‘If he’d wanted to stay home safe, I’d have had some harsh words for my wife. I’d have known he wasn’t mine.’
‘I’ll do my best to keep him out of trouble.’
‘Let’s pray you can. If the Chosen have taken a hand in this –’ Kareem shrugged. ‘Who knows?’
‘That’s true, unfortunately. That reminds me, I’ve got something I want to leave with you. Suppose the Chosen decide to eliminate me and Soutan – I don’t want them getting their ugly paws on this.’
From his shirt pocket Warkannan took out a roll of rushi, protected by a leather cover stamped with a design of two crossed swords below a crescent: Jezro Khan’s crest. Kareem kissed it, then slid the rushi free with a snap of his wrist that unrolled the letter. The sheet had one long torn edge, as if the khan had ripped a blank page from a book in his haste.
‘It’s Jezro’s handwriting, sure enough,’ Kareem said. ‘Thanks be to God, merciful as well as mighty!’
Warkannan had read it so many times that he knew every word by heart.
‘To Indan, Warkannan, and all my friends in Kazrajistan,’ the letter began. ‘That is, of course, assuming I have any friends left. I wonder what you’ll say when you find out I’m alive. Will you celebrate, or will I only be seen as a damned nuisance, a ghost who should have stayed dead? I don’t even know what things are like in the khanate now. Warkannan, do you remember me? Consider this an invitation to come have a couple of drinks with me. I have some interesting things to tell you. I don’t dare say where I am, but Yarl Soutan has agreed to help me. All I can do is pray to God that he’ll bring you back with him without my brother finding out. Maybe a couple of men can slip over the border unseen. Yours as always, Jezro.’
The signature had touched Warkannan deeply, just a simple name, no longer the honourable and regal titles, just Jezro. With a sigh, Kareem finished the letter and began rolling it up.
‘Well, he’s going to find out what loyalty means, isn’t he? From what you’ve been telling me, Warkannan, we can count on four thousand men the minute he crosses the border.’
‘At least. And there’ll be plenty more as soon as we start marching.’
‘Should pick the khan’s spirits right up. I never thought to see the day when he’d sound so dispirited.’ Kareem tapped the roll on his palm. ‘But exile’s hard on a man.’
‘So it is,’ Soutan said. ‘And Jezro loves his homeland.’
Warkannan stifled a yelp and turned to see the sorcerer standing by the door. Soutan had a way of gliding into a room that set Warkannan’s teeth on edge.
‘The last time I saw the khan,’ Soutan went on, ‘he talked about Haz Kazrak as if it were Paradise.’
‘Well, there’s something about the place a man’s born in.’ Kareem glanced at the letter in his hand. ‘But it’s a shock to see him so hopeless. Especially since you were going to deliver his letter.’
‘He thought I’d never reach the khanate alive.’
‘I wouldn’t have bet good money on it, either.’ Kareem smiled, then turned thoughtful. ‘Ah God! When we were all young and on the border, if someone had told me that I’d end up a traitor to the Great Khan I’d have slit his throat!’
‘I’d have done the same,’ Warkannan said.
Soutan stood hesitating, then found a chair and sat down uninvited. Warkannan decided that the only way to smooth over the incident at dinner was to pretend it hadn’t happened; he handed the sorcerer a glass and the bottle of arak. Soutan smiled in what seemed to be a conciliatory manner and poured himself a drink.
‘I take it you served with our khan, too?’ Soutan said.
‘I did, and proudly,’ Kareem said. ‘The stories we could tell, huh, Warkannan?’
Perhaps it was the arak, or the shadows dancing around the ChaMeech skulls on the wall, but they ended up telling a lot of those stories that night. Soutan sat unspeaking, seemingly profoundly interested in tales of too much fighting, drinking, whoring, and the resultant hang-overs or disciplinary actions.
‘What surprises me,’ Soutan said at length, ‘is that the khan seems to have been treated just like any other officer.’
‘Exactly like,’ Kareem said. ‘When you’re riding down a pack of screaming ChaMeech, there’s no time for giving yourself airs.’
‘Imph, no doubt.’ Soutan tented his long pale fingers and considered Kareem over them. ‘Back in the Cantons we tend to think of the Kazraks as rigidly hierarchical – everyone knowing their place, everyone afraid to leave it, that sort of thing. What I’ve seen and heard while I’ve been here makes me think we’re wrong.’
‘Well, yes and no.’ Warkannan waggled a hand in the air. ‘The cavalry is one place a man can rise above his birth.’
‘And the university,’ Kareem put in. ‘Get a good religious education, and the faith will take you far.’
‘True,’ Warkannan said. ‘In the cavalry you get your education the hard way. At the end of a spear.’
The pair of them laughed while Soutan smiled, thinly but politely.
‘Jezro told me once,’ Soutan said, ‘that a man can rise from an ordinary trooper, get himself commissioned, and then be accepted as an officer.’
‘He can, yes,’ Kareem said. ‘And you can start off as an officer and get yourself broken down to the ranks, too, if you don’t obey orders. What counts in the cavalry is whether or not you meld with your unit. There’s no room for individual heroics or individual slackers, either. A lot of young aristocrats can’t seem to understand that.’
‘Quite so.’ Warkannan glanced at Kareem. ‘Men from the ranks – they know they live or die together. If they’re smart and capable, they can rise far. Remember what’s his name? The sergeant from First Company.’
‘Yes, I do, the man with only three fingers on one hand.’ Kareem looked exasperated. ‘Damn my memory! His name’s gone right out of it. And then there was Zahir Benumar. A damn good sergeant who made an even better officer.’
‘Ah,’ Soutan put in. ‘That name rings a bell. I think the khan may have mentioned him.’
‘Probably he did.’ Kareem turned in his chair to speak to Soutan. ‘Now if Zahir were drinking with us tonight, we wouldn’t be having all this trouble with people’s names. He had a phenomenal memory, Zahir.’
‘He certainly did,’ Warkannan said. ‘Unlike mine. Do you know where he is now, Kareem? He was transferred off the border, of course.’
‘Suddenly, too, now that you mention it. To the Bariza Second Lancers, wasn’t it? I lost track of him about then.’
‘So did I, and I’m sorry I did.’ Warkannan considered for a moment. ‘I did write him care of his new unit. Either they didn’t forward it, or he wasn’t interested in answering me.’
‘Don’t be an idiot!’ Kareem snapped. ‘The letter must have got lost somewhere along the way. Men who endure what you two went through together don’t forget each other that easily.’
‘I’d like to think so. When Soutan first turned up, I had thoughts of trying to find Benumar, to let him know the good news if nothing else. Zahir, Jezro – the three of us. We were a good team as officers. Worked well together.’
‘That’s one way of putting it.’ Kareem paused for a smile. ‘Well, if you bring Jezro back, Zahir’s bound to hear of it quickly enough. I did hear he was transferred again, out of Bariza, I mean. I can’t remember where. Must be the arak. Can’t be middle age.’
They shared another laugh, but Warkannan set his glass down. ‘I’ve got to get up before dawn,’ he said, ‘I think I’ll call it a night.’
‘Yes, tomorrow it starts.’ Kareem turned solemn. ‘And may the Lord guide you every mile of your journey.’
Just at dawn, they assembled in front of the villa, Warkannan, Soutan, the two young men, all holding the reins of their riding horses, who stamped and snorted as if they too knew that the journey ahead promised great things. After a last handshake all round, they mounted, took the lead ropes of the pack horses from the servants, and headed fo
r the gates. When Warkannan glanced back at the house, he saw figures at the windows of the women’s quarters. Curtains fell, and the figures disappeared. Tareev turned in his saddle once to wave farewell to his father, but Warkannan never saw him look back again.
The road brought them free of the oak forest by noon, and by mid-afternoon they rode up to the crest of the last high hill. In front of them the downs of the north border fell away. Beyond, the view faded to a lavender haze, spreading endlessly, it seemed, under a harsh sun.
‘There they are,’ Soutan remarked. ‘The plains.’
‘Yes indeed,’ Warkannan said. ‘I started hating them after I’d been on the border for maybe a week.’ He turned in the saddle to glance at Arkazo and Tareev. ‘Very well, gentlemen. Let’s ride.’
The road dropped down through waist-high vegetation, purple and orange, red and russet, a tangled mass of thorns and fleshy leaves fighting over sun and air. Here and there hill trees – thick fleshy trunks topped by huge flabby pink leaves – rose above the chaparral and sparkled with beads of resinous sap. Over them insects swarmed like pillars of smoke. As the men rode through, they now and then heard the rustle or squeal of small animals fleeing the noise of their passing. Occasionally a chirper, a lizard about the size of two clasped hands, broke from cover and flew on a whir of turquoise wings.
The road would settle into shallow valleys, then rise again to another hill crest, but each stood lower than the last. Just at sunset they climbed the last rise and saw below them Haz Evol, a straggle of town along the reed-choked banks of a stream. The fort, a tidy square of thorn walls, stood just beyond.
‘Is it safe to ride in?’ Arkazo asked. ‘What if someone recognizes you?’
‘It’s a chance I’ll have to take. We need information.’ Warkannan ran his hand over his burgeoning black beard. ‘The last time I was on the border, I was clean-shaven and in uniform. It’s funny, but when you’re in uniform, no one much looks at your face. I’ll bet I can slip through.’
Haz Evol, a small rambling town, existed to serve the military and little more. Warkannan hired quarters for his party at a shabby little inn, made of stacked trunks of spear trees bound together with vines. He went immediately to their cottage while the others tended the horses and brought in the gear. They ate in, rather than risk letting someone get a good look at them in the public common room.
‘Now tomorrow, if anyone asks you why I don’t come out, tell them I’ve got some kind of a fever,’ Warkannan said. ‘That’ll keep people away.’
‘Just so,’ Soutan said. ‘We need to buy gift goods – charcoal, wheatian, matches, things like that. The Tribes are hospitable, but it’s very rude to not have gifts to give them in return. Besides, spending money will get the townsfolk feeling friendly towards us.’ He glanced at Arkazo and Tareev. ‘Let me do the talking. Neither of you has impressed me with his subtlety.’
When Tareev opened his mouth to snarl, Warkannan waved him silent. ‘Soutan’s right.’ He turned back to the sorcerer. ‘Go on.’
Soutan did so. ‘We need to find out if anyone remembers anything about this merchant we’re tracking. I consulted the oracle last night, and it said that we’re in grave danger of being deceived.’
Tareev and Arkazo snickered.
‘I wish the oracle had told us this earlier,’ Warkannan said.
‘So do I,’ Soutan said. ‘It has its little ways.’
‘Well, let’s hope we’re not on the wrong trail. If one of the Chosen’s already heading east, time’s short.’
‘Oh, there’s plenty of time. I don’t care how dedicated or highly trained this spy is. He can’t get across the Rift alone. He’ll have to talk a comnee into escorting him. Have you forgotten about the ChaMeech?’
‘I never forget the ChaMeech. Let’s hope they eat him.’
‘They will, if he tries to ride alone. There’s only one thing the ChaMeech fear, and that’s magic. A spirit rider can scare them off, and I’ve no doubt this Chosen One knows it as well as I do.’
‘And what about us?’ Arkazo said. ‘Do we have to attach ourselves to the stinking barbarians, too?’
‘Of course not,’ Soutan snapped. ‘You have me.’
All the next day Warkannan paced back and forth or sat near the window to keep watch. Now and then he would try to read – he carried a copy of The Mirror of the Qur’an everywhere with him – but doubts distracted him, even from the beloved teachings of the First Prophet. Fortunately, Arkazo and Tareev returned early in the afternoon with their armloads of supplies.
‘No one seemed to be following us, sir,’ Arkazo reported. ‘No one told us much, either. Soutan sent us back. He had the gall to say that we talked too much and got in the way.’
‘Ah.’ Warkannan thought that for once, the sorcerer was probably right. ‘Well, why don’t you two go out and get our horses some water? I’ll pack these supplies.’
Soutan came back late, bringing with him a skin of keese and a girl, a mousy little thing whose clothes reeked of grease and strong soap. Warkannan wondered about Soutan’s taste in women until the sorcerer announced that Vorika knew things of interest. At that, Warkannan sat her down in the best chair and poured her a cup of keese. Vorika, it turned out, worked as a kitchen girl in a local caravanserai that served the merchant trade. She was also flattered enough by all this unaccustomed attention to giggle, hiding her stained teeth behind one hand.
‘Well, I saw this merchant, but I didn’t know him. Everyone talked about him for days. He was crazy. I mean, just absolutely everyone said he was crazy, because he went out onto the grass with only a couple of men along.’
‘A merchant, huh?’ Warkannan said. ‘What kind of goods?’
‘Oh, axes and swords, stuff like that. Just absolutely everyone told him he was carrying ChaMeech bait – that’s what they called it, ChaMeech bait – but he wouldn’t listen.’
Warkannan and Arkazo exchanged a significant smile.
‘Come now, girl,’ Soutan said. ‘Tell them what happened to this merchant.’
‘Oh yes, sir. Well, you see, about a week after he left – I think it was a week, anyway – no, I tell a lie – it was ten days after he left, but anyway, he came back. His men said they were going to leave him out there alone if he didn’t. So he rode south somewhere for the next horse fair. A couple of the men who stay regular-like in our inn saw him there, you see, and they say they teased him ever so much about it.’
Warkannan swore so vilely that the girl flinched. He apologized, soothed her feelings with a couple of silver deenahs, and ushered her out. He returned to an uncomfortable silence. Tareev and Arkazo sat on the floor, looking at the carpet. Soutan had flopped into an armchair, and his smile carried barbs.
‘The oracle may be ambiguous at times,’ Soutan remarked to the empty air, ‘but it never outright lies.’
‘It doesn’t, huh?’ Warkannan sat down on the divan. ‘Well, I wonder if the Chosen sent this merchant as a deliberate false trail.’
‘Maybe they didn’t have to.’ Soutan glanced at Arkazo and Tareev. ‘Fools abound, after all.’
Arkazo started to speak.
‘Shut up,’ Warkannan said. ‘Now let me think. It’s possible that our spy’s slipped over the border without anyone knowing, of course, but that possibility gets us nowhere.’
‘There’s that cavalry officer,’ Arkazo said. ‘The one who was cashiered.’
‘Yes.’ Soutan drawled the word. ‘How providential, wasn’t it, that a comnee took him in? Are we going to ride along the border and ask about him?’
‘No,’ Warkannan said. ‘We’re heading out tomorrow. Sooner or later, we’ll find a comnee. If one of the comnees has taken in a Kazrak, the news will spread. They’re like that, passing things along. We’ll track him down.’
‘And what then? Ask him ever so politely if he’s one of the Chosen?’
‘No. We’re going to kill him. If he’s not the right man, well, I’m sorry for the poor bastard, but I don’t
dare take any chances, not with Jezro Khan’s life.’
‘The Chosen aren’t so easy to kill, from what I hear.’
‘No, they’re not. We’re going to have to try, though. If God wills it, it’ll get done.’
Soutan rolled his eyes, then laid a hand on the copy of The Mirror that Warkannan had set down on the table.
‘What is this?’ Soutan said. ‘Not the Qur’an itself?’
‘No. No one can touch the holy book unless they’re ritually pure, so you can’t carry it around in your saddlebags with you. That would be sacrilege. This is just a translation into Kazraki.’
‘So it is a Qur’an.’
‘No, because it’s not in the old language.’
‘But the thoughts are surely the same.’
‘Maybe, but God spoke in the old language, not in Kazraki. That’s why the real Qur’an is so holy.’
Soutan raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘What do you think would happen if you touched a copy when you weren’t pure, whatever that means? Fire from heaven?’
‘Of course not! The law’s just a sign of respect.’
Soutan had the decency to look abashed. Warkannan changed the subject.
They rode out from Haz Evol in the cool of dawn. Warkannan led his small caravan of four mounted men and four pack horses due east, heading for the Great River, where the comnees congregated during the summer. The last of the downs dwindled behind them until the plains stretched ahead, mile after mile of grass, turning from lavender to a deep purple here at the end of the spring rains. The grassland ran to a horizon as straight as a bowstring. Here and there a few orange and magenta fern trees or a stand of blood-red spears rose up to point at the sky; otherwise, there was only grass.
By their first night’s camp, the plains were beginning to get on Tareev and Arkazo’s nerves. It happened to men, their first time out; the cavalry called it border fever, a twitchy way of riding, a certain way of turning the head, staring this way and that, a certain slackness about the mouth as men realized that there was simply nothing and nobody out in the grass but the wandering comnees. Tareev and Arkazo had all the symptoms. At night, they hugged the pitiful excuse for a campfire, flinched at every strange sound, and talked much too loudly when they talked at all.
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