Silk Road

by Falconer, Colin

  The wind was a constant, tireless enemy. Josseran found he could not speak or even think because of it. It buffeted them with invisible fists, trying to drive them back, raging at them day after day.

  One afternoon, the clouds vanished for an instant, and they saw on the other side of the valley the scars of shale and liver-coloured earth that had been carved into the blue-white massifs of the glaciers. An ochre river, coiled like a vein between the mudslides of shale and ice, twisted down to a patchwork of shadowed green valleys, perhaps a full league below them.

  It was like looking over the earth from heaven.

  Khutelun turned in the saddle, her scarf whipping in the wind. ‘You see,’ she shouted. ‘The Roof of the World!’

  Josseran had never felt so small. Here were the dimensions of God, he thought, the length and breadth of Him. This was raw religion.

  Up here I am a long way from the man I thought I was. Every day I feel another piece of me is stripped away and I become a stranger to myself. No longer subject to the Rule, or in the thrall of the Church, I have such wild and blasphemous thoughts. It is a savage freedom this journey has afforded me.

  He looked at William, slumped over his horse, the hood of his cowl pulled over his face. ‘We are far from Christ here!’ he shouted at him.

  ‘No man is ever far from Christ, Templar!’ William shouted over the roar of the gale. ‘The hand of God guides and protects us, even here!’

  You are wrong, Josseran thought. The god that lives here has no dominion over me.

  The corpse had turned black in the frost. The eyes were gone, torn out by birds, the entrails opened by animals. It appeared above them for a moment through the mist. It had been placed on a crag above the track, an arm hanging stiff over the lip of the rock. It was impossible to tell if it was male or female.

  ‘By the balls of St Joseph, what is that?’ Josseran muttered.

  ‘It is the custom,’ Khutelun said. ‘In the valleys we consign our dead to the worms. In the high passes they leave theirs for their gods.’

  William made the sign of the cross. ‘Heathen,’ he spat.

  They saw two other corpses, in various stages of disrepair. And the next day, as they were passing through a narrow defile under a fist of black frost-cracked rock, Josseran heard something fall and he cried out an alarm, thinking it was a rock. Behind him, something landed on William’s shoulder in a shower of small stones. It looked for all the world like a giant black spider. William shrieked and his pony shied, loosening the scree under its feet, and almost threw him.

  It was Josseran, closest to him, who turned Kismet on the narrow trail and grabbed the reins of William’s mount and calmed her.

  William stared at the rotted thing that had tumbled on to him from the unseen corpse twenty feet above.

  ‘There you are, Brother William,’ Josseran said. ‘The hand of God.’

  The roar of his laughter echoed through the lonely mountain trails.

  XXXVI

  JOSSERAN TURNED HIS face towards a cool sun. The ruins loomed above them in dark relief. The fortress had crumbled away over the centuries, and now there remained just a few tumbledown walls of mud brick high on the cliff, testament to some long-ago purpose. Josseran wondered at the lonely men who had soldiered here.

  Khutelun reined in her horse beside him.

  ‘What is that place?’ he asked her.

  ‘It is called the Sun Tower,’ she said.

  She walked her horse through the defile. Josseran followed. The path vanished into the black shadow of the cliff. ‘The legend says that many years ago a great khan arranged for his daughter to marry a prince who lived on the other side of these mountains. But there were bandits hiding here and the way was uncertain. So she was brought here to the tower, with her retinue of handmaidens. Mounted guards were posted at each end of the defile while they waited for the prince to arrive with an escort to take her the rest of the way. But when he finally came to claim her he discovered she was with child.’

  ‘The guards?’ Josseran said.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘The handmaidens were brought before the khan and swore to him that the princess had not been touched by any man, that every day at noon a god came riding from the sky on horseback to lie with her. They said the child belonged to the Sun.’

  ‘And did the khan believe this story?’

  ‘Do you not believe that a god can lie with a woman and give her his seed?’

  Josseran laughed. ‘There is only one way that I know that a babe can be made.’

  And then he thought of his own faith and his laughter died in his throat. Do I myself not believe such a legend, he thought, and is it not the cornerstone of my faith? He glanced uneasily back at the tower and then at William.

  The further I travel through these barbarian lands, the further I forget myself. I could be lost here and never find my way back to Christendom again.

  And perhaps never wish to.

  That night the black mountains froze under a silver moon. The wind whipped the canvas of their tent in a sudden flurry and he felt a droplet of snow trickle down his neck under the hood of his robe.

  William shivered beside him.

  ‘Khutelun says there are Christians on the other side of these mountains,’ Josseran said.

  ‘When did she tell you this?’

  ‘A few days ago.’

  ‘Why did you not tell me this before?’

  ‘I am telling you now.’

  ‘Is it Prester John?’

  ‘I do not know. She just said that they know already of our religion in Qaraqorum and that there are even those in the court who practise it.’

  William took time to frame his response; the cold was slowing his thoughts. ‘I told you God would guide us, Templar.’

  ‘We also discussed the tenets of our faith and she expressed a desire to see the Gospels,’ Josseran said.

  ‘You told the witch about the Holy Bible I have in my keeping? For what purpose?’

  ‘She is curious about our religion.’

  ‘She is not to touch it! She will defile it!’

  Through a hole in the tent Josseran saw a star fall down the sky, leaving a trail of mercury. ‘Perhaps you will make your first convert,’ he said.

  ‘She is a witch and beyond redemption.’

  ‘She is no witch.’

  ‘So now you are an expert in these matters?’

  ‘She is simply curious about our Holy Book,’ Josseran said, feeling his temper rise. ‘Surely the word of God brings only good to those who see it?’

  ‘You are enamoured of her!’

  Josseran felt this truth like a physical blow. ‘Damn you,’ he said.

  He turned his back and huddled under the furs. As he closed his eyes he thought of Khutelun, as he did every night in the darkness. William was right. He had left France to find redemption in Outremer, and now he was, as William said, enamoured of a witch. Perhaps there is no redemption, he thought, not for men like me. I shall be thrown into Hell. But when it is as cold as this, it makes it harder to fear the fire.

  XXXVII

  THE CLOUDS WERE below them today. A cold sun hovered in a sky of washed blue. It was as if they were already in heaven.

  They had ascended to a world of massive boulders, the playground of giants. Around them were the serrated citadels of the mountains and the great ice flows of the glaciers. Even the rocks here had split from the cold. Khutelun told him this was the highest place in the world; indeed, they had journeyed for days now without seeing habitation or a single other soul, although Josseran once looked up and saw a pair of snow leopards watching him from a ledge, their slow hazel eyes unblinking.

  Their only other companions were the wolves, rarely seen, their lonely and mournful cries splitting the night.

  They subsisted on the curd the Tatars had brought with them. Khutelun had explained to him how it was made; they boiled mare’s milk, then skimmed off th
e cream until it formed a paste, and then left this residue in the sun to dry. After a few days it hardened to the colour and consistency of pumice. When going on a long expedition the Tatars took ten pounds of this curd in their saddlebags. When local provisions were doubtful they put half a pound in the leather bottle they kept on their saddles and by the end of the day the hammering motion of the ride produced a sort of gruel, which they ate.

  It was never enough. Once, at the end of a day’s hard climb, he saw Khutelun take her knife and slit the vein at her horse’s neck. She held her mouth to the stream of blood and drank it down. When she had finished she held her hands over the wound again until the blood had clotted.

  She wiped the blood from her mouth with her sleeve and grinned at him. ‘You have a weak stomach, Barbarian.’

  He shook his head, revolted.

  ‘A little does not weaken the horse. And it keeps us alive.’

  William also saw what Khutelun had done. ‘You still think she is not a witch?’ he hissed.

  ‘Leave me alone.’

  ‘She drinks the blood of animals! She belongs to Satan!’

  ‘Just get away from me.’

  ‘She is a witch! Do you hear me, Templar? A witch!’

  They wrapped fur hides around their legs and hauled their ponies into the teeth of a blizzard. They would have quickly become lost if not for the markers, made of the bones and horns of dead sheep, that had been left to guide travellers through the snows.

  Late one afternoon they reached a cairn much larger than any other they had seen, this one made not of bones but of rock. The Tatars called it an obo. One after another, they walked their horses around it. Then Khutelun climbed off her horse and added another stone to the pile.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Josseran asked her.

  ‘It is for the remission of our sins,’ she said. ‘According to the holy men who live in these mountains it brings us a better incarnation the next time we are born.’

  Josseran had never heard such nonsense. ‘A man is only born once,’ he protested.

  ‘Here they say that when a man dies his spirit enters another body, and this incarnation is more or less fortunate depending on his deeds during this lifetime. And so he progresses through a thousand lives until he is one with God.’

  ‘Surely you do not believe this?’

  ‘It does no harm. If the holy men are wrong I have wasted just a few footsteps and one stone. If they are right I have made my next life a better one.’

  Her pragmatism irritated him. To his mind, faith was faith; you did not temper it according to geography. Yet there was a curious logic to what she said.

  ‘You should do it also,’ she told him.

  ‘I have no time for such superstition.’

  ‘Do you wish to bring bad luck on all our heads during this journey?’

  He felt the other Tatars watching him. ‘I shall do it for the sake of diplomacy then,’ he said. He walked his horse slowly round the stones. After all, as Khutelun had said, what harm could it do?

  ‘What is this strange ceremony?’ William asked him.

  ‘It is for the remission of sin,’ Josseran answered. ‘They wish us to follow their example.’

  ‘Confession followed by absolution, administered by an ordained priest of the Holy Church, is the only way sins may be forgiven.’

  ‘All you have to do is walk your horse around the stones, Brother William. You do not have to believe in it.’

  ‘It would be a betrayal of faith.’

  ‘It would take you no more than a few seconds.’

  But William wheeled his horse away. ‘I will not dance with the Devil!’

  The Tatars shook their heads. A shadow raced across the valley towards them. Josseran looked up. It was a griffon, circling on the currents high overhead, scanning the ground for carrion.

  Perhaps an omen. He hoped not.

  XXXVIII

  THEIR CARAVAN TRACKED down once more into the clouds, as a storm rumbled through the passes ahead of them. They saw a valley far below them, where the stone houses of some Tajik shepherds clung perilously to the cliffs above a rushing river. The path crumbled under their feet and a chill, amorphous mist enveloped them, cloaking them in cold and silence.

  Their horses snorted in protest as their unshod hooves slipped on the lichen-covered shale, scrabbled for purchase on rocks riven with deep cracks from the bitter cold. They sent small avalanches of loose rock down the slope.

  Flurries of wind threw sharp ice in their faces.

  They reached a narrow ledge skirting a ravine. The way had narrowed to a path no wider than the shoulders of a horse. One slip would mean both mount and rider would fall to their death.

  William watched Khutelun and her companions pick their way across, the vanguard disappearing into the grey mist. He pulled on the reins of his horse, hesitating.

  ‘Put your trust in these ponies, Brother William,’ Josseran called behind him. He had to shout to make himself heard over the rush of the river below.

  ‘I should rather put my trust in God,’ William called back. He started across, singing a hymn in Latin, Credo in Unum Deum.

  Josseran started the slow crossing behind him.

  They were perhaps halfway along the rock face when William’s mount, perhaps disturbed by the nervous jitterings of its rider, lost its footing on the shale.

  William felt the pony stumble. It tried to regain its balance, its rump jerking as it attempted to correct its mistake. William lurched sideways in the saddle, throwing the beast further off balance.

  ‘William!’

  He heard the warning shout from Josseran. He slid from the saddle and with his back against the rock face he dragged on the reins, in a futile attempt to pull the horse back on to the path. Both the animal’s rear hooves were over the lip now.

  ‘Help me!’ William shouted at Josseran. ‘Everything is in there! Everything!’

  The leather bag on the saddle contained the illuminated Bible, the Psalter, the vestments, the silver censer. William released the reins and reached for the saddlebag. He caught a giddying glimpse of bottomless grey clouds and frost-cracked granite walls.

  He consigned his soul to God, his fingers refusing to release their grip on the precious Bible and Psalter. He screamed, even as he committed himself to death.

  Strong arms closed round his waist, hauling him back from the edge.

  ‘Let go of it!’ Josseran screamed in his ear. ‘Let go!’

  It was a moment that seemed to go on forever. No, William decided, after an age of soul-searching that took but the blink of an eye; no, I will not release my hold. I will die if I must. But I cannot forfeit the Bible and Psalter. Otherwise the journey here will be of no consequence and I will have failed the Lord.

  He saw the horse fall, sliding down the rock slope, kicking desperately at the air. Then it was gone and he waited to follow it down into the chasm. Instead he lay on his back on the rock and ice, the Tatar witch standing over him, her face drawn in a grimace of frustration.

  She shouted something at him in her heathen tongue. He clutched the precious leather bag to his chest, felt the reassuring weight and bulk of the Bible and censer inside it. Knowing that it was safe, he rolled on to his knees and shouted a prayer of thanks to the merciful God who had saved him for His higher purposes.

  Khutelun stared at the Christian holy man, the pathetic bundle clutched to his chest. The barbarian lay beside him, unmoving. She knelt down and pulled back the hood of his cloak. When she took her hand away there was dark blood smeared across her fingers. He had smashed the back of his head on the rocks saving this madman.

  ‘What is so precious in the package that the crow is willing to die for it?’ one of her escort growled. The crow: the name the Tatars had given the Christian shaman.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Khutelun answered.

  The barbarian’s eyes had rolled back in his head. Perhaps he was dead. ‘Joss-ran,’ she whispered.

  Inexplicab
ly, a fist closed around her heart.

  XXXIX

  ‘I AM GOING to give you the unction,’ William whispered. He kissed the precious purple stole for which he had risked his life and placed it around his neck. He murmured the words of the last sacrament, putting his fingers to his lips, eyes, ears and forehead as he repeated the familiar Latin benediction:

  In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti . . .

  They were in the lonely dwelling of a Tajik shepherd. Outside the wind growled and rushed, like the moaning of the Devil himself.

  ‘Now you will make your confession,’ William whispered, ‘so that you may be received straight away into heaven.’

  Josseran blinked, but found it difficult to focus his eyes. The friar’s face was thrown into shadow by the orange glow of the fire. ‘I am not . . . going . . . to die.’

  ‘Make your confession now, Templar. If you die unshriven you will have to face Satan.’

  Josseran tried to sit up but the pain pierced his brain like a knife and he cried aloud.

  ‘I shall make it easy for you. I shall make your confession on your behalf. Repeat my words. “Forgive me, Father, for I am a sinner. I have sinned in my heart, for I have harboured unholy thoughts about the witch, Khutelun. In the night I have abused myself while thinking of her and spilled my seed as I did so.” Say it.’

  ‘Damn you, priest,’ Josseran grunted.

  ‘You have lusted for her. It is a mortal sin, for she is a Mohammedan and a witch. You must be absolved!’

  Josseran closed his eyes.

  ‘Say it! “I have spoken against His Holiness the Pope and against William, his vicar. I have uttered blasphemies.”’

  ‘I am not . . . going to die . . . and I do not need . . . your absolution.’

  ‘Open your eyes, Templar!’ Josseran felt the priest’s fetid breath on his face. ‘Before this night is ended you will come before your Father in heaven!’