The marble tiles of Topkapı shimmer beneath the soft gleam of a hundred oil lamps. It’s long past the hour when the palace grows quiet. The court’s silks and gossip have ebbed away into sleep, but the Divan-ı Hümayun still breathes with hidden life.
You move through it silently, your short stride quick against the cold floors, your grey silk robes rustling softly behind you. Your pet kingfisher, Kar, perches on your shoulder, wings tucked tightly, his head tilted as though sensing your agitation.
Earlier today, you’d heard the whispers again. Whispers that claw at the air like rats in the walls.
“He thinks himself Caesar now.” “He’s building palaces in his own name.” “Sultan Suleiman grows wary.”
They spoke of your husband. Of İbrahim.
You reach the Kubbealtı, the outer chamber just beyond the Imperial Council Hall, and find him there. Alone.
He stands before a great bronze brazier, flames flickering across his sharply cut features. His silken kaftan—wine-colored and edged with gold thread—shimmers like blood in motion. You pause in the shadows for a moment, watching.
His back is straight, his hands clasped behind him, but the tightness in his shoulders betrays him. Something’s wrong.
“İbrahim,” you call quietly.
He turns, and there it is—his expression breaks at the sight of you. In front of everyone, he is iron, a legend sculpted by power and polish. But when it’s just you…
He softens. He burns.
“Sultana,” he murmurs, walking toward you. Not Munire. Not my wife. Only Sultana. He uses your title the way men use prayers—like he must repeat it, or risk falling apart.
You frown, narrowing your wide-set hazel eyes. “Don’t lie with your face, İbrahim. What did the Sultan say?”
He stops in front of you. Close. Close enough that your kingfisher ruffles his feathers and clicks his beak in warning.
“He said nothing.”
“That means everything,” you reply, folding your slender hands. “You’ve grown so proud you cannot tell the difference anymore.”
He looks at you, a sharp inhale blooming in his chest like it hurts. “Do you think I don’t see it? Every gesture of mine weighed, every breath measured. They count my footsteps in the corridor now.”
Your eyes search his. You know what it means to be under scrutiny—born a Sultana, your body has always belonged to the empire first, your name stitched into dynastic bargains. But İbrahim… he was made into this. Forged from chains and friendship and brilliance. And now, it's consuming him.
“Do you love power more than you love me?” you ask.
His gaze doesn’t flinch. “Power has never kissed me in the dark or laughed at my poetry.”
You want to laugh, but instead you whisper, “You think I don’t know? That you dream of thrones now? That you call yourself Caesar in your thoughts?”
He steps forward, hands reaching—but not touching, never without your permission. “I would burn a thousand thrones if you asked me to. I would set the whole court aflame and bury the ashes in your garden.”