[AMAL POV]
I followed the cloaked figure down a narrow corridor that led to the storage rooms beneath the great hall. The air grew cooler as we descended, and I could smell something that made my stomach turn—the sharp scent of oil and pitch.
The figure ahead of me stopped at a heavy wooden door and produced a key. As the door swung open, I caught a glimpse of what lay beyond: barrels of oil, bundles of dried wood, and lengths of rope soaked in pitch. Everything needed to turn the great hall into a funeral pyre.
But it was the person opening the door that shocked me most.
Amina threw back her hood, revealing her gray hair and weathered face. But her expression was nothing like the maternal concern I had seen in the kitchens. This was the face of someone who had made peace with mass murder.
"Is everything ready?" asked a voice from within the room.
"Nearly. The oil has been spread beneath the floorboards. The kindling is in position. When you light the fires, the flames will spread faster than anyone can react."
"And the exits?"
"Secured. No one gets out until we're finished."
I pressed myself against the wall, hardly daring to breathe. Through the doorway, I could see two men arranging the final preparations. One was Yusuf, but the other was a stranger—tall, lean, with the bearing of a soldier.
"The timing must be perfect," the stranger was saying. "We light the fires just as the main course is served. The hall will be full, the guards relaxed, the exits crowded with servants."
"What about our people inside?" Yusuf asked.
"They know the risks. Some will escape through the kitchen passages. Others..." He shrugged. "Every war has casualties."
"Including my daughter?"
"If necessary."
I saw Yusuf's face crumple, and for a moment he looked like the broken father I had met in the herb garden. But then his expression hardened again.
"For the greater good," he said quietly.
"For the greater good," Amina agreed.
I had heard enough. I began to back away, but my foot caught on a loose stone. The small scraping sound seemed to echo like thunder in the narrow corridor.
"What was that?" the stranger asked.
"Probably rats," Amina replied, but she was already moving toward the door.
I turned and ran, my soft shoes silent on the stone floor. Behind me, I heard the door slam shut and the sound of rapid footsteps. They were following me.
The corridor ahead branched in two directions—left toward the kitchens, right toward the main palace. I chose right, hoping to lose myself in the maze of passages that connected the great hall to the royal quarters.
But as I rounded a corner, I nearly collided with another figure. Strong hands grabbed my shoulders, and I found myself looking into the concerned face of Khalil.
"Amal? What are you doing here?"
"My lord," I gasped, struggling to catch my breath. "I have to tell you something. The rebels—they're planning to burn the hall. Tonight. During the feast."
His expression sharpened. "Are you certain?"
"I saw the preparations. Oil, kindling, everything. They're going to light it during the main course."
"How many of them?"
"I don't know. At least three in the storage room, but there must be others."
"Show me."
He drew his sword, and I realized that he had been expecting trouble. We made our way back toward the storage rooms, moving carefully through the shadows.
But when we reached the corridor, the door was open and the room was empty. The barrels of oil remained, but the people were gone.
"They knew someone was listening," Khalil said grimly. "They'll have moved to a backup location."
"Can you stop them?"
"Not without knowing where they are." He examined the oil barrels, his face dark with anger. "This much accelerant... the fire would spread through the entire palace. Not just the hall."
"What do we do?"
"We evacuate the feast. Quietly, without causing panic." He looked at me. "You've done well, Amal. Your warning may have saved hundreds of lives."
"What about Najwa?"
"She'll be freed, as promised. But first, we need to—"
He was interrupted by the sound of a bell ringing—not the call to prayer, but the urgent clang of an alarm. Somewhere in the palace, something had gone wrong.
"The feast," Khalil said. "It's starting."
We ran through the corridors, past startled servants and confused guards. As we reached the great hall, I could see that the guests were already seated, the first courses being served. Everything looked normal, festive even.
But I knew that beneath the floor, soaked into the ancient wood, oil was waiting for a spark.
"There," I said, pointing to a side door. "Amina went that way."
Khalil signaled to several guards, who began moving toward the exits. But as they did, I noticed something that made my blood freeze.
Small tendrils of smoke were beginning to rise from the floor near the far end of the hall.
"It's starting," I whispered.
"Guards!" Khalil shouted. "Clear the hall! Everyone out!"
But his words were drowned out by the sudden roar of flames as fire erupted from beneath the floor. The oil-soaked wood caught instantly, spreading the blaze faster than anyone could have imagined.
Panic erupted in the hall. Nobles screamed, overturning tables as they tried to reach the exits. Servants dropped their trays and ran. The air filled with smoke and the acrid smell of burning silk.
But the exits were blocked.
Dark figures stood in the doorways, weapons drawn, preventing anyone from leaving. I recognized some of them—servants who had attended the memorial service, people I had worked beside for months.
"The windows!" someone shouted.
But the windows were too high, too narrow. The hall had been designed for beauty, not escape.
I looked around desperately, searching for Ghada in the chaos. If she was here, if she had been caught in the trap her father had set...
"Amal!" Khalil grabbed my arm. "The kitchen passage. Can you reach it?"
I looked toward the servants' entrance, where smoke was already billowing. "I think so."
"Get as many people out as you can. I'll handle the rebels."
He drew his sword and charged toward the nearest exit, where two rebels were blocking the door. I saw him cut down one of them, but there were too many, and the smoke was getting thicker.
I ran toward the kitchen passage, dodging falling beams and panicked nobles. The heat was intense, and I could feel the flames spreading beneath my feet.
But as I reached the passage, I found it wasn't empty.
Ghada was there, helping an elderly foreign ambassador toward the exit. Her veil was singed, her face streaked with soot, but she was alive.
"This way!" I shouted, gesturing for others to follow.
Together, we guided a stream of people through the narrow passage to safety. Nobles, servants, merchants, diplomats—all equal in their terror, all dependent on our knowledge of the palace's hidden ways.
But as we worked, I couldn't shake the feeling that we were saving only a fraction of those who were trapped. The main hall was becoming an inferno, and many of the exits remained blocked.
"We need to get the rebels away from the doors," I told Ghada.
"How?"
"I have an idea. But it's dangerous."
I told her my plan, and her eyes widened with fear. But she nodded.
"Do it," she said. "I'll help."
We made our way back toward the hall, where the situation was deteriorating rapidly. The fire had spread to the silk hangings, creating a canopy of flame above the terrified crowd. Bodies lay scattered on the floor—some overcome by smoke, others trampled in the panic.
But my plan was simple: if we could create a distraction, draw the rebels away from the exits, people might have a chance to escape.
I picked up a fallen torch and ran toward the storage rooms where we had seen the oil barrels. If I could create a secondary fire, an explosion perhaps, it might force the rebels to abandon their positions.
"Amal, no!" Ghada shouted, but I was already running.
The storage room was exactly as we had left it. The oil barrels stood in neat rows, waiting to feed the flames above. I touched the torch to the nearest barrel, then ran.
The explosion shook the entire palace. Flames shot through the floor of the great hall, but they also created a breach in the wall—a new exit that the rebels couldn't block.
"There!" I heard Khalil shout. "Everyone to the breach!"
People began streaming toward the new opening, pushing past the confused rebels who had been knocked down by the blast. I saw foreign diplomats helping injured servants, nobles carrying children, the artificial barriers of rank temporarily dissolved by shared desperation.
But the victory was temporary. The fire was spreading faster now, fed by the additional oil. Soon, the entire palace would be ablaze.
"We have to go," Ghada said, grabbing my arm.
But as we turned toward the exit, I saw something that made me stop. In the chaos, a figure was moving against the crowd, pushing deeper into the burning hall.
It was Amina, and she was heading for the royal table where the sultan's family was trapped.
She had a knife in her hand.
"The sultan," I breathed. "She's going to kill the sultan."
Even with the hall burning around them, even with hundreds of people dying, the rebels were still trying to complete their original mission. They would use the chaos to assassinate the royal family, then escape in the confusion.
"We have to stop her," Ghada said.
"How?"
We ran back into the inferno, dodging falling beams and desperate people. The heat was unbearable, and the smoke burned our lungs, but we pressed on.
Amina had reached the royal table, where the sultan and his family were trapped behind an overturned table. The Second Prince was there too, his sword drawn, but he was facing three other rebels.
"Your Highness!" I shouted, pointing toward Amina.
He turned just as she lunged with her knife. The blade caught him in the shoulder, spinning him around. But the wound gave me the opening I needed.
I tackled Amina from behind, driving her to the ground. The knife flew from her hand, clattering across the stone floor.
"You little traitor," she hissed, clawing at my face.
"I'm no traitor," I replied, pinning her down. "I'm just someone who chooses to save lives instead of taking them."
Ghada appeared beside me, helping to hold Amina down while The Second Prince dealt with the other rebels. Around us, the last of the survivors were escaping through the breach I had created.
"It's over," The Second Prince said, his voice hoarse from smoke.
But as he spoke, I heard a sound that chilled me to the bone—the crash of falling timbers from the ceiling above. The fire had weakened the structure of the hall, and it was beginning to collapse.
"Everyone out!" Khalil shouted. "Now!"
We ran for the breach, half-carrying the injured sultan and his family. Behind us, the great hall—the scene of countless feasts and celebrations—collapsed into a roaring inferno.
We emerged into the cool night air, gasping and coughing. Around us, survivors huddled in small groups, some weeping, others simply staring in shock at the burning palace.
"The casualties?" Khalil asked one of his guards.
"Seventeen dead, my lord. Thirty-seven injured. It could have been much worse."
"What about the rebels?"
"Eight captured, five killed. The rest escaped in the confusion."
Including, I noticed, Yusuf ibn Marwan. Ghada's father had vanished, leaving his daughter to face the consequences of his choices.
"And Najwa?" I asked.
"She'll be released at dawn," Khalil promised. "You've more than earned her freedom."
But as I looked around at the destruction, at the injured and traumatized survivors, I wondered if freedom was worth the price we had all paid.
"What happens now?" Ghada asked quietly.
"I don't know..." I said as I breathed heavily.
As dawn broke over the smoking ruins of the great hall, I thought about the choices we had all made. The rebels had chosen violence in pursuit of justice, and had achieved only destruction. The royal family had chosen oppression in pursuit of order, and had created the very rebellion they feared.
But Ghada and I had chosen something different. We had chosen to save lives, regardless of rank or allegiance. And perhaps, in the end, that was the only choice that mattered.
The palace would be rebuilt. The kingdom would endure. And somewhere in the dungeons, Najwa was waiting to be free.
Four weeks had passed since the great hall burned, and still Najwa remained in the dungeons. Four weeks of my daily visits to the guards, my formal requests, my increasingly desperate pleas. Each time, I was told the same thing: "The Prince will consider your request when he has time."
The palace had been transformed in those weeks. Where once there had been elegant corridors and furnished chambers, now there were scaffolds and stone dust, the constant hammering of reconstruction. The Second Prince had moved his court to the eastern wing, the only part of the palace that had escaped the fire's reach.
But the most haunting change was the absence of faces I had known. Amina had been executed in the courtyard the morning after the fire, along with three other servant girls who had aided the rebels. I had been forced to watch, as had all the palace staff—a reminder of the price of treason. Only Ghada had been spared death, receiving twenty lashes instead because she had helped save the Sultan's life. The scars on her back were still healing, and she moved carefully, wincing when she thought no one was looking.
I had grown thin from worry and sleepless nights. Ghada, despite her own pain, tried to comfort me, but we both knew that each day Najwa remained in that cell, her chances of survival grew smaller.
"You cannot keep going like this," Ghada said as I prepared for yet another attempt to see the Prince. She moved stiffly, her back still tender from the lashes she'd received. "You'll collapse from exhaustion."
"Then let me collapse," I replied, adjusting my cleanest robe. "At least I'll have tried."
"Amal—"
"No." I turned to face her. "I saved the royal family. I saved hundreds of lives. I stopped a rebellion. And for what? So they could let an innocent woman rot in their dungeons?"
Ghada was quiet for a moment. "Perhaps... perhaps that's the point."
"What do you mean?"
"The Prince knows what you did. He knows he owes you a debt. But acknowledging that debt, especially to someone like us—" She gestured at our simple clothes, our scarred hands. "It threatens the natural order. Maybe he's waiting for you to give up, to forget about Najwa, so he won't have to admit that a servant girl's word means something."
Her words struck me like a physical blow because I knew she was right. But they also strengthened my resolve.
"Then he doesn't know me very well," I said.