Osman held her fragile body in his arms. He walked down the stair toward her room.

Amal and the other maids were standing at the bottom of the stair with mouths wide open. Amal couldn't control her jealousy and ran towards Osman.

"Oh, my prince let me help you. Don't bother yourself with a lowly maid."

The angry glare that she received from Osman in return was enough for her to step back.

Khadijeh opened the room's door, the room was still messy. Osman carefully placed Arta on the bed, he stood by her side and watched her with concern.

"Your highness Tabib is here." The guard informed at the door.

"Send him in."

The doctor bowed and with Osman's hand gesture, he moved closer to examine Arta.

Tabib first examined her heartbeat by touching her wrist and body temperature then opened her eyes with his fingers.

When the doctor took her hand to examine her heartbeat Osman noticed bruises looked like fingers on her hand and he harshly threw angry glares toward Khadijeh. Khadijeh said nothing and just lowered her gaze.

The doctor stood up and bowed again "It's not anything dangerous. She just needs to eat and rest for a while. Her body is weak and tired. I'll give you a portion to feed her first so she can gain some energy to wake up."

Osman nodded serval times. Tabib took out a bottle from his bag and gave it to Khadijeh. "Feed her with this portion, she will wake up soon after."

"OK, you may leave." Osman said

Khadijeh bowed and was about to leave the room when Osman stopped her "What has happened to her hand?" Osman asked so coldly that a chill ran down Khadijeh's spine.

"I think the other girls gave her a hard time on her first day." Khadijeh said softly.

"I told you to take care of her not to leave her with those wicked girls" rays of anger were visible in his voice.

"Please forgive me your highness, I'll be more careful."

While they were arguing, Arta slowly opened her eyes but was too weak to move or say anything. She saw Osman was angry and Khadijeh was standing like a victim in front of him.

She slowly drifted back to darkness.

"Feed her the portion and report to me of her condition." With that, he turned and briefly looked at Arta again and left the room.

***

Later that day after Arta took few spoons of the portion, she opened her eyes again.

"What happened?" she saw Khadijed sitting on a chair by her side. Looking around the room she realized someone has cleaned the room and replaced the broken chair with a new one.

"You fainted; don't you remember?" Khadijeh said softly.

Arta tried to sit up by her head spines. Khadijeh urged her to lay back and pointed to the tray of food on the table. "you need to eat and regain energy."

She brought the tray closer to her and gave her the glass of water to drink. Then she gave her pieces of meat to eat. Arta accepted the food obediently. She knew that she needed her energy in order to escape the palace.

After eating the food she felt better and lay back on her bed again. Khadijeh left her and went to Osman and reported.

Arta was deep in her thought trying to remember what had happened. The last thing that she remembered was that she was in the bath hall arguing with Osman.

She sharply inhaled and covered her mouth with her hand "He wanted me to bath him. That bastard!" she searched all her body from head to tow to check if there are any indications that he had touched her. She found nothing except the bruises on her hand, which was still painful. "I'm going to kill you Amal." She pressed her teeth together.

Speak of the devil the door suddenly opened and Amal came in. If Satan was female she looked like him. She quickly approached Arta and bent to look her in the eyes "if you think I bought your show you better think again."

Arta rolled her eyes at her "What are you talking about?"

"Pretending that you fainted to grab the prince's attention? How pathetic!" she hissed and straightened her back.

Arta laughed. "You are crazy!"

"I won't let you have him. I was supposed to be his personal maid, not you!"

"I don't care about being a stupid personal maid, you can have him." She said looking indifferent.

"Is this a new trick of yours? Hah, I won't buy it." With that, she turned and left the room.

"Stupid girl!" Arta hissed and lay back on her bed trying to sleep.

When she opened her eyes, the room was dark except for the moonlight that was coming from the tiny window close to the ceiling. She tried to sleep again, pulled the blanket over her head and shut her eyes. It was useless. She has already slept the whole day and now she is fully awake. She decided to come out of bed.

She enclosed her body into a robe and left the room. She wanted to go outside and walk in the garden. She went upstairs and straight to the entrance door. She pulled the door open and was about to step out when two spares blocked her way. "You cannot go out."

"Is this rule for everyone or just me?"

The guards looked at each other and didn't reply.

It was useless arguing with them. She quickly turned on her hill and the guards closed the door again.

She was furious. She decided to walk around the west wing palace now that she is not allowed to leave.

Walking upstairs thinking about the happy life that she had as a princess in the same palace, thinking about the last time she saw her father in the balcony of her room, and the gift that he gave her, her mother's necklace. Where was it? These barbaric people had probably stolen it from her like everything else. She felt so sad thinking about her happy and carefree past.

She found herself in front of her royal bedchambers. She was itching to go inside and search for her mother's necklace. Now that was the only thing that she wanted more than anything else in the world.

She had no idea what could possibly be on the other side of the door. She only hoped that she found her room as she had left it before the war.

She took a deep breath and gather her courage and slowly turned the door's knob. The door opened with a faint click.

She slowly pushed open the door. Luckily the door's joints were well greased and did not make any sound. She tiptoed inside. The room was dark and it took her a few minutes to adapt her eyes to the darkness.

Her heart was beating so fast as if she was doing something wrong. She gasped at the sight of the room.

"Oh my God!" she whispered to herself. Her eyes filled with tears. What has happened to her room? nothing in there was familiar anymore. Her heart was pounding heavily and tears filled her eyes. Luckily no one was in the room.

With trembling steps, she walked to the balcony. She was suffocating and needed fresh air.

Standing in the balcony the cold wind of winter slapped her in the face but she didn't care. She found the sofa that she and her father sat that day still in place.

She covered her mouth when a whine escaped. She sat on the sofa and cried silently. She was drowned in her misery that did not notice someone was watching her from behind the net curtains.

***

Two days after her faint she still hadn't seen or heard from Osman. She was happier this way. She didn't need to constantly be reminded of their loss. She was in her room when the door harshly opened, and she jumped to her feet.

"What is going on?" she asked from two guards who were coming her way. They grabbed her on her arms and quickly walked her out.

"What are you doing? Don't touch me. Where are you taking me? " she was resisting and trying to free herself from their grip, but it was useless.

The maids were out watching her as the guard took her with them. Still resisting they arrived at the east palace. She was convinced that they want to execute her. So this is the day that she was supposed to die. She was shaking uncontrollably.

They arrived at the east palace and forced her on her knees inside one of the halls.

"Shahzadeh" a small figured old man with a long white beard was sitting on his knees shouted in surprise. There were several bruise marks on his face indicating that he had been tortured.

"Pirbaba?!" Arta looked at the old man questionably.

In the hall was Osman, Samir, Ahmad, a man who she did not know, two guards who had grabbed Pirbaba from his shoulder and two more guards who had brought Arta.

Arta looked around the hall and realized it was the treasury hall. Now she realized why they had brought her there.

Suddenly a sword drew close to her neck. Following the sword's blade, she saw Osman on the other end of the blade. His eyes were as cold and dark as ever.

"Talk you old fool or I'll cut her throat in front of you."

"No please! I beg you!" Pirbaba was pleading and crying.

"Pirbaba why are you here?" Arta asked looking shocked.

"I'm so sorry your highness. I couldn't flee the city. They want me to open the treasury." Pirbaba said crying looking ashamed.

"No you can't ..."

"Shut up!" Osman roared. The sword blade touched Arta's neck. He was tired of waiting and was losing his patience every second that passed. He wanted that damn door to be opened now.

"I'm not afraid of you. I don't care if you kill me." She held the sword's blade and pressed it harder to her neck while staring furiously at Osman. A thin string of blood became visible on her neck. A moment of concern and hesitation flashed in Osman's eyes. He never wanted to hurt her and now his sword had cut her neck. He moved a step back and was about to drop his sword.

Samir tried so hard not to interfere. After their small argument with Osman and his suspicions of him being in love with Arta, he had tried to distance himself from her. Arta was a pitiful person, but Osman was his life long best friend. He didn't want to upset him.

At the sight of blood on her neck, Pirbaba couldn't resist any longer. "I'll do it." He was crying and pleading to Osman on his knees "Please don't hurt her." he then looked at Arta "Shahzadeh please forgive me; I cannot be the cause of your death." he cried harder.

"No Pirbaba don't..." She stood up and moved a step toward Pirbaba, Osman prevented her from going any further and ordered the guards to take her back to the West palace.

The guards forcefully removed Arta and left.

"I'll open it for you just promise me you will not harm her." Pirbaba told Osman.

Osman nodded.