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That was, perhaps, Abbas' next greatest fear, at the moment. If one of the other Hahls thought they could rule over the Sandlords at the Mad Demon's decree, then the resulting conflict would be just as bad as fighting Abolish directly. Or even worse.

That would, without a doubt, fracture the Hahls irreparably. There was no way in the black hells that Abbas would allow his children to ever be made subservient to the Mad Demon, and he was quite certain that several of his ruling kin felt precisely the same way. Hasan Duxan, Yusef Shihab.

And Asad Najir, of course, if he still counted.

Those men would sooner die than work for Morgunov. Abbas would've liked to say the same about the others, but...

These were trying times. When it came down to it, he honestly didn't know how the remaining four heads might react. Hamza Dagher, Navid Kattan, Tariq Haayen, Rahat Mateen. When so many lives were on the line? When so much power was waiting to be seized?

The War of the Three Sands had certainly proven that the loyalty among the Hahls was not above reproach. That conflict may have been long before his time, but Abbas didn't intend to ignore the lessons from it.

The last thing he wanted was to fight a war for the soul of his kin.

But if that was what had to be done, then he would not back down, either.

Freeing Asad would go a long way toward preventing that, he hoped. The man may have become something of a black sheep in recent years, but Lion of the Desert still meant something to his kin. Even if many of them today did not hold to the old ways very strongly, he suspected that most of them would still not wish to go against such a sacred figure in open war.