by Donald Tyson
The girl began to sing an Egyptian folk song softly in my ear. I did not reprove her. She sang well, in a voice strong and pure of tone. It was long since I had raised my own voice in song. I remembered a song of Yemen that had been a favorite of the Princess Narisa. When the girl fell silent I began to sing it, wondering where the princess walked at that moment, and if her mind held an image of me as I had looked before the day of my mutilation.
When I finished, Martala rested her cheek against my back and began to hum to herself. I felt the soft burr of her voice in my spine.
“I don’t care what fate awaits us,” she said. “I am happy.”
For three days we rode from sunrise to sunset, meeting no other travelers and seeing no human habitations. Nothing moved in the plain apart from the hawks that passed high overhead and an occasional desert creature.
At the end of the third day we stopped to watch a fox chase a hare. The fox ran with the brush of its tail streaming behind it, pursuing the hare with determination borne of hunger. It ran faster than the hare, but the hare possessed greater agility. Each time the hare dodged to the right or left, the fox overshot it snapping frustration at its heels, and had to loop back to resume the chase. The hare led the fox eastward toward a line of rocky hills with slopes that were almost vertical. The sun low at our backs made the racing beasts easy to see even in the distance, although the heat rising from the plain caused their forms to waver, as though they ran through shallow water.
Abruptly, the hare vanished. A moment later, the fox also vanished. I continued to watch, wondering if my eyes had deceived me.
“Where did they go?” Martala asked. “It looked as if they ran into the cliff, but there’s no opening.”
She echoed my own thoughts. I stirred the camel to life, and we began to ride toward the place where the hare had disappeared. I expected to see some small cleft revealed as we drew nearer, but the rock face remained unbroken.
“Where did they go?” I repeated to myself in a low voice, eyes narrowed.
They ran into the gap between the hills, my love.
Sashi thought I had asked the question to her.
“There is no gap between the hills,” I pointed out.
There is a gap. Can’t you see it, Alhazred? It is quite narrow.
I studied the distant line of hills. It stretched in an unbroken wall to the left and right, curving away on both sides. There could be no mistake. The setting sun behind me shone full on the rock.
Mulling on this puzzle, I suddenly remembered a passage in the voluminous writings of Ibn Schacabao, concerning a valley three days to the east of the river Euphrates. He called it the Valley of the Speaking Mouth, and asserted it to lie behind a wall of impassable cliffs, its entrance concealed by enchantment. What else had he written? I searched my memory. Within the valley resided something called the seat of wisdom, a place of great danger, but what this seat did, or who had made it, Ibn Schacabao did not venture to reveal. There was something about a serpent with venom so poisonous, it could be diluted to an almost infinite degree, yet still retain the power to kill. The other things he had written about the valley were lost to me. I had given little attention to the fable. Ibn Schacabao was surnamed the Boaster by later commentators, and was held to be an unreliable source.
If there was a glamour on the hillside, there might be a way to remove it. From the front pocket of my leather wallet I drew forth the scroll of the Old Ones and opened it in my hands, scanning its text for the remembered lines. It took several minutes to find the passage, but Martala sat with admirable patience behind me and allowed me to concentrate. There it was, the formula of banishment in Greek translation and in the guttural language of the Old Ones, transcribed in Greek letters. I found the starting place and read the strange words in a clear voice. They vibrated on the air and sprang forth from my lips like living things.
For several breaths I stared at the hills. Nothing happened. Disappointed, I lowered the scroll to return it to my wallet. When again I looked, I saw a gap in the wall of reddish rock. It was as Sashi had described it, quite narrow. Whatever glamour had been laid upon it was directed at human eyes, not the eyes of beasts, or those of djinn. Wider in the middle than at its top or bottom, it gave the appearance of a mouth turned on its side. As I watched, it seemed to open and close as though speaking silent words. The illusion was startling.
“The heat rising from the plain makes it appear to move,” I told Martala.
“Will you enter it?” Her attempt at indifference could not conceal her apprehension.
“It may lead through the hills. If we ride around, it will add days to our journey.”
Before the power of the banishment failed and the veil of glamour descended once more to conceal the entrance between the hills, I urged the camel forward at a trot. As we drew nearer, the gap assumed a more natural appearance and ceased to open and shut.
It was wide enough at the elevation of our saddlebow to allow our passage without the rolled sleeping rugs brushing both sides at once, though so narrow at its dusty floor that the camel had to pick its steps with care to avoid tripping on its own hooves. At the top it opened to the sky, but in places its sides almost touched far above our heads. It wound like the body of a snake, making it impossible to see ahead more than a few paces. Should it end abruptly, we would be forced to lead the animal out backwards by its tail, since there was no space for it to turn its body. I studied the soft dust but saw no footprints, or tracks of horses or camels, only the marks of small desert creatures. No one had walked here for a long time.
A projection of rock from the left side of the passage forced me to bend forward until my face pressed against the neck of the camel. I felt Martala’s body fit itself against my back. The camel lowered its own head and stepped forward. The overhang rubbed the back of the girl and squeezed her hard against me. I exhaled and bent still lower.
We emerged into a narrow defile with steep sides of broken rubble. After the knife cut through which we had passed it appeared spacious. Stones loosened by sudden floods had spilled down the slopes and completely filled up the floor of the defile in places. We climbed over them with care. They were treacherously balanced and apt to turn underfoot. In this way we made a slow progress eastward in the gathering twilight. The walls of the defile drew apart on either side, and we found ourselves at the top of a hill, overlooking a valley. I stopped the progress of the camel and sat studying the geography of the place.
Completely surrounded by hills, it extended from west to east in the shape of a boat, narrower at each end. The densely forested floor lay under shadow, making it difficult to see its features, but the setting sun lit the crests of the distant hills with a ring of fire. At the western end, not far from us, a spring bubbled vigorously up from the naked crown of a low hill, the noise of its waters loud in the still air of twilight. It divided into four streams that flowed in separate courses across the slope of the valley floor to lose themselves from sight beneath the canopy of trees.
I narrowed my eyes and studied the eastern end. The waters must exit the valley somewhere, but I could discern no opening in the hills, only a shadowed oblong mass almost obscured by the gathering darkness. It was necessary to descend quickly, before we lost the last of the light. I urged the camel down the grass-covered slope and under the tall trees. Some resembled palms, but were larger than any I had ever seen. Others were strange in shape, arising from the ground like great ferns to spread their curving boughs over our heads as we passed.
As we moved further away from the rushing waters of the spring, the voices of birds reached our ears, chattering and squawking with a bewildering cacophony as though in competition with each other. I could not see them among the trees, but they were all around us. The hooves of the camel sank into the soft green floor of the forest. The air beneath the trees brushed my face with cool fingers, and the tall grasses gave way to low plants
and ferns that grew in a carpet of dense green moss.
Despite the near absence of a breeze, I realized we were not under attack from swarms of biting flies. This was scarcely to be expected in so lush and wet a valley. Insects flew past our heads with soft drones from time to time, but ignored us. The dense overlapping canopy high above the mossy ground kept it free from undergrowth, while the immense thickness of the gnarled and vine-cloaked trunks that supported it testified to the vast antiquity of the forest. It was strange not to see the stars emerging in the heavens. Soon it would be so dark, I would not be able to find our way. I urged the camel toward a tributary of the spring. It snorted and hesitated, uncertain what to do with it, but at last was encouraged by a combination of curses and kicks from my heels to step into the water, which did not rise higher than its knees.
On the other side, we dismounted and used the last of the dying light to find a knoll upon which to spread our rugs. So green and moist was everything, we could not have made a campfire even had we been inclined to do so. The vague shadow of the hobbled camel cropped the lush ferns with evident pleasure, to judge by the sounds from its jaws, which seemed loud now that the birds had fallen silent for the night. From curiosity, I broke off a fern head and chewed it. The water-filled stem, cool and pure on my tongue, held no bitterness. Sitting on our rugs, we shared some of the dried fruit and vegetables we had purchased at Hilla by touch, for it was already too dark to see each other.
The tranquility of the forest conveyed a sense of harmlessness that caused me to neglect to set a watch. It is difficult to know what I could have watched for in that utter blackness. A deep weariness closed my eyes almost before I lay upon my rug. I slept without dreams and awoke refreshed in the soft light of morning, alert and listening. Regular breaths from the girl indicated that she continued to sleep. The forest noises gave no hint of what had disturbed me, but my body held an unnatural tension.
What is it that woke me, Sashi?
Someone watches you from the stream, my love.
Where the stream divided the trees, enough light reached the forest floor to encourage the growth of low shrubs dense enough to hide within. I rolled my eyes to my left without turning my head, and saw leaves tremble. Wide brown eyes peered out at me. It looked like the face of a young boy.
Yawning and stretching my arms as though just awakened, I stood and walked in a sleepy fashion in the opposite direction among the great pillars of the trees, as though looking for a place to void my bowels. The moment I passed from observation behind a moss-covered fallen log, the twisted roots of which towered above my head, I bent my course and traced the edge of the stream back to the bush where the watcher lay on his belly.
His bare feet and naked brown legs projected into the sunlight. Drawing my dagger, I crept forward with care to avoid rustling the tall grass and grabbed his ankle in my left hand.
He cried out in surprise and kicked so hard, I could not hold him. In a flash of copper-colored skin he slipped under the bushes. I forced them apart and stumbled through, annoyed at my clumsiness. The shadowed depths of the forest betrayed no movement. The camel stood rubbing its hindquarters against the irregular bole of a tree. Martala lay propped on her elbow on her sleeping mat, squinting and blinking at me.
I told her about the watcher. The information did not surprise her.
“He probably hoped to steal from our packs while we slept,” she said, yawning.
“There must be a village. Maybe it lies hidden behind that black wall I saw from the hillside.”
After eating a frugal breakfast, we bathed in the stream. The water was unnaturally cold, as though it flowed over ice deep within the earth before issuing forth from the spring on the rocky hillock. It felt delightful against my bare skin. The dust and dried sweat of travel turned to mud and washed away as I dipped my cupped hands and flung the silver droplets over my arms and shoulders, standing knee deep with the swift current tugging at my shins. Martala danced naked beside me, laughing and splashing herself with the icy spray.
We decided to wash our garments, not knowing when we would get another chance to be clean. Plunging them deep to get them wet, we found a boulder that projected above the surface of the water and beat them until the dirt no longer ran from them. All this while, I kept an eye upon the place where I had laid my wallet containing the precious rags of spiders and roots along with the scroll of the Old Ones. That we were watched, I had no doubt. I sensed several sets of eyes upon me. Sashi confirmed this feeling.
They are in the trees, Alhazred.
“How many, Sashi?”
I see four of them.
“Warn me if any venture near our wallets.”
Martala made no remark at this one-sided dialogue. She was accustomed to hear me address Sashi aloud. She seemed curiously unconcerned about our watchers. The sunlight and chill current intoxicated her and made her giddy. While we waited for our undershirts and tunics to dry, she danced up to her knees in the middle of the stream like a young child, scooping handfuls of smooth pebbles from the bed and throwing them into the air so that they made circular ripples where they fell that were swept away in a moment.
It was easier to lead the laden camel behind us through the trees than to ride upon its back. Progress was slowed in spite of the openness of the forest floor by many fallen trees. The gaps in the canopy created by their fall allowed sunlight to shine down and gave rise to saplings and dense brush difficult to penetrate. The irregular patches of sunlight provided some sense of where we were going. I tried to keep moving northeast, toward the middle of the valley, but when the boughs closed overhead and shut out the sky, it was impossible to be certain of any direction. We crossed a tributary of the spring. I could not judge whether it was the same one we had bathed in, or another.
Once, an antelope no larger than a dog walked in front of us and stopped with its foreleg raised to regard us with curious brown eyes. I approached, but to my astonishment it did not run away. When I extended my hand, it leaned forward and sniffed my palm, wrinkling its moist nose. Only when I tried to lay my hand upon its neck did it leap backwards. It walked slowly away from us on stiff legs, pausing several times to gaze back over its shoulder before it was lost from sight among the trees.
Birds showed the same lack of fear when we approached. We saw many varieties, some the size of peacocks with richly colored plumage of red and green and blue. They did not move aside until we were about to step on their backs, and even then did so only with squawks of protest, as though annoyed at having to make the effort. It appeared to me that they had never been hunted. The only animals to behave in a more natural manner were the small wild pigs that we heard rooting amid the trees. They took care to keep their distance, and when they chanced to wander near enough for us to see them, they turned and waddled away with quick motions of their short legs.
In the afternoon we came upon a forest path and followed it in what seemed to be an easterly direction. It opened into a clearing filled with thatched huts. Fearing an ambush, I hesitated to enter the village, but when at last we made our way cautiously to the center, we found it deserted. Nothing stirred, not even a dog. I ducked my head into several of the doorless huts. They were small in size, their openings no higher than my chest, their thatched roofs too low for me to straighten my back while inside. Woven baskets filled with dried strips of some dark meat, and others containing figs, nuts, or berries sat beside several of the entrances. At first glance I thought the baskets made of coarse cloth, so fine was the weaving. They were decorated in green, yellow, blue, and red with complex geometric patterns that displayed no right angles.
Beside a wooden bowl partly filled with a kind of coarse flour I noticed a mortar and pestle of sorts. The pestle was no more than a rounded rock, and the mortar a depression in a flat stone. Near them lay a stone knife with a handle of woven grasses. The blade was elegant in shape, the weaving done in
crossing diagonal bands that simulated the scales of a serpent. From the end of the handle extended a woven loop with a slip knot. For the first time I noticed that there were no fireplaces, not even a single circle of fire stones in the center of the clearing.
“These people are savages, Alhazred,” Martala said, eyeing the knife.
“So it appears.”
We sampled the berries and nuts, and examined the woven works. Not even the crudest strip of cloth or leather could we find in any of the huts. Weaving of grasses seemed to suffice for all the needs of this tribe. I wondered what they wore as clothing.
My curiosity was soon satisfied. Martala spoke my name quietly and pointed behind me. I turned to see a group of about a dozen men, if they can be called such, working their way cautiously into the village, each with a stone knife held high as if to strike. None stood taller than my chest. They were slender of limb, so that they resembled young boys, save for the wrinkles around their eyes and mouths which betrayed their adult years. In color, their skin was like newly beaten copper, more yellow than red, except for their cheeks and beardless chins which were tattooed in geometric designs with a dark blue pigment. They wore their black hair in three braids down their backs.
All were naked. No, not naked, I realized. Around their necks and ankles many wore strings of red transparent beads that caught the sun. The beads could only be amber, but of a darker and richer color than any amber I had seen in Yemen. I wondered where they procured it, and how much they had collected.
As they drew nearer, Martala stepped beside me and drew her dagger, her preferred weapon. I unsheathed my slender Damascus blade, but held its point downward in a manner that did not threaten. The leader, whose braided hair showed streaks of gray, spread his arms to halt the other villagers and came forward alone. Fear was evident on his features. He kept glancing from me to the girl to the camel. The beast fascinated him, so that he had difficulty looking away from it. I wondered if it could possibly be the first camel he had ever seen.
