A Dowry for the Sultan

by Lance Collins

  He thought of Irene and wondered what he would find in Archēsh, his fanciful expectations alternating between hope and doubt. Guy rode with his shield on his back, the surcoat hiding his mail and a dark blue scarf wrapped around his helmet to both keep the hot sun from the metal and cover the shine so that he now blended into the landscape. He was surprised at how he had changed in a few months. It was second nature to him now that when coming to a fold of ground or a rise, he would halt below the crest, able to see over it, unseen, surveying the bounds ahead in case danger lurked. Once he would have merely ridden on in confident ignorance.

  The sun was up a hand’s breadth when he first dismounted in a low depression with a line of sheltering timber. There he offered the mare a drink at a small stream. She sniffed it and drank a few mouthfuls, impatiently lifting her head to look around, ears pricked, water dripping from her muzzle and the iron bit. “Drink more, Sira! You never know when the next one will be.” At the sound of his voice she gave him a sudden rub of acknowledgement over his face with her muzzle. Guy spluttered, wiping off the water. “I deserved it—starting to sound like Togol.”

  Conscious of a state of freedom and calm, he took a swallow of water and surveyed the enormity of the empty landscape around him. Not so long ago it would have frightened him, both the place and being alone in it. Now he felt confident enough to deal with its exigencies, for he was splendidly mounted, well-armed, capable in his sense of direction with a folded map tucked down the leg of his boot and possessing enough understanding of the local languages to get by.

  Hours later, leading the mare up a rise and halting below the crest, Guy looked around to recognise landmarks from the hunt and memorise more. He decided to mount and in that very moment with his foot in the stirrup, he was suddenly aware how hot it had become, how brittle the yellow grass was and how the sky had burned a brilliant blue. The mare made to turn for home as he stepped into the saddle. Guy kneed her gently back to the east with a sympathetic chide as a sudden uneasiness touched him. With the sun high, he recognised the low feature that dominated the valley where the camp of the irregulars had been and rode closer, expecting to be challenged. The mare stopped and snorted; ears pricked, flicking back to him, then forward again. “Steady girl.” Guy breathed softly, experiencing a sudden fear. Quickly he slipped the haft of the spear under his left thigh and drew his bow, making ready an arrow. Then he urged the tense mare on towards the sound of flies.

  Only the naked dead sprawled in the looted dell. Sixteen of them, most eviscerated, purplish intestines stuffed in the blood-blackened and screaming mouths of the severed heads. Guy fought down the bile rising in his throat and looked around for any evidence of nearby Seljuks, but he seemed to be alone with the dead cavalrymen and flies in the midst of the gagging smell of death. Two men, stouter than the others, had been forced down on their knees, their hands pinned wide by stakes, the skin flayed off along the arms and shoulders and the sinews taken. Guy in his shock had heard that the Seljuks did this to make bowstrings. Close by, a horse with a Roman saddle lay with its legs stiff and belly swollen. Guy did not dare dismount in case he had trouble regaining the saddle quickly if attacked.

  With nausea welling inside and the animal instinct to flee almost overwhelming, Guy turned from the scene and trotted away, controlling the tense, rushing mare, seeking the cover of the sparse trees and thickets where he could. He reasoned the camp had been surprised while most were away, that the Armenian screen might be damaged, but intact along its outpost line. Uneasy, he wondered why they had not alerted the fortress. Pausing in some concealing low ground, he marshalled his thoughts. To return to Manzikert, even to warn them, seemed pointless, since he had little to report but the deaths of sixteen irregular troops. He had not delivered his despatches nor ascertained conditions at Archēsh. Above all was his own moral code to save Irene if he could.

  Dry-mouthed and with an empty feeling inside, he rode east, keeping to the higher ground away from the road. He walked Sira, aware he would need to husband her strength more than ever now. As darkness approached he sought a thicket in which to hide for the night and found one, dense and extensive on an insignificant looking knoll with a clear view of the distant Archēsh-Manzikert road. Guy dismounted and led the mare into it where he cleared a space and sat with his back braced against a trunk, the reins of the saddled mare wrapped twice around his hand. Thus he prayed; for Irene, his salvation, for the souls of the slain and the survival of the people. He saw again the strange new star and prayed the more because of it. As darkness gathered, he saw two pinpricks of light on distant hills and wondered if it were the Armenian irregulars. Surely they would not be so careless now.

  All that Bryennius, Bessas and the scouts had told him of the Seljuks and soldiering began to play in his mind. He was now in the area where the Seljuk screen would be searching out Christian posts and guarding against any prowling Roman troops. Guy realised the Seljuk main body might be besieging Archēsh already. If their screen was composed of tribesmen under their own emirs, then their discipline may be more lax and the temptations to looting and rape the stronger. Hence they might be less interested in a single rider, especially one moving eastward. Sira sniffed his ear with her soft muzzle as though wishing to know his troubled thoughts. Guy reached up and stroked it, glad of her company.

  It grew dark and the waxing moon rose. Guy thought about food and almost gagged at the thought, but knew he should force some down. Groping to his saddlebag, he offered a bruised apple to the mare. She disdained it, so he threw it deeper into the thicket. Dry mouthed, more than water could slake, he chewed on overcooked roast beef and stale bread. Swallowing a sip of water, he considered remaining awake, lest the Seljuks creep upon him. A cloud crossed the moon as a breeze sprung up through the thicket. Guy prayed again to keep Leon Magistros’ demons and goblins from his overplayed imagination. Through it all, Irene’s face came to mind, again and again. Later, reasoning he would need all his strength in the morning, he allowed himself to doze, reins in one hand, dagger in the other.

  He awoke with a start in the darkness and sat listening. The silence seemed deafening with its breeze and the sounds of small creatures about their nocturnal toil. He felt his courage draining from him and ruefully recalled his confidence of the previous morning in comparison with his present fear of being alone in this great emptiness with the Seljuks about. He shook violently for a time until, by sucking in air and whispering an almost forgotten prayer, he regained some semblance of self-control.

  It was at this lonesome, wavering point that Guy determined to complete his mission. If he stayed away from the high ground and imitated the same cunning tactics he had used before the wadi fight and that the irregulars had employed against the hunting party, he might get close enough to Archēsh to at least determine whether the town had fallen or was besieged. If he happened to stumble on Irene in his quest and was able to offer assistance, then … “Worry about that bridge when we get to it!” Guy quoted Togol’s frequently stated philosophy. He rose stiffly and gently stroked Sira. “Let’s go.”

  Guy led the mare for hours, watering her in streams where he could and allowing her to pick at the grass as they progressed, until the first grey steel touched the eastern sky. Then he mounted and they walked on, now keeping to the lower, darker places. Finally they approached a low black crest. Sira stopped suddenly, ears pricked, as a strange tongue came faintly to them. It was answered from somewhere close by. His heart pounding, Guy, hunched in the saddle, leaned down by the mare’s neck and peering into the dimness, whispered for Sira to be silent. On the rise before them, there were figures silhouetted against the glowing dawn. He backtracked and circled around, finally finding a vantage point where he could look towards Archēsh without appearing obvious. Dismounting and kneeling, he urinated. His stomach a knot, a short while later he urinated again, annoyed in the knowledge that it was from nerves.

  As it grew lighter Guy noticed an o
dd, distant whine, but was too concerned about his immediate surrounds to pay further attention to it. He could see Seljuk outposts on the hills around and wondered if he had been observed. It occurred to him that, with the scarf around his helmet and the Islamic origin of his horse and equipment, they might mistake him for one of their own from a distance. He worried the distinctive outline of the almond-shaped shield would betray him so he abandoned it under a stunted bush.

  Looking across the valley, he could see the city walls, the sea of felt tents before them, horse herds grazing in the distance and the siege train with its wagons and engines in line-of-march. He was too late: Archēsh was already surrounded by the enemy. Guy wondered why the machines were not deployed, until he followed the outline of the walls and saw the gates open. He realised the equipment was no longer needed. The town had fallen and the noise Guy had been hearing without recognition was the sound of the sack, a distant screaming.

  He watched helplessly, his mind numb with horror and fear for Irene. A Seljuk patrol rode past, looking straight at him. Caught out, heart in his boots, Guy brazenly looked back, unable to breathe. They rode on and he gulped air in relief. The hours passed and with them, his indecisions; he could offer help to no one, had observed all he could and must warn Basil as soon as possible. Reluctantly he decided to ride away.

  Then amongst the enormity of the scene stretched out before him, Guy noticed a disturbance ripple through the tents. A rider on a swift horse galloped away from the city along the Manzikert track. Instinctively, Guy rose and watched. It was too far to be certain, but something in the horse’s stride reminded him of Irene’s stallion. A ragged pursuit was being organised in the camp. Two mounted Seljuks gave chase but were already several bowshots behind the fleeing rider. Others would have been saddling up. The route the fugitive must take curved around the spur-line below Guy. Already the Seljuk picket further down the spur was mounting to intercept the flying black horse.

  In a trice, Guy checked his saddlecloth for scalding folds and tightened the girth a hole. He snatched the cloak from the saddle and tied it loosely around his neck, so the flapping folds might foil arrows which would otherwise stick in his back or Sira’s rump or flanks. With a thumb, he plucked the string of his cased bow to ensure tautness and flung himself to the saddle, with Sira already plunging down the stony length of the spur in pursuit of the cantering picket on their rangy Turkmene horses. With a feeling of detached calm, Guy closed on the five Seljuks as they made to intercept the fugitive. Two of the tribesmen were shaking out lassos.

  Guy was certain it was Irene now. She had lost her headdress and he could see her dark hair tied behind, the set of her face and the glimpse of a mail corselet under her green tunic. She also had donned a cloak which flew behind her. Guy could see the familiar black boots and forward set of her legs in the fine saddle she used, bow case and quiver rattling at her hips. Irene saw the gap closing and was riding for life, urging the black horse on and screaming his name, “Get-up! Shahryād. Shahryād. Shahryād.” The valiant stallion strove with nostrils flaring pink after the mile long sprint through the Turkish camp.

  As he closed, Guy had a detached feeling that, with the greatness of her horse and her own skill, Irene might have outmanoeuvred the Seljuk picket. He hit them from the rear at the gallop just as they bunched before Irene on the track. The first he took in the neck, wrenching the spear free with a flick of the wrist as he passed. Whirling the spear over his head, Sira on her haunches as he jerked her around, Guy slashed another across the eyes with the point and smashed the front legs of a white mare from under her rider as he turned Sira onto the Manzikert track. He had a fleeting image of Irene as she passed, staring at him first with astonishment, then recognition. Guy broke free of the melee and settled in the saddle, Sira giving her determined little snatch at the bit as she lifted into the gallop.

  Irene checked the black horse and looked past him. “C’mon, Guy. C’mon. On my left. On my left!” She gestured urgently.

  He remembered then that she was left handed and would be able to cover their right rear with a Parthian shot from the saddle, as he could attempt to cover their left. A look passed between them as Guy drew abreast of her and she pushed Shahryād back into the gallop again. Knee to knee they raced away, their gallant mounts seeming to know their peril. Quickly they settled into a bounding unison of pounding hooves and honest hearts, lungs heaving like bellows. He turned in the saddle and saw a shouting, strung-out group of about fifty in pursuit, all waving spears or bows.

  Irene also turned and looked again, then at Guy. She wiped tears from her eyes so that he wondered at the emotion of the close escape and whatever else had happened at Archēsh. For all that, she had not lost her senses, for it was Irene who shouted, “We have to rein in these horses to save a sprint in them.” She looked over her shoulder again. “Even if it means they get closer.”

  So they eased back on the foaming bits and Guy knew he had never been more alive; with the highest joy and the most putrid fear, senses naked like a wild thing.

  Gradually in that long race for life, the lead Seljuks drew closer. Arrows whizzed by and Guy saw one strike Irene’s flapping cloak. Then he noticed several lodged awkwardly in his own. One grazed his bridle hand, drawing blood and another seared his right leg below the knee. A big Seljuk on a chestnut horse drew near, making ready a lasso. His actions made Guy think they were after their horses, especially Irene’s stallion. This would have made little difference to their fate if the Seljuks had caught them, but it changed the rules of the hunt a little. The Turk was racing neck and neck with them now. Guy glanced at Irene.

  She looked across at the Turk and then behind. “He’s the only one close,” she shouted.

  The Turk’s rope snaked out as he stared fiercely at Guy and shouted something that was lost in the rush of that wild ride. He was big and handsome, his cap gone; long hair and moustache flying back over the shoulders of his lamellar cuirass. Guy noticed the Seljuk’s horse gasping in air as it had been flogged to catch them. He saw the quiver, the loose red trouser leg and boot with the toe curled up. In practiced hands the rope was coiled and again snaked out. Guy foiled it with his spear a second time.

  “Kill him, Guy! He knows your horse!” Irene cried.

  Guy, standing in his stirrups as they raced over the hard ground, was not sure of the spear cast at the rider. As the rawhide lasso was coiled a third time, he raised his spear overgrasp, as though to foil the rope again. Instead, he drew back and hurled it deep into the racing chestnut’s shoulder. Horse and rider fell heavily and lay still.

  Rise after rise passed as Irene and Guy on their reeking steeds splashed through the shallow streams and past the deserted wayside hamlets. Sira and Shahryād galloped in unison now, rejoicing in their strength as they drank the wind in foam tossed draughts, their crouched riders stirrup to stirrup in the flight from Archēsh.

  Slowly, another rider gained on them, whipping his gasping mount, guiding the magnificent beast into a position in their right rear, where normally it would be impossible for the intended victim to strike back. Wielding his light war axe, the Seljuk had not counted on a left-handed archer. Irene, twisting gracefully in the saddle, reins loose, goose-feather drawn to her cheek, sent the slim reed shaft driving into the folds of his armour, dangerously close to his exposed throat. Taken aback by the sudden threat from beneath the cloak of the woman whom he had already thought his prize, the Seljuk drew back, screaming his outrage.

  As the country through which they galloped altered, Guy recalled how the road made a broad northern sweep around a range of low but rugged hills interspersed with stony creeks and gullies. As they entered this stage, they rode over a low crest. Looking back, they discovered their pursuers were gone.

  Comprehension gripped him. “They’ve taken a shortcut and will try to get ahead us,” he explained above the rush of their ride. “The country is too open to hide, and the scre
en are scattered and may not be alive, even if we could find them. Nor is there any sign of a patrol Basil was going to send.” He thought desperately for another way out of danger, but could think of none. “We must ride for it,” he said, surprised at how calmly the words came out.

  Irene looked back at the deserted track behind them and nodded.

  They clapped heels into the heaving flanks and drove their knuckles into the pumping shoulders until their fingers were brown with stinging salt sweat and the animal oil of horsehide. They flew for mile after mile. Guy’s mind raced with the rhythm of the ride as he looked around for sight of the pursuers; seeing Sira’s chestnut ears moving forward and back, an ear cocked on Shahryād, as though to match her stride to his.

  He saw Irene crouched in the saddle, going with her black horse and giving him everything. She looked back at Guy for long seconds.

  Nothing was said. There was nothing to say.

  In a burst of gravel, they rounded another bend hugging a low hill and suddenly saw their pursuers close on the road a bowshot behind them. Yells of abuse and outrage bespoke the Seljuks’ heedlessness now, about harming their prized horses. Guy reasoned, and thought Irene would know too, they had at least another twenty miles to gallop before reaching Manzikert. Whereas they had to husband the strength of their horses and keep ahead for the whole distance, their Seljuk pursuers held no such thoughts. The tribesmen would have been prepared to goad everything out of their horses, confident in their ability to recover after the capture.

  Something struck Guy’s helmet. Raising his hand he felt an arrow caught in the blue cloth he had wound around it. He pulled at the scarf, tossing it aside and reproached himself for not saving to buy a mail coif before this. The Turks were coming dangerously close and their archery more accurate.