by Severin, Tim
‘What are your conclusions?’ I asked. I was sceptical of the accuracy of such a method, but impressed by the amount of mathematical calculation. It seemed more arcane and intricate than merely dreaming.
‘According to the astrology, your journey is not yet over. There will be more hardship, some disappointment and death, but – finally – great happiness. Life will change back to where it began.’
I was mildly disillusioned. Musa’s predictions were hardly less ambiguous than the Oneirokritikon.
Behind us came the sound of the door opening, then the librarian’s reedy voice announced that our escort had arrived and was waiting to bring us back to our lodgings. We got to our feet and thanked Musa for his help.
I avoided looking at Osric as we left the building. We had gone only a few yards before he asked in a low voice, ‘Sigwulf, why didn’t you tell me that your dream of two wolves and Walo covered with bees is an omen of his death?’
There was an uncomfortable pause as I struggled to find the right words. ‘You forget that the Book of Dreams also states that madmen achieve what they set out to do, which is why I thought Walo should travel with us.’
When my friend did not reply, I added lamely, ‘Walo has proved to be our lucky mascot, essential to our embassy. Thanks to him, the ice bears have reached Baghdad, not to speak of the gyrfalcons.’
Osric stopped abruptly and turned towards me, his eyes searching my face. ‘And if this costs him his life?’
‘My dream with the bees was nothing to do with his impending death,’ I said firmly. ‘As I told you, a bear is called a “bee wolf” in the Northlands, and the dream was fulfilled the day Walo crawled into the cage and sat between the two bears without being harmed.’
Osric looked only half persuaded.
‘Walo was rejected by his family, struggling to survive, teased and mocked by strangers,’ I concluded. ‘Whatever happens to him now must be better than if we had left him behind in Aachen.’
My friend managed a slight nod, as if to accept my reasoning but, as we walked on in silence, I felt that the foundations of our mutual trust had shifted slightly.
*
Nadim Jaffar kept his word. A servant called at our lodgings the following morning with a message that our private audience with the Commander of the Faithful would take place later that day. He also brought two sets of black clothes, so it seemed that Abram was not expected to attend. Indeed, we had seen little of our dragoman since he had obtained permission to find accommodation with his co-religionists outside the Round City. His role as a guide was largely redundant. Whenever Osric and I stepped outside, a guide was loitering in the street. Doubtless an employee of Jaffar’s barid, sent to keep an eye on us, he insisted on accompanying us everywhere, showing us the sights. At the caliph’s lion enclosures we had learned that Osric’s information had been correct; we counted thirty of the beasts in captivity.
‘No avenue of lions held on chains, I hope,’ I joked nervously to Osric as we put on black silk shirts and long gowns, black trousers and belts, black slippers and tall, narrow hats made of straw and covered with black felt stitched with black brocade.
My hat was nearly the length of my arm, and threatening to topple sideways. Osric came across to straighten it. ‘It would be tactful to wrap the bestiary in a length of black cloth before presenting it to the caliph,’ he suggested.
I selected a spare black turban and wound it around the precious volume.
Soon after midday, the same man who had brought us to Nadim Jaffar’s garden arrived to bring us to our meeting with the caliph. Instead of leading us towards the great dome of the central palace as I expected, he took us in the opposite direction, out of the city by the north-east gate and towards the river. We negotiated the narrow streets of a residential quarter and came to an imposing gatehouse flanked by brick walls too high to see what lay on the other side. Guards searched us, unwrapping the bestiary, and checking that it was not hollowed out to conceal a weapon. Beyond the gatehouse we emerged onto a broad, open terrace a hundred yards in length and built along the river front. It gave a spectacular view over the Tigris with its constant movement of boats across to the array of grand houses lining the far bank, and – a little downstream – the main city pontoon bridge. Overlooking this lively scene was a handsome palace in the Saracen style. Tiled domes gleamed turquoise in the late afternoon sun. Bands of polished marble – dark red, black and green – emphasized the symmetry of the rows of arched windows along the façade. The main entrance was framed by slender marble columns and high enough for a man to enter on horseback. This, our guide informed us, was the Khuld Palace, the Palace of Eternity, and here the caliph would receive us.
Veering off to one side, he took us to a side entrance half hidden by a screen of delicately carved stonework. Here he left us with a chamberlain waiting with two assistants, and they accompanied us down a long deserted corridor, past a line of closed doors. Tiled walls threw back the clack of our footsteps on the marble floor and, with our escort in such close attendance, we might as well have been prisoners on the way to their cells. The difference was the all-pervading scent of rosewater that perfumed the air. We were hurried up two flights of steps and then along a gallery that looked down on a large antechamber where small groups of black-clad men were standing and waiting, possibly for an audience with the caliph. There was no way of telling whether they were courtiers or officials. They did not look up, and it was clear, too, that our escort did not want us to be seen.
At the far end of the gallery, we were ushered into a room and the chamberlain and his assistants silently withdrew, closing the door behind us and leaving us alone.
Osric and I exchanged glances. We had stepped into a jewellery box. Panes of coloured glass in the ceiling illuminated gorgeous silk hangings covering the walls. Underfoot the thick carpets were richly detailed with intricate patterns of blossoms and fruit. Gold leaf had been applied to every exposed surface. Here the scent of rosewater was almost overpowering. Directly in front of us hung a curtain that divided the room in half. The fabric was gauze so fine that the slightest draught set it swaying. Daylight filtered through it, yet by a clever trick of the weave it was impossible to see what lay the other side.
I guessed we had been brought into one of the upper rooms of the palace with a window overlooking the Tigris. I strained my ears, trying to catch the sounds of the river when – bewilderingly – through the curtain came a succession of whistles and liquid trills. I recognized the song of a nightingale.
Osric and I stood facing the curtain, waiting politely for whatever might happen next. Several minutes passed. I wondered if someone was observing us secretly and I dared not turn my head and search too obviously for a spyhole. The birdsong stopped, then started again, then stopped. There was no other sound, no movement. Presently, the curtain in front of us swayed minutely, the barest tremor. I heard a faint rustling sound. Another pause followed. Finally, an unseen hand or some hidden mechanism drew back the curtain in a single, smooth movement.
The other half of the room was even more opulent. Matching mirrors extended from floor to ceiling on the side walls. They were positioned to angle the daylight pouring in through the window arch on the further wall and direct it onto hundreds of precious stones sewn into the fabric of the wall hangings. The gems caught the light and glowed in all their brilliance – amethyst, ruby and emerald. The cloth itself shimmered with gold and silver thread. Suspended from the ceiling by a silk cord in one corner was a golden birdcage. The drab brown of its occupant, the nightingale, made the surrounding colours appear all the more sumptuous.
Directly in front of us the floor level was raised to create a platform and oblige us to look upwards. There, reclining on two bolsters were two boys. I recognized one of them immediately. He was Abdallah, Caliph Haroun’s son whom I had seen in Jaffar’s garden. Something told me that the other boy was his half-brother, Mohammed the Crown Prince. Both were much the same age and identically dressed
in long black surcoats and tightly fitting trousers, and both wore black turbans. While Mohammed’s turban had a diamond brooch in the shape of a starburst, Abdallah’s turban bore no decoration.
For a long moment we stared at one another without a word being said. Then, making me jump, one of the mirrors swung to one side and became a door. Through it stepped a tall, handsome and well set-up man about thirty years old, whose light complexion contrasted with a neatly barbered black beard some four or five inches long. He wore no jewellery but his long black silk gown was open at the front to show an under-robe of grey silk with discreet bands of embroidery at the collar and wrists. On his head he wore the same style of tall black felt hat as Osric and me, though his hat had a black turban wrapped around it, the free end hanging down his back. The two youngsters promptly sat up straighter on their cushions. Even without that hint I would have known that the man who had entered the room was their father, Haroun al Rashid, Prince of the Faithful, Caliph of Baghdad and Allah’s Shadow on Earth.
Beside me, Osric immediately sank to his knees and pressed his forehead to the ground. A heartbeat later I followed his example, almost letting slip the bestiary I was clutching. We stayed kneeling until a quiet voice told us to rise. Getting to my feet, I found that the caliph had sat down between his two sons, only a few paces from me, and was scrutinizing us closely.
‘You must be Sigwulf,’ he said to me. ‘Abdallah did not tell me about your eyes.’
I realized that the sunlight coming in through the window behind Haroun was falling full on my face.
‘The great Iskander also had eyes of different colours,’ Haroun continued. ‘He, too, was a great traveller.’
My mind had gone blank. I knew he was talking of Alexander the Great and I tried desperately and unsuccessfully to recall what I knew about the extent of Alexander’s journeys. I stood there tongue-tied and feeling foolish.
Abdallah came to my rescue. He leaned towards his father and whispered something.
‘My son tells me that you have a book to give us.’
This was safer ground. My mind began to clear. ‘Your Magnificence, it is but one of the presents that my master Carolus, King of the Franks, sends you in return for your great generosity in the gifts you despatched to him, for which he thanks you.’
I realized that I was gabbling and forced myself to slow down. ‘There are other items he hopes will please you – bears, birds of prey, specially selected –’ I was still so flustered that I only just stopped myself from mentioning that the animals had been chosen because they were white.
Fortunately, the caliph cut across me. ‘Nadim Jaffar has told me about these and Mohammed and Abdallah have been to see the bears. They are indeed remarkable.’ He leaned forward slightly. ‘The book . . . ?’ he prompted.
It was clear that the caliph was in a hurry. I presumed that he was taking a short break from his official duties to hold this private audience, and was doing so to please Abdallah who had reported on the meeting in Jaffar’s garden. Certainly Abdallah was listening closely to everything being said as if he owned the interview.
‘Your Magnificence,’ I blurted, hurriedly unwinding the black cloth from around the book, ‘it cannot compare with the splendid volumes in your royal library, but King Carolus hopes that it will be of some interest.’
Abdallah scrambled to his feet. He came across the platform and I handed him up the book. He took it back to his father, and then sat down beside the caliph, who opened the cover. On Haroun’s left, the other son, Mohammed, leaned in to look more closely.
There was silence as the caliph slowly turned the pages, pausing from time to time to study a particular illustration. At one point he stopped for several moments, then looked up at me, and turned the book around so that I could see the picture.
‘What is this bird?’ he asked. He looked down again, and slowly and carefully read out: ‘ “c-a-l-a-d-r-i-u-s.” ’
With a shock I realized that Haroun al Rashid had deliberately not looked at the Arabic translation that had been prepared long ago in Aachen. He was testing out his knowledge of Western script. I was dumbfounded. The contrast with Carolus could not have been greater. In Aachen, I had watched the King of the Franks looking through the pictures in the bestiary. He could write no more than a few words in his own language and struggled with reading the simplest phrases. In Baghdad, his counterpart, the Commander of the Faithful, could recognize a foreign script and, with close attention, even make out the letters.
On the page that Haroun then held out to me were two pictures. The upper one showed a man with a crown on his head. He was lying on a bed and looked very ill. At his feet a white bird vaguely like a magpie was perched on the bed frame, behind it an open window. It was clear that the bird had flown into the room and settled there. The bird was staring at the crowned man. The lower picture was identical except that the bird, instead of staring at the man, had turned its head and was looking away.
‘A caladrius, Your Magnificence,’ I explained, remembering the text written below, ‘is a bird that can foretell whether a king who is sick will live or die. If the caladrius looks at the patient, the sickness is drawn into the bird. It then flies up into the sun and is burned away and, with it, the sickness. But if the caladrius looks away when he sees the ill king, then death is certain.’
Haroun’s expression did not change. He turned the book around in his hands and continued to look through the pages. I wondered if I should have been more tactful in my explanation, then thought to myself that a translator in the royal library would eventually produce a full translation of the text written below the pictures, and that the caliph might see it. It was wiser to be honest.
The caliph reached the end of the book, and looked up at me again. ‘Many of the animals shown here I recognize. Some are already in my collection. But others are not.’
On his right the young Abdallah looked pleased, doubtless glad that he had told his father that it might be worth looking through the book I said I was carrying.
‘You are to be congratulated on delivering the bears alive – and the other animals – from such a great distance,’ said the caliph.
I bowed in acknowledgement.
‘It is pleasing that your King Carolus and I have a shared interest,’ Haroun continued.
I cleared my throat and spoke as humbly as possible. ‘My Lord Carolus has a menagerie, though not as varied as your own superb collection. He instructed me to say that if you could send him unusual animals he would be very grateful.’
‘Did he mention any particular animal?’ asked the caliph.
A clear memory sprang into my mind: Carolus showing me a picture in the book and saying that, if the opportunity arose, I was to ask the caliph if he could supply such a creature for the royal collection.
‘Your Magnificence, King Carolus mentioned one creature of particular interest to him. It is shown, I believe, on the eighth page of the book.’
The caliph turned to the correct page, and studied the illustration for several moments. ‘I find something familiar about this animal but can’t place exactly what it is. Perhaps you can explain further. What is written underneath?’
He passed the book to Abdallah and listened approvingly as the lad read out: ‘“The Griffin: It has the body of a lion but the wings and head of an eagle. Some say it lives in the Indian desert, others in Ethiopia. A griffin will tear a man to pieces or carry him to its nest to feed its young. Griffins are strong enough to carry away an entire live ox.” ’
The illustration showed a fierce, predatory creature with a cruel hooked beak and huge wings sprouting from the shoulders of a lion-like body. Its paws had long curved talons.
‘That must be the same as our simurgh, that some call the rukh,’ said the caliph gravely.
Mohammed, the crown prince, leaned in and spoke quietly in his ear. I did not like the sly expression on the youngster’s face as he sat back straight and watched me.
‘Naturally, I shall b
e happy to oblige your King Carolus,’ announced the caliph. ‘This animal is known to us, though only by hearsay. It is a great bird so fierce and powerful that it can even carry away elephants in its claws.’
He glanced approvingly at the crown prince. ‘My son reminds me that the rukh is found in the lands south of the Zanj.’
The caliph turned his full attention back to me, and his tone of voice left no doubt that he was giving orders. ‘I too would like to add a rukh to my animal collection. You and your companions have shown great skill in these matters and I will ask Nadim Jaffar to make arrangements for you to travel to the land of the Zanj and on to where the rukh lives. Bring back at least two of the creatures. One will be for my collection, the other to take back to King Carolus.’
I could only bow. The private audience had taken a totally unexpected and unwelcome direction and there was nothing for me to say. I had an uncomfortable recollection of Carolus telling me to find a unicorn.
The caliph spoke to Abdullah. ‘I think our new emissary to Zanj should keep the book until he returns from his voyage. It may be useful.’
My hands shaking, I took the bestiary from Abdullah, and my consternation must have been obvious. The caliph looked down at me with the suspicion of a twinkle in his eye. ‘You can place it with my royal library on your return, Sigwulf, and do not look so dismayed. Iskander travelled to the far ends of the earth, even to the Land of Darkness. In our Holy Book, it is said that he even reached the fountain of life. Take him as your example.’
With those words the caliph rose to his feet and the curtain that divided the room began to close. But before it drew completely shut I caught a brief glimpse of a grin of malicious triumph on the face of Abdallah’s rival, the crown prince.
*
The moment Osric and I got back to our lodgings in the Round City, I sent for Abram. ‘Where’s the land of the Zanj?’ I asked the dragoman when he arrived.