"The blood your ancestors spilled cries out still from these stones."

Steel sang against steel, a cruel symphony echoing across the mountainside as Farid moved like living poetry through the chaos of battle. His blade traced Persian calligraphy in crimson, each strike as precise as a scribe's pen, each parry flowing like water over stone. He fought with the grace of ancient warriors whose names were now whispered only in epic verses, his eyes burning with the fire of ten thousand untold stories.

The enemy emerged from the fog like demons from forgotten tales, their war cries shattering the sacred silence of snow. In response, the Shahdokht-e-Siyah materialized from shadow, their silver masks catching the pale light like fallen stars. They moved with the terrible beauty of desert vipers, their curved blades painting death's poetry across the battlefield. Yet even these legendary warriors, these children of night and secrets, were not immortal. Arrows rained down like black tears from heaven, and one by one, several of the masked guardians fell, their silver faces turned skyward in eternal silence.

Through the swirling snow and chaos, Farid's gaze was drawn upward, to where fate herself seemed to be weaving her deadly tapestry. There, high upon the mountain's crown where clouds kissed stone through the blizzard, stood the puppet master of this bloody dance, orchestrating death with the precision of a temple mathematician.

"Enough," Farid breathed. His horse, understanding its rider's heart as only war-bred steeds can, surged forward through the storm of steel and shadow.

The mountain path twisted like a serpent's spine, treacherous with ice and promises of death. Warriors descended upon him like falling stars, leaping from the heights with cries that spoke of vengeance older than empire. Farid met their fury with calculated grace, his sword singing songs of steel and sorrow. One attacker's arm traced a crimson arc through the winter air; another's chest bloomed red like desert roses as Farid's blade found its mark.

"Kaveh!" The name tore from his throat.

"I am your sword, my prince!" Kaveh's response thundered across the battlefield as he cut through the enemy ranks, his blade harvesting lives like autumn wheat. Together they carved a path through the chaos.

The snow beneath them turned crimson, each drop of spilled blood a story untold, each clash of steel a verse in the endless epic of empire.

They moved as one, warrior-prince and captain. But Farid's gaze never wavered from the shadow-figure above – the puppet master of this deadly dance, silhouetted against winter's veil like a djinn made manifest. Between them yawned a chasm deep enough to swallow armies, its darkness hungry as a demon's mouth.

"Stay back, Kaveh!" The command cracked like thunder in the frozen air.

Before his captain could voice protest, Farid became one with his mount, their hearts beating the ancient rhythm of war. The horse gathered itself like a storm about to break, muscles coiled with the power of ten thousand desert winds.

They flew, suspended between earth and sky, between life and legend. For a heartbeat that stretched into eternity, they were poetry in motion, defying the very laws that bound mere mortals to the ground. Then they landed with the force of destiny itself, an avalanche of snow cascading into the void behind them like the trailing hem of fate's garment.

Without pause, Farid melted against his horse's neck, releasing the reins to let ancient bloodlines guide their path. His hands found the second blade strapped seamlessly to the first blade – twin to the first, forged in the same fires, blessed by the same prayers. With a motion smooth as flowing silk, he joined the blades at their hilts, creating a weapon that sang of forgotten magic and remembered glory – the double crescent of the ancient kings.

Arrows whistled toward him, deadly in their precision, but Farid's spinning blade became a shield of whirling steel. The shafts splintered upon contact, their broken fragments scattering like snowflakes.

When he reached the enemy archers, he launched himself from his horse in a fluid leap. His body twisted in midair, the double crescent blade flashing as it cut through his foes. He landed in a crouch as graceful as a court dancer's bow, the snow around him painted with the crimson stories of fallen foes. One by one, the archers and swordsmen fell, their cries silenced by his blade.

At last, only the strategist remained, standing like the last verse of an epic tale. His face was a map of old battles, each scar a story written in flesh and memory. But it was his eyes that held Farid's attention – they burned with the kind of hatred that outlives empires, the kind that passes from father to son like a bitter inheritance, each generation adding its own verse to an endless song of vengeance.

"These lands will never bow to Persian chains," the man snarled.

Farid drew himself up like a sword being unsheathed. "The mountains themselves would disagree."

The strategist's smile was all wolf-teeth and winter frost, yellowed like old ivory. "The blood your ancestors spilled cries out still from these stones, Persian. If not today, then tomorrow. If not tomorrow, then in the years to come, until your children's children kneel in the dust and beg death's sweet mercy."

Farid tilted his head, calm as still water before a storm. "Then we shall wait for such days with patience."

The strategist's roar echoed off the mountainside like thunder, his twin blades catching the weak sunlight as he charged. "Die, Persian dog!"

But Farid moved like water in moonlight, like shadow given form. His blades sang once – a single, pure note in the frozen air – and the strategist's body crumpled to the snow. Blood bloomed across the whiteness like scattered rubies, each drop a testament to the swiftness of Persian steel.

"I would," Farid murmured, sliding his blades home with the soft whisper of metal against leather, "if I were a dog."

The wind keened its lament around him as he turned to survey the convoy below. Through the dancing veils of fog, the Shah had emerged from his caravan like a lion from its den, his presence commanding even in illness. His eyes met Farid's, and in them burned a pride fierce enough to melt winter itself. A single nod passed between them, weighted with meaning heavy as empire.

In that same moment, Farid caught Sima's gaze – quick as lightning, warm as summer wine – before she looked away, her lashes falling like dark wings against her cheeks. The sight tugged at something deep in his chest, and a smile curved his lips as he whistled for his mount.

Rejoining the convoy felt like stepping back into a world of shadows and whispers. Kaveh's acknowledging nod carried the weight of brotherhood forged in blood and steel. The Shah's grunt of approval as Farid checked on him spoke volumes before sleep claimed him once more.

"You fight like the wind spirits of old tales," Sima's voice drifted to him, soft as silk against stone.

Farid turned, something in her tone making his heart stutter like a warrior's before his first battle. "Are you unharmed?"

"I am well." The words fell from her lips like pearls, precious and measured.

"Good. But stay alert – these paths are treacherous as a serpent's promises."

Sima rode in silence, her mind a maze of unwanted revelations. Why had her heart stumbled when he asked after her safety? Why had watching him charge into danger felt like a blade between her ribs? Such feelings were dangerous as mountain paths in winter, yet here they bloomed like desert flowers after rain.

She was a woman who had danced with shadows and played games of empire, yet now she found herself undone by the simple concern in a prince's voice. The irony tasted bitter as medicine on her tongue.

A rider emerged from the swirling snow like a ghost made flesh, his horse's flanks steaming in the bitter air. The message he carried from Persepolis landed in Farid's chest like a poisoned arrow: Rostam, their father's most trusted brother, would not come.

The words spilled from the messenger's frost-chapped lips like winter rain. Rostam sent his deepest regrets, but the armies of Hyrcania – that ancient kingdom of warrior queens and snow-fed forests – pressed hard against Persia's northern borders. To abandon his men now, when blood stained the frozen ground and victory hung delicate as morning frost, would be to invite disaster.

The message continued, each word another shard of ice in Farid's heart: Perhaps one of the trusted nobles might stand in his stead, or – here the messenger's voice took on a careful neutrality – Hormoz could claim his rightful place as interim ruler, as was his birthright as crown prince.

Farid's fingers tightened on his reins until the leather creaked in protest. This was more than bad news – it was a crack in the foundation of empire, a weakness that wolves like Hormoz and Navid would smell from leagues away. His mind raced like a desert wind, seeing the threads of conspiracy drawing tighter with each passing moment.

"Wait," he called to the messenger, who had already turned his mount to leave. The word hung in the frozen air between them like a prayer. "Take a message to Parisa."

His sister's name tasted like honey and heartache on his tongue. At fifteen, she was already wise beyond her years, a girl who read people as easily as others read poetry. If anyone could see the shadows gathering in the palace corridors, it would be her.

"Tell her..." he paused, choosing his words as carefully as a swordsmith selecting steel. In times like these, even the walls had ears, and messages had a way of finding themselves in the wrong hands.

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