Novel Full Chapter 454: Here I Am III
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{Inside The Projection}
Time bled slow as it always did.
Yet, through all that time, Malik never left the Golden Throne.
The dais was home for a time too long…
In feeling, not in length.
Nearly everyone had left the Holy Palace.
And yes, that included every leader of his Sultanate, the Grand Viziers, Court Leaders, Dīwān Officials, City Governors, Military Commanders, Spiritual Heads, Diplomatic Envoys, Judges, Advisers, and all High Nobles.
It was chaos.
In the midst of all that, Layla, his wife, had left as well.
As did Azeem, leaving only when he found Badroulbadour a beautiful place to rest.
By then, barely anyone remained, a few stragglers at most, servants who had nowhere else to go.
Malik was left alone, abandoned by most.
His people, aside from his Shurtat al-Khamis, able to be counted on one hand alone.
The Holy City hummed with rumors: their Sultan was forsaken!
Never had they heard about such a mass exodus before…
Never did they see it in their history books.
Soon, the Holy Palace would be under siege, and no one was there to defend it.
Sinbad and his brood worked hard to send letters nearly everywhere on Fam Iblis.
They, by the orders of their brother-in-law and the little ones’ uncle, had to make the entire world know that Malik was currently alone and weak, with no one to defend his palace but himself.
Azeem’s “betrayal” was especially focused on, reaching every market, every caravan, and every tavern that would listen, making their grief louder and their hatred sharper.
They wanted the world to see the fault lines.
To follow the script Malik had written for his Silent Requiem.
A script that required them to contact Azeem and have him help the “Heroic Coalition,” which he did, as advertised by his army of owls once more.
Those cute ones weren’t the only ones working hard, however.
Malik’s Elite Guard moved in silence, handling all the things he could not, while he kept his body anchored to the practice of resisting Corruption, trying to extend those few minutes he had left for as long as he could.
His men buried and bribed all who threatened his plan.
They even pushed those who wanted to honor their alliances away.
The script didn’t include help; Malik was to be shown as a lone figure until the end.
And so, while he circulated away, they slipped letters into the right hands, blacked out trade routes, and lit false fires to lure the wrong patrols away, all to keep the coalition moving cleanly.
It’d all be for naught if their motivation was affected before the “final battle.”
They also made sure that Scheherazade wasn’t about to interfere.
She alone could’ve wiped out the coalition, and that would destroy all that their Lord so desperately needed, so they kept an eye on her, despite knowing that she knew of their tracking and that she very well had the right to kill them at any time.
Now, to keep up with what was happening, Malik felt the world by way of reports:
He heard how caravans were diverted, grain stores were moved under cover, and healers were put on false missions, riling mortals up, pushing everything towards the ‘end.’
Meanwhile, the coalition’s march, the one that came for his head, continued to creep closer on every map he had.
Scouts, caravans, harried envoys: nothing happened quickly; everything happened inexorably.
Many had joined them in their march, making it seem like the entirety of Fam Iblis had turned against him.
Anyone else might’ve felt something now that death was close, but…
He simply cultivated through all of it.
If circulation were prayer, he’d be a fanatic.
Yet, this fanatic wasn’t safe from interruptions.
One day, his rhythm was broken by hurried feet.
A sound so familiar, he could feel the warmth already.
Of course, it was Dunya, and she burst into the hall.
Whether she screamed his name or made the closest thing to a scream a mute could, he didn’t hear. And not because he didn’t want to, but, well, it was because he couldn’t.
The footsteps he heard were only the vibrations of the ground that he felt.
His eyes weren’t all there either, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t see.
Though his eyes were closed, he sensed Aether, and that was enough to paint a picture.
Dunya’s hands were being waved around in a panic, her eyes wide as she staggered toward the throne, a tiny storm about to collide with the reincarnation of stillness.
Sinbad, who rode on her shoulder, had his feathers flare up.
[Shurtat al-Khamis are coming.]
He, of course, knowing of his Elder Brother’s condition, spoke directly into his mind.
[All their tasks are completed, Elder Brother. They’ll arrive when you say the word.]
“Let them come.”
Malik’s circulation of Aether broke for a second as he allowed his hearing to come back and pushed himself upright, muscles protesting, the floor feeling suddenly like a place that had been slept on too long.
He almost slipped; his feet scrabbled, but he found balance.
His eyes opened for a fraction to glance at the Golden Throne next to him.
…They were entirely black.
A void of Corruption leaching at the edges.
He shut his eyes just as quickly and threw himself onto the throne, letting out a very long and tired breath.
Watching him struggle to even move, Dunya and Sinbad stood frozen, tears leaking from their faces in ways small and terrible.
They had seen too many things malleable into sorrow; they didn’t know just how anyone could hold what Malik was holding. Unable to comprehend a fraction of what he was currently going through, his feelings, and the sheer Will one would need to hold back such Corruption.
Sinbad, who had so many words, had none that suited the moment.
Dunya’s hands clenched uselessly at her skirt, her usual confidence nowhere to be found.
But thankfully for their hearts, footsteps arrived to interrupt, many of them.
In poured Shurtat al-Khamis, wearing black cloaks, faces known and unknown.
Kabir was the first of them, followed closely by Rami, Sarah, Tarek, Faisal, Ayyub, Zayna, Jibril, Nashir, Faraz, Ghassan, Rafi, Hassan, and Basim, forming a half-circle around the Golden Throne.
“We…”
Kabir kneeled.
“We’ve completed everything, my Lord. The caves are ready.”
The others kneeled beside him just as he looked up at Malik.
“…Is this the end, my Lord?”
He asked that question in his eyes more than his tone.
“Yes…”
Malik’s nod was slow.
“I’m to die now.”
His words crushed his people’s hearts.
“No—no, my Lord! You can’t—please—”
Kabir’s composure immediately shattered, the first noisy breakdown.
“Hhhnnhhh—hhhhhnhhh—”
Quickly followed by Dunya, who began to sob loud enough to make Sinbad ruffle.
“MYYYYY LOOOOOOOOOOOOOORD!”
Zayna’s face twisted, and she screamed while snapping her head down.
They were unable to believe this moment had finally come.
What followed was a desperate, messy outpouring.
Of course, it wouldn’t be neat; it couldn’t be.
They piled words and pleas on him in waves.
Shurtat al-Khamīs was everything he had trained to be, and yet…
When the ‘end’ came, it seemed that even they couldn’t help but crack.
“No—my Lord, think again!”
Rami cried.
“There’s always another way—”
Sarah grabbed Rami’s sleeve.
“Don’t—don’t do this to him. We… we can’t…”
Her words could barely leave her lips as Tarek shouted:
“You raised us from nothing, m-my Lord! Don’t leave us behind!”
Faisal would’ve clutched Malik’s knees if he could.
“Please! Stay. Stay with us. Stay for us, my Lord!”
Ayyub’s voice was raw with terror.
“We burned with you, we bled with you, and if dying is what you think you must do, then—”
He swallowed a sob.
“We will die with you, my Lord!”
Zayna’s back bent further.
“I love you! We love you!”
Her scream devoured the men’s.
“If you won’t stay for yourself, then stay for us! If you must sacrifice your life for those fools, carry our lives with you. Don’t leave us—don’t leave me with nothing!”
Jibril’s hands were on his head.
Faraz’s voice broke into pieces.
Nashir’s forehead was on the ground.
Ghassan and Rafi were shouting in the same breath, pleading and angry all at once.
Hassan and Basim held each other like little kids on the edge of an ocean, watching a storm come.
They were not warriors in that moment; they were his children.
Each of them called him Lord, teacher, brother, and savior—in one breath.
All the words they used to make sense of the man who had remade their lives.
Malik only listened, letting the words wash over him the way a cliff takes surf.
He let them say their words… he let their pleading fill him like rain.
He did not speak, though his lips twitched as if he might.
The sound of them was its own kind of ache.
A kind he never knew existed.
“Think of another way.”
Kabir begged through tears.
“Think of any way we can keep you.”
A begging most cruel.
“If it meant that we would die, then be burned, then be thrown shredded in the air, then be revived, then killed, then burned, then be thrown shredded in the air, repeat a thousand times, we’d do it all to have you stay with us, O my Lord!”
The ache in that plea made Malik smile faintly at them, a so very tired smile, with twitching lips, struggling to even stay in position.
“The only certainty in life is death…”
It was the only thing he allowed himself.
“This is natural. I’m just… leaving a little early compared to those in my position.”
Silence pressed into them for a breath.
The sentence had settled cold…
It did not comfort them.
No, what it did was so very far from that.
And yet… that didn’t break them; no, they wouldn’t be his people otherwise.
Instead, it had influenced them into action, a promise to keep.
But before they could even begin such an action…
Dunya rushed forward and raised her hand.
“HEE!”
She took the lead from them.
Zayna, quickly standing up, followed her next, roaring the words Dunya could never utter:
“Here I am, O Lord!”
Kabir stood, shaking as he bawled it into the hall.
“Here I am, O Lord!”
One by one, they came, a litany of lives willing to commit the same absurd miracle.
Each one stepped forward until the chorus swelled and the hall was full of a single chant.
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
Malik had everything he had ever built and everything he would give away.
He had tried to make them hate him into strength, but love, ridiculous, stubborn, and relentless love, had followed him into the rooms he thought he’d sealed shut.
Inside the thrumming noise, he felt unbearable gratitude… a terrible weight.
He’d thank them, but the word was hardly a kingly thing.
No, he couldn’t have them see that.
He couldn’t have them see ‘human.’
Even they wouldn’t be able to stop themselves from breaking.
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
“Here I am, O Lord!”
And so, he simply listened to it…
“Here I am, O Lord!”
A repeating promise that pushed him forward.
“HERE I AM, O LORD!”