Chapter 1 #2
"The corruption is being drawn forth," Osman explained calmly. "The divine light identifies the tainted blood and burns it away. The pain is cleansing. The pain is holy."
I could not breathe. Could not move. My fingernails cut crescents into my palms, but I could not look away. Could not stop hearing her screams as they echoed off the golden walls and marble floors and the impassive faces of nobles who sipped wine and whispered behind their fans.
Twelve lashes. Fifteen. Twenty.
Her voice failed somewhere around the eighteenth stroke.
After that she merely shook, her mouth stretched open in silent anguish, her back a ruin of golden wounds that smoked in the perfumed air.
The white shift was tatters now, soaked through with something that might have been blood or might have been light.
Every instinct screamed at me to go to her.
To kneel beside her broken body and offer—what?
Comfort? Apology? As if either could undo what had just been done.
But I couldn't move. A princess didn't rush to the side of a marked girl.
Didn't show weakness, didn't question the priests, didn't make a spectacle that would only bring more scrutiny down on both of us.
Going to her wouldn't help. It would only make things worse.
The guilt burned in my throat like bile.
"Purified," Osman announced. "She will require time to heal, but she shall emerge stronger. Purer."
I did not hear the rest. Did not hear anything save the roaring in my ears and the echoes of Yara's screams as I turned and walked toward the nearest exit.
Behind me, the drums resumed. The next child was being brought forward.
I reached a servant's corridor before I doubled over and retched.
* * *
I found refuge in the Golden Bazaar three days later.
The market sprawled across the eastern quarter of the palace grounds—a labyrinth of silk-draped stalls where I could lose myself among merchants who knew nothing of purification ceremonies or the sound a child made when divine light carved through her flesh.
I always felt at peace at the market, but despite the brightness from the sun, the tension was palpable.
People were glancing around nervously at the Light Court guards that patrolled the streets.
This didn't feel right, and I should have questioned my father about it, but lately he never had time for me.
I had not slept well since Yara. I had not eaten. I needed to feel normal. Even if only for an hour.
I was examining a bolt of silk from Kizi when raised voices shattered my fragile peace.
"—and I am telling you, the ceremonies are a farce!"
Ferit. My cousin Ferit, drunk before midday, swaying near the central fountain. His face was flushed, his voice growing louder with each passing minute.
"They purify servants and half-bloods, yes, but what of the real threat? What of the shadows that have crept into the highest halls of power?"
Passersby were beginning to stare. A few nobles paused their browsing, drawn by the spectacle. I noticed Sarp standing nearby with an expression of polite concern—and at the crowd's edge, Hakan watched with cold, calculating eyes.
"Ferit, perhaps you should—" one of his companions began.
"I should what? Stay silent while traitors compromise our security?
" Ferit laughed bitterly. "High Lord Volkan walks these streets every day, pretending to care about the realm's protection.
But where are the increased patrols he promised?
Where are the stricter border controls? Why do shadow sympathizers still walk freely among us? "
My blood ran cold. This was dangerous talk—far more dangerous than drunken rambling.
"Ferit," I said, pushing through the crowd toward him. "Lower your voice—"
"Why?" He spread his arms wide, playing to the gathering crowd. "Everyone knows it. Volkan is either incompetent or complicit! The Divine Council has failed us! They speak of light and protection while shadows spread through our court like rot through—"
"Lord Ferit."
The voice cut through the marketplace like a blade.
High Lord Volkan materialized from the crowd, his silver robes immaculate, his ancient face carved from stone.
"High Lord." Ferit went pale, wine-flush draining to gray. "I was merely—"
"You were merely questioning my competence before half the market." Volkan's gaze swept over the gathered witnesses—the merchants, the nobles, the servants who had paused their work to watch. "You were suggesting the Divine Council itself has been compromised by shadow influence."
"I did not mean—I was not—"
"You were speaking treason." The words fell like stones. "In public. Before witnesses. While clearly intoxicated.”
"Lord Volkan, please." I stepped forward. "He had too much liquor—"
"Go back to the palace, Princess Ada. You should not be here," he cut me off before I could finish.
"No—wait—" Ferit's bravado crumbled as guards seized his arms. "I was drunk, I didn't mean—someone set me up! Someone got me drunk, put words in my mouth—this is a conspiracy, I swear it—"
I tried to argue, but Volkan summoned more guards and I was simply ignored. He barked that this was none of my business. My voice didn't matter, and I knew what happened to others that tried to speak against the court. I watched as they dragged Ferit away, his protests fading into the crowd.
In the ringing silence, my gaze swept the thinning crowd—and snagged on a familiar figure at its edge.
Hakan. Arms crossed, watching the scene with cold satisfaction. Beside him, Sarp shifted his weight, looking uncomfortable. Almost guilty.
Everyone knew them. The scholarship students who acted like they owned the Academy's hallways, classes, and all the societies.
Hakan with his sharp tongue and sharper cruelty.
Sarp who softened the edges but never stopped his friend's worst impulses.
Half the court girls were obsessed with them. The other half were terrified.
I used to be something else to Hakan. Before.
His green eyes found mine. Something flickered there—triumph, maybe, or challenge—before his expression shuttered and he turned away, disappearing into the crowd with Sarp at his heels.
I let him go. But I memorized the satisfaction on his face, and I carried it back to the palace like a coal against my skin.
For three hours I paced my chambers, replaying every detail. Ferit drunk before midday. Hakan watching from the edges. Sarp's guilty expression. The way it had all unfolded so neatly, so perfectly timed, as though someone had choreographed every moment.
By the time I stormed back to the market square, my grief for Ferit had calcified into fury.
I found Hakan near the central fountain, lounging against the stone rim as though he hadn't a care in the world. Sarp sat beside him, flipping through a book he clearly wasn't reading.
"Princess." He inclined his head, mocking. "Enjoying the show?"
"You." The word came out flat. I ignored the heat that rose over my skin. Unfortunately, I always felt it whenever I noticed that he was no longer a boy, but a handsome man. "You did this."
"Did what?" He pushed off from the pillar, strolling toward me. "Got your cousin drunk? Made him speak his mind?" His smile sharpened. "Ferit managed that all on his own. I just made sure the right people were listening."
"He'll be tortured. Imprisoned. Maybe executed."
"Probably." Hakan shrugged, and my anger erupted inside me. "Should've kept his mouth shut."
"You were the one that gave him the liquor," I accused. I had been at the market for an hour or so, but I was certain that Hakan had been in the tavern with Ferit.
"I had a few drinks, but no one pushed Ferit to gobble all that whiskey." Those green eyes—eyes I used to trust—held nothing but contempt. "Although it was entertaining."
Sarp stepped forward, touching Hakan's arm. "Maybe we should go—"
Hakan shook him off. "Why? The princess has something to say." He tilted his head, studying me like I was something mildly interesting. "Go on then. Defend him. Tell me how your drunk idiot cousin didn't deserve exactly what he got."
"He spoke the truth."
The words escaped before I could stop them. Hakan's eyes flickered—surprise, maybe, quickly buried. Why did I even say it?
"Careful, princess. That's dangerously close to agreeing with a traitor."
"He was wrong to say it publicly. But he wasn't wrong." I held his gaze. "You were at the purification. You saw what they did to those children. To Yara."
Something shifted in his expression. There and gone.
"I saw a ceremony," he said flatly. "Sacred traditions of the Light Court. Nothing that concerns me."
"Nothing that—" I stepped closer, fury rising. "They whipped a fourteen-year-old girl until she couldn't scream anymore. And you watched."
"So did you." His voice dropped, soft and vicious. "Watched and did nothing. At least I don't pretend to care."
"I tried—"
"You tried?" He laughed—short, ugly. "You said 'wait' and then sat back down like a good little princess. Very heroic. I'm sure Yara appreciated it while they flayed her back open."
The words hit like someone shoving a blade between my ribs. Because he was right. I had done nothing. Said nothing that mattered. Just watched, like everyone else. I should have gone to my father, should have interfered.
"Hakan." Sarp's voice was sharp now. "That's enough."
"Is it?" Hakan didn't look at his friend, his eyes locked on mine. "The princess seems to think she's better than the rest of us. Thought she should know she's not."
"I never said—"
"You didn't have to." He stepped closer—too close—and his voice dropped to something only I could hear.
My heart started beating faster. His scent enveloped me as I took a sharp breath.
"Still wearing white, little sun. Still playing pure.
Does it help you sleep at night? Pretending you're different from them? "
"I am different—"
"You're nothing." The word was a slap. "Just another golden-blooded hypocrite crying pretty tears over broken things you'll never actually fix."
My hands were shaking. "Hakan, you know my stand on this. We used to be friends."
"Were we?" His smile was cruel. "I remember a stupid girl who used to follow me around like a lost puppy.
Who thought because I was nice to her once, it meant something.
" He leaned closer, breath warm against my ear.
"It didn't. You were just convenient. Something to pass the time until I got bored. "
I went rigid.
"Jasmine," he murmured, so soft only I could hear. My stomach dropped. "Still can't smell it without thinking of me, can you? Without remembering how you begged."
My breath stopped.
"Hakan—"
"'Please, Hakan. Just once. No one has to know.'" His voice was a perfect, mocking imitation of who I'd been a century ago. The words I'd whispered in the dark, trembling, terrified, desperate. Words I'd never told anyone. Words I'd tried to burn from my own memory.
"Stop." The word came out broken.
"I could have had you right there against the garden wall. You would have let me. You would have thanked me." He leaned closer, lips brushing my ear. "But why would I want Gün Ata's desperate little virgin when I could have anyone? You weren't even worth the effort of saying no nicely."
Sarp shifted beside us, clearly unable to hear but reading the tension. "Should I fetch a priest? Last rites? Because one of you is about to die and I'd rather not be implicated."
Neither of us looked at him.
Hakan was watching me—watching my hands shake, watching three years of carefully buried shame claw its way back to the surface.
"Still wet for me, princess?" His smile was filthy, cruel. "Still touching yourself at night wondering what you missed?"
My palm cracked across his face before I knew I'd moved.
The sound echoed through the market. Hakan's head barely turned. When he looked at me again, his cheek reddening, something burned in those green eyes. Something that looked nothing like hatred.
"There she is," he said softly. "Knew she was still in there somewhere."
"I hate you." My voice shook, but I didn't care anymore. "I hate you, Hakan Bürsin."
"Feelings are mutual, princess." He smiled—a real smile, dark and devastating.
He turned and walked away. After a moment's hesitation, Sarp followed, but not before throwing me an apologetic look over his shoulder.
"You didn't have to do that," I heard Sarp say, voice tight. "That was cruel even for you."
"She needed to hear it."
"Did she? Or did you just need to say it?"
Their voices faded, leaving me alone with echoes and the ghost of Hakan's smile and a handprint still burning on my palm.
I hated him.
I hated him.
I repeated it like a prayer all the way back to the palace, and if the words tasted like lies, I refused to acknowledge it.
Melo was waiting on my windowsill when I returned.
She sat with her tail curled around her paws, russet fur burnished copper in the dying light, turquoise eyes fixed on me with an expression that was half reproach, half concern.
She had been bound to my bloodline for generations—protector, guide, and the only creature in this entire palace who had never once lied to me.
She’d never spoken a word to me either, not in all the years I’d known her.
But she didn’t need to. I’d learned to read her silences the way other people read faces.
I sank onto the bed and told her everything. About Ferit. About Volkan. About the look on Hakan’s face—that cold, calculated satisfaction, as though a man’s destruction were nothing more than an afternoon’s entertainment.
Melo listened, her ears swivelling with each detail. When I finished, she was quiet for a long time. Then her tail flicked once against the stone—sharp, deliberate—and she tilted her head toward me with something ancient flickering in her gaze. A warning. Or perhaps a sadness.
I knew what she meant. Be careful with that one.
“I hate him,” I whispered.
Melo held my gaze. She didn’t blink. She didn’t need to.
That night, I dreamed of golden light and screaming children.
And of green eyes burning with hunger in the dark.