"Love, that most treacherous of poisons, had bloomed in soil meant for vengeance."

The sun bled its dying light across the sky when they reached the abandoned mines of Darvish. What once stood as a monument to human ambition—a place where iron sang and men dreamed of fortune—now sprawled like the skeleton of a forgotten god. The ruins thrust through earth's flesh like broken bones, their jagged edges scraping at the heavens. The air hung thick with dust and memory, each particle a story suspended in time, waiting to be heard.

Their horses, acquired in the previous village for the harsher journey ahead, shifted restlessly beneath them. The beasts were desert-bred, their coats gleaming like polished bronze in the fading light, their eyes holding wisdom older than empires. Farid's mount—a stallion with legs like carved marble—pawed at the ground, as if trying to wake the sleeping earth.

When Farid dismounted, the sound of his boots meeting earth was a whisper of surrender. His eyes traced the architecture of destruction before him, each glance a prayer, each breath a question. His father's entourage should have painted this desolation with signs of life—hoofprints like calligraphy in the mud, broken wagon wheels spinning tales of passage, the lingering perfume of survival. Instead, silence wrapped around them like a shroud.

Sima remained astride her mare, a creature whose coat rippled like nightfall. Her eyes—sharp as a falcon's, keen as a blade—searched the ruins for secrets. Her horse, more perceptive than its riders, nudged aside a stone with deliberate grace. "Nothing stirs," she breathed, and her words carried the weight of prophecy. "Not even ghosts dare linger here."

Farid's hands became fists of desperation, each knuckle a story of fear and hope. The White Wolf Clan, had they finally written their bloody verse upon his father's flesh? Had they dragged him into the mountain's maw, where shadows devoured secrets and silence swallowed screams?

Then Sima's hand rose like a crescent moon against the darkening sky, pointing toward something.

Farid followed the gesture, and his stomach knotted. 

Bodies.  

Scattered like fallen leaves across the dry earth. Persian soldiers, their armor split open like ripe fruit. And among them, the silent shadows of Shahdokht assassins—the Shah's loyal blades, sworn to die before failing their master. Their black robes were drenched in red, their lifeless hands still curled around hilts that had availed them nothing. 

But the Shah's carriage had vanished like smoke in wind.

Hope kindled in Farid's chest, dangerous as wildfire in summer grass. "He lives," he breathed, the words a prayer and proclamation both.. 

Sima's expression remained cold, though he caught the flicker of something in her eyes—frustration, grief, rage. The poison in her veins was patience, but patience frayed when it was stretched too thin. The Shah had slipped through death's grasp once again.  

It doesn't matter, she thought to herself. The poison is working. He won't live to see Susa.

Farid's mind raced ahead like a wild horse, mapping paths across desert's canvas, measuring breaths between here and salvation. Susa beckons. Where he fled, I follow.

He turned toward his mount, but Sima's hand caught his wrist—a chain of flesh and bone and unspoken truths.

"Farid," she whispered, her voice carrying the weight of mountains. "Listen to wisdom's whisper. Rush forward now, and you'll dance into their trap like a moth to flame. If the White Wolf Clan did not claim him, then something darker hunts these shadows. Whatever beast stalks these lands will not show mercy to a prince who chases ghosts with his heart instead of his head."

But Farid was already pulling away.  "What madness are you spewing? This is duty, written in blood and sworn before gods whose names are older than these stones. My father called, and I will answer. I made an oath as ancient as the stars themselves."

Sima's heart fractured like a pomegranate dropped on marble, seeds of truth spilling crimson across her carefully constructed lies. She shouldn't care for this stubborn prince with his fire-forged honor and steel-wrapped heart. Yet he had tasted more than her flesh that night—he had sampled her vulnerabilities, drunk deep from the well of her secrets. Love, that most treacherous of poisons, had bloomed in soil meant for vengeance. But her mission remained: the shah must die, like all tyrants before him.

Farid swung onto his horse. 

The Karkeh!" Sima's voice rasped. "Its waters are demons dancing in liquid form, more merciless than any mountain we've escaped. Follow this path, and we court death like a lover."

Farid hesitated. A heartbeat. No more. 

"I release you," he declared, each word a key turning in a lock. "You're no longer Sogoli. The oath that binds you dissolves this moment."

"Only the shah holds such power—" But her protest was weak as winter sunlight.

"Choose your path now, Sima. Turn away, seek any horizon that calls to you. I'll tell him you were lost to the wilderness—mourned for a season, then forgotten like last year's snow. This is your moment of freedom. But I?" His voice hardened like steel in ice. "I ride to finish what was written in my blood."
Then he pressed his heels to his horse's sides and surged forward. 

His horse surged forward like an arrow loosed from fate's bow.

Sima cursed in languages older than empires, but her horse was already following, drawn by the invisible threads that bound their destinies.

Her heart waged war against itself—a decade of careful plotting unraveling like silk before a blade, all for a prince who burned brighter than reason. Ten years her junior, yet he commanded her heart with the authority of ancient kings. What cruel god had written this story in the stars, making her heart betray her cause for a boy who carried dawn in his smile and destruction in his wake?

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Night had claimed its throne in the heavens, transforming the river into a writhing serpent of liquid obsidian. The waters sang their ancient song of destruction, gorged on mountain rains, their voice a thunderous promise of oblivion. Where once a bridge had stood—a testament to human defiance against nature's will—now only ghosts of timber remained, bones beneath the water's hungry surface.

Sima drew her horse alongside his, close enough to share breath. "The current is strong," she said, her voice barely audible above the water's rage.

Farid's silence was an answer in itself.

When he urged his mount forward, the beast's hooves scattered moonlight across wet stones.

Sima's fingers found his arm, her grip fierce as destiny itself. "Farid—" His name escaped her lips like a prayer, like a secret too precious to hold. Tears gleamed in her eyes, each one a story untold, a truth unspoken. In that moment, her heart threatened to spill every secret she'd guarded: the blood price that drove her, the shadows that haunted her dreams, the vengeance that burned like eternal flame in her bones.

"My father's life is not a price I'm willing to pay for caution," he said, his voice raw with determination. "I refuse to wear the same coward's mask my brothers chose."

"You're worth ten of them," she breathed, the words carried on winds of truth. "Ten thousand."

"Then why?" His question cut like a blade. "Why do you hold me back?"

"Because I—" The confession rose in her throat like smoke, like fire, like destiny itself. But the roar of the river consumed her words, dragged them into its depths alongside her courage. Sima's jaw tightened, trapping unuttered truths behind gritted teeth.

Farid turned away, reading in her silence all the things she couldn't say.

She watched, heart thundering louder than the waters below, as he prepared to challenge nature's fury. Her hands, empty now of his warmth, curled into fists of helpless prayer.

The river bellowed its challenge to the night sky, a sound like mountains breaking. And Sima felt fear take root in her heart—not for herself, but for this man who had become more precious than all her carefully laid plans, all her sacred vows of vengeance.

"If you're determined to die tonight," Sima called out, her voice cutting through the river's roar, "then I refuse to let you do it alone." She urged her horse forward, drawing level with his.

Farid's eyes met hers in the darkness—a look of gratitude, of understanding, of something deeper neither dared name.

Together, they guided their mounts into the angry waters. The current struck like a physical blow, nearly unseating them both. Their horses fought against the river's pull, muscles straining, nostrils flaring with effort.

"Keep moving!" Farid shouted above the thunder of water. "Don't let them stop!"

Halfway across, Sima's mare stumbled on hidden debris. The current seized them, dragging horse and rider sideways. Sima's cry pierced the night as icy water crashed over her.

Farid's reaction was instant. He turned his mount against the current, fighting to reach her. His hand shot out, catching her reins just as her horse found its footing again.

"I've got you," he called, though the words were nearly lost to the river's fury. "We do this together!"

They pressed on, each step a battle against nature's might. The horses' breaths came in steaming plumes, their bodies trembling with exhaustion. When Sima's mount stumbled again, Farid's horse steadied them both, the animals working in concert with their riders.

The far bank seemed to retreat with each advance, like a mirage taunting desert travelers. But slowly, painfully, they drew closer. The current's grip began to weaken.

When their horses finally dragged themselves onto the opposite shore, both riders were shaking—from cold, from fear, from the sheer force of being alive. They dismounted on trembling legs, their clothes heavy with river water.

"Look," Sima whispered, pointing ahead as they caught their breath.

Through the night's veil, the lights of Susa glimmered like fallen stars. The ancient city rose from the darkness—a promise, a warning, a destination. Its walls, old as empire itself, seemed to watch their approach with ancient eyes.

Farid reached for Sima's hand, finding it cold but strong. "Thank you," he said softly.

She squeezed his fingers, unable to voice all that filled her heart. The river had changed something between them—or perhaps only revealed what was already there.

Their horses nickered softly, steam rising from their flanks in the cool night air. Ahead, Susa waited with its secrets, its dangers, and whatever fate had drawn them to its gates.

"We should move," Sima said, though her fingers remained entwined with his, as if woven by fate itself. "Your father..."

Farid nodded, his eyes fixed on the city. "He's in there. I feel it in my bones, as surely as I feel the prayers written on my heart."

They mounted their exhausted horses and rode toward Susa's lights, leaving the river's roar behind. But its echo stayed with them—a reminder of what they'd faced together, and what might still lie ahead.

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