"I have borne many wounds in my time. What's one more, if it leads to truth?"

The journey southward carved a path through silence and shadow, each step bringing them deeper into the heart of winter's domain. The Karkheh River lay ahead like a distant promise, but first they must thread their way through mountains that harbored secrets old as empire itself. Here, where the air was thin enough to slice moonlight into ribbons, the convoy wound its way through paths known only to mountain ghosts and desert memories.

The fog wrapped around them like a burial shroud, thick enough to swallow sound itself. It had been four days since the message winged its way to Rostam in Persepolis, four days of silence that sat in Farid's gut like molten lead. Whispers of rebellion traced the air like poison, speaking of Omid and Navid – brothers whose ambitions were sharp as curved daggers and twice as treacherous.

Omid was a fool, barely worth a second thought. It was Navid who truly concerned him. If Navid caught even a whisper of the Shah's departure from Babylon, the consequences could be dire.

Farid rode at the head of the procession, where his horse's breath bloomed like phantom roses in the frozen air. Before him, the Shahdokht-e-Siyah moved like living pieces of night, their silver masks catching what little light dared pierce the gloom. They were death made manifest, the shah's shadow-sworn guardians whose very presence spoke of blood and ancient oaths. Behind them rode fifty more warriors, their armor gleaming dully beneath black cloaks, led by Kaveh – a man who had pledged his sword to the shah before Farid was born.

"Even the devils would seek shelter on such a night," Kaveh muttered, his words muffled by layers of wool and frost. His horse, dark as a midnight promise, drew alongside Farid's mount. "The cold bites deep enough to freeze a man's very thoughts."

Farid's eyes never ceased their restless dance across the landscape, reading the secrets written in snow and stone. "The cold," he said, "is the least of our worries,."

A laugh escaped Kaveh, brittle as winter-burned leaves. "True enough. This cursed fog will hide the White Wolf Clan well. They are creatures of shadow and spite, born in the black heart of these mountains."

Farid's fingers tightened on his reins until the leather creaked in protest. The White Wolf Clan. Their very name was a curse in these lands, spoken only in whispers and warnings. They were the children of conquest's aftermath, their hatred for Persia passed down like precious heirlooms, mother to daughter, father to son. Their raids left nothing but ash and echoes, villages transformed to graveyards between one moonrise and the next.

The fog swirled around them like the ghost of an ancient sea, hiding the jagged peaks that rose like broken teeth against a sky the color of old bones. Somewhere in that vast whiteness, Farid knew, other eyes were watching – patient as winter, hungry as wolves.

"Keep your senses sharp as steel, Kaveh," Farid murmured, each word carried away by the bitter wind. "The Shahdokht-e-Siyah serve Death before they serve men. Their loyalty belongs to the Shah alone – they would feed our bones to the wolves without hesitation."

Kaveh's nod was grim as a headsman's blade. "Then we stand or fall by our own swords." He wheeled his mount back into the ranks of the guard, where steel whispered against leather and every eye searched the writhing mists for danger.

Farid guided his horse through the swirling white until he rode beside the Shah's carriage, its ebony wheels groaning like dying men against the frozen earth. There, wrapped in an emerald cloak trimmed with winter-white fur, rode Sima. She sat astride her mount as if it were a throne, every line of her body a study in grace that defied the mountain's fury. The sight of her stole the breath from Farid's lungs more surely than any winter wind.

"Sogoli," he called, his voice carrying over the wind's lament. "Does the cold not bite at you as it does the rest of us?"

Sima adjusted her emerald cloak, her breath curling in the air. She turned to him then, her dark eyes meeting his. A smile graced her lips. "Cold?" she replied, "My prince, the cold is an old friend. I find it... clarifying."

Farid's laugh was soft as falling snow, warm despite the bitter cold. "Clarifying, you say? You have a poet's tongue. Or perhaps a warrior's spirit."

Her smile widened slightly, though it didn't reach her eyes. "Perhaps both. Or neither. What brings you to my side, my prince? Surely, you have more pressing matters to attend to."

"Must I always have an agenda to speak with you?" Farid asked, letting his mount draw closer to hers.

"In these times?" She gave a delicate laugh that crystallized in the frozen air. "I find it difficult to believe that anyone in this procession moves without purpose."

He leaned towards her then, close enough that the fur of their cloaks nearly touched. His voice dropped to a whisper that seemed to melt the very frost between them. "Perhaps I simply wish to know what thoughts spin behind those eyes that see so much."

The silence that followed was heavy. Sima's gaze drifted to the vast whiteness ahead, where the blizzard had softened to a gentle descent of snow, though the fog remained. When she finally spoke, her voice carried an edge of something that might have been longing, or perhaps regret.

"My thoughts are my own, my prince. They wander where they will, like the snowflakes on the wind."

"And yet," Farid pressed gently, "the wind leaves traces of its passing. It carves stories in stone and snow."

She turned to him then, and for a heartbeat, her mask slipped – revealing something raw and real beneath the careful artifice. "Would you read such stories, Prince Farid? Even knowing they might cut deeper than any blade?"

"I have borne many wounds in my time," he replied. "What's one more, if it leads to truth?"

Sima's laugh was barely a breath. "Truth? Now who speaks like a poet?" She adjusted her emerald cloak, a gesture that seemed to rebuild her walls stone by stone. "Truth is as shifting as these mountain paths, my prince. What seems solid beneath your feet might crumble to smoke with the next step."

"Then perhaps," Farid said, "we should focus on what lies directly before us, rather than the path ahead."

"And what do you see before you?" she asked.

"I see a woman whose mysteries run deeper than any mountain cave," he answered honestly. "One whose heart beats with rhythms I have yet to understand."

The fog swirled between them like a dance of ghosts, and Sima's smile turned enigmatic. "Understanding can be dangerous, my prince. Some mysteries are better left veiled."

Farid's smile froze on his lips as a sound cleaved through the mountain air – a wolf's cry that spoke of hunger and ancient hatreds. The howl echoed off the peaks like a prayer to forgotten gods, sending ice through his veins that had nothing to do with the winter's bite.

"Wolves?" Sima breathed, though her fingers tightened almost imperceptibly on her reins.

Farid's spine straightened, his hand finding his sword's hilt with the familiarity of an old lover. Though the Shahdokht-e-Siyah had melted into the surrounding white, their presence hummed in the air like the promise of lightning before a storm.

"Keep to the caravan's shadow," he commanded. "Whatever darkness this fog births, sogoli, do not leave the shah's side."

Her eyes found his through the swirling snow, and for the space of a heartbeat, he glimpsed something raw and real beneath her careful composure – concern, perhaps, or fear. But like frost touched by morning sun, it vanished in an instant.

"Your will, my prince," she murmured.

As Farid spurred his mount forward, the air itself seemed to hold its breath. Then it began – a sound like winter's whisper, a thousand deadly birds taking wing at once. Arrows emerged from the fog like rain from a storm cloud, their steel tips hungry for flesh. They struck the shah's caravan with dull thuds, but the brass-reinforced walls turned them aside like water off stone. Not all were so fortunate – several guards crumpled with startled cries, their blood painting crimson flowers in the snow.

The remaining guards moved as one, shields locking together like scales on a dragon's hide. Farid wheeled his horse in a tight circle, eyes searching the whiteness above. A strategist would want height, would want to see their prey trapped below like rats in a pit. He pulled his black scarf higher, becoming one with the shadows, indistinguishable from the Shahdokht save for his missing mask. His sword sang as he drew it, the steel gleaming like captured starlight.

"Men of Persia!" His voice carried over the wind like thunder. "The White Wolf Clan thinks to make us prey, but they forget – in these lands, we are the children of lions!"

The men hammered their shields with slaps and punches in a thunderous response.

More arrows pierced the white veil, and with them came the wolves themselves – warriors clad in pelts and skull-masks, rising from the snow like vengeful spirits. They had laid in wait, buried in winter's embrace, and now they emerged with steel in their hands and hatred in their hearts.

The mountain air filled with the song of clashing blades and the prayers of dying men, while above them all, the peaks watched with their eternal, stony indifference.

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