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They remained in that state for a long time before Ayanah finally cut short her weeping—a cry she had not had the chance to release until today—and stood up to head back into the bathroom.
Inside, she collapsed into a fresh wave of weeping. They could all hear her from the bathroom, but she remained there for a long time. When she was finished, she washed her face with water, stepped out, dried her face, and dressed in her uniform. She felt a severe, crushing pain in her chest and heart, but there was nothing she could do about it. She simply finished getting ready and moved to the side to sit down. Looking at Zuhrah, who was still crying, Ayanah walked over, bent down, and tenderly kissed the center of her head and the side of her face. Opening her mouth, she spoke in an incredibly soft, calm voice:
"That is enough. Wash your face and get ready so we can leave."
Zuhrah let out a heavy sigh and looked up at Ayanah. Just as she opened her mouth to speak, Ayanah shook her head and said:
"It is nothing. It has passed. Just go and get ready."
Zuhrah stood up and went into the bathroom, looking thoroughly pitiful.
The moment she stepped out, Sakinah went in. Once they were all completely dressed, the three of them left and headed to the lecture hall.
This rift and the tragic circumstances they found themselves in thoroughly shattered Ayanah. She completely lost her joy and vitality due to the immense sorrow weighing heavily on her soul. Consequently, she became cold as ice, silent and withdrawn.
Whatever Zuhrah wanted, Ayanah did it for her without any argument or chatter. Whenever they were in the room, Zuhrah would lie close, clinging to her body, while Ayanah would hold her tightly, praying for her and stroking her hair. Ayanah could find no peace because an intense fear and trauma threatened to shatter Zuhrah’s sanity. A deep, consuming terror gripped them because it felt as though entering this palace meant they had lost themselves forever—and perhaps, they had lost each other as well.
Zuhrah felt a profound fear of being separated from Ayanah, a fear greater than anything that had happened to them in the past. If she were to lose Ayanah, she preferred that God take her life so she could die. If nothing else, she deeply craved the relief of death because of the absolute lack of peace in her heart.
On the eve of their departure into the inner palace, they spent the night awake, locked in each other's arms. It was during that night that Ayanah finally broke her silence and had a long conversation with Zuhrah. She reminded her that there was absolutely nothing they could do in the world right now to meet Abaas again someday, except to remain resilient and survive until the time when Allah would bring a change to their destiny. There was no way to avenge themselves against the people of GHAZ except by surviving to tell their story. Therefore, if Zuhrah truly wanted Allah to bring the day when she would reunite with Abaas or hear word of him, she had to endure and stay strong until the day Allah chose to take her soul.
Zuhrah, who only then realized the immense mental fortitude Ayanah was forcing herself to display, felt her body go numb. She felt as though she couldn't endure it, but even if she couldn't, she resolved to try and give Ayanah the strength to live, because Zuhrah was the only person left alive who kept Ayanah's heart beating properly.
As for herself, she truly felt she couldn't go on; she genuinely wanted Allah to take her out of this world so she could rest. Yet, she knew that if she were gone, Ayanah’s life would become meaningless and empty, because she would never find happiness again.
By dawn, they were already standing. Even before the morning light broke, they had been woken up and gathered in a large assembly area.
There, they were redistributed uniforms and bags of essential items; everyone was handed their own gear.
They only returned to their rooms briefly to perform the dawn prayer. As soon as they finished, the summon bell rang again. They filed out, each carrying their pristine bags, looking perfectly presentable.
Ayanah and Zuhrah felt a profound chill of apprehension settling over them. It was only now that Ayanah fully understood Zuhrah's terrifying premonition: that they could be separated at their workstations or sleeping quarters. Because of this, her own body grew intensely cold with dread.
Long bus-like vehicles were lined up. They were packed inside, and the vehicles drove out, transporting them deep into the palace grounds.
Even inside the vehicle, they held each other's hands in a fierce, iron grip, with Sakinah sitting right beside them. They were driven past the grand gates of the Slave Kingdom and directed toward the insanely massive gates of the inner BOYEM Palace, where the security presence was terrifyingly strict.
The palace entrance gate itself seemed to dazzle their eyes with its breathtaking beauty, crafted as if it were solid gold.
A meticulous scan of their belongings and their bodies was conducted. For an entire day, the guards performed this repetitive security screening. As the process neared completion, they reached two specific girls whose father's name matched perfectly in the records, indicating an identical lineage.
They were abruptly halted and surrounded by an imposing ring of security guards. The guards forced them to their knees on the ground. With their heads bowed low, the girls' bodies shook violently with a terror that threatened to stop their very heartbeats.
The Chief of Security arrived at the scene personally. He stared at them intensely before reviewing their listed names. Fixing his gaze on the older of the two, he opened his mouth and demanded:
"What is your relationship? Why are your surnames identical?"
The older girl swallowed hard. Keeping her head bowed low, she replied in a faint, trembling voice:
"We share a blood relation..."
Before the words could even fully leave her mouth, she was seized and hoisted into the air as if she were a mere object. She was violently thrown into a menacing vehicle that looked less like a car and more like a heavily armored war machine.
She let out a piercing scream, desperately trying to reach for her younger sister as she was dragged away, feeling as though her very soul was being ripped from her body. But the guards showed no mercy or human emotion. Her head was violently slammed against the iron frame of the vehicle, causing her to collapse inside as blood began to trickle down the side of her face.
Her younger sister wept hysterically, screaming her sibling's name as if her heart would break. Instantly, a guard knocked her unconscious on the spot using an electronic shocker. An order was barked to pick her up and send her back to the Slave Kingdom.
Witnessing this horrific display, another group of three slaves standing behind them began to tremble violently with terror, because they too were biological siblings born of the same mother and father.
When the guards checked their records and saw their identical names, the three siblings were immediately torn apart. The identification licenses of two were instantly revoked, leaving only one behind. The remaining two were destined to be banished to completely different kingdoms. For those who met an even worse misfortune, they were thrown to the wild beasts to be eaten as meat. This was because, from the very moment of entering this country, slaves who possessed any familial ties to one another were strictly banned.
This was an unyielding, brutally enforced law and structural rule: relatives were never permitted to serve together as slaves within the palace. Whenever relatives were discovered, the standard punishment was to execute one and spare the other. This law dated back to ancient times; many generations ago, three biological siblings plotted an escape and a coup d'état that triggered an incredibly catastrophic rebellion within the Boyem Palace—an uprising so destructive that its likeness had never been repeated in history.
Consequently, since the era of the ancestral rulers, this law had been severely tightened and heavily enforced. If a slave was found to have any family members, the penalty was death for the entire family line to completely eliminate any threat of treason or subversion.
Over the past decades, countless slaves had lost their entire families to this brutal law. Before any slave could be stationed in Boyem, it had to be completely verified that they stood entirely alone in the world, with no living relatives, to prevent the leakage of palace secrets. This was why, even if you eventually gained your freedom, you could never leave the territory of Boyem, because you had no one left in the outside world; you could only build a new life within the kingdom.
For this reason, human traffickers who brought slaves into the country always ensured that their captives had no living family left in the world—or if they did, they ensured they were permanently eliminated, so the slave would belong exclusively to the palace.
The Kusrawa traders, right from their initial entry into the country, had thoroughly verified that their slaves had no living family left in the world. Consequently, under current palace procedures, if anyone was discovered to be accompanied by a blood relative, one would be eliminated and the other spared.
It was a law of such absolute, terrifying authority that no one could ever bypass it. Without any hesitation or second thought, one was simply eliminated. And that exact same fate was about to play out for these newly arrived slaves.
Enduring excruciating agony and completely losing their minds to despair, the next group of siblings found themselves utterly incapable of letting go of one another. Ultimately, they chose to have their lives taken together—all three of them who stood behind the first pair. Without wasting a single moment, the guards dragged the three of them away toward the rear. Moments later, the sharp report of a firearm echoed through the air, fulfilling their desperate choice. Yet, no one saw where the shots came from, nor what was done with their corpses.
Zuhrah and Ayanah, who were standing near the very end of the line, slowly lifted their heads and looked at each other. Their bodies went completely limp as they faced the horrific, monstrous destiny unfolding directly before them—a nightmare they had never anticipated.
Ayanah’s eyes turned a deep, bloodshot red, while tears began to stream freely down Zuhrah’s face. Zuhrah could not tear her gaze away from Ayanah. Even now, she felt as though her soul was leaving her body, because she knew that separation from Ayanah meant her certain death.
She resolved that she would choose to be killed so that Ayanah could be spared. However, they had absolutely no idea who the guards would choose to spare and who would be executed.
Zuhrah desperately wanted Ayanah to live because Ayanah possessed mental fortitude, resilience, and spiritual devotion; she knew Ayanah could survive safely here. Yet, she also knew that Ayanah would choose to have them both killed together, just like the group before them, because Ayanah would never willingly allow them to be torn apart.
Scalding tears rolled down her cheeks as she stared at Ayanah, aching to throw her arms around her to feel the warmth of her body in a final farewell. But even that small comfort was permanently denied to them. Therefore, she resolved that they must choose to live for Ayanah's sake alone, even if it meant severing their blood ties forever. As long as she could simply see Ayanah alive, breathing the same air in the same palace, that would be enough for her.
Sakinah, who stood directly in front of them, turned around slowly and stepped between the two sisters. Her own eyes filled with tears of deep empathy and pity for them, especially for Ayanah, who was shaking her head in denial. Ayanah's eyes were turning a terrifying shade of red, and her hands began to tremble. Opening her mouth, she looked at Zuhrah, who was weeping with an expression of profound vulnerability and pain. Ayanah whispered:
"Zuhrah, I cannot live in this world without you. Zuhrah, I choose to leave this world alongside you. Let us leave together and find peace..."
Zuhrah shook her head violently, her tears intensifying as she replied in a weak, breathless voice:
"What about Abaas?"
"Allah will protect him. But right now, as you stand here with me, I cannot endure a life where you do not exist, Zuhrah."
Releasing a silent, choked sob, Zuhrah desperately tried to wrench her hand free from Ayanah's iron grip, saying:
"It is precisely so that you can live that I will choose this path. I want you to live, Ayanah. I want you to find a life that will eventually bring you peace. For that to happen, we must choose to deny our blood relation. As long as you are alive and I am alive, serving in the same palace and breathing the same air, if Allah wills, we will secure our freedom together one day and leave this place together."
Ayanah shook her head fiercely, tightening her grip on Zuhrah’s hand even more as she argued:
"Zuhrah, if we choose that, we are separating forever! We will be in the exact same place, but we can never show that we know each other, let alone acknowledge that we share the same blood! We will never be allowed to feel the warmth of each other's presence, we will never be allowed to look at each other, and we will never again be Ayanah and Zuhrah of GHAZ! That is it—we are separated for eternity until the day Allah grants us freedom. Do you understand what that means? That is the absolute law and rule here, and violating it means forfeiting your life! I cannot do it, Zuhrah!"
#MAMUH
HAYATEEM by Mamuhgee
(Transactional and banking details omitted for narrative clarity)
Sakinah firmly believed that as long as they could stay alive, it was far better to endure the emotional hardship of pretending to be strangers. Knowing they were at least within the same palace grounds was vastly superior to having their relationship discovered, which would lead to them being slaughtered in vain or separated across entirely different kingdoms. It was better to remain in the same place, even if nothing would ever bring them together again.
Therefore, using both of her hands, Sakinah clamped down on their locked hands and forcefully pried them apart. Zuhrah burst into a silent, agonizing weep, her heart shattering completely as she realized that this was truly the end.
Ayanah, too, wept bitterly, her voice choking as she found herself utterly incapable of tearing her eyes away from Zuhrah, who was staring back at her with equal despair. Sakinah also wept, bowing her head deeply toward the ground.
As the security line finally moved up to them, their names were read aloud: AYANAAH GHAZ and ZUHRAH GHAZ. When the guards demanded to know their relationship, Ayanah lifted her bloodshot, heavily swollen eyes and stared intently at Zuhrah. Zuhrah quickly and completely wiped her face clean, opened her mouth, and declared:
"We share no blood relation whatsoever. It is merely an identical surname."
The moment she uttered those words, a heavy security stamp was violently pressed onto their files—alongside a distinct, specialized restriction stamp. This stamp ensured that if a cruel twist of fate ever brought them together even within the same restroom, one would be immediately executed and the other spared to eliminate any suspicion. Furthermore, if either of them ever cast a lingering glance at the other, the exact same death penalty applied.
Their identification cards were shoved into their hands, and they were marched into the inner palace grounds. Every part of their physical bodies felt entirely numb and frozen, save for their legs, which dragged them forward like soulless puppets.
Scalding tears rolled down Ayanah’s cheeks as she felt every emotional anchor within her completely shut down. She desperately wanted to lift her head to steal one final, parting look at Zuhrah, but that opportunity was permanently gone. Similarly, Zuhrah desperately wanted to gaze at Ayanah, but the chance was forever lost. Tears spilled from her eyes as she closed them tight, blindly following the guards down a path entirely separate from the one Ayanah and Sakinah were being marched down.
With every single step Ayanah took, she felt as though she was being forcibly separated from her own soul. At this stage, she had reached the absolute lowest point of total loss; there was not a single shred of light left for her eyes to see, not even an atom's weight of hope.
Her legs trembled violently, and her heart began to fail her. She simply could not endure being separated from Zuhrah, even if refusing meant forfeiting her own life; she was entirely willing to accept death. Consequently, she slowly ground to a halt, abandoning her forward march.
Slowly lifting her head, she resolved to turn around and look back at Zuhrah, even if that single glance cost her her life.
Sakinah, who was marching directly behind her, acted with lightning speed. Moving with a calm, calculated precision so as not to alert the nearby guards, she firmly grabbed Ayanah and physically blocked her from turning around. She refused to let her turn and throw her life away, knowing it would mean that Zuhrah’s profound sacrifice and emotional agony would have been entirely in vain.
A fresh torrent of scalding tears continued to stream down the face of Zuhrah, who likewise did not turn around, carrying the profound trauma and agonizing heartbreak of Ayanah's condition deep within her soul.
Sakinah was the only one who managed to cast a subtle, quiet glance backward, fixing her eyes on the retreating back of Zuhrah, whose faltering posture made it clear she was on the absolute brink of a total cardiac collapse from emotional trauma.
A profound sense of pity and sorrow overwhelmed Sakinah's heart. Zuhrah was heading into a life where she would have to survive entirely alone, stripped of every single person her life had ever known. In contrast, Ayanah was slightly more fortunate, as she at least had Sakinah by her side.
No matter what lay ahead, Sakinah knew that this was yet another grim, brutal trial with which Allah would continue to test their endurance.
Slowly, the process of sorting the slaves into their respective quarters was completed. They were loaded into separate vehicles and transported deep into the heart of the inner territory where the world of Boyem truly resided.
The sheer architectural layout, the structural design, and the paradisiacal luxury found within the Boyem Palace far exceeded any legend, historical record, or tale of global empires ever told in history.
It felt to the girls as though they were no longer walking on Earth. Everywhere they passed, the walls were constructed of highly polished mirrors, reflecting their broken forms back at them and dazzling their eyes. Terrified by the scale of the wealth, a deep dread filled them. They lowered their heads completely toward the ground, holding their trembling bodies tight as they fought to gather their composure—knowing that absolute focus and emotional discipline were paramount to surviving their duties.
They were taken directly to the newly constructed slave quarters within the palace grounds. They were assigned a room identical in structural layout to the one they had left behind in the Slave Kingdom, except this particular room housed exactly three slaves.
The specific world Ayanah was thrust into was entirely isolated from Zuhrah’s sector; a vast physical distance and immense security cordons separated the various wings of the palace. Ayanah was stationed directly within the Imebētiś wing—an entirely self-contained world consisting of fifty luxury residential blocks reserved exclusively for the Sultan's personal mistresses.
Under the palace rules, any slave woman whom the Sultan slept with would, if she became pregnant, be immediately assigned her own lavishly adorned, staggeringly beautiful apartment within this wing. She would be granted an unimaginable level of luxury, accompanied by over ten personal slaves assigned to serve her exclusively. There, she would nurture her pregnancy, give birth, and raise the royal blood of Boyem in absolute comfort and opulence that defied comprehension. She would continue to live there in luxury and freedom with her slaves until the royal child turned fifteen years old. At that milestone, a magnificent estate surpassing all imagination would be prepared for the child deep within the primary palace grounds where the Sultan resided. The child would be relocated there alongside a fresh contingent of slaves, returning only to pay respects to his mother, or hosting her at his estate.
As for any slave woman whom the Sultan slept with but who failed to conceive, she would be sent to a separate wing to return to a life of servitude, though she would be removed from the ranks of ordinary, low-level slaves.
Ayanah and Sakinah were assigned to the contingent of slaves responsible for serving the Sultan’s newest Imebētin (mistress). Zuhrah, meanwhile, was sent far away to the primary wing of the Sultan’s first wife (the Empress). Thus, a massive structural chasm was established between the two sisters, leaving absolutely no hope of ever bridging the gap.
Ever since they arrived at their assigned quarters, Ayanah had been on the absolute verge of an emotional collapse. Broken by the trauma of her separation from Zuhrah, she could barely function. It was only through Sakinah's desperate, unyielding support that she was kept from completely losing her sanity. Sakinah wrestled to comfort and stabilize her until the deep hours of midnight, before Allah finally granted Ayanah a sense of grim resignation, allowing her to force herself to accept their reality.
The following morning, precisely at the first light of dawn, they dressed immaculately in their uniforms and filed out to begin their duties.
They arrived directly at the apartments of the new mistress. Their specific unit consisted of exactly six slaves. Upon entering, they immediately set to work, executing their respective chores before the mistress had even awoken from her sleep.
Ayanah was assigned the task of cleaning the massive bathroom and hand-washing the delicate garments the mistress had used. She washed them meticulously using her hands without touching the mechanical washing machines, despite having been thoroughly trained on how to operate every piece of modern luxury equipment during their schooling phase.
The moment she finished, she sanitized the bathroom once more and prepared a deeply relaxing, steaming bath for her mistress, infusing the water with incredibly rich, aromatic perfumes—a skill they had also been comprehensively taught, down to the absolute smallest detail.
Once everything was fully prepared, she moved to the edge of the bathroom door and stood perfectly still, her head bowed low as she awaited her mistress's awakening.
She stood in that exact frozen position for thirty agonizing minutes before the mistress finally emerged from her massive, incredibly luxurious canopy bed, which was adorned with unimaginable wealth.
Upon approaching, the mistress completely ignored Ayanah's polite greeting. Slipping out of her nightgown, she callously dropped it onto the floor and stepped straight into the perfectly prepared bathroom.
Ayanah silently bowed, gathered the discarded nightgown from the floor, and carried it to the laundry area. She immediately returned to the linen station, picked out three specific towels from a stack of over twenty—including a specialized hair-drying wrap, all radiating a soft, luxurious scent—and returned to stand perfectly still by the bathroom entrance.
She endured a grueling, prolonged period of standing without making a single physical movement. Despite the severe muscular ache racking her body from the extended strain, she remained upright, her head bowed low, completely losing track of time. Finally, the mistress opened the bathroom door. Ayanah immediately extended the first towel. The mistress accepted it, wrapping it around her body, before taking the second to cover herself, and placing the third over her head to dry her hair.
The moment the mistress walked over to her vanity mirror, Ayanah ducked back into the bathroom. She cleaned it thoroughly from top to bottom, flushing the drains and restoring it to a pristine state, as if no one had just used it.
Finishing up, she stepped out to help tidy the bedroom and the bed. Sakinah and another slave girl entered the room to blow-dry and style the mistress's hair while she sat staring at her reflection in the massive mirror.
They spent hours continuously catering to her every whim. Once her grooming was complete, she moved to the dining area to eat a lavish breakfast consisting of several varieties of gourmet dishes prepared by the other slaves. The girls surrounded her table, each executing a specific task to serve her.
Until late into the night, the slaves remained standing on their feet without a single moment of rest. Aside from brief breaks to perform their daily prayers, their entire existence was consumed by an endless cycle of grueling service to this woman.
Only at midnight, long after the mistress had finally fallen fast asleep, were they permitted to return to their quarters.
They were thoroughly, utterly exhausted. They lacked the physical strength to do anything else; the moment they lay down, they crashed into a deep, dreamless sleep.
At the very first crack of dawn, the wake-up bell rang violently. They immediately sprang out of bed, executed the general cleaning chores assigned to the slave wing until the call for the dawn prayer sounded, performed their prayers, bathed, dressed in their uniforms, and hurried out to begin serving their mistress all over again.
Just like the previous day, they spent the entire day executing backbreaking labor and servitude without a single moment of peace. They were forced to eat their meager meals while standing up; they were denied the basic dignity of sitting down.
****This marked the brutal onset of the harsh servitude they found themselves trapped in—a life of unyielding bondage devoid of a single moment of rest. You were never permitted to sleep until the master or mistress you served had fallen into a deep, heavy slumber.
In the beginning, before their bodies adapted to the grueling routine, the physical toll was devastating. However, as the weeks rolled by, they gradually became conditioned to the harsh labor until it became second nature, and their bodies stopped feeling the raw pain.
They operated with the clinical precision of computers—working silently, making no errors, and maintaining an absolute composure.
Four solid months had now passed since they became full-time slaves within the Boyem Palace. They had completely adapted to the strict structural layout and the absolute laws of the empire, executing their duties without a single mistake.
When combined with the months they had previously spent within the Slave Kingdom, they had now spent nearly seven months in BOYEM—marking exactly one year and one month since they were violently torn away from their parents.
Throughout all these months, not a single day passed without Ayanah experiencing a deep, agonizing sorrow over the loss of Zuhrah.
With every movement and every breath she took, her existence was defined by a profound misery and heartbreak, compounded by the traumatic loss of her family.
Sakinah was the only living witness to the absolute, consuming sorrow sealed deep within Ayanah's heart, though on the surface, Ayanah outwardly embraced her grim destiny with absolute silence.
Suddenly, the mistress they were serving was blessed by Allah with a royal pregnancy. Under palace protocols, this meant she was immediately excused from being called to the Sultan's bed until after she gave birth—and even then, only if fortune favored her to be selected again.
Her sudden removal from active rotation struck a wave of deep anxiety and fear through the entire slave wing. This was due to the impending arrival of a new batch of Imebētin (mistresses) who were about to be selected for the Sultan. The Sultan was currently outside the country, but prior to his return, a fresh group of beautiful mistresses had to be meticulously selected so he could relax with them upon his arrival.
#MAMUH
#ROYALTY
#AYANAH GHAZ
#NUAB BOYEM
HAYATEEM by Mamuhgee
Despite the overwhelming panic, anxiety, and fear gripping the beautiful slave girls throughout BOYEM regarding the upcoming selection of new mistresses, Ayanah remained completely oblivious to the matter. It was entirely outside her scope of concern. She knew with absolute certainty that out of the thousands of slave women serving within the palace grounds, she was far down the hierarchy, hidden away within the Imebētiś service wing. She was not stationed in the main wings of the Sultan's two primary wives, whose numbers never changed.
Therefore...
📖 Story Summary
This segment of the novel HAYATEEM captures a turning point of profound emotional trauma, systemic cruelty, and structural adaptation for three main characters: Ayanah, Zuhrah, and Sakinah.
- The Psychological Breakdown and Resilience: The story opens in the aftermath of an intense emotional crisis. Ayanah suffers a severe emotional breakdown, weeping in isolation inside a bathroom before forcing herself to put on her uniform. Despite her internal agony, she displays remarkable resilience to comfort her sister, Zuhrah, who is on the brink of losing her sanity due to trauma. Ayanah instills a survival mindset in Zuhrah, reminding her that their only hope of surviving the cruel empire of Boyem and eventually reuniting with their loved one, Abaas, is to stay strong and endure.
- The Brutal Law of Boyem Palace: As the slaves are processed into the inner sanctuary of the massive BOYEM Palace, they encounter a terrifying security protocol. The palace enforces an ancient, unyielding anti-nepotism and anti-treason law: No biological relatives are allowed to serve as slaves together. This law was established generations ago after three siblings successfully organized a catastrophic rebellion within the palace. The punishment for blood relatives discovered during the intake screening is immediate execution for one or both parties. The text details the horrific enforcement of this law as siblings ahead of them are dragged away, beaten, knocked unconscious, or summarily executed by firearm when they refuse to separate.
- The Great Sacrifice: To survive, Zuhrah and Ayanah are forced by their companion, Sakinah, to violently break their physical hold on each other. When their records are checked, Zuhrah denies their blood relation, claiming they merely share a surname (AYANAAH GHAZ and ZUHRAH GHAZ). They are spared but heavily flagged with security stamps that dictate immediate death if they are ever caught interacting, looking at one another, or even occupying the same room. They are permanently separated into completely different wings of the palace.
- The Reality of Servitude: Ayanah and Sakinah are assigned to the Imebētiś wing (the wing housing the Sultan's pregnant or active mistresses), specifically tasked with serving a new mistress. Zuhrah is sent far away to the Empress's wing. The narrative details the grueling, clinical, and mechanical nature of their life over the next four months. They work like automated computers under a brutal regime where they must stand for hours, eat while standing, and are forbidden from sleeping until their mistress sleeps.
The New Threat: The story concludes four months later (thirteen months since they were taken from their parents). Ayanah's mistress becomes pregnant, which alters the power dynamics of the slave wing. As the mistress is taken out of rotation, the entire slave quarter falls into panic over the upcoming selection of a fresh batch of beautiful mistresses for the Sultan's return—a political shift that Ayanah remains entirely detached from due to her profound depression and isolated assignment.
🗺️ Setting and Character Descriptions
🌆 The Setting: BOYEM Palace
- The External Gates: Insanely massive and crafted to resemble solid gold, symbolizing the absolute wealth and blinding opulence of the empire.
- The Security Apparatus: Extreme, highly armed, and cold-blooded. The security presence features high-tech body and property scans, armored war-like vehicles, and electronic shockers. The guards execute commands with clinical, unblinking cruelty.
- The Architecture: Described as a literal earthly paradise that defies historical comparisons. The inner corridors are lined with highly polished mirrors, forcing the broken slaves to constantly look at their own subjugation.
The Imebētiś Wing (Mistress Quarters): A massive, self-contained complex consisting of fifty luxury residential blocks. It is a space of extreme material luxury—featuring canopy beds, fine perfumes, and extensive linen selections—designed to house the Sultan's pregnant or active concubines in absolute opulence.
👥 Characters
- Ayanah Ghaz: The emotionally anchored yet deeply traumatized protagonist. Despite internal agony that makes her "cold as ice," she possesses incredible mental fortitude and a deep sense of spiritual devotion (tawakkali). She assumes a protective role over Zuhrah but is driven to the brink of choosing death over a life separated from her sister.
- Zuhrah Ghaz: Ayanah's biological sister. She is highly vulnerable, fragile, and profoundly traumatized by the horrors they have faced. Her sanity is actively threatened by fear. Despite her fragile state, she exhibits supreme self-sacrifice by lying to the security guards to deny her bloodline, choosing a lifetime of painful separation to ensure Ayanah survives.
- Sakinah: The grounded, pragmatic, and fiercely protective companion of the sisters. She serves as the voice of harsh reality. Sakinah physically forces the sisters apart to prevent them from committing mutual suicide, acts as Ayanah’s emotional pillar during her breakdown, and keeps her from violating palace rules.
- The Mistress (Imebētin): An entitled, cold, and privileged woman within the royal hierarchy. She treats her slaves as invisible tools, callously dropping clothes on the floor and demanding hours of flawless, silent service. Her pregnancy shifts the dynamics of her entire household.
Chief of Security / "Bullet": The human manifestations of the empire's unyielding cruelty. They are cold, bureaucratic killers who execute women, enforce structural laws without emotion, and utilize extreme violence to maintain palace security.
📊 Narrative & Literary Analysis
1. The Theme of Totalitarian Separation & Dehumanization
The core dramatic engine of this text is the brutal enforcement of the anti-relational law. The BOYEM Palace acts as a totalitarian regime designed to systematically strip individuals of their pre-existing identities, families, and histories. By enforcing a law that executes or separates biological family members, the palace ensures that a slave has "no one left in the outside world." This structural isolation eliminates the risk of collective rebellion (the historical coup d'état) and forces the slave to depend entirely on the palace structure for survival.
2. The Motif of the Mirror and Spatial Isolation
The author masterfully uses space and materials to emphasize the psychological weight of slavery:
- The mirrors lining the inner palace walls serve a dual purpose. While they represent luxury, they act as a psychological torture device for the characters, constantly reflecting their forced submission, their uniforms, and their physical exhaustion back at them.
The spatial division between the Imebētiś wing and the Empress's wing materializes the emotional separation of Ayanah and Zuhrah. They inhabit the same geographical space ("breathing the same air") but are structurally and legally cast into entirely different worlds.
3. Coping Mechanisms: The Dehumanized Worker
The text describes the slaves adapting to their brutal environment by becoming "like computers." This comparison highlights the psychological dissociation required to survive extreme trauma. To avoid punishment or psychological collapse under a regime where you cannot sit or sleep, the characters suppress their human expressions, turning their movements into flawless, mechanical actions.
4. Language and Emotional Pacing (Hausa Literary Style)
Mamuhgee utilizes intense emotional adjectives and repetitive structural phrases to establish a heavy, suffocating mood:
- Phrases like "jiki na kyarma" (body shaking/trembling), "yawan gaske a cikin rai" (immense weight in the soul), and "tamkar qanqara sbd sanyi" (like ice due to coldness) intensify the characters' internal struggles.
- The shift from the chaotic, high-stakes terror of the security gate to the slow, monotonous description of daily chores highlights the grinding reality of long-term trauma. The sudden twist at the end—the selection of new mistresses—reintroduces a political tension that sets up the next arc of the novel.
