Silk Road (13 page)

‘So,’ Qaidu growled. ‘This is what a barbarian looks like.’

Josseran said nothing.

‘Which of you can speak the language of men?’

Josseran looked up. ‘I can, my lord.’

‘I am told that you wish to speak with the Khan of Khans in Qaraqorum.’

‘It was the wish of the lord Hülegü, whom it was my honour to meet in Aleppo. I brought him a message of friendship from my master in Acre, which is in Outremer, far to the west of here.’

‘The Khan of Khans is dead,’ Qaidu said. ‘A new Khaghan is to be elected. No doubt he will accept your obeisance when the time is right.’

Josseran was stunned. Their chieftain was dead? He wondered why no one had thought to tell him this before. Would the succession be disputed, as it so often was in Europe? Their own Jerusalem had been in a state of war for years over the crown. If there was a delay in the succession, did it mean they must return to Acre? Or would they be made to spend months, years even, in these lonely mountains while any dispute was settled? He thought about Gérard and Yusuf mouldering in Aleppo.

It seemed to him they would all be old men before this was over.

‘You have brought gifts for me?’ Qaidu asked him.

‘We have gifts for the Great Khan in Qaraqorum. It was a long journey and we could carry only very little.’

Qaidu seemed displeased with this response.

‘What did he say?’ William said.

‘He wants to know if we have gifts for him,’ Josseran answered.

‘We do have a gift for him. The gift of religion.’

‘I do not think it is quite the treasure he was hoping for. I think he would rather have something that is negotiable in the bazaar.’

Qaidu pointed at William. ‘Who is your companion?’

‘He is a holy man.’

‘A Christian?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Can he do magic?’

‘I fear he cannot.’ Unless you call turning any sweetly reasonable man into a foul-tempered madman within the space of hours, he thought.

‘Then what good is he?’

Indeed!

‘He has a message for your Khan of Khans from our Pope, the leader of our Christian world.’

‘Pope,’ Qaidu said, repeating this strange and cumbersome word several times. ‘Does he also wish to gaze on our Khan of Khans?’

‘He does, my lord. Is the Great Khan’s palace many days’ ride from here?’

Laughter from around the court. Qaidu silenced the gathering with a raised hand. ‘To reach Qaraqorum, first you must cross the Roof of the World. But it is yet winter and the passes are closed. You will wait here until the snows melt. Perhaps another moon.’

‘What is this Roof of the World?’

‘It is as it says. They are the highest mountains on the earth, and they are only passable in the summer.’

‘What is he saying now?’ William said.

‘He says the mountains are yet unpassable. We may have to stay here until the spring.’

‘Next spring? By the time I arrive we may have a new Pope!’

No, Josseran thought. By the time we arrive Christ Himself may have returned a second time.

‘Tell him we must not delay our journey another second!’ William said.

‘What is this babble coming from the mouth of your holy man?’ Qaidu asked.

‘He says he will be honoured to be your guest until it is time to move on,’ Josseran said. ‘Only he is much concerned by the news that your Khan of Khans is dead. He asks if a new Great Khan has been anointed.’

‘That is of no concern to a barbarian,’ Qaidu said and lifted a hand languidly in the air, to indicate that the audience was over. ‘See that they have food and lodging,’ he said to one of his aides.

As they left the pavilion Josseran saw the girl among the crowd of faces by the door of the yurt. A longing, as yet formless and nameless, moved in the shadows of his mind. He brushed it aside, as a man might brush aside an importunate beggar. Yet from that moment it dogged him and would not leave him alone.

A
BAND OF
sunset was framed against a pale sky in the doorway of the yurt. Fur-clad figures hurried in and out, carrying broiled sheep or horsemeat for their dinner.

Josseran stared into the cooking fire. The thin blue flame charred the outside of the meat, without really cooking it. He put some of the mutton in his mouth. It was still raw and bloody.

‘Look at the fire,’ William said. ‘It hardly burns. A mark of the Devil.’

Josseran spat a piece of gristle into the coals. ‘If there is one thing the Devil can do, it is make a fire burn well.’

‘Then how do you account for this magic?’

‘The woman Khutelun says it is because we have climbed so high up the valley. It takes the strength from the flames.’

William grunted his disbelief.

They had been brought to the yurt of Tekudai, Qaidu’s eldest son. It was unlike any dwelling Josseran had seen so far on their journey. It was a circular, domed tent with a collapsible lattice framework of bamboo or willow poles. The frame had been covered with sheets of heavy felt and the whole structure lashed down with ropes of horse-hair. He supposed it was perfectly suited to the nomad’s way of life, for Tekudai said it could be erected or dismantled in a few hours and the whole structure transported on the back of two or three camels when the Tatars moved from the summer pastures down to the winter lowlands.

Even the larger yurts, such as that belonging to the khan and his family, could be carried intact on the back of a wagon.

But the interiors all conformed to the same established Tatar design: in the centre was a fire pit, covered with smoke-blackened pots. Magenta and blue garment chests and rolls of bedding were
stored around the walls, along with saddles and riding harnesses and huge earthenware water jars. The beaten-earth floor was covered with rugs. Spiders and scorpions, Tekudai told him, would not set foot on a felt carpet, so they served a dual purpose, keeping the yurt warm and dry as well as deterring insects. The entrance, which faced the south, as they all did, had a heavy flap, brightly painted with pictures of birds.

Either side of the entrance hung two felt figures, one with the udders of a cow, the other with the teats of a mare. The cow hung on the left side, the east, for that was the woman’s side of the yurt. The mare hung on the man’s side, on the west, for women were not allowed to milk the mares; that was man’s work. It was from mare’s milk that they fermented their koumiss, the staple of the Tatar diet.

It still astonished him the amount of mare’s milk these Tatars could drink at a single sitting. Sometimes it seemed that it was all that they lived on.

Tekudai, as master of the
ordu
, sat on a raised couch behind the fire. Above his head hung another idol which the Tatars called ‘the master’s brother’. Above his wife’s head hung another called ‘the mistress’s brother’. The Tatars called these idols
ongot
, and there were several in every yurt.

Only Qaidu, as khan, was allowed to keep the hallowed image of Chinggis Khan.

Josseran watched the Tatars as they ate. First they took some of the fat from the meat to graze the mouth of Natigay, another of their gods, then they tore off great chunks of the parboiled mutton and held them close to their faces with one hand, while slicing off mouthfuls of meat with a knife held in the other.

‘Look at them, how they eat!’ William said. ‘They are not men at all. The earth opened up and these creatures swarmed out of Hell itself. Even the woman. She is a she-devil, a witch.’

Josseran said nothing. He did not think her a devil at all.

‘Somewhere this way is Prester John. If we can get a message to him, we can save ourselves from these devils.’

Prester John! Josseran thought. As much a superstition as the giant ants!

‘You do not believe?’ William asked.

‘I believe if there ever was a Prester John he is with God now.’

‘But surely his descendants live on.’

‘The Mohammedans have commerce with the East; some claim they have even been as far as Persia itself and they have never heard of such a king.’

‘You believe the word of a Saracen?’

‘You believe the word of men who have never been further east than Venice? If this legend is true, where is this Prester John?’

‘The Tatars may have forced him south.’

‘If he runs from the Tatars like everyone else, what use is he to us?’

‘He is this way somewhere. We must listen for word of him. He is our salvation.’

Josseran grew irritable, as he always did when talking to this friar, and returned his attention to the food. Khutelun, sitting just across the fire from him, watched his efforts to eat in the Tatar way and said: ‘Perhaps you should eat in your own manner. You have such a big nose you may cut off the end of it.’

Josseran stared at her. ‘Among my own people my nose is not considered so large.’

Khutelun relayed this knowledge to her companions, who all laughed. ‘Then you must all be descended from your horses.’

Damn her, he thought. He continued using the knife in the Tatar way. He had learned from his many years in Outremer that it was wiser to imitate local customs than to continue with old habits. And besides, he would not give up and let her have the satisfaction.

Some of the men had finished eating and were now supping bowl after bowl of black koumiss. Tekudai’s brother Gerel was already drunk and lay on his back, snoring. His companions sang raucously while another played a single-string fiddle.

Josseran watched Khutelun from the corner of his eye. She was beautiful but not in the way of a Frankish woman. Her face was oval, with the high cheekbones of the Tatars, polished like the bronze of a statue that had been much regarded and admired. Her movements reminded him of a cat, sinuous and graceful. But it was something
in her manner, her spirit, that attracted him, the way she looked at him.

Though, of course, it was absurd to even contemplate such a union. ‘I have never seen hair of such colour,’ she said to him, suddenly. He realized that as he had been secretly been watching her, she had been watching him.

Josseran kept his head short-cropped in Acre, as was the rule inside the Order, but since they had been travelling there had been no barbers to attend him and now he was conscious of the length of it. He brushed it away from his face with his fingers.

‘It is the colour of fire,’ she said.

For a moment their eyes locked.

‘So,’ she said, finally. ‘You have come to make peace with us.’

‘An alliance,’ he corrected her. ‘We have a common enemy.’

She laughed. ‘The Tatars do not have enemies. Only kingdoms we have not yet conquered.

‘You have seen for yourself. Our empire extends from the rising of the sun in the east to its setting place We have never been defeated in battle. And you say you want to make peace! Of course you do!’ He still did not contest with her and she seemed frustrated by his passivity. ‘You should have brought tribute for my father.’

‘We had not expected to have the honour of gazing on your father. However, we bring words of friendship.’

‘I think my father would rather have gold.’ The men around her laughed again. Josseran noticed how they deferred to her. In France a woman would never be allowed to talk so freely unless she was a whore and would not be treated with such respect unless she was a queen. It was evident the Tatar customs concerning women were very different to their own.

‘Who is your friend?’ she asked him.

‘He is not my friend. He is a holy man. I am commissioned to escort him to Qaraqorum.’

‘He is the colour of a corpse. Does he know how ugly he is?’

‘Do you wish me to tell him?’

‘What is she saying?’ William asked. He had some of the boiled mutton in his fingers and was pulling at the tough meat with his teeth.

‘She finds you pleasing to her eye and wishes me to pass on her admiration.’

William’s response was startling. It was as if she had slapped him. ‘Remind her she is a woman and has no place speaking to a friar in such a manner. Is she a whore?’

‘I think she is a princess.’

‘She does not behave like any princess I have ever known.’

‘Their customs are different perhaps.’