“We must escape quickly. They will be expecting these men to come out soon.” His hoarse whisper sounded loud in the chamber. The blood was beginning to puddle beneath the bodies of the dead men.
Max retrieved the soldiers’ weapons and passed a sword to Talon.
“You search them while I stand guard,” he whispered.
Talon only wanted to know what the men possessed that he would need. There was a large set of keys which he took and tied to his belt, and then he took their turban cloths and threw one at Max, who wound it around his head. It had the effect of changing Max into an unidentifiable man from anywhere in the region. With his luxuriant, albeit filthy, beard, he could pass in the dark for a beggar or laborer.
“We need to find some charcoal for your hair later,” Talon muttered, eyeing him critically in the light of the torch.
He did the same for himself and then retrieved some metal discs from the necks of the corpses. He thought these might be useful as identification. The soldiers had carried a few coins between them and he took these also. Now they were ready.
They locked the door behind them, then Talon had an idea. He knew there were cells above them, so he told Max to stay near the main door and keep watch.
“What are you going to do?” Max asked, “Let’s get out of here while we can.”
“I want to create a diversion. Wait here,” Talon commanded.
Leaving a very nervous Max hiding in the dark shadows clutching a spear and watching for danger, Talon skipped up the flight of stairs until he came to the top landing. He ran to the end of the corridor and began to unlock doors. He did not open them until he had reached the last, then he called into the darkness, “Everyone out, there is a fire!” He heard stirring sounds from the cells, but he did not pause. Then he risked the same for the corridor where they had been incarcerated. He then tossed the torch onto a pile of old sacking, wood and other leavings in a corner. Before long the flames licked hungrily at the material and some wood had caught. There was a lot of smoke and the stink was nauseous.
“Max, let’s go,” he shouted.
“It’s about time. I was wondering what you were up to,” Max said nervously, from near the entrance door.
They slipped out of the door and shut it quietly and heard the first of the prisoners panicking as the smoke infiltrated their cells. It would not be long now, Talon thought to himself. He hoped they had enough time to reach the gate and make an exit while the prison riot ensued.
They moved forward across the maidan without being challenged, towards the far wall where the main gate was located, and slipped into the deep shadows nearby to await events. Before long the main door of the prison swung open with a crash, and a yelling mob of ragged prisoners poured out then rushed down the steps. Talon and Max could see the red glow of the fire as it spread, and they heard the screams from those who had been too slow to escape.
Suddenly the men of the fortress realized what was happening and began to shout and raise the alarm. Some rushed out of a door in the main building to try and stop the prisoners, while others ran to try and find water. If the fire became widespread it could engulf the rest of the fort. They were too few and too slow to react.
The men who tried to stop the prisoners were no match for the crazed scarecrows who leapt upon them and killed them with their bare hands. Snatching up the fallen guards’ weapons, the prisoners rushed for the gate and butchered the guards who tried to stop them. The huge bar was lifted by many hands and under the determined weight of the maddened men, the great wooden gates opened ponderously, to crash against the walls outside. Talon glanced at Max in the firelight and they knew it was their opportunity to join the escaping prisoners as they poured onto the street in an excited mob, yelling and brandishing their new weapons. They were out for blood this night.
Talon had no idea where they might be going, but decided that running deeper into the town after the maddened men was not a good idea. He glanced up and saw to the north there was a glow, and he assumed it to be the great light on the Pharos point shining by the entrance to the harbor. Using this as his compass, he set out in a westerly direction towards what he remembered as the graveyard city. He surmised that they might be able to hide there from the inevitable hue and cry that would soon ensue.
He wanted to get them a horse or a camel and he kept his eyes open while they ran through the darkened streets. The rest of the prisoners had charged off to loot and steal what they could find and would be easy prey for the soldiers when they came looking for them the next morning. None accompanied Talon and Max as they ran into the darkness trying to put as much distance between themselves and the prison.
Due to their enforced idleness and lack of proper nutrition, it was not long before the two men were winded and tired, but Talon kept urging Max on, saying that they had to keep going till they found a safe place to hide. Unfortunately, the options were sparse, as they could not see for any distance, and all around them the buildings were dark and unwelcoming. A light cool wind was beginning to come in off the sea. They felt it close, may be less than a mile to their north, but to the fugitives in their underfed condition, it meant hardship from the cold.
Fate was kind to them this night. On the outskirts of the main city where the houses had thinned out, they came across a cluster of buildings set in among a large grove of Cyprus trees and palms that swayed in the night breeze and rustled in the dark. They paused to watch for any danger of running into people on the road, but the buildings were just far enough away for them to be indistinguishable from the darkness to anyone watching from the houses.
Then Talon stiffened and touched Max’s arm. “Look, Max, I see horses…we might be able to take one or two of them.”
Max grunted in the dark. Like Talon, he was exhausted from the privations of the prison and the lack of exercise, combined with the recent excitement and now this long walk. He peered towards where Talon was pointing then whispered, “I see the horses, but how do we take them?”
“With care,” his companion whispered back.
Talon began to move towards the shadows, closer to where the horses were hitched. It soon became clear from sounds of carefree laughter and loud talk that there was a party going on within the courtyard of the large block of buildings. Although he could not see the activity, there was a bright glow from many oil lamps. He heard reedy music, accompanied by the tapping of a small drum and the clapping of hands.
Peering through the main entrance, which was open, he guessed that it might be a marriage celebration. His eyes by now were well used to the dark, and he noticed that while there were guards on the walls, their attention was focused on the events taking place inside rather than on the restive animals outside. He leaned towards Max, who was deep in the shadow of the bushes near him.
“The horses might be guarded, Max. I shall go and get them. You keep watch.”
There was a slight rustle in the bush in acknowledgement and then Talon moved towards the animals. There were several of them grouped around a structure that looked like a well. They were still saddled, and ready to leave at any time. His suspicions proved to be correct: a guard was slumped against a cypress tree; but the snore Talon heard was clue enough to how alert the guard would be. He walked slowly towards the animals. He did not creep towards them, as he did not want to startle the horses. He found the guard was fast asleep; the smell on his clothing and breath told Talon he was happily drunk and unlikely to waken any time soon. Talon inspected the horses and found to his delight that they were prime animals.
They were Arab desert war-horses and well accoutered. He untied the reins of two of them, whispering gently to them as he did so. The animals had watched him come, so they were not surprised. Their ears were cocked and their noses pushed forward to be touched and to take the scent of a new person, and if they were lucky, to beg for a treat. He had nothing to give them, but he stroked their noses, and then led them slowly away so that their hooves would not make noise. He moved deeper
into the shadows away from the celebrations. As he came to the dark of the cluster of trees, he was startled at the sound of a voice behind him calling, “Where are you going with those horses? Who are you?”
“I am Ahmad and I have been told by my master to walk his horses. He is going to be late and did not want his precious beasts to be tired from standing so long. He is soft on his lovely ponies. Your friend is drunk, by the way.”
A man walked out from where he had been relieving himself in the bushes with a laugh. It sounded as though he too had been drinking. Talon had to stop and get his breath; it could so easily have gone badly, and he did not want to leave bodies all over the place.
He stroked the muzzles of both horses, and got a curious nudge in return. It comforted him to have their sharp smell in his nostrils and to feel their warm breath after the filth of the previous months and weeks. Max materialized out of the dark and took one of the horses from Talon.
“That sounded close, Talon. What did he want?”
“To know what I was doing. I told him I was the syce and walking the horses. He was taking a piss!”
They walked alongside the horses for another hundred yards and then quietly mounted and walked them for a half mile more until they knew they could not be heard, and only then touched the sides of the animals and moved into a canter.
“We cannot go back the way we came, Max, and the man back there knows we headed west. The sea is to our north so our only way is to the south. Once we are past the end of the lake we’ll veer south. That is the way we must go, and very fast.”
Max felt his saddle bags. “I think there are coins in these bags, Talon.”
Talon reached behind him and felt the bags on his own saddle. They chinked. “Yes, Max, it appears we are blessed with coin for our escape!”
They set their mounts to a long gallop. For the first time in months, Talon felt the wind in his face and the pleasure of a good mount beneath him, and began to think that they were at last free.
Seeing the narrow path before you
Without any room to the left or the right
Will you boast of what you are?
With death and destruction like a wall
On either side, will your heart hold out
And will you be strong?
— Hapenini
Chapter 5
Highwaymen
Talon and Max sat upon their stolen horses on the slope of a low hill and stared down at the road below that ran alongside a narrow river. This river meandered from the plain to the east which was obscured by the heat haze. It flowed into the west towards what looked like a large lake. They were, as ever, cautious about revealing themselves when near human habitation or on roads; and while they were mounted they stayed hidden among the scrub trees and rocks of the hillside looking down on the activity along the river banks.
They were still filthy but had managed, with the help of a few coins, to purchase new clothes and bathe in a ditch some way back. Although their clothes were more or less the same as any other traveler's on these roads, stained and dusty, neither had trimmed their beards, so while they might have smelled a little better, they still looked like a pair of wild-eyed scarecrows.
Anyone who looked close could see that they were astride a couple of magnificent war horses, worth a lot more than the two ragged men should be able to afford. Talon leaned down over his mount’s neck and stroked its sweaty flank. His mount was a compact dark bay beauty with a short back and slim legs; the one Max rode matched it perfectly. His horse shook its magnificent head and snorted impatiently through flared nostrils. Talon brushed away the flies that were bothering the animal, a gelding. Talon wished that it had been entire, but he knew that stallions of this breed were prone to erratic behavior when their absolute obedience in battle was needed, which was why they were gelded.
“I shall name you Rakhsh, because you are fleet of foot,” he told his mount. He received a rolled eye and a stamp of impatience for an answer.
“Patience, my beauty, we will be down by the water soon,” Talon said with a chuckle.
The road more or less followed the bends of the meandering river on its south side. However, to Talon’s eyes, it was not quite a natural course of running water. Peering through the heat haze, he could see beyond this first one another huge river, perhaps two miles away to the east.
He realized that river had to be the Nile. Shading his eyes from the glare of the sun he could distinguish boats of many kinds on its vast expanse of water. The most common were the quick, slim falukahs with their lateen sails that made easy headway driving upstream and had great speed sailing downstream with the wind and the current behind them. His eyes traced back from the Nile to the flowing water below them. It had to have been modified by man, he thought; its banks did not look natural enough, they were bright green with papyrus clumps interspersed with tall reeds, and even taller cane brakes, while in other places trees had grown up into small dense copses that provided welcome shade to travelers.
He and Max were four days into their journey south. This unexpected barrier gave Talon cause for concern. This strip of water winding through the valley, narrow though it was, would require a boat to cross, of that he was sure; and he could not guess what lay further south. Perhaps they should turn east.
He was not certain if they had avoided a city known as Al Qahirah, which he knew existed somewhere over to the east; he wanted to avoid it at all costs. During their stay in Al Iskandrȋyah he had heard people in the souk talk about the city called Al Qahirah [Cairo] with envy and with some scorn, as it was the new city of the sultans.
They, the people of Alexandria, wondered why their city, one of the fairest in the world, was being slighted for a city that lay in the swamps of the Nile delta. Talon only wanted to avoid it as he knew it would be swarming with soldiers, and hence could be a trap.
“I think it is time to turn eastward and take our chances with that big river over there.” He pointed to the east. “If we can steal a boat, we can cross over, and then head north towards the Kingdom of Jerusalem. I see no purpose in continuing south anymore.”
Max nodded, “I agree, and if we have avoided that place you call Kwiro? We should be going east by now.”
“Cairo.” Talon corrected him. “The Arab people call it Al Qahirah. In truth, my friend, I do not know where we are right now; but we must not lose sight of that huge river, for then we are truly lost.” He pointed to the east again.
“Indeed, it seems vast, Talon,” Max said, sounding bemused, peering at the mighty river in the distance.
“But we cannot do anything until they leave,” Talon said, pointing with his chin to a group of people.
The sun was still in the eastern quadrant of the sky. Its rays reflected off the water, creating a glare that blinded and made it hard to distinguish the size of the few boats on the water of this man-made channel. None appeared to be interested in landing nearby, despite the fact that there were people resting by the banks, under the shade of a small but dense plantation of palm trees and shrubs. There was the usual collection of camels and donkeys standing in the shade that denoted a traveling caravan.
It was the presence of the people on the roadside that had arrested their journey. They were now waiting to see when the travelers would leave, allowing them to go down to the water unnoticed. Both they and the horses were thirsty. The horses were restless, reacting to the scent of water below.
Talon placed his hand on the neck of his fine mount to calm its straining and to brush off flies that appeared in swarms no matter where they stopped, if even for a moment. The horse responded by pawing at the ground as though to say, “Why are we not flying like the wind instead of being tormented by these flies?”
Talon smiled and patted its neck reassuringly.
He wiped his face with the tail of his turban. It seemed hotter than usual; the humidity was rising, which made him sweat profusely, and he wondered if he might have a fever. For some days now, he had not felt
very well. The sun was hot and the heat haze that was forming on the water and on the land partially hid the distant buildings from view.
“I would like to go down to the water and bathe, Talon. I have not washed for so long I have forgotten the pleasure of it. I am also sick of the fleas in my clothing and wish to wash my garments before I am eaten alive by the vermin,” Max moaned as he scratched at himself for the hundredth time that morning.
Talon nodded and grinned ruefully. “I agree it is a distinctly unpleasant thing to be downwind of you.”
Max grinned. “So now you know why I am upwind of you.”
Talon grinned.
They had been avoiding villages and any other form of human habitation as much as possible; there had not been that many so far away from the great river. This had meant hovering on the edge of the desert where the land was barren and often not easy to travel along.
One remarkable night they had ridden past some huge angular mountains which Talon was sure had been built by men, their lines were so sharp. These had been on their horizon for two days and a night. Their surprise had been complete soon after when they rode past a monstrous head that stuck out of the sand. It looked like some ancient deity that the kings of long ago might have worshipped.
Neither Max nor Talon could explain these wondrous sights that were illuminated by the light of the moon and stars. The great silence that had surrounded these marvels had further awed them, and they had made the mistake of drifting further eastward to see more.
They were rudely awakened by the sudden sighting of villages and human habitation, something they had wanted to avoid. Dogs had barked and men had called out. Silently they had reined up and slowly retraced their path back into the desert’s edge, to where they were now.
Assassination in Al Qahira Page 7
