by Severin, Tim
He twirled the unicorn’s horn. ‘Sigwulf, you are to press ahead with the embassy to the caliph. You must cross the Alps before the snow closes the passes on your way south.’
‘And the aurochs?’ I ventured to ask. I noticed that he used the word embassy rather than mission. It seemed that my task had acquired extra status.
‘I’m still sending the aurochs as my giant beast, though it can’t match his elephant in size. You’ll be taking just a single one. My verderers could not trace another.’
He hefted the horn again. ‘But this I will keep with me. I will enjoy seeing the expression on the face of my doubting councillor.’
It was strange to see the king as elated as a child with a new toy. ‘Sigwulf, you’ve done well. I shall not forget the service you have rendered.’
I took it as a dismissal, bowed, and backed away towards the door.
‘Go and see Alcuin,’ were the royal parting words. ‘He will arrange all that is needed and can provide the necessary letters of introduction. And you’ll find he has an additional gift for you to hand over to the caliph.’
*
Amid all the bustle and clatter of the building works it was reassuring to find that Alcuin was just as I remembered him – tall and spare, dressed in the same dark gown and sandals, a calm, watchful expression on his intelligent face, and his same habit of coming straight to the point.
‘How did you get on?’ he asked as he opened the door to his cell-like office and saw me on the threshold. ‘Do come in.’
This time there was no aurochs horn on display, and he waited for me to finish recounting the outcome of the visit to Kaupang before he sat down again behind his desk. ‘A fair result,’ he said.
There was no other seat in the room, so I remained on my feet feeling like an errant schoolboy facing his master. ‘I wish we had been able to bring back a unicorn. That was what the king wanted most of all.’
‘Really.’ He put just enough scepticism into that single word to make it clear that he thought this had been an impossible quest.
‘I managed to bring back an example of the creature’s horn. I’ve given it to the king,’ I told him.
‘I look forward to inspecting it,’ he murmured politely. However, the scepticism did not leave his eyes. Both of us knew that charlatans sold fakes to gullible clients.
‘The king mentioned that there’s an additional gift that I am to carry to Baghdad,’ I said brightly, hoping to change the subject to something more positive.
‘I’ll come to that in a moment. First, you need to be aware of a recent political development.’ He put his elbows on the desk and steepled his fingers as he studied me carefully.
‘You are aware of the route the embassy will follow?’ he asked.
‘Upriver by barge, then across the Alps to Rome, from there by sea to the Holy Land and then . . .’ I fell silent. My grasp of the geography of the eastern lands was hazy.
‘. . . Or possibly up the river Nile,’ he continued for me, ‘then by caravan across the desert, and finally by ship to Baghdad. A very long journey, with many risks: blizzards and avalanches in the mountains; sand storms in the desert; gales at sea. Fortunately, as I mentioned before, you will have a very competent guide who has made the journey in the reverse direction, bringing that unlucky elephant. I’ve arranged for him to come here so I can introduce you.’
Alcuin lowered his hands to lie flat on the surface of the table. Their backs were faintly mottled with light freckles, and there was a smudge of ink on his right index finger.
‘What I have to say is best explained before he gets here. It concerns other than the physical dangers.’ His tone remained restrained and calm, but his expression was very serious. ‘Recently there have been overtures from Constantinople, proposing a marriage union between the royal houses of Frankia and Byzantium. There was even a hint of a wedding between Carolus and the regent empress Irene.’
It occurred to me to say that Carolus was already married, and for the third time. He also had a string of mistresses. But of course that was no obstacle to a political union.
Alcuin held my gaze. ‘The proposal was declined as diplomatically as possible. Nevertheless, the Byzantines are sure to have seen it as a snub.’
More of a slap in the face, I thought, from someone who was in the process of sending rare gifts to the caliph instead.
‘Sigwulf, you will be travelling through regions where the Greeks, the Byzantines, are very influential. They would dearly like your embassy to fail. You will need to be on your guard, even in Rome itself.’
The image of the gold solidus gleaming on Redwald’s desk in Kaupang sprang into my mind. ‘Perhaps Carolus can ask the pope to offer the embassy additional protection?’ I ventured.
‘Pope Adrian is a staunch friend. I’m sure he will do everything he can to assist a ruler whose allegiance to Holy Church is without question.’
Alcuin paused, perhaps he was aware how bland his last statement had been. His next words brought a dash of icy realism.
‘Pope Adrian is nearly ninety years of age so there is always the question of who will succeed him. There are factions and counterfactions in the Eternal City and they will take advantage of any opportunity to further their own candidate, including serving Byzantine interests.’
Alcuin’s eyes were red-rimmed from lack of sleep. I wondered how many hours each day he was obliged to spend giving government advice. ‘Fortunately, I have a good friend in Rome whose advice will guide you through those murky undercurrents. I have personally written a letter of introduction for you,’ he said.
‘The additional gift for the caliph . . . ?’ I reminded him.
Alcuin’s careworn expression was replaced with something more cheerful. ‘Yes, and it’s something you will appreciate.’
He stood up and went to the shelves that lined the wall on his right. They held his writing materials. He took down what I had assumed was a thin stack of fresh vellum but now I saw was a newly sewn book that had been lying with its spine against the wall.
‘The king’s own idea. I’ve seldom seen him so excited about a project,’ said Alcuin, placing the book in my hands. ‘I had to assign four of my best copyists to get it ready in time.’
I looked down at the volume. It was expensively bound in what I guessed was fine goatskin. The cover was stamped and dyed with interlaced patterns in green, blue and red, and the detailing was outlined in gold leaf.
‘A hurried job but the best we could do,’ Alcuin explained. ‘Carolus is concerned that not all the animals he is sending the caliph will survive the journey. If that happens, you are to use this book to show the caliph what creatures had been selected for him, apologize for their loss, and enquire if there are any replacements that the caliph might prefer.’ Alcuin allowed himself a tight smile. ‘You will also take the opportunity to point to the animals that Carolus himself would like to receive for his own zoo.’
Carefully I lifted the cover of the volume. The fresh stitching made the binding stiff, and the leather still had the chalky smell of the alum tanning.
It was another bestiary. The first page had an illustration of a lion with a heavy, curly mane, roaring over a small, sleepy-looking cub. Underneath was a paragraph summarizing the creature’s habits and nature.
A lion always sleeps with its eyes open and evades the hunter by using its tail to sweep away the tracks left by its paws in the sand or dust. The mother lion gives birth to five cubs the first year, four cubs the second year, and so forth. The cubs are born dead. They come to life when the mother breathes in their faces, and the father roars over them.
Below were several lines in Saracen script. I presumed they were the Arab translation.
Alcuin’s voice brought me out of the book. ‘Sigwulf, think of it as a catalogue, as a list of possible gifts that might be exchanged between a king and a caliph.’ He was smiling at me, half in amusement, half in warning. ‘Carolus wonders, for example, if by any chance the caliph can se
nd him a griffin. You’ll find it on the third page.’
I turned to the correct illustration. It showed a bizarre, fierce-looking creature that had the body and tail of a lion but the head and wings of an eagle. The griffin, according to the description written underneath, was an enemy of horses and large enough to fly away carrying a live ox.
I looked up at Alcuin. ‘It seems a lot more extraordinary than a unicorn,’ I commented.
‘That is not your concern, Sigwulf. What matters is that the king believes the creature may exist.’
‘Do you think that there’s really such an animal as a griffin?’ I asked him.
Alcuin permitted himself a delicate shrug. ‘If there is, and you find one, then you will have added to our knowledge of the creatures God placed on this earth. Another wonder of God’s creation.’
I thought his reply was tactful but still sceptical.
‘Is this an exact copy of the bestiary that Carolus showed me?’ I was itching to look through the bestiary at my leisure and to discover what other bizarre and strange animals were thought to exist.
‘The copyists had permission to add creatures shown in other books in the palace library.’
I closed the book gently and carefully so as not to distort the fresh stitching. ‘In Kaupang a hunter told me about a wondrous bird that has a beak striped with all the colours of the rainbow. That would make a very striking gift between monarchs.’
‘I’m sure the caliph already has more than enough parrots in his zoo,’ said Alcuin drily.
‘Not a parrot. A sea bird that eats fish and lives in cliffs. It flutters its wings so fast that, in flight, it flies like a bee. My informant couldn’t tell me its Frankish name.’
‘And it tastes delicious,’ interrupted Alcuin.
‘That’s right! Dark flesh, with a flavour like pigeon.’
Alcuin broke into a sudden, boyish grin. It was something I had never seen before. ‘In my youth I spent three years at a monastery on a remote island off the coast of north Britain. In spring time we caught and ate those birds by the dozen, their eggs too. But I don’t think you’ll find them illustrated in that book. They’re called puffins.’
I must have looked crestfallen because he added, not unkindly, ‘And that gaudy beak is only colourful in summer. The rest of the year it looks very ordinary.’
I thought back to the white furs I had seen in Kaupang’s market, winter furs from creatures that wore much more drab colours for the rest of the year. It occurred to me that animals, like humans, could deceptively change to suit the occasion.
Alcuin was still chuckling when there was a discreet knock on his door. He gestured at me to open it. A chancery clerk was standing on the threshold, soberly dressed in a brown tunic, grey leggings and lightweight summer shoes. Then I noticed that his clothes were of very expensive fabric and beautifully cut. He was in his late thirties, of about my own height, slim and fit-looking. From a cap of short black curls to the beardless, fine-boned face with its pointed chin, everything about him was neat and self-contained.
‘Come in, Abram,’ said Alcuin from behind me. ‘I want you to meet Sigwulf. The two of you will be in one another’s company for many weeks. I’m sure you will get along well.’
The newcomer’s brown eyes rested for the barest fraction of a moment on the book in my hand, before he gave me a pleasant open smile, showing small, even teeth, and said, ‘I understand you have just returned from a most successful venture to the Northlands, a region I would dearly love to visit. Perhaps you will be able to tell me all about it.’
Maybe it was because he reminded me of Osric, my closest friend, that I took an instant liking to Abram. They both had the same quietly intelligent look, the same dark skin and fine features and self-assured poise, though of course Abram was many years younger and did not have Osric’s lop-sided stance with his damaged neck and badly set leg.
‘It’ll be the other way round, Sigwulf,’ observed Alcuin as the visitor joined us. ‘I doubt anyone has travelled to more countries than Abram has. He’s more likely to be telling you about foreign countries. How many languages do you speak, Abram?’
The newcomer spread his hands in a depreciating gesture. ‘Just a few.’ His Frankish was perfect, without the trace of an accent.
‘Just a few with absolute fluency, you mean,’ chided Alcuin. He turned to me. ‘Abram speaks a dozen languages well, and I suspect he has a working knowledge of the same number again. He’s being modest.’
Abram deflected the compliment with a slight shrug. ‘I hope to be more successful as a dragoman for Sigwulf than I was in delivering a live elephant to King Carolus.’
‘A dragoman? That’s a word I’ve not heard before,’ I said.
He turned to me and there was a twinkle in his eye as he made a small circling motion with his right hand, touching first his chest and then his brow. ‘In Rome you may call me your “dragumannus”, in Arab lands your “tarjuman”, and if we reach the realm of the Khazars, a “tercuman”.’
He had succeeded in making me laugh. ‘Plain Frankish will do for now.’
‘Then I am your dragoman. I’m sure you noticed the similarity between the different words. They all have the same meaning: someone who acts as guide and interpreter.’
Abram’s mention of the elephant prompted me to ask Alcuin about the condition of the aurochs that had cost Vulfard his life.
‘It left Aachen the same day that we received word that you had got back. The plan is to assemble all your animals at Dorestad and to take them by water as far as possible. It makes their transport easier.’
The bell for tierce tolled faintly, the sound muffled by the substantial brick walls of the chancery. ‘Time for chapel,’ said Alcuin. He handed me a single sheet of vellum, rolled and sealed, which had been lying among the documents on his desk. ‘Here’s the letter for my friend in Rome. His name is Paul. He works for Pope Adrian as his Nomenculator.’
‘Nomenculator?’ I asked.
‘The official who deals with requests for favours from the pope.’ Alcuin got to his feet. ‘Let’s hope that you don’t have to call upon his professional intervention.’
He accompanied Abram and myself out into the corridor. ‘Sigwulf, the chancery is finalizing your travel documents. Carolus has designated you as his special envoy. He is determined that your embassy is a success.’
There was an awkward pause as Alcuin hesitated. The sound of the church bell came from our right, from the basilica. To the left lay the offices of the chancery. I realized that Alcuin was giving me a chance to accompany him to the church service. When I made no move, he pulled the door closed behind us, turned on his heel abruptly and strode off, sandals clacking on the stone flags. I had a shrewd idea he was disappointed: he would have preferred an ardent Christian to be taking Carolus’s gifts to the caliph. But Abram was an Israelite and Osric’s origins were in Hispania. If the white animals did reach Baghdad, they would be brought before the caliph by a Jew, a Saracen and someone who was not even a churchgoer.
Chapter Seven
I SPENT MOST OF the next day alternately arguing and pleading with the treasury’s senior bookkeeper. A stickler for detail, he demanded full and proper accounts for the funds I had taken to Kaupang. When I was unable to provide them, he showed his displeasure by restricting the amount of silver allowed for the new mission. He provided instead a document authorizing me to requisition supplies from royal stores along the road. I considered going directly to Carolus to put a stop to this bureaucratic nonsense but was wary of being seen again in the royal apartments. There was too much risk of encountering Princess Bertha, and early the following morning I slipped out from Aachen feeling relieved that I had avoided her. I was on my way to rejoin Osric and the others. As arranged, Abram was waiting for me an hour’s brisk ride along the now-familiar road. With him were three mounted servants in charge of half a dozen packhorses. The men had the vigilant yet patient manner of seasoned travellers and I guessed they were Abram�
��s regular attendants.
‘I hope we don’t run out of money,’ I confided to Abram after explaining my tussles with the skinflint in the treasury.
‘I can arrange cash for us along the way,’ he answered.
‘As far as Baghdad?’
He gave an easy smile. ‘As far as necessary.’
The sun was burning off the dawn mist and the day promised to be blisteringly hot. The horse provided to me by the royal stables had already worked up a sweat and we paused for a few minutes to allow the animal to cool down. The dragoman took the opportunity to introduce his attendants to me. One of them was a cook, good at producing a decent campfire meal, and another was handy with making running repairs to the tents and other equipment strapped to the horses. There was no need to ask about the third man. He had a serviceable-looking sword dangling from his saddle and was evidently a bodyguard. Never before had I felt so well prepared when starting on a journey.
‘Does your cook prepare special meals for you?’ I asked as we moved off at a gentle amble. It was a leading question for I was curious to know more about my travelling companion. I presumed his attendants were his co-religionists but he had made no mention of the fact.
‘I try to follow the dietary laws of my faith,’ Abram replied. ‘Fortunately, Radhanites are allowed broad dispensation due to our wandering way of life.’
He turned in the saddle to check on our little pack train, and I stole a sideways glance at my companion. He rode well, his handsome face alert as he watched the passing traffic.
‘Alcuin told me about the constant wayfaring, but that’s almost all he knew about your people.’
The dragoman showed no sign of resentment of my probing. ‘We originated in Mesopotamia many centuries ago, according to one theory. Others say that we came out of Persia.’
‘What do you believe?’
