Sick at heart, Derar stumbled from the fire-lit, hellish scene with its cries and lamentations. In the three-quarter moonlight he tripped on something in the darkness and found Emren Dirse similarly indisposed, sitting on a rock. He recognised the emir by the set of his felt cap, brooding shoulders and the warhorse grazing nearby. “What ails, friend?”
There was a long silence before Emren responded. “Dandanqan was not like this, Derar. Battle is one thing—but I have no heart for this.”
Derar heaved a long sigh and joined him on the rock. “Why did you come?”
“To solve the fate of my father and find his chestnut mare.” Emren looked at the moon and continued. “Borne along on the folly of my father and the avarice of his people. I am nought but a prince of thieves.”
They let silence reign between them until Derar heard a sound behind him. He did not turn. So complete was the devastation and so strong their host, he felt no fear but, sensed it was Farisa with their horses. She had taken the bits from their mouths and had been holding them while they grazed greedily on the green grass of the valley floor. There was a little food and water on his saddle. Not feeling hungry, but with the soldier within warning him to take some nourishment, Derar ate and drank a little. Finding a flat place close to Emren Dirse, he wrapped himself in his cloak, and lay down beside Farisa, their horses knee-hobbled, the reins held in their hands. The whole time she had said nothing and avoided his eyes.
Derar stirred in the dawn and found Emren Dirse, still sitting, dozing.
Then Derar saw the two skinny figures, a teenage girl and her younger brother, at the foot of the emir’s rock.
Emren awoke. “If they’d tried to run away during the night, I would not have stopped them,” Emren said. “But they couldn’t understand my language.” With that he rose and turned, bellowing for an old man of his tribe, whom he ordered to take the two captives with the column of prisoners and booty that would be chivvied away in the long walk to Tabriz, thence to the slave markets of Baghdad, Bukhara and Samarqand. “Take them safely to the house of my aunt in Tabriz.”
Derar walked off and bought a small urn of pungent coffee from a Seljuk boiling a kettle of water into which he had dropped a handful of the berries. Returning to where Farisa was caring for their horses, he poured cups for the woman, Emren Dirse and himself. They squatted on their booted heels, sipping the black liquid, watching the scene of rough horsemen saddling up. The dead looked pale in the morning light. Their blood had dried black or soaked into brown splotches in the grass while the air reeked of smoke from still smouldering dwellings. Bawling emirs were organising baggage camels and carts, supervising the whipping of the prisoners onto their feet.
Wretched women and children shuffled past. Some maintained a look of defiance that the mounted guards would soon beat or rape out of them. The more enterprising had thought to snatch whatever they could from the ruins of their lives, anything that might serve as a moral or physical support during the march into captivity, which they could scarcely imagine and only dread. Derar dropped his gaze, stared at the ground in front of him and finished his coffee.
Farisa and Derar mounted and rode in the van, behind Emren’s two horsetail standards as the Seljuk host trotted northward along the stream that flowed from Dvaradzo-Daph to the plain of Basen. Emren rode silently on his dun mare, ruling with heavy hand, forbidding any distraction after plunder. Such a pace did he set his well-mounted men, that a messenger from Tughrul galloped forward to tell the van to slow down so the rear might keep up.
In the early afternoon, Derar and Emren Dirse spearheaded ten thousand horse—tribal Seljuks, Turkic ghulams, Kurds and a sprinkling of renegade Christians—down into the fertile plain of Basen, decorated as it was with little hamlets and by fields of cattle with other domestic animals.
North of the stream the impregnable fortress of Kapetrou on its precipitous rock had stout triple-walls with many towers, all crowded with soldiers and engines. Forward of the walls, forbidding earthworks comprising a palisaded mound guarded by a thick bed of stakes and other obstacles behind a broad, deep ditch, enclosed fields containing the town’s livestock and gardens. Many soldiers and their horses manned these works, sunlight on their spear points. They clashed their weapons and roared loudly for the Seljuks to come and fight.
An emir, with the insolence of success against Berkri and Archēsh, led his men forward to be met by such a storm of darts that many were killed and the remainder driven off.
The Sultan saw it. “We’ll not bother with this place. Ride on and fire the villages.”
This was done as the Seljuk host jogged west to where the plain narrowed to its head near the village named Du. While this hamlet was massacred pitilessly, Tughrul Bey rode with a small group of his advisors to the crest of a promontory from where they could see in the distance a mighty fortress, stronger than any yet encountered. There was debate whether it was the famous citadel of Theodosiopolis, or Karin, or Artsn of the Romans—rebuilt.
At length, the Sultan silenced the babble and summoned Theodore Ankhialou, who informed them the fortress city was Karin of the Armenians, called Theodosiopolis by Romans. During their conquest and occupation, the Arabs had called it Kālīkalā. The ruins of Artsn, he explained, lay a short ride beyond by the Western Euphrates.
Derar considered the battlements of Karin and the ground around it. It looked impregnable to the forces the Sultan had with him. Moreover, if they had attempted to storm it, they would have been vulnerable to an attack against their rear from the Roman troops at Kapetrou.
“Leave me,” commanded Tughrul Bey, sitting on a rock and staring into the west. The sun sank behind a bank of clouds, turning them golden and sending gilded shafts of light into the eyes of the watchers from the promontory.
Derar al-Adin, dismounted and holding Qurmul, waited listlessly, slapping the ends of the reins softly against his boots in physical boredom and spiritual desolation. In the lower ground of the Plain of Basen, he saw the raiders fan out, looting and pillaging. His mind turned to the intricacies of the shepherd king’s strategy and tactics. The Sultan’s object was to secure the major frontier fortresses and stabilise the border with the Christian lands before preparing to move on Baghdad. As the Horse-archer had correctly discerned after the fight at the wadi, the Sunnis of Baghdad would not be too disheartened should Tughrul Bey fail in Vaspurakan, despite their hope the Seljuks would protect them from Iranian Shi’ite Būyids and the Shi’ite Fatimids of Cairo.
The fortresses of Karin and Kapetrou obviously could not be carried with the means the Sultan had with him. Moreover they were too far inside Roman territory to pose a serious threat to the Seljuk rear around Tabriz, when Tughrul moved on Baghdad. More importantly, protracted Seljuk siege operations against either would uncover the Sultan’s army to a stroke from the Roman armies now mustering, according to Tughrul’s spies, at Caesarea. As it was the far-flung Turkish bands, with the indiscipline inherent in pillaging, were vulnerable to Roman counter-attack.
But Manzikert? Manzikert, isolated and defiant, remained a burr under the Seljuk saddlecloth. Guarding the south-eastern approaches to Vaspurakan, Armenia, Taron and Mesopotamia, as well as providing a mounting base for Roman attacks on Her or Tabriz, the fortress posed a definite threat to the Seljuk rear.
Derar mulled over this as if he were the Sultan. He concluded that Tughrul would return to Manzikert to force the capture of the city, thus wresting Vaspurakan from the Christians. Concentrating his main force on Manzikert would allow the flanking columns to withdraw to it if they were menaced by the Romans. Tughrul had already stunned all by the precipitous capture of disputed Berkri, the loss of which over twenty years before had so piqued the Commander of the Faithful in Baghdad. The surrender of Archēsh had greatly enhanced his prestige. Overwhelming Manzikert would crown the success of his campaign, paving the way for permanent settlement.
At the thought o
f soon returning to the besieged fortress, Derar’s mind turned to the problem of rescuing Zobeir and keeping his designs from the Seljuks.
At length, Tughrul rose and walked thoughtfully to them. “Tonight we camp here. Tomorrow, we return to Manzikert.”
* * *
63Mantelet—a portable shield or protective screen to shelter a number of soldiers from enemy weapons.
64Naphtha—a volatile, highly inflammable, limpid, strong-smelling, bituminous liquid, likened to or comprising petroleum or paraffin oil: used for lighting, in solvents and weaponised as an anti-personnel or anti-materiel incendiary.
65Haşer- ordinary citizens drafted to their Sultan’s army and paid a wage.
Chapter Twelve
The Landscape of Fear
The Seljuk Camp at Manzikert,
Evening, 29th August 1054
Derar al-Adin had camped impatiently with the Sultan’s entourage that cool night outside Karin. He wanted done with the sanguinary pillage and hoped the summons to the royal tent would furnish a pretext to get away. Although uninvited, Emren Dirse had accompanied him to the dismay of the Sultan’s functionaries. Derar transcribed Tughrul Bey’s dictated orders, reminding Isma’il to commence undermining the Manzikert circuit walls as soon as possible, with the object of mounting an overwhelming deliberate attack within two days of the Sultan’s return.
For similar reasons, Emren Dirse had begged leave to accompany Derar, stating that he was anxious to return because his father’s invaluable mare was thought to still be in the city.
The Sultan did not need a reluctant emir with the horde. He smiled. “Anxious for the unbeliever not to escape once more? You should’ve got him first time. Who’ll lead your people?”
“My younger brother Beyreh with Burla’s guidance.”
Tughrul, seated on a camp stool, had thought on it awhile, tapping his boot as if absent-mindedly with an arrow. Suddenly, he looked up. “Beyreh will do well enough with your sister’s advice—it will do him good. Go. It’ll be as well to have you looking over Isma’il’s shoulder.”
With a spare horse for each and another for Farisa, captured by Emren Dirse’s men, the three had ridden rapidly back the way they had come. Losing their way just as darkness descended across the plundered countryside, they took a wrong turn and happened upon a castle and village. Intrigued, they had ridden closer and found the fort intact, guarded by a detachment of ghulams. It had been ransacked but not destroyed, nor had the peasants been killed or enslaved, though many had been bashed and violated. A ghulam told them they were ordered by Bughra Dumrul to protect the place and its people.
Derar and Emren Dirse looked at each other. “Our spymaster must have his reasons,” Emren remarked.
Derar kept his own counsel, but his mind was racing: could the holding belong to someone of use to, or allied with, the Seljuk spymaster? But who, and where were they? Or Dumrul could simply have been staking out a claim for subsequent ownership?
Farisa asked, seemingly innocently, “What is this place called, for we have lost our way?”
“It is called by the unbelievers, Arknik,” the soldier replied.
“The girl has confessed our embarrassment,” Derar said, shooting her an appreciative look. “Which way is it to Manzikert?”
In answer, the ghulam escorted them to the track and pointed the way as Derar inquired after the master of these lands.
“His name is Zakarian. I’m told he’s in Malazgird,” said the soldier, using the Turkish name for the besieged city.
The three resumed their journey, reaching the army camped around Manzikert late the following afternoon. Emren Dirse conveyed the Sultan’s authority, Derar his word.
Isma’il, in order to please the Sultan’s messengers with the progress of the tunnel, took Derar and Emren to the engineer’s camp. The forward edge of this was marked by the position of two mangonels and four of the heavier ballistae. The spoil was carried away in baskets and used with other materials to gradually fill crossing places in the ditch, most of which was still dry. Only some sections on the north east corner, and the south east corner near the lagoon, had been flooded to form a moat. Osketsam, the Sultan’s father-in-law, accompanied them, proclaiming his role in command of the tunnellers and boasting that he would be in the mine when they had dug far enough to hollow out a cavern under the walls. Isma’il, eager to impress, showed them the timber reinforced entrance and complained about the lack of useful beams. The engineers and the Daylami prince wanted to build moveable siege towers, but no heavy timber was available. “It’s disappeared in the smoke of ten thousand campfires,” Isma’il moaned. He explained that the other two mangonels and remaining four heavy ballistae were positioned to cover the north wall, threatening two separate breaches in the walls, thus splitting the defence since the Christians would have to plan to fight simultaneous penetrations.
Isma’il suggested that all would be ready for the main assault a week hence. “That will be the seventeenth day of the siege—a reasonable effort considering the distance over which we’ve had to operate from Tabriz.”
Emren Dirse whistled despondently through his teeth when Isma’il told him of the garrison’s recent daring sorties, over two days, to collect food. “Ayeee!” Emren exclaimed. “Who will tell the Sultan? I’m glad I was with him at the time. You tell him!”
In the early evening, Derar sat in the lamp-lit guard tent by the Sultan’s dark pavilion and used the excuse of writing a despatch to the shepherd king to scratch a note to the Horse-archer. No one had tasked him to write the Sultan an account of the siege operations, but he hoped that having begun the process of writing his reports, the Sultan would be tempted to confide further instructions. Osketsam came and went, taking his ease in the far corner of the tent when not immediately occupied with his duties.
To the Romans, Derar wrote a quick account of the manoeuvres of the three columns and the devastation of the rural districts. He noted the little castle Arknik had, unlike other places, been spared and was under guard with the owner believed to be in Manzikert. Derar outlined the interest in the woman who escaped from Archēsh, as well as Ankhialou’s presence with the Seljuk army. Finally, he warned of the tunnel, describing its location and direction in detail. He was careful to highlight the estimated date of completion and date planned for the main assault.
With the note to the Horse-archer tucked in the small leather pouch at his belt, Derar handed his official despatch to Osketsam. The emir studied it, his mask-like visage framed by the light beard under the black felt cap, betraying no sign of cognition or anything else regarding Derar’s neat Arabic script. Derar started to worry that he could actually read, or was suspicious enough to summon another. Osketsam looked directly with his hard eyes at Derar. “Show me the other thing you wrote,” he demanded.
With his worst fears rising in his throat, Derar passed him the note intended for Bryennius, while his heart beat so hard that he was certain Osketsam would surely see his chest thump in time.
“What is this one?” Osketsam unfolded it unhurriedly. “Why did you not show me and why does it not go to the Sultan?” His eyes bored into Derar’s.
“Alas, I’m ashamed,” Derar said softly. “It is a poem, for one far away.”
“What’s wrong with the girl you have with you?” Osketsam, still holding the paper, asked in the sort of conversational tone that Derar had learned to mistrust in many people. “She’s comely and serves you well? Or am I wrong?”
Derar realised he was still on dangerous ground, talking about the vagaries of love and marriage with the father of a Sultan’s bride. He watched the parchment move close to the candle flame.
Just then Ames entered the tent. The Seljuks used the thin, richly-gowned Persian as a court scribe. He wrote well and had a reputation in the camp as a poet of note, the wealthier soldiers entreating him to write lines they might
use to court women. Derar had heard that Isma’il paid Ames to write romantic poems for Hurr on his behalf.
“Ames!” Osketsam called across the tent.
Ames paused, turned and made to join them.
Derar reached out and slowly took a corner of the note in Osketsam’s hand, saying, “Bother not Ames with this poor effort, for he is a famous poet and it would shame me to have him read it.”
“What is it?” Ames asked.
Osketsam did not let go. “A love poem,” he spluttered with amusement. “The Arab has written a love poem.”
“Oh, as they do,” Ames sniffed.
Osketsam laughed openly at the snobbery. Unlettered in Arabic himself, he released the incriminating correspondence and ushered Derar sympathetically out of the tent, bellowing for a courier as he did.
Derar walked a furlong from the dim light of the guard tent, his heart still thumping as if it would explode. Almost sobbing at the reprieve, he paused in a dark place, wrapped his despatch to Bryennius tightly around an arrow shaft and replaced it in his quiver.
In the small hours when he thought Farisa was fast asleep, Derar rolled on his elbow and crept from their tent. He walked quietly to where he thought the outpost line would be, then sank to his belly and paused, listening, wondering if a silent sentinel in a dark shadow had seen him. With the moon a crescent low in the sky, Derar remained long, uncomfortable hours on the hard ground. He stilled his desire to move, knowing that he must outstay any who chanced seeing him. With the infinite patience of a hunter, he waited so that the lack of movement would cause any observer to think they had imagined it, or, for their curiosity to overcome them so they would investigate. Derar gripped his dagger and laid low, the silence of the still night heavy on him.
A Dowry for the Sultan Page 44