Silk Road

by Falconer, Colin

  CXXV

  Kashgar

  It was clear to William that the princess Miao-yen was near the end. How many times had he come to this room, how many prayers had he whispered in her name? She was dying. God was not about to bestir himself for a painted heathen.

  She looked dead already. Her breath was barely discernible.

  His fingers slid over her skin, smooth as ivory, hot with fever. Emboldened by familiarity with its sweet terrain, it continued its explorations, settling finally on the bud of the girl’s breast.

  Some barricade within him crumbled down; there was no one to ever see, no one to ever know. Even the object of his desire would not be witness to his fumblings. This fragile princess with her painted face had been offered to him on this altar as his private plaything, his to possess without consequence. Soon she would give up her spirit to the darkness and whatever sins he committed would be buried with her.

  Or so the voice in his head reasoned.

  He reached beneath the silk of the gown and gasped when his fingertips touched the hot and supple flesh of her thigh. He hesitated, before continuing his exploration. His hand was shaking uncontrollably, his mouth was dry, his mind empty of anything beyond the sensations of the moment, blind to salvation or even reason.

  He set aside his Bible and lay down on the bed beside her. He placed her compliant arms around his shoulders and kissed her painted cheek. And as the shadows crept across the room he gave himself over to the terrible urgings of his soul.

  CXXVI

  JOSSERAN HAD ALL his life trained regularly in martial discipline, in close combat and in horsemanship. So he overcame the boredom of the long winter months of inactivity with a self-imposed regime, maintaining his sharpness in the saddle as best he could.

  Every afternoon he took his horse to the maidan below the fort and drilled alone with sword and lance. A discovery he had made in the local bazaar had helped him immeasurably. The local merchants stored watermelons by hanging them in slings from bamboo poles so that they remained succulent almost through winter. Every day he bought half a score of these fruit and took them out to the orchard on the other side of the maidan and skewered them on long poles. He would then ride at speed between the mulberry trees and attempt to slice cleanly through a melon with his sword without breaking the horse’s stride.

  When all the fruit had been thus vanquished he dismounted his black stallion and gave her a curry with the wooden blade the Tatars used to groom their horses. It was the same pony Khutelun had brought him the night of his escape from Qaidu’s camp. He cared for him well, although he had no particular affection for the beast, for he was irritable and sometimes vicious. He had named him William.

  He heard hoofbeats and looked up. Sartaq rode across the maidan, in the distinctive straight-legged Tatar style. When he reached the orchard he reined in his pony and jumped down, picking his way through the skeletons of the trees. When he saw the wreckage of the mutilated fruit in the dust he looked at Josseran and grinned.

  ‘If you Christians ever go to war against watermelons, they should watch out.’

  ‘I pretend the melons are your head,’ Josseran said. ‘It helps my aim.’

  Sartaq grinned again. ‘I have good news,’ he said. ‘Your shaman has proved his power.’

  Josseran tried to hide his surprise. William had led him to believe that she was on the point of death. ‘She fares better?’

  ‘This Wey-ram,’ Sartaq said, using the Tatar pronunciation of ‘William’, ‘for all his strangeness, has powerful magic.’

  Powerful magic? Josseran believed the princess would recover or die, as God willed, regardless of the good friar’s prayers, but he said: ‘I never doubted the efficacy of his powers.’

  Sartaq could not hide his relief. At last there was an end in sight to their journey. ‘As soon as the snows melt we will cross the Roof of the World to Alghu’s court at Bukhara. From there we will send you on your way to the western lands.’

  It was more than a year since he had seen Acre. He wondered what had taken place there during his absence. His hosts would tell him nothing, perhaps because they knew nothing themselves. Outremer was another world to them. Had Hülegü made a treaty with the Haute Cour after all, without Josseran’s efforts? Or had he swept on? When he and William reached Acre would they find just smoking ruins?

  Josseran did not want to go back to Outremer. He knew he would have to face the friar’s accusations of heresy and blasphemy in front of the Council. The fact that he had saved the wretched man’s life twice would count for nothing with that intractable churchman. He cursed himself now for speaking so freely and making of the friar an enemy.

  But the Grand Master would protect him from any consequences. They were Templars, and even these Dominicans could do no more than shake their fists at them. He might not be able to leave the Order straight away, as he had planned, though. Not until William was back in Rome.

  He wondered if poor Gérard and Yusuf were still held hostage at Aleppo. They, at least, would be pleased to see them safely returned.

  ‘I can see the prospect of departing Kashgar makes you speechless with joy so I shall leave you to your melons,’ Sartaq said. Then, as an afterthought, he added: ‘Should you find yourself outflanked, call for aid and I shall send a squadron of my cavalry to help you fight your way out through the figs.’

  He laughed and rode back towards the fort.

  Miao-yen was laid out like a corpse on her bed, in her robes of red brocade, tiny silk slippers on her feet. The pale light from the window made her skin appear almost translucent.

  William sat there for a long time, watching her, not trusting himself to move. Finally, he reached out a shaking hand to touch her forehead. It was impossible. The fever had left her; her skin was cool to the touch.

  He thrust a knuckle into his mouth to keep from crying aloud. What have I done?

  She stirred and for a moment he feared she would wake. He jumped to his feet and backed away from the bed until he felt his shoulder blades pressed against the stone.

  What have I done?

  He heard the cries of a Mohammedan priest over the roofs of the town, the infernal song of the ungodly reverberating from the blue and distant mountains until it seemed to fill the room, deafening him.

  He had never thought to see miracles in his daily life. Yet here was one, by his own doing. God had laid hands on this heathen princess to refute him and, yes, to punish him.

  Why else would God choose to save this woman now?

  He fell on to his knees and began to pray once more, this time for his own soul, not the girl’s. Then he prayed that Miao-yen’s recovery would be short, and that she would lapse again into the sweats, for only with her passing could he be sure his terrible sin would be buried forever.

  CXXVII

  NOW MIAO-YEN was well, her maids surrounded her constantly, fussing like hens. She sat up in the bed, the white powder of her cosmetic disguising her deathly pallor. She had been dressed in a gown of crimson brocade with charcoal sash, and there were ivory and gold pins in her hair.

  Josseran and William were ushered into the room. They came to stand at the foot of the bed.

  ‘I am pleased to see you recovered, my lady,’ Josseran said.

  Miao-yen attempted a smile. ‘Thanks to the magic of Our-Father-Who-Art-in-Heaven.’

  Josseran turned to William. ‘She credits you with saving her life, Brother William. She offers you her thanks.’

  It seemed to Josseran that the friar received this news with something less than rejoicing. Some humility from him, at last. He clutched a small wooden crucifix in his fist, turning it over and over in his fingers. ‘Tell her it was God’s will that she lived.’

  Josseran turned back to Miao-yen and relayed to her what William had said. Their conversation continued in low murmured voices.

  Josseran said: ‘Good news, friar. She would like you to baptize her into our holy religion.’

  William looked as if he
had been slapped. ‘I cannot.’

  Josseran stared at him. ‘You cannot?’

  ‘I have instructed her as far as I can. She must pray and give thanks to God for her deliverance, if that is her wish. But I am not satisfied as to the sincerity of her faith, and so I cannot give her holy baptism.’

  ‘But she wishes you to help her! Here is a soul begging you for the blessings of Christ! She will be your first convert! Is this not what you wished for all the time we were in Cathay?’

  ‘Tell her not to pester me further,’ William said. ‘I have given you my counsel on this subject.’ He turned and fled the room.

  There was a startled silence. Miao-yen and her ladies stared at him, bewildered. ‘Is Our-Father-Who-Art-in-Heaven angry with me?’ Miao-yen asked, finally.

  Josseran was too astonished to answer. Finally he stammered: ‘I do not know what is wrong with him, my lady.’

  ‘Does he not wish me to worship the Pope, as he has instructed me?’

  ‘I have no idea what he wishes any longer.’ Could his brush with death in the desert have tipped the balance of his mind?

  ‘Perhaps you will ask him to come back and see me. I do not want him to be angry with me.’

  ‘I am sure he cannot possibly be angry with you, my lady.’

  ‘Yet that is how it seems.’

  Josseran did not know what to say to her. Brother William had such a gift for grasping ignominy from the jaws of triumph. ‘Once again, I am very glad to see you so recovered,’ he managed.

  ‘So that I can rush to my husband?’

  Through the window he heard the bleating of fat-tailed sheep on their way to the market and to slaughter. It seemed to him the Tatar princess understood their predicament.

  ‘After our parting in my father’s gardens at Shang-tu, I thought never to see you again,’ she said.

  ‘I have missed our conversations.’

  ‘I told you my father would prevail. You see how it is? Already he has isolated his brother. Alghu saw how the tide was turning and my father won him over by promising him the Chaghadai khanate as his own fiefdom and helping him assassinate the regent. What can Ariq Böke offer him? Just constant demands for men and taxes for his army. With Alghu on my father’s side Ariq Böke is trapped between their two armies.’

  ‘Alghu is indeed fortunate to have you as part of the bargain.’

  ‘I am merely my father’s excuse to cede so much of his kingdom to another prince. It is politics.’

  ‘I hope your new husband will treat you well,’ Josseran said.

  ‘And if he does not, my father will still be Khan of Khans and Emperor of the Chin. So what does it matter?’ She sighed. Perhaps she was wishing now that they had all let her die.

  Josseran stared at the Mohammedan church framed in the south-facing window. A Tatar princess raised in the ways of the Chin now sent to live among Mohammedan princes. Could there be a more lonely life? ‘I am sure your new khan will realize he has been sent a gift more precious than gold.’

  ‘Who knows what he will think of a girl with lily feet?’ She closed her eyes and laid her head back on the pillow. ‘But I am tired. The illness has drained all my strength. You should leave me now. You will speak with Our-Father-Who-Art-in-Heaven, tell him I do not wish him to be angry with me and that I thank him for saving my life?’

  ‘I will, my lady,’ Josseran said.

  He took the narrow stone steps up to the roof of the tower. It looked out over a maze of alleys and flat mud roofs, and the half-dome of a Mohammedan church. A sandstorm was rushing in from the north. Oil lamps flickered in a thousand windows; the afternoon was pitched into a premature twilight.

  Josseran let the wind buffet him. What is wrong with you? he thought. You are not a Chin princess with lily feet. She has no choice that she can make, but you could still take another path in your life. She is powerless, you are not.

  So will you accept the same fate, a life of regret and resignation, all for the want of a little courage? Josseran Sarrazini, if you cannot learn to live, then you must learn to die. Whatever way things go, at least you will be free.

  CXXVIII

  Fergana Valley

  The yurts had been loaded on the kibitkas, the tent-carts, and vast flocks of sheep and goats and horses raised clouds of dust across the plain. Qaidu sat astride his horse, watching the preparations. His lips were drawn in a line as thin as a bow beneath his grizzled beard. He stared stolidly ahead, the ermine cap with its earflaps drawn down over his head.

  Khutelun rode up to greet him on her white mare. She was dressed in the insignia of a shaman: a white-cowled robe with drum and staff.

  ‘Have you spoken with the spirits?’ he said to her.

  ‘I have.’

  ‘What did you see in the other world?’

  Khutelun could not tell him that her seeing had again failed her, so she told him only what she had foreseen in her mind: ‘I saw a war without ending. I saw the empire of Chinggis Khan crumbling away to many kingdoms, as it was before.’

  ‘Do you see us abandoning the Fergana steppe to Alghu?’

  ‘I see us running like the wolf pack, returning at night to carry off the young and the weak and give no one at the Roof of the World a moment’s rest.’

  Qaidu considered, his face grim. ‘Khubilai has sent one of his daughters to Bukhara, as bride. It will ensure the alliance between him and Alghu and keep us all in their grip, like a bird in a fist. At present this princess is safe behind the walls of the fort at Kashgar but soon she will be on her way across the mountains for her marriage. Alghu has sent a mingan of his cavalry as her escort.’ He gazed beyond the mountains, as if he could see their caravan. ‘I would that she did not arrive.’

  ‘Let me do it,’ Khutelun whispered. ‘Give me five jegun of your horsemen and I will stop her.’

  ‘I thought this is what you would say.’

  His own yak-tail standard flicked and whipped in the wind. ‘You will see to it that Alghu receives his new bride without her head. Can you do that?’

  ‘I can do it,’ she promised him.

  CXXIX

  Kashgar

  WILLIAM FOUND JOSSERAN in the stables, sitting on a stone trough, holding his sword and scabbard two-handed, resting his weight upon it. His robe was hunched around his shoulders.

  He looked up when he heard the friar’s footsteps in the darkness.

  ‘I thought to find you here,’ William said.

  ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I have spent much of this last year in the dubious pleasure of your company, so I know a little about the way you think, Templar. Were you going to ride out tonight or would you have done me the courtesy of a farewell before your departure?’

  ‘I have never seen the need for farewells. And you no longer need me, Brother William. These people will not harm you. They will see you safely along the rest of your journey.’

  ‘You were charged with my protection until we are safe returned to Acre.’

  Josseran sighed. Yes, that had been his commission and what a burden it had proved to be. ‘Why did you not agree to baptize the girl?’

  ‘She is not ready. Your princess pretends to love Christ, but her soul has no understanding of God. She is still a heathen.’

  ‘You have just described almost everyone in France. None of us understand anything about God or religion other than what you tell us to believe. Look, priest, she has asked for instruction and the solace of baptism and you refused it.’

  William stayed silent.

  ‘I do not understand you.’

  ‘That is, as you say, because your vocation is war, not religion. For instance I do not understand this sudden concern for a certain Tatar princess. Is that the reason you planned to leave tonight without me?’

  A long silence. Vapour from their breath hung in the frigid air. Josseran shivered and drew his cloak more tightly around his shoulders.

  ‘Well?’ William persisted.

  ‘I am thirty-one yea
rs old. I could return to Troyes, but there is nothing for me there. I have seen and heard things this last year that have forever changed the way I see myself and the world. Besides, the moment I step on French soil you will bring charges against me for heresy, as you have threatened to do almost since we left Acre. The only way I can protect myself from you and your holy brothers is to remain with the Temple, and I have had enough of a monk’s life. You want me to help you now, priest, but I know you Dominicans, what you are like. The moment we are back safe in Outremer, you will think nothing of bringing me down.’

  ‘Can you think of nothing but yourself? You have a duty to your Temple and to God. You have been charged with the safe return of the Pope’s legate at Acre and you gave your word to Thomas Bérard that you would fulfil it. And what of the truce you have brokered with Khubilai? The fate of the Holy Land rests with us.’

  ‘You may tell the Haute Cour all you have seen and heard, and I am sure they will be glad of your reports. Your voice in the Council will do as well as mine. As for the treaty, Hülegü will do what he wants now. The Emperor has no interest in affairs beyond this war with his own brother. The Tatar empire is breaking into pieces from within. They are destroying themselves without any help from us. Our journey was for nothing. Should we never return, it will make no difference to the history of Jerusalem.’

  William was silent. Something rustled in the dark corners, a rat perhaps, foraging through the straw. A pool of water had frozen black on the stones at William’s feet.

  ‘They toyed with us, William, from the very beginning. Hülegü already knew the Great Khan was dead. He wished only to play for time, to see if the succession would be contested by his brothers, as indeed it has transpired. The charter we received from Khubilai is lost, but even if we still had it, it means nothing now. Hülegü is free to treat as he pleases, and the Son of Heaven has no authority over him. It is all to be done again.’