Chanakya’s fingers tightened around his staff. “Impossible. We purged the line. Every cousin, every nephew.”

He knelt beside the paralyzed Sinharan. “You are not a Nanda prince. You are a cousin thrice removed, a failed merchant from Anga who once sold counterfeit jewels. You killed the real Sinharan in the forest and took his locket. The Nagas despise you. They fed us your every secret for a bag of gold.”

“Drop the sword, Emperor,” Sinharan hissed. “Or she dies now. And you will watch.”

“I do not seek your throne, Chandragupta,” Sinharan said, his voice a melodic whisper that carried across the hall. “The Nandas ruled through greed. I saw my brothers poison each other for a golden cup. I fled to the forests, lived among the Nagas, learned their wisdom. I come to offer you a gift—a treaty of blood and silence.”

Sinharan’s eyes widened. He looked at the goblet. “The poison… it was fake?”

Sinharan’s lips trembled. “How…?”

Sinharan was not executed. On Chandragupta’s orders, he was stripped of his claims, branded on the forehead as a liar, and exiled beyond the empire’s borders—alive, but forgotten.