The Mer- Lion

by Lee Arthur

  John the Rob, like Carlby and the Taureg, knew not the words of this language other than a scattering of oaths and obscenities learned the hard way: alongside the Scots toiling in the galleys, crossing the desert, rebuilding al Djem, fighting in the games. Thus, though keeping his head properly bowed, the beggar chief had time to study the row of silent ones surreptitiously. And out of the comer of one eye, he saw one man's lips move in concert with the Scots. It gave him something to think about as he and the others joined Eulj Ali in the baths. Now—in the latter's presence—was no time for serious conversation; however, there would be ample opportunity later. Only three of these—Eulj Ali, the Taureg, and Fionn—were ordered by Ali to attend the nuptial feast.

  Ali did not allow de Wynter to sleep long. There was much to do and not much time in which to do it. "Come, my friend, it is time to be up." A sleepy, yawning de Wynter stretched and sat up, looking about, trying to orient himself. He was in a tent... not large but lavish. The walls were hung with a kaleidoscope of carpets, woven in shades of green and brown and blue and the earth reds of Ali's beloved iron-rich mountain homeland. The divan upon which de Wynter sat was covered with another rug, one woven of wool as soft as silk; his feet rested on still another that made the ground seem soft. Ali, watching de Wynter take it all in—the trays set up here and there, the plush cushions and ottomans scattered about the floor, the elephant foot that held scrolls in one corner—said quietly, "My tent. It is yours, it and anything within it."

  It was the desert-dwellers greeting and Ali, de Wynter was sure, at that moment meant it. De Wynter at another time and under other circumstances might have allowed his sense of humor to take control and have asked for the gift of the owner of the delightfully feminine voice he could hear speak in bits and snatches. But not today. "My friends?" was all he could summon up the energy to ask.

  "They have already bathed. And if you are ready, we shall go there, too, to cleanse your body inside and out." Ali took de Wynter's silence as assent and gestured him to lead the way through the hangings he pulled aside.

  At first, he thought night must have just fallen, for the sky to the west was still reddened by the setting sun. A second glance—taking in the stars—made de Wynter wonder. He would have been horrified to learn that the Moulay's games this evening were being lit by more than a hundred dying human torches. Ali preferred not to discuss the subject and so hustled his charge toward the east and the Roman baths, where Aisha and Ramlah had spent the last hours. Ali headed for a different section. These rooms were set aside just for men and were much more modem and Tunisian than ancient Roman. In an outer room empty except for divans built against the wall, de Wynter and Ali stripped, handing their clothes to a servant. Each took the measure of the other's well-modeled body and decided he was in better shape. Each then was given a foukah to wrap about his hips and high wooden clogs to protect his feet from the hot floors. "The water and the floors are heated from beneath,'' Ali explained, leading the way into the first of three hot rooms. De Wynter was prepared for the difference in temperature, but not for the silence broken only by the splash of water in a marble fountain and the faintest scuffling of the naked feet of the male bath attendants.

  "If you need to relieve yourself?" Ali tactfully suggested, and de Wynter nodded, following him into the latrine. It was a room such as he had never been in before. The basins carved of marble stood at many different heights along the wall, so that each man might relieve himself without undue splashing. Gold animal heads served as water faucets to wash the urine away.

  "Another need?" Ali asked, pointing to a series of marble seats, again of many heights.

  De Wynter shook his head and the two returned to the hot room. There-they took their places at opposite ends of a long, narrow marble tub, filled halfway up with extremely hot water. Immediately an attendant began ladling in boiling water, gradually raising the temperature of the water until de Wynter swore he was about to be parboiled like a prawn. But if Ali could take it, so could he. Leaning back, each man rested his head against the tub's ledge, attendants carefully lifting his head to put towels beneath to protect the neck. Then, each was left with his thoughts. Ali thought of the night yet ahead when he would gain the jamad ja'da but lose Aisha. De Wynter daydreamed about his loving reception by Anne Boleyn in England short weeks from now when he disembarked from the first ship he could find heading that way.

  How long the two men rested there, de Wynter had no idea. But too soon Ali murmured, "The water grows cool," stepped out of the tub, and led him to another room containing two marble slabs set upon pillars. He stretched out face down on one and gestured for de Wynter to take the other. Then, two masseurs went to work, rubbing the men down with a glove of fur. No part of de Wynter's backside was missed, from his neck to his anus to his big toes. And when he thought he'd been rubbed to death, the real massage, bare-handed, began. Was this, de Wynter wondered, just a continuation of the games? Powerful fingers worked the shoulderblades until they cracked; the backbone was pressed on, hard, here and here and here and here, until de Wynter listened for the telltale crack of a broken back. Abandoning the back for his arm, muscles were prodded by persistent fingers, the elbow jerked, the fingers cracked, the arm itself stretched until de Wynter thought he'd have to yell, "Give it back." In fact, only the sight of Ali being put through the same torture, arm for arm, leg for leg, kept de Wynter there. Then, the agony was over. The masseur took thick, soft, perfumed soap and lathered it in from head to toe, turning his victim over so as to do the front. Their work finished, the masseurs disappeared to let the two men rest.

  Again, it was Ali who finally sat up and led the way into the steam room. Compared to this, the water in the marble bath was cool. Now, the cleansing from the inside out began. As de Wynter sat sweating, gentle hands began scraping the lather and sweat off his back... his arms... and legs.... working up to his chest. Then without warning, someone emptied a bowl of water over his head... and another and another. He sputtered and stood up protesting, but Ali, laughing, said, "Relax, it's part of the bath." From the hot room, they made their way through a series of cooler rooms, gradually accustoming their pink skin to normal air. Then, oh another marble slab where he was toweled dry. Turning over onto his back, he discovered the toweler was, as he had suspected, a woman. A naked woman. At that moment, she reached down and pulled off his foukah, leaving him as naked as she, with the expected results.

  Ali, watching, laughed. "So you are a man with a man's desires after all."

  But de Wynter couldn't answer, his face was being lathered up. The almond-eyed, dark-haired girl then took up a straight razor and prepared to shave him. Nervously, he awaited the first stroke. It was smooth and firm and gentle. Relaxing, he felt but could not see other hands on his body. More lather or oil or something was being rubbed into his armpits and on his chest and about his outstretched manhood. Why, he didn't know, and with the razor on his neck, didn't dare ask, lest in moving his mouth he slit his own throat. Another head bent over his face to look into his blue eyes, then gentle hands began working his hair, combing and, judging from the scraping sound, cutting and shaping it.

  The man who stood up when all this was done—his body washed off and oiled, his nails paired and pumiced, his teeth scrubbed and gums rubbed—did not look as though he had spent the last months rebuilding an amphitheater under the burning sun, except of course for the bronze of his skin. Nor did he look like a man, he thought with shock, looking down where his pelvic hair had been! Even as he stood there staring, the slave girls took giant puffs and began powdering his body, powder making little clouds that tickled his nostrils. Fresh puffs patted the excess off. At last, he and Ali were ready to return to the room of the divans, where male servants waited for them with fresh clothing. Ali's were the garb of the silent ones, but the fabric was the finest wool. De Wynter's garments were of silk, the trousers so thin he was almost glad there was no hair there to show through. Over them hung a long loose wool robe, embroidered
at hem and cuff and neck in silver and edged with smoke gray pearls. The slave wrapped a girdle about his waist, and about that a rope of pearls. As two more men brought white leather slippers for his feet, de Wynter commented, "You dress your guests well."

  "It gives me pleasure," was Ali's diplomatic answer.

  "Why?" De Wynter's eyes narrowed as he waited for the reply.

  "Why does it give me plea—"

  "No, why do you dress me this way?"

  Ali had hoped to avoid such questions until they had made their way at least as far as Aisha's tent, but he realized he now had no choice but to answer and pray that Allah guided his tongue. "You are to be a guest at a banquet tonight—"

  "The Amira's?"

  Ali reluctantly nodded.

  "I'm not going. Take those sandals away and bring me back my old tunic. I shall go nowhere near that woman."

  The slaves, in a quandary, looked to Ali for instructions. He gestured for them to stay as they were. As de Wynter began to shrug the heavy robe off, Ali shook his head, and the two attendants firmly pulled the robe back up onto de Wynter's shoulders.

  "You have no choice, my friend—"

  "Don't call me that. You are not my—" de Wynter continued to try to disrobe.

  "But I am. Believe me, I do this for you." Ali's claps brought reinforcements for the attendants, de Wynter kicking and squirming within their grasp. But he was at too great a disadvantage. When de Wynter's futile struggles finally ceased, Ali had the man bring the slippers forward again. "Put them on him," Ali commanded, and the two men squatted to do so. The first one picked himself up with a howl of pain as de Wynter's heel caught him on the side of the jaw. The other avoided such a kick only by falling back on his haunches. Two more attendants entered the fray, wrapping their arms around de Wynter's legs and using their body weight to prevent further kicking. Now, he was lifted bodily, the slippers placed on his feet. Silken ties, brought at Ali's command, bound his wrists and ankles. Rather than risk losing him or mussing him, Ali decided to carry the man to the Amira's tent like the trophy he was—slung like a dangerous cat from a trophy pole fashioned from a cluster of the silent ones' spears. De Wynter's arriving like this, Ali guessed, would set the Amira's teeth on edge and do more to further the selection of Fionn. Ali was not adverse to influencing her choice right up to the very end.

  A dozen guards accompanied the "guest of honor" and the Amir out of the baths and down a completely deserted street of a city, two thirds empty tents and one third abandoned ancient ruins. They needed no torches to light their way, for eerie red light still emanated from the amphitheater itself. Ali, seeing the sparks soaring above it, found himself wishing that the fires would burn out of control and trap their instigator in his inhuman campfire. Waiting to let the silent ones go past with their burden was a large contingent of roped-together slaves who had belonged to the losers, fresh fuel for the huge funeral pyre.

  The black in front, who had gray scattered liberally through his tightly kinked hair, stood still and looked at the man hanging from the pole, taking him for one of them. "Take heart, my toother. Allah's blessings upon you."

  "And you," de Wynter answered, bewildered anew by a country that could produce such dignity and bravery in the midst of utter depravity.

  Slaves were not the only ones destined for immolation; scattered among them were groups of better-dressed men who had been spectators at the games and now were to become part of the spectacle themselves. These men, judging from their torn raiment and disheveled appearance, went not so stoically to their deaths. Ali, whose idea it had been to so sacrifice them, watched these, too, herded toward al Djem without a twinge of regret. He would have slaughtered hundreds and thousands to save the life of the one man he now escorted to the Amira's white wedding tent. And whose messenger came to hurry their steps.

  It was his genuine regard for de Wynter that forced Ali to make an offer essentially inimicable to his own cause: "I shall, if you like, cut you free. Then you can walk in like a man, the victor of the games that you are."

  "Never. Never will I willingly have aught to do with that woman."

  With anyone else, under any other circumstances, Ali would not have been gainsaid, but for once, one single time,-he chose to be self-serving and temporized, "You may be wise. In the meantime, give me your word—"

  "No. The only way you'll get me in there is trussed like game and hanging from this pole. And even then, Ali, you'll not keep me there. Not unless you de me and hold me down."

  "So be it," Ali said, waving Aisha's messenger aside and gesturing to the pole-bearers to proceed.

  While de Wynter had slept and been groomed, Aisha had not been idle. With her mother's assistance, she, too, had spent hours being bathed, buffed, perfumed, and groomed for her wedding—and torturing herself over her choice for consort. Logically, sensibly, intelligently, practically, by any measurement she could devise, the giant remained the proper choice. Yet something within her rebelled at her own practicality, and perhaps the same aspect of her personality made her long for love where love could not possibly exist: not in a mariage de convenance. Nevertheless, she knew it was true. Besides, the sheikh had made his preference for the jamad ja'da undeniably known. While the giant's feats had won plaudits, the daring and imagination of the final coup of the jamad ja'da was the fabric of which legends were made and stories woven. Still, she could not ignore her own certainty that the white-haired one would never be as malleable as the other.

  At one point, in desperation, she was prepared to reject both in favor of another. Which other? The Taureg? She laughed cynically. Might as well choose the monkey-faced one; neither inspired more than mere admiration for their ability to survive. As for Eulj Ali—never! Besides, she had other plans for that braggart.

  The garments she wore this night were almost identical in cut and color to the ones she'd worn the night before, except that upon these were lavished more embroidery, more diamonds, and more gold. Looking at herself in the mirror, she wondered how he could resist smiling upon her with favor. He? With favor?

  With a cry, she threw the mirror from her. The song birds in their cages, startled, scolded her loudly. How dare I, she thought, think of him again? And why always that one? Why not the other one, too?

  The mirror was retrieved and returned undamaged by a frightened asira and Aisha patted the girl on her head as if she were a pet, then touched her own fingertips to her lips, to show the server that the thanks were not just of the body but of the soul, too.

  None too soon was she ready. Her mother headed the procession to the white wedding tent where Aisha would await, as a proper Berber wife should, the coming of her husband. There would be no elaborate wedding ceremony such as the Christians and Jews knew; marriage among the Moslems is a civil matter. And that had been accomplished by the signing of the scroll some seven days ago by 180 men. Whichever candidate she chose tonight was, by law, already married to her and had been for a full week.

  Beyond the diaphanous curtains, beside the soft, fresh-made bed with its perfumed silken coverings and telltale white sheepskin, she waited alone save for her cheetah, al Abid.

  Finally, voices and vague shapes seen through the curtains announced her time was upon her. Even as the men settled down onto the low divans placed for them, she swept back the curtains and strode into the room, her long skirts swirling, her eyes taking in the whole scene at once. Eulj Ali was there in rich robes of red and rubies, in sharp contrast to the twice-married Taureg in his black robe and black sandals, with a black scarf covering his lower face, its ends tied behind his ears, then hanging down his back. The giant, who took up most of one divan, wore robes of blue. Lapis lazuli around the border picked up the color of a man's eyes, the eyes of a man who wasn't there, the jamad ja'da.

  Then, too, neither was her Amir l'al-assa. Had the two lingered too long at the baths? Or was Ali prematurely enjoying the other's favors? Her eyes grew stony as with a snap of her fingers she brought a slave running
. A word or two and he was off to find the miscreants.

  The slave was back almost immediately. Ali came first, and behind him a richly dressed human trophy dangled from a pole. A word from the Amir and the carriers gladly lowered their burden to the floor, there to lie on his side. Seeing Aisha's obvious displeasure, Ali tried to explain. "He would not come of his own doing. We had to tie him.''

  "Untie him," she ordered, frowning down upon the man who lay there, his very bindings his final insult and affront to her person.

  "But he—"

  "I said," she said, enunciating every word distinctively, "untie him."

  Ali shrugged. Stepping forward, he pulled his own knife and, rolling de Wynter over with his foot, bent down and sawed through the silk ties that bound first ankles, then wrists. With one catlike movement, de Wynter rolled over and sprang to his feet and leapt straight for Aisha. He was stopped in his tracks by the pounce of Aisha's cheetah. The snarling al Abid would have given any man pause.

  Although Ali had instinctively lunged after the prisoner, it was Aisha who, taking advantage of the jamad ja'da's hesitation, sprang forward and, baring her own small blade, pressed it hard against his jugular.

  "If you move," she informed him, trying hard to keep her breathing even, "you drown your lungs in your own blood. Heed me and heed me well. You are an invited guest at my table. Now act the part. Or else you shall never sup again without the food and drink flowing freely through a slit in your neck."

  She had never killed a man. She wasn't sure that she ever would. But she was sure he did not know that, and, rather than have him test her resolve, she stepped back and removed the knife from his throat as Ali moved in between them.

  Just as quickly, a frustrated de Wynter went for Ali, knocking him to the ground and narrowly missing taking the princess with him. On top of the two struggling men sprang the snarling cat. More in fear of what al Abid might do to the jamad ja'da than of what me two men might do to each other, Aisha waded into the fray, catching her pet by the collar while signaling her guards, with her free hand, to move in and restrain the white-haired one.