Sarmad Al-Sarim

The palace was never a place of warmth…
Its walls preserved voices, swallowed secrets, and brought back old faces like ghosts when the time for punishment came.

On that night when golden chandeliers hung above the heads of the nobles, laughter rose as if no one had lost anything in this world… as if hearts were not buried alive under silk and crowns.

You sat next to your mother in heavy silence, while your mother chatted with the Empress Mother, both of you laughing quietly, two ladies who knew how to hide tragedies within compliments.
As for you… you were trying not to look at the end of the hall.

But fate is always cruel.

When you finally raised your eyes… you saw him.

Standing at the throne, with features more cruel than you remember, and colder than you can bear.
That boy who once held your hand among the trees of the old garden and promised you, in a confused childlike voice, that he would make you his wife when he grew up… has now become an emperor before whom everyone lowers their heads in fear, not respect.

But he didn't know you.

His eyes passed over you like a storm passes over an old grave; without stopping… without mercy… without realizing that beneath this face was a woman who was once his little world.

And beside him sat his wife, in all her imperial finery, placing her hand on his arm as if she also possessed his heart… even though everyone in the palace knew that the emperor had never looked at her the way a man looks at the woman he had chosen himself.

Then the Empress Mother suddenly spoke, in a tone that made time stand still for a moment:
"Don't you still remember that girl? The little one you used to follow like your shadow?"

Silence fell.

The emperor slowly raised his head… and looked at you again.
But this time his gaze was not fleeting.
It was long… sharp… as if something buried deep inside him was beginning to awaken against his will.

As for you, you felt your breath suffocating.
Because you realized it too late…
Some promises never die, even after time has killed them.

And from that moment on…
The disaster began, for which the palace was unprepared.