sting.

He also knew that she'd been told about this meeting, just as he had. There was no surprise on her face about what Sarasef had just revealed. The surprise was about something else, something no one had expected, not even Dee.

He followed her gaze to the center of the hall just in time to see the prince turning his attention from him to Djari. Their eyes met, and suddenly something in the hall altered, slipped free of its cloak, stepped forward to stand naked before their eyes. Hasheem could feel the hair on his arm rise to the sudden drop of temperature, could see his breaths turning white as he exhaled the same way he'd felt at the hunting ground. On the throne, Sarasef sat with his hands curled tight around the armrests, watching the two of them as intently as Dee who looked like he'd just seen a ghost. Djari's eyes were glowing bright amber, like Nazir's when he was having one of his visions.

So were the prince's.

And then, when silence tightened its grip around the chamber, when time seemed to have come to a screeching stop, a loud rumble filled the hall. It shook the ground underneath their feet, sent a tremor through the marble tiles and up their spine, rising and rising in intensity as it threatened to bring down the walls. The hall flashed white for a second, and through the opening in the ceiling—the one they called the Eye of Marakai—a spear of light slammed down into ground halfway between Djari and the prince.

It blinded the hall, knocked out their hearing like a fist to the head as it left its mark. The running crack in the marble formed a long diagonal line across the room, ending on either side at Djari's and the prince's feet, as if a god had split the earth open, linking the two of figures for them to see.

For the world to see.

And through it all, as if they had been someplace else, locked together in a battle no one else participated, the prince and Djari never took their eyes off each other, hadn't so much as stirred at the thunder and the lightning that ripped apart ground before them. Djari held the prince's gaze, jaw clenched indescribably tight, face pale as a corpse without uttering a sound. Her counterpart shared that expression, only he was breathing twice as fast as she did.

"It would seem," Dee said at length, addressing no one in particular, but bringing all out of their stupor, "that there are more witnesses to this meeting than the four of us. My lady," he turned to Djari, inclining his head a little, "if I may. Apart from what we know of your titles," he paused for a moment, allowing his next words to resonate, to grip the attention of those present. "What else are you?"

Hasheem swallowed, placed a step forward to address the question, hoping to steer it in another direction. Before he could utter his first word, and for the first time that evening, Djari turned, caught his eyes, and silenced him with a look. Clearing her throat, she pulled back her shoulders and pitched her voice to carry, addressing the entire hall if not also the gods above. "I am a daughter of Ravi, born on the veiling of Rashar. My first breath has brought with it the darkening of the world and the circlet of fire. In the eyes of Ravi," she drew a breath, and, as precise and steady as the way she drew back her bowstring to shoot a target, let loosed the flaming arrow that ignited the first fire that would later spread through the peninsula. "I bring with me an ending of the war and the reign of Rashar."

It was a declaration of war, backed by the very hour of her birth and the hope she'd brought into the world with her existence. Dangerous, considering where they were and the revelation she'd just given her enemies. With a stroke of a quill and a bird sent to the Black Tower, the salar would never hesitate to bring down an army to get rid of her, even here, even if it would mean taking down the Rishi. Hope, or more importantly, an embodiment of hope backed by the gods had to be extinguished as quickly as possible. That had always been the way by which Salar Muradi achieved victory and remained victorious. It was why he'd hunted down oracles before all else. One word of this got out, and he would hunt her down before Za'in izr Husari and with everything he had.

Hasheem shuddered at the thought, and yet he knew it had been necessary under the circumstances. War was coming with the arrival of the prince and Deo di Amarra. Whatever Sarasef decided could mean victory or defeat to the White Desert, and that decision, Hasheem knew, could be shaped by what she had been prophesied to be. Still, Marakai, the Sky Father, had made his mark tonight, and the line had touched two people in that hall. There was a meaning to that he had yet to decipher, a meaning only Dee seemed to understand judging by the grin he had failed to contain.

"I see," said Deo di Amarra, turning to Sarasef who seemed to have retreated into the privacy of his own thoughts at the revelation. "I take it you have shared with our guests the details of the salar's proposal sent prior to our arrival?"

Sarasef nodded grimly. "I have."

"And in having done so they have offered you an alternative? That is why they are here, I presume?"

For that, Hasheem stepped forward to reply. "I have." It had been him who'd requested that they be present, and him who had offered Sarasef an alternative. Judging from the surprise on Djari's face, he figured Sarasef hadn't told her of that detail.

Dee's attention was on him now, studying his expression closely with a practiced calm. Only Hasheem had been with him long enough to recognize the signs that told him his mentor's mind was racing for answers at this very moment. For the very first time, Deo di Amarra had known nothing of what he'd walked into, and had not been given time to deal with it. He wondered if it would make a difference. He also wondered if something else would.

Without removing his eyes from Hasheem, he said, "Might I inquire that it be shared with the rest of us then? To be fair."

Hasheem turned to Sarasef for permission and was relieved to see it given. It wasn't easy for him, hadn't been from the moment he knew who had accompanied the prince. The last person he wanted to go against was this man who had taught him every knowledge he possessed, the same man who had made him into what he was now. The least he could do was to try to be fair, even though fairness had never been a concept that existed in the world they lived in.

"The alternative is to not bring in an army to defeat Saracen," he said, searching his mind for the right word, and realized there had been none, "but to have him killed."

It would solve all the problems. Sarasef wouldn't need any more men than he had to deal with Saracen. Without a leader, the faction that had defected would be in disarray, giving Sarasef an opportunity to round them up, win a number of them back—if not most—over time. They were, after all, mercenaries not loyal to any nation or land but to any man who could fill their pockets. Should he agree, Sarasef could reject the proposal, send the salar's army back where they came from, and avoid conflict with the Visarya for the time being. He could be—might be—forgiven for the mistake of having captured Djari in exchange for stalling the war.

A good alternative, except for one problem. To Sarasef, it would mean killing his own brother when he could have been taken alive.

If that meant anything to the chief, Hasheem couldn't tell. Sarasef wasn't the kind of man to be read easily, nor was he one to wear his emotions on his sleeve.

Neither was Dee, for that matter.

With a disturbing quietness only those closest to him understood, Deo di Amarra kept his eyes on him as he considered the stakes at hand, perhaps also trying to decide his next course of action, and maybe, just maybe, where he wanted to stand in all this.

For a time, no one spoke a word. Even Djari seemed to be drowning in her own thoughts, or waiting to see the next turn of events. She had, he realized, become uncharacteristically calm and far removed from the image of a young girl he'd come to know. A searing pain shot through his heart at the thought, pried open an existing wound that wasn't going to heal anytime soon.

The one who broke that silence, the only one who wasn't attached to anything in that hall, was the Prince. "You are just one man," he said as-a-matter-of-factly, still, that hint of mockery in his tone was audible.

Hasheem turned to him and stated in the same manner. "It only takes one."

"To fight his way through a thousand men?" The mockery was not concealed this time.

"He doesn't have to." It was Sarasef who spoke. "My brother had gone to lengths to get his hands on the Sparrow on his way here. If he were to escape from my care and stumble into Saracen's men, he would be brought directly to him."

My care. Hasheem winced at those words. There were too many things attached to that. Sarasef's intentions to keep him for one, the unwelcome feeling the chief harbored toward him for another, assuming the clothes he'd been offered hadn't already given it away, of course. He could only wish it hadn't, and that those words wouldn't be caught and turned into a weapon.

"Perhaps. Only he would be tied up and relieved of all weapons when that happens," the prince countered.

Hasheem drew a breath and made a decision, one he had been reluctant to make for some time. What he had been wasn't news to the three men in that hall, but it was the one part of his life he hadn't wanted Djari to know. There was no avoiding it now, however, not with what was at stake. "Not in bed, no," he said and forced himself to not look at Djari or what would be on her face then.

"Assuming he takes you to bed, of course."

At another time, in a different place, Hasheem might have been able to hold back some of his rage. But there and then, having been pushed to reveal that life in front of Djari, trying to deal with everything that had happened and was happening, together with his craving for blood that was growing by the minute, his control was slipping. Had slipped. "I am the Silver Sparrow of Azalea, forget not, my lord prince," he reminded them. "That reputation has been earned, not given to me by birthright. It is a profession at which I happen to excel and dominate for the past five years. For this, you will believe it when I say, that if I want you in my bed, you will be. The same goes," he turned to Sarasef, "for Saracen."

The prince swallowed, shifted his weight uncomfortably at words he knew better than to put to the test. Hasheem had been trained for that. People like him all had been trained to lure, to catch, to release with strings attached. Strings he knew when and how to pull to get them to come back, to spend more coins—to find coins they didn't have—to pour it all on him. It was the whole point of being good at it, the only way he could seize some power and control back into his life, even if for a short time. Not too different at all from holding a knife to a person's throat, if one were to look at it from a certain angle. The desire for pleasure was a thing as powerful as the desire to live, and he had been the master of both to men and women alike. With men, it was always easier. Men could be triggered, drove out of their senses and reasoning, made to salivate, to beg, to spill secrets at just a thought of what he could do to them.

And what he could do, Sarasef himself knew enough to suck in a breath the moment he'd finished the sentence. There was a certain comfort to hearing it, even at the cost of having unpleasant memories resurface. At the very least, the one man he needed to convince needed no convincing.

"A fine plan," said Deo di Amarra lightly—too lightly for his liking. "Getting Saracen alone isn't a problem. I have, in fact, turned down his offer for the Sparrow three times in the past. Killing him is also a standard procedure for all of my first class assassins. But how, may I ask," he turned to address Sarasef and Djari both, "do you intend to get him out alive and back in your care?"

Hasheem bit his lip over that. Leave it to Dee to figure out so swiftly and clearly the stakes those who opposed him had to lose. He would remember Sarasef's offer for him, of course, however long ago that was, and it had been a folly to have wished that his mentor wouldn't catch those words. His life did hold meaning to the chief and to Djari, and neglectfully, he hadn't really considered the possibility of walking out alive if he were to do this. It would be different from escaping the city he knew with secret passages to avoid running into the whole brigade of guards. This was breaking out of a camp of a thousand or so mercenaries. He hadn't planned to die when he'd come up with the offer, but dying had never been a factor in whatever he decided to do. Dee knew this, of course, and also knew that he wouldn't have thought of a solution to that problem, old habits and all.

Before he could figure out an answer to that, Djari stepped forward and ascended the dais, pausing to stand two paces away from Sarasef. "We'll get him out," she said, her voice ringing loud and clear, "with our warriors."