The battle raged in the valley below, but Soraya remained safe in her camp on the hill top. Safe for now at least. There was no telling what dangers the end of this battle would bring her.

"It's not a pretty sight," Goshtab said from behind her. He sat comfortably in a chair a ways behind her, under the open tent that the servants had set up so that they could watch the battle while being shielded from the sun.

It had been mere hours since her troops had engaged, charging down the walls of Shiraz, and still the fighting continued. It was impossible to see much detail from her vantage point at such a distance. Even the troop formations were unclear. The soldiers were so mixed up in the fights that she couldn't tell which men were fighting who, or who was on her side.

The only indication she had was of the small column of fighters towards the center of the maelstrom. They moved uniformly through the chaos, although their progress was slow, but even from this distance she could see the bursts of flame that constantly erupted around them before dissipating into the air. It made Soraya recall the fireworks at the palace during festival days. Short lived and gone in an instant, but beautiful.

"There's no use watching from there. The result will be the same regardless of how much you torture yourself," he called in his scratchy, elderly voice. "Come, sit down."

Soraya scowled at him, but he spoke with reason. Torturing herself would do her no good. Now she could only leave her fate in the hands of the gods. She turned and sat down upon the beautifully embroidered seat next to his.

He regarded her coolly, his filmy eyes seeming to read her thoughts.

"It's not the same up here," he commented, gesturing to the quiet camp around them. It seemed so empty, so haunting, without the soldiers there to fill it with noise and movement. "Down there, they're fighting for their own lives. But if all of those men are brutally murdered in the battle, the responsibility will be yours entirely."

Soraya moved to shoot Goshtab a glare, but hesitated. Despite his words, his tone wasn't malicious or even threatening. It was the wisdom of his experience that he was giving to her now. How many lives had he been responsible for in his decades in power? How many deaths? It was merely a fact of the powerful, that all blame and glory fell to you.

"Have you ever fought in battle?" Soraya asked, her gaze returning to the raging field down below.

Goshtab scoffed. "Never," he said. "I held a sword once, when my father though to train me amongst the other young recruits in the palace. Never tried swordplay again after that."

Soraya turned to him curiously. "Did you lose that badly?"

"Oh, no," Goshtab replied flippantly. "I won every match. I was a shoddy swordsman, it's true, but I'd managed to threaten every one of those other boys into letting me win." He turned to her with a mischievous smirk. "After that, my father was finally convinced that my talents were of the mind, not the sword."

Soraya nodded, trying to imagine a youthful Goshtab glaring at the other children until they lowered their gazes and admitted defeat. It wasn't hard to picture.

"I suppose your son is the same as you," Soraya said.

"In the ways that matter," Goshtab replied evasively. "He will be a strong leader for the House of Varaz when I'm gone. That's the best I can do."

Soraya glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. For however conniving and devious the old man seemed, for however cruel, he genuinely cared deeply for his house and family. She supposed everyone had to care about something. As things went, family wasn't a bad weakness to care for.

"Tell me about my father," Soraya said suddenly. Goshtab turned to her with a brow arched in surprise. She hadn't meant to say her thought out loud, but she couldn't help it. "He was a horrible shah, wasn't he?"

The Shah had been killed less than a year ago now, but even when he'd been alive, Soraya hadn't truly seen his true self. She'd only seen the mask he wore for her, the mask of a loving father and devoted ruler. He must have had thousands of those masks. Which ones did he put on for Roshani, Esfandar, for her mother? Which one had been real?

The shah Jamshid's reign had been a tumultuous one from the beginning. It was strange, how history formed so quickly, and how it was hidden at the same time. Jamshid had been the youngest of his brothers, last in line when his father had died.

But each of the three brothers wanted the throne for themselves, and the war of succession began. Soraya almost wanted to laugh as she thought of it. It seemed that every time a shah died, his children killed each other to take his place. Would they never learn? Or perhaps it was destiny, the gods' terrible cost for achieving such great power. Soraya would never know.

Did you feel the way I did, father, when you had to kill your brothers? Soraya thought bitterly, looking down upon the battlefield. How did you do it?

Katayoun had supported Jamshid's right to the throne, and that had made all the difference. With her power and legitimacy, her father had won, executing his older brothers for their treachery, which had been no greater than his.

The history was known to all in the palace, yet only spoken of in hushed tones and whispered voices. It had been as if the servants had been afraid for the princes and princesses to know the truth of their father's crimes. They'd been right in a way. The shah had to retain the narrative of his legitimacy.

Or perhaps they'd known that history would only repeat itself when the time came to crown the next shah.

Only it had come sooner than they'd all expected. Roshani had seen to that when she'd plunged her sword through the shah's heart.

Goshtab sighed, leaning back in his chair. His eyes looked off into the distance, seeing people and places that no longer existed in this world.

"The throne didn't suit him," Goshtab said after a moment. "He had no patience for politics, no skill at governing. But many shahs have been this way, and were strong rulers. They only needed to have the right people at their side." He paused meaningfully there. "Your father had the wrong people at his side."

Soraya grew quiet as well. She thought she knew what he was referring to- she knew all too well.

While Katayoun had been behind him, whispering directions in his ear, her father had gained success. But like all men, he soon grew to resent his mother's control. That was when he had begun to look for a wife, a shahbanu to take her place by his side.

He had married Tarsa, first princess of the House of Suren. The princess had been beautiful and powerful and from a wealthy noble family. The match had been perfect, and they were soon married. The empire at last had its empress, and stability had begun to descend for the first time since the civil war.

By all accounts, Jamshid had loved Tarsa. At least, he had for a little while.

Roshani's mother had been named Yasmin. She was not a princess, she wasn't powerful or wealthy, nor was she from a royal family. She was beautiful, though, as beautiful as a goddess descended down to earth. That beauty had aged but never faded even when Soraya had known her.

Yasmin had been born in a lowly hovel miles and miles from the capital, in the dark and crude outskirts of the empire where even the greediest of nobles never bothered to claim. She had sold herself off in order to travel to Nishapur, or her family had sold her- accounts differed on the truth.

Her beauty had been a precious tool to her, Soraya was sure, but it was her intellect and shrewdness that let her to rise up as far as she did in the palace. By the time the shah first met her, she was a high ranking courtesan in the palace, singing and dancing at royal celebrations and now and then going with a lord who requested her company.

Soraya knew of the story because Katayoun had told it to her in whispered tones, her eyes warning her never to repeat.

One day in the middle of the burning summer, Yasmin had performed for a celebration of one of Parthia's ancient conquests. The shah had not been supposed to be there that day, but the heat was so oppressive that he'd had to delay his planned visit to the Suren capital city. He'd attended the performance, and the empire's fate had set its course.

Yasmin was still young then, a young woman as radiant as the sun and as entrancing as an orchid in full bloom. Her long dark hair framed a perfectly rounded face, luminous brown eyes gazed out above her perfect red lips. Decked out in all sort of jewels and finery for the dance, she must have been as blinding as the sun to those who beheld her. At least, that is how Katayoun recounted the tale. Perhaps it was all exaggeration.

Yasmin had met the shah's eyes with her burning gaze and he'd fallen in love instantly, as the story went.

Katayoun's eyes always grew sad and regretful at this part of the story.

"I saw it the moment that it happened," she'd lamented. "And after that, there was nothing that I or the gods could do to change it."

Tarsa had remained childless even after a year of marriage, and it wasn't unusual for a shah to have several wives. Still, when the shah had announced his intention to marry Yasmin the uproar had shaken the empire so seriously that for several weeks it had seemed inevitable that House Suren would erupt into revolt.

It was Yasmin's unspeakably lowly status that offended them, her unsavory rise to power and her completely commoner blood. House Suren had gone mad that such a woman was to follow such a high regarded princess as Tarsa. The shah conferred honors to Yasmin that he'd never once given to Tarsa. He doted on her entirely, neglecting his first wife in her favor. Soraya still sometimes wondered how rebellion had been avoided then.

But it had been, and Shah Jamshid had married Yasmin, making the poor, clever courtesan empress of the vast and ancient empire of Parthia.

Soraya had often wondered whether Yasmin had truly loved her father or if it was truly a manipulation of his love. In her mind, she liked to believe that it was a little bit of both. Regardless, events unfolded as the gods dictated them.

Yasmin soon became pregnant with a child, and soon after Tarsa at last became pregnant as well. The shah had declared the entire year a festival to the goddess Anahita, goddess of fertility, for blessing both empresses at the auspicious time. Tarsa gave birth to Esfandar in the rainy season, on a monsoon day. He'd been so small and weak, they'd feared he wouldn't live, yet fortune let him survive.  Yasmin gave birth to a strong girl who she called Roshani. The name meant bright light, a name which Yasmin thought would be a good omen to the child. However, it had the same sound as the word for passionate anger as well. It would prove to be a perfect name for the girl. Tarsa gave birth to Esfandar in the rainy season, on a monsoon day. He'd been so small and weak, they'd feared he wouldn't live, yet fortune let him survive. 

Political struggles still raged in the background of the courtly dramas. In order to quell a revolt, Jamshid took a third wife: Homeira, Soraya's own mother. She was small and quiet, a strong but infinitely subtle woman. Soraya's heart still tugged painfully at the memories of her, still fresh with grief. She hadn't deserved to die, none of them had. Yet here she was, and all of the empresses and their husband were buried in the ground.

Tarsa and Yasmin had been vicious rivals from the very beginning, as one would have expected from the tumultuous start to their relationship. Jamshid continued to favor Yasmin, yet Tarsa as first empress also commanded power and attention.

The intrigues between them at court over the decades were innumerable, vast, and violent. Yet only the last one ended in their demise.

When the time had come for the shah to announce the crown heir, the one who would become the next ruler of all of Parthia, the great battle had started. Soraya remembered the story from here on, though she wished she didn't.

Shah Jamshid, however much he loved Yasmin more than anyone in the world, felt immense guilt for neglecting Tarsa. As apology for his actions, she convinced him to name Esfandar as crown prince, despite his being the second eldest child.

It went against the long held tradition of the eldest royal child becoming heir to the throne, and Yasmin, wishing for Roshani to be empress one day, was livid.

It had been the last straw.

Yasmin had finally been convinced that she had to take that final step, regardless of the repercussions. She'd had Tarsa poisoned that night, a draught so potent she died within minutes. It had been ridiculously simple, really. Only the consequences would not be so.

The plot had led back to Yasmin. There was only one punishment for such a crime committed within the royal family: death.

Soraya shut her eyes, pushing away memories she did not want to see: her sister, wandering the halls at night, their father angrily demanding answers while Soraya looked on horrified. Roshani was crying, shouting at her- Roshani would hate her forever for this, but the truth would have gotten her killed. She shook her head, as if she could push away the images in her own mind with the motion.

Until the very last moment, Soraya still had believed that the shah would never carry out the order. He was the shah, after all- his word was law. If he'd wanted to banish her from the empire or imprison her- if he'd wanted to simply pardon her outright, he had that right.

But something had changed within him at her betrayal. An anger deep inside him stirred. Perhaps he'd begun to see finally, the manipulations and abuses of the past twenty years.

Yasmin was executed. Roshani had been there to watch. Homeira had never liked Roshani very much, had always warned Soraya to be careful what she said around her sister, but at that moment she'd attempted a motherly gesture, moving to cover Roshani's eyes at the moment of the execution.

Roshani had brushed her off, her eyes never wavering from the execution ground wear her mother stood. Soraya had buried her face in her mother's skirts, unable to watch. When she'd at last looked back up again, Roshani was standing in the same place, as if she hadn't moved a single muscle, eyes staring blankly ahead.

Roshani had changed that day as well. They all had, Soraya supposed. But Roshani most of all.

The memories flashed so painfully in her mind that she nearly forgot the current dangers around her, the battle below where her trusted companions and subordinates fought her brother, a battle that would decide whether or not she herself lived or died.

She was about to speak, to say what she didn't know, but at that moment a gasping courier ran through the empty camp and knelt at her and Goshtab's feet.

"What news from princess Farah?" Goshtab asked immediately. It seemed that he knew the messenger from previous reports.

The man took a moment to catch his heavy breathing, then hesitantly glanced up at Goshtab with nervous eyes.

"Yes, my lord," he replied. "She sends an urgent warning. Empress Roshani is mobilizing her armies- she's marching to Varaz."