Chapter 35 · Chapter 35

The quiet that followed did not break; it hardened. Across the vast expanse of the grand majlis, the murmur of lowered voices died away as the carved double doors swung wide once more. The elders of the Al-Rumaih and Al-Subait councils reassembled in a measured tide of immaculate white thobes and dark bishts, their movements subdued beneath the weight of unresolved reckonings.

I smoothed the dark silk of my abaya, making sure the shaila framed my face with absolute precision. Not a single strand of hair slipped free; not an inch of composure faltered. In a room where every breath was weighed against lineage and precedence, weakness was not merely judged—it was consumed.

Hatim did not move from where he stood near the high gilded console, but his dark eyes tracked my approach across the room. He held the room in an unbroken grip of heba, commanding the space without raising his voice by half an octave. Between his long fingers, the dark amber misbaha rested motionless against the crisp linen of his sleeve.

At the head of the chamber—the sadr—stood the heavy walnut armchair beside his own.