Kings of Albion

by Julian Rathbone

  I came round to the sound of running water and chiming bells, with the warmth of the sun on my body and a sweet, jasmine-like fragrance in my nostrils. Opening my eyes, which seemed gummed as they are when one wakes from a fever, I found I was lying beneath a low orange tree or bush whose glossy leaves, black against the pearly sky of dawn, shaded my eyes though not my torso and legs. They were lit by the first glow of the sun that had just cleared the crags to the east of the city, bringing with it instant warmth. A deep happiness filled my soul, and without questioning how I had come to be where I was I allowed myself to drift off again into a different sort of sleep, a healing, warming, happy sleep.

  Next time I awoke I sat up with a start, and the last shadow of a second or third dream melted like mist. Again it had been of a lady, but as different from the first as could be. This one was pure white, with yellow hair, naked, standing in a cave of ice. Even as I hauled myself into a sitting position (the leaves brushed my old turban and a big round fruit bumped on the top of my head) and re-oriented myself, she vanished. She had left me with a warm, rich glow in my loins and, such was her power, even on an old man, a smear of semen across my stomach.

  I plucked an orange from the tree, broke through its rind with my thumb and gorged myself on it. Never had I enjoyed a fruit so much as the juice trickled down my chin and my eyes roved across the domes, shikhatras, or mountain-like towers, and pinnacles of the city. They were both behind and in front of me, on the far side of the valley, glowing with gold leaf or ceramic mosaic. The great river with its woods, gardens, threaded its way between them before losing itself in the fields and forests that stretched beyond into the mist-enshrouded distances.

  Again I wondered how I had got to be where I was. Had the time I had spent with Suryan and Uma been just as little real as the dream of the naked white woman? Perhaps. At all events I had come to no harm, had, for the most part, pleasant recollections to dwell on, but now, if I was to be paid by Prince Harihara, I had an appointment to keep.

  Chapter Eight

  This time, the chamberlain with his silver and ebony wand was waiting for me and eager to conduct me into the Prince's presence. Harihara had chosen to be out of doors, and was sitting in a carved marble chair beneath a palm tree in one of the small, enclosed gardens. Beside him there was an octagonal table, also marble, pierced and fretted to look like one of the more intimate temples. His long fingers picked at a silver dish tilled with ripe fresh dates; next to it he had placed the package of parchment leaves I had brought him from across the world, the red thongs loosely tied up again.

  He now questioned me far more closely than he had before about my previous journeys to Ingerlond, how well I knew the language and the customs, and whether or not I should be able to find the place where his brother Jehani was hiding. From this I gathered, erroneously it turned out, that what interested him as much as the whereabouts of his brother was the location of the city built of precious stones and gold.

  I answered all these questions with as much honesty as I could muster, but as I sensed that an offer of employment was in the air and since I was destitute, following the loss of my shipwrecked horses, I said nothing that might imply a less than complete mastery of the Inglysshe tongue, or a less than extensive knowledge of the country and its customs.

  Next he concentrated on the prowess of the Inglysshe in the arts and sciences of war but on this subject I had to confess myself ignorant-at least at first hand. I gave him my impressions: that both gentry and common people fought with foolhardy bravery, were competent in the management of their weaponry, but had been, in recent times, poorly led. In the past their kings, who claimed many cities and much land on the mainland by right of inheritance, had won many great battles against the kings of the Franks, but in the last few years had lost almost all they had gained. This was because their current king was first a babe then a youth and finally an indecisive weakling, some said mad, and partly because the Franks were led by a wild woman, possessed by devils, who inspired her troops to feats of bravery and cunning. How else could a mere woman have won so many victories before the Ingerlonders captured her and burnt her alive as a witch?

  'But they are skilled in the most up-to-date improvements in the art of warfare?' Prince Harihara was now insistent, clearly signalling the answer he wanted to hear.

  I am a stranger to the courtier's arts but I knew there would be no point in denying something about which he had already reached a conclusion.

  They fight from horses?' Yes. 'They understand the science of building fortifications?' I remembered the towers and battlements that circled Calais. Yes. 'And the art of using fire-powder? Do they have that? I mean not merely as an incendiary but as a propellant.' I recalled that I had seen, on the quay at Calais, monster tubes, known as canes or cannons for their resemblance to the hollow stems of wood children use for simple whistles or pipes, mounted on wheeled carriages. They were used, I had been told, to throw large balls of stone or iron at hostile ships, pirates or Frankish, attempting to cross the harbour bar. So, yes again.

  The interrogation continued for a half-hour or more, but, though I could only guess to what it tended, I sensed that I had already said enough and that Prince Harihara's mind was made up. He was merely padding out the process so that it would not appear that he had taken an important decision without due consideration. At last he came to the point, and I confess I was more surprised than I allowed myself to reveal.

  He cleared his throat, leant back in his chair so that his face was shaded from direct sunlight. His eyes shone, on account of the reflection from the nearby pool. He laced his long fingers beneath his chin. 'I have a mind,' he said, and his voice was quiet but firm, 'to go to lngerlond myself, find my brother Jehani and bring him home. I have discussed this possibility with the Emperor and he is agreeable, provided I combine the trip with other objectives that will be of more public value. To this end I shall require the services of a guide who knows the language and the country. In short I expect you to come with me in that capacity.'

  Note: not 'I should like…' or 'Would you be so good as to…', but 'I expect'. The surprise was that he was coming too. That I had not anticipated – he was of the imperial family, held a senior position in the government, namely Minister for Defence of the Realm. Moreover, considering his age and the pampered ease of his life hitherto, I doubted his capacity to withstand the privations we should undoubtedly encounter.

  However, he had arrived at a correct estimate of my circumstances and knew I was in no position to refuse gainful employment. I was not quite sure how I should demonstrate my assent. Had he been a caliph or sultan there would have been no problem: I should have thrown myself on my knees in front of him, grasped his hands, and showered them with kisses and even tears of gratitude, but these Dravidian princes seemed to expect less formal if more subtle appreciation of their rank. They are, however, just as proud as their Arab, Moghul or Brahminical equals, and stand on ceremony too, but a ceremony that is muted, played down, so an illusion is created that discourse with them is conducted as if between equals, near equals anyway. On this occasion I bowed my head, and kept it bowed for a second or two, which appeared to be enough.

  'That's settled, then. Chamberlain Anish will take over now and look after you. Through him I want you to make all the preparations you think necessary to get us on our way as soon as possible. I shall require a train commensurate with my position as envoy of the Emperor, but not so magnificent as to inspire envy or suspicion. Anish and you will work out the details.'

  He waved his hand, and I found that the Chamberlain was already at my elbow, having returned on silent feet. His master popped a date in his mouth, and thus contrived to signal that the audience was over and that he had other business to attend to. Thus it was that three months later we sailed not from Mangalore but from the more northern port of Gove or Goa, which we Arabs call Sindabur, thereby making the overland journey from the City of Victory shorter by fifty miles or more and the sea
voyage to Yemen by.is many leagues.

  During the in-between time I was put on the Prince's pay-roll and given a room in the compound that served in the Royal Enclave as his private residence, his official offices, and quarters for his servants and staff. The room was small but clean, the wont thing about it being that it was set over a yard on to which the kitchens opened so the air was often heavy with the smell of clarified but rancid butter, garlic and stale spices. The money, however, was good, especially as I had no expenses, and I banked almost all of it with a Jewish diamond-dealer, whom I befriended on the other side of the river, thereby laying the foundations of the minor fortune that now sustains my old age.

  I did not, during this time, meet or even see Suryan or Uma. I spent the early afternoon of the day on which I had concluded arrangements with my Jew wandering about the commercial sector looking for the house to which I thought I had been taken. The trouble was that there were, it seemed, literally scores that might have passed for it and none that fitted my recollection exactly, so I gave up. Indeed, by the time we left the city I was more or less ready to accept that the whole experience had been a fantasy brought on by tiredness, the strangeness of my new surroundings, with some wish-fulfilment thrown in too.

  However, I did find a temple, a shrine, not in the Sacred Zone but tucked away between the river and the commercial sector the image of whose goddess exactly matched up with my dream, if it had been a dream, of the black woman ornamented with skulls, dripping with blood. The place was deserted, as if ill-omened, though kept clean and properly maintained. No one would tell me who this goddess was, but rushed past when I asked them, some making warning signs much like those we use in Arab countries against the evil eye. However, eventually a small girl, carrying a straw bag filled with flat, plate-like loaves of bread, told me she was Kali, Bhadra-kali, the goddess of death who, in the legend, slays Shiva.

  For the rest I continued to enjoy most of what Vijayanagara had to offer. The great buildings, many of them public, whether devoted to government or religion or to utility and pleasure, never ceased to fill me with wonder and delight. Especially I remember the Queen's Bath, the Shiva Temple, with its bewitching wall paintings, the stepped pool with its terraces of stone seats dropping in half pyramids to the cool water where anyone might find refreshment in the afternoon heat, the imperial elephant stables with their wonderful gilded domes and tall entrances. Everyone; it seemed, was a musician or poet, from the Emperor himself, who was considered an avatar of Krishna and who in writing verses in praise of the god thus praised himself, down to the humblest porter in the fruit market.

  There was fruit and rice in plenty for all, and so cheap as to be almost free. Milk, butter, cheese, eggs and fish cost a little but not much. Meat eating was discouraged as being both unhealthy and against religion though the nobility hunted deer and wild goat through the mountain forests and served it at family feasts. Everyone was adequately housed for there was timber, brick and stone in abundance. And so, dear Mah-Lo, my three-month stay passed in congenial work preparing for our expedition and in delight at my harmonious and elegant surroundings.

  There was just one evil to be feared: the sultans to the north of the river Krishna, their satraps, and the envious malevolence of their Brahminical collaborators. For the most part they fought each other rather than the Dravidians, but every now and then a warlord, feeling secure to the north after a brief, successful campaign against his neighbours, crossed the river and penetrated as far as he could, looting, pillaging, raping until the Emperor could gather a force strong enough to drive him back. Then the streets of the city would be filled with the wounded and maimed, temples became hospitals, and the open spaces camping grounds for refugees.

  Chamberlain Anish, he who carried the ebony wand, proved a valuable ally, a skilled negotiator and a man of practical sense.

  About fifty years old, he was short, tubby, had narrow eyes a little like a Chinaman's, and a real understanding of his master's foibles, which yet did not lessen the respect in which he held him. He also had a small silky beard, a fringe about an inch long that ran from ear to ear like a noose: he stroked it with brusque little movements whenever he was pressed to make a difficult decision. Apart from the irritation this habit caused me. we got on well enough.

  One day, when time hung heavily as we waited for an official in the treasury to release funds, I asked him what were the real purposes of our journey and indeed of Jehani's before us.

  His normally serene expression clouded. 'It is historically inevitable," he said, 'that Vijayanagara will be overwhelmed, if not by the Bahmani sultans then by the Moghul hordes from further north. It has been the policy of our enlightened emperors to do all they can to postpone that evil day for as long as they can.' He took a turn about the treasury official's anteroom, looked over his shoulder as if fearing eavesdroppers and took me by the elbow to a shady corner. 'The root of the problem is this. Our Mussulman armies will fight their co-religionists only for as long as two conditions are fulfilled. One, that we can pay them more than our enemies can, and, two, that they are assured of winning while suffering only minimal casualties. There is no point in being paid a vast sum if you don't live to enjoy it. This means we must either employ ever larger armies or equip them with the best arms and armour available, then teach them to use them efficiently. The latter course is obviously preferred. We have had indications, by rumour and hearsay, that the Inglysshe, since they are the least civilised and most barbaric people on earth, are, when well led, unbeatable, not only through their courage and prowess but also because of the equipment they use. It was to establish the truth of this assumption that Jehani travelled west, hoping to bring back with him knowledge of the military technology the Inglysshe possessed, and possibly military men who could teach our armies how to fight.

  'There was a personal side to Jehani's mission too. He and Prince Harihara had quarrelled – over a woman, of course. That is all over now. She died shortly after Jehani left, and the Prince is anxious to find him, help him fulfil his original mission and bring him home.'

  Thus Arrish. Events bore out what he told me then, but with an added dimension. In England Jehani had fallen in with a group of hedonistic atheists who acknowledged no god but the god within, the individual conscience unmediated by holy books or priests – the Brothers of the Free Spirit, who had cells right across Europe and corresponded with like-minded people in the east too. Everywhere they recruited hierophants, mostly from the lower sort, and everywhere they were ruthlessly persecuted. The Brother who had given me Jehani's packet and died at the stake in Calais had been one of their number.

  One problem we faced was clothes. Neither the Prince nor Anish could conceive of the effects of cold rain, frost, howling icy gales, the whole panoply of weather those western isles could throw at us. When I described sleet driven by an icy wind they said that they would wear two silk or cotton gowns instead of one. In the end I realised we were approaching the problem from the wrong angle.

  'Let us,' I said, 'set aside a certain amount for each member of our expedition, in some easily carried but easily exchanged commodity which we will carry separately from the rest, in sealed packets, and which all will swear not to touch until we need to buy the clothes the locals wear to keep out bad weather.'

  Of course they suggested spices, but we were already carrying many sackfuls of many different sorts, and I was afraid that those kept for clothes would be muddled with the rest and exchanged for something of no particular value in Ingerlond, though of substantial value in Vijayanagara. In the end we chose pearls. These, though beautiful, are not rare along the coasts of Vijayanagara or on the many small islands and archipelagos out in the ocean, but in northern climes are highly prized, especially those of any size or of unusual colouring. Each of us, then, took a small bag of pearls, which was only to be sold or exchanged for warm clothing and substantial footwear when these became necessary.

  There was another problem too, which I came upon in a sm
all yard behind the stables that had served as an entrepot for our baggage. It was in the form of a heap of leather cases, tooled, in part gilded and painted, with tasselled straps and handles, varying in length from three feet to ten, and for the most part roughly cylindrical. There were two score or more of them, together with racks and racks of feathered shafts, again of varying lengths and styles. They provided the clue, of course, to what the leather cases contained, though it was Anish who murmured the explanatory word. 'Crossbows,' he said, somewhat drily. 'His lordship collects them.'

  'Well, he can't take them with him,' I said firmly. 'What we have here will require six mules and two more muleteers, which means a seventh mule to carry their baggage. Moreover, there are enough weapons here to furnish a squad of archers – no one will believe we come in peace as traders when they sec this lot.'

  'He will insist, I fear.'

  'Why?'

  'It is not simply the weapons that obsess him but the use to which he puts them. He hunts. It is his passion. He has crossbows and bolts for every sort of quarry he might come across. Tiny ones imported from China, scarcely more than a pound or so in weight, which throw a six-inch dart, for small birds – larks and quail particularly -to machines from Nepal capable of throwing a bolt three hundred paces and bringing down a mountain goat. Finally, this monster,' he kicked a bag big and bulky enough to hold the body of a six-foot wrestler, 'which, when assembled, requires a crew of three, one of whom carries it on his back, another to wind a winch to pull back the string, which is made from plaited water butfalo hide, and a third, his lordship, who aims and shoots.'