by Robert Low
Wearily, we howed him up under rocks when he died in the dark, then moved off, leaving him to the desert, that feeding animal which grows ever larger and will eat all who dwell in it, one day or the day after.
We came down into Jorsalir like sleepwalkers, drunk on the bustle and the green of it all, forcing the four camels Aliabu had given us for our gear along a road choked with beggars and cripples, pilgrims and thieves, merchants and soldiers.
None spared us more than a glance, not even when they saw our wild hair, blue eyes and weapons. Afrangi, we heard them say, then offer whatever they offered to Allah to spare them from evil.
The guards on the gate looked us over warily and we did likewise to them, for these were Sarakenoi and we had been fighting them only recently. But such was the strange way of things here that they shrugged and passed us through the Bab al-Sahairad, the gate named after the Mussulman burial howes nearby and which means ‘Gate of those who do not sleep at night’.
As we went, a guard said something which the Goat Boy, puzzled, told me was to do with ‘the peace of Umar’, which just bewildered us all.
It was fitting, when I looked back on this and other omens, that we should have come into this holy city of the Christmen through a gate meant for dead men and later spat out of it through the Dung Gate, used to dump their shit.
The stink and the heat was a hammer blow and we stopped in a teeming square, the first one we saw with water, then had to bat the camels aside for a chance at it. I surfaced, blowing water and luxuriating in the feel of it coursing down my back. There were cries of outrage as we muddied the trough and the surrounding area, but we put hands to hilts and scowled.
My ring-coat was rolled up on a camel, but I still sweated in stinking wool and had gone through too much to be cursed at by a pack of Saracen goat-fuckers.
‘Shame on you, Orm Ruriksson, in this holiest of holy cities,’ growled Brother John when I voiced this same opinion out loud – and provoked laughter from the others, enough for me to think that all it took to fasten us together again was a little water and a common foe.
‘The Trader’s right,’ Finn agreed. ‘Let them mutter. I have skulked and crawled through their festering desert until even my prick is full of sand. Enough. If these shits want to kill me, here I stand.’
And he did, wet hair straggling, flying round his shoulders as he spread his arms wide and spun in a circle. ‘Here I am, you goat-fucking eaters of dogs,’ he bellowed at the top of his voice, thumping his chest with both fists. ‘Finn Bardisson from Skani, whom they call Horsehead, is ready for you. Are there any takers?’
There was a moment when everything stopped and was still, a marvellous thing in that teeming place. Then the noise crashed in again and people moved on their way and into their own talk, leaving Finn standing with his wild-bearded chin out and his arms flung high. Few looked at us now and none made growls in our direction.
‘Ah, shit,’ said Kvasir suddenly, seeing two speararmed guards come up. ‘Well done, Finn Bardisson from Skani, whom they call Horsearse, we are not two minutes in the city and you have brought trouble on us, I am thinking.’
The guards stopped and rattled off in their tongue, which I had picked up enough of to know they wanted to talk to the leader. Me. The Goat Boy, pale but still standing, closed in beside me like a shadow and we fell into the three-handed conversation we had grown skilled at.
The exchange was brief and sharp and polite. We were in the wrong quarter and would be more at home moving to the foreign side of the city, for most afrangi and others usually entered through the Jaffa Gate, which was west. Unless we were Jews or Armenians, in which case we should go south.
Either way, we’d better do it quick, for the Peace of Umar was a pact which Sarakenoi had with the Christmen, forbidding the latter to wear Arab clothing or carry weapons, among other silly things. We should comport ourselves more seemly, too, for there was bad feeling for Greeks and Christ-followers in the city, who outnumbered everyone else, but had no power.
‘We aren’t Christmen,’ snorted Finn, truculently, then caught Brother John’s eye and shrugged. ‘Well, just new ones and not like the puling bairns they usually see.’
We went west, pushing down the narrow, crowded streets, the Goat Boy in front to call out warnings and Finn, Kvasir and Short Eldgrim swaggering behind him, hands on sword hilts to make the point a little more firmly. On the way, I saw the marks of old fires, charred black buildings and ruins, so it was clear there had been trouble.
It took a long time in the swelter of early afternoon and we were practically at the Jaffa Gate when we spotted camels and what appeared to be mud-brick hovs for travellers. At the same time, we were swamped by those who wanted our custom.
I picked an evil, scar-faced individual and negotiated a price. The Oathsworn straggled in and started unloading their gear, in a street where cookstalls elbowed each other for space and the braziers and ovens belched out even more heat.
The smell of hot oil and cooking meat was heady enough to send most of us lumbering over for cubes of lamb on olivewood skewers, or vine leaves stuffed with shredded goat, or flakes of fish, pungent cheese, figs, those limon fruits we loved. The desert had kicked out all our dreams of smiling naked virgins with bags of silver and a horn of ale and replaced them with ones of such food, washed down with fountains of crystal-clear water.
They wandered back, beards greasy, chewing and smiling and blowing burned fingers. They sat cross-legged in the shade and, within the space of an hour, were sorting through gear and starting to fix what they could.
‘They seem quieter now,’ muttered Kvasir, handing me two skewers of lamb. ‘It would be better if we had some hope of plunder at the end of this, though, Trader.’
‘We have had gods’-luck so far,’ I pointed out, ‘for these Mussulmen could just as easily have caused us grief. If we go robbing them, I am thinking their goodwill will be shortened.’
Kvasir nodded reluctantly. ‘In that case, we had better find Starkad and get this over with in a hurry. After that, I am thinking it would be a good idea to go back and raid Cyprus on the way to our silver hoard. That way we will not only get loot, but the Danes will have had some revenge on those who held them prisoner.’
This was alarming, for Leo Balantes’ promises still rang in my ears and getting past his ships would take more gods’-luck than I thought we had. Still, it came to me that it was no bad thing to tell the Danes, which thought I shared with Kvasir.
He chuckled and nodded. ‘Now you are thinking, Trader. Einar could not do better.’
He meant well of it, but the fact that he was right chilled me on that searing afternoon, so that my smile back at him was sickly.
As he turned to spread this, casual as a rumour, I was at least glad Brother John was out of earshot, for one more knowing look from him would put an end to our friendship. The fetch of Einar hung about the rest of that day and into the yellow-lit night, where the smell of frying meat seemed to grow even stronger, the cries of vendors even more shrill.
We had scared everyone else off from this hov, much to Scar Face’s scowling annoyance. He had twice tried to up his price and twice been sent packing, the second time with the threat of Finn’s boot up the arse if he came back a third time. Since our purses were thinner than the wind, this was all he would get.
Those same thin purses kept most of the men sitting morosely round the fire, hugging dreams of Cyprus plunder and revenge to themselves as if they were naked women. Those with money juggled the sense of new boots with the hook of drink and women; I was wrestling with this myself, in the middle of this Street of Poor Cooking, when Brother John bustled up, bird-bright and wearing the brown robe of a Christ priest, which he had never done before.
‘I had it from the monks of the Holy Sepulchre, no less,’ he told me cheerfully. ‘Though they are unrequited heathen Greeks, they have such vestments for pilgrims.’
‘The holy what?’ I demanded, bemused by the sheer, shinin
g ferocity of the little Irish priest.
‘The Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The new one, since the original was broken down some three hundred years ago by the heathens, may God have mercy on their benighted souls.’
‘Whisper that in this place,’ I told him, shaking my head that anyone could think a three-hundred-year-old building was new. ‘I am glad you found some friendly Christmen, Brother John, for it seems to have lightened your spirits and renewed your clothing.’
‘Renewed my spirit, boy,’ Brother John corrected sonorously. ‘I have stood on the spot where our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified and I have now achieved my dream. Now I can go home to Ireland.’
I blinked at that. Though the little priest could be a pain in the arse, I did not want to lose him quite as sharply as this. He saw my look and grinned, shaking his head.
‘I am hoping you will get me some of the way, young Orm, for I still do not swim well.’
‘Just so,’ I replied, then winced as a vendor bawled out a long string of words, of which I recognised only ‘fish’ and ‘Lake Galilee’.
‘I was not merely renewing my spirit and my clothing,’ Brother John went on, falling into step with me. I sighed and went with it, taking it as a sign from the gods that the priest was with me, thus preventing me from heading for the lure of women and drink. New boots and sense, then.
‘What else?’
‘News. The burnings we saw came about only a few weeks before, because the chief Greek priest here, the Patriarch John, publicly urged the Basileus to reconquer Jerusalem, the stupid man. So the Mussulmen and Jews attacked the Anastasias, set fire to the roof of the Martyrium and looted the Basilica of Holy Sion.
‘They found the Patriarch hiding in an oil vat and dragged him out. Maybe a torch got too close to him, for he ended up burning. The Ikshid, this Turk, is very sorry for it and peace has been restored – but the Sarakenoi want no more trouble here.’
That was timely news; we would keep our heads down and our tongues between our teeth then.
‘Just so,’ agreed John, hugging himself with the glee of more news, which he finally threw out just as I was getting irritated. ‘I know where Martin the monk went and so where Starkad is.’
Now that was news that stopped me in my tracks and, grinning at his cleverness, Brother John laid it all out.
He had worked out that, like him, Martin would head for one of the holiest places this holy city had to offer if he had reached it and there was none more Christ-kissed than this Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where visits from afrangi were few enough for the Greek priests to remember them all.
Sure enough, five or six days before, a hawk-nosed western priest carrying a bundle on his back had come to pray and had then asked the way to the tomb of Aaron. A day after that had come the limping man with golden hair, asking after the hawk-nosed priest. And now us.
Brother John beamed and stood, his arms folded, hands thrust inside the sleeves of his new robes.
‘Fine work, right enough,’ I said to him and his smile threatened to split his face, shining bright in the dying twilight. ‘Where and what is the tomb of Aaron?’
‘A church where it is said the brother of Moses is buried,’ answered Brother John. ‘And staffed with western priests. Though still not good Celts, they at least cross themselves in the right way and so are better than Greeks, I am thinking. It comes as no surprise this Martin would go there, for he would be assured of rest and food.’
‘Good work,’ I said to him and watched him beam. ‘No mention of Valgard Skafhogg, all the same.’
‘Even that,’ grinned Brother John. A woman flitted silently behind him, paused, looked at me from over a veil, her liquid, dark eyes smiling. I swallowed, wondering if I was mistaken.
Oblivious, Brother John went on: ‘The Greek priests are furious at rumours that some deserters from the Great City’s army have come this far south on a raid. Caravans to the east, from Baghdad, have been attacked. The situation is delicate and they don’t want any excuse to let the Mussulmen and Jews loose … are you listening, boy?’
I blinked, but he had caught where I was looking. By the time he had turned, the woman had drifted into an alley out of sight.
‘Of course I am listening,’ I snapped. ‘I was thinking, that was all. It sounds like the ones who have our comrades in thrall. Did they say how many?’
Brother John shook his head. ‘Hundreds. Even allowing for rumour, there must be a fair few. No caravan would come from Baghdad these days without armed guards.’
Hundreds. Our comrades, perhaps growing fewer by the day out there in the desert with these dead-eaters, who were growing madder than the full moon’s ghost. I saw this Dark-hearted One, crouched like a wolf in a pack, gnawing on the gods knew what and the shiver lurched along my spine so that the priest saw it.
‘Just so,’ said Brother John, grimly. Then he asked me brightly what I was doing now. So I told him a lie – buying boots – while thinking of the woman and if she was still in the alley.
‘I’ll come with you then,’ he said.
‘No. Buying boots is a solitary thing, priest. Go and tell Finn and Kvasir what you know.’
He looked at me, shrugged and then moved off, seeming to glide now that he had robes that went all the way down to cover his feet. I watched him disappear round a corner, then moved slowly up the alley.
She was there, I could see, for the alley had a strong yellow lantern hung at the end of it and, if I had been thinking at all, that would have warned me, for there was nothing there save some steps up on to the first level of the tangled roofs and why would a whore want to hump in lantern light?
I had no experience of Mussulmen women, so moved cautiously, knowing only that to lower their veils was a sin, though the Bedu women did this with no shame, which was confusing. Then she shrugged her shoulders, slipped the dress off and I looked at the most beautiful breasts I had ever seen, it seemed to me. They glowed in that yellow-lit alley, tipped with dark berries and trembling. Dry-mouthed, I took a step and heard another behind me.
‘Ha!’ shouted Brother John. ‘Boots is it, then?’ He darted in front of me and raised one hand to make the sign of the cross at the woman. He started to speak as, annoyed, I was moving to thrust him aside with a curse. ‘Begone,’ he growled at her. ‘Apage Satanas.’
I was about to roar at him when the arrow struck, a dull thump of sound that pitched him forward, leaving me to gape at this strange feathered sapling which had suddenly sprouted between his shoulder blades. The woman screamed.
I knew I was next and sprang forward, smacking the lantern off its hook, so that it clattered and rolled and went one way, while I went another, into the now darkened lee of the stairs. A second arrow whirred and the woman screamed again, then I heard her fall.
Black silence and the stink of smoking fish oil from the lantern. The woman gave a gurgling moan, but Brother John was still and quiet and the surging of blood in my ears was almost as loud as my breathing. Strain as I might I could not hear anything around me.
Then there was a scuff, from above, from the rooftop the stairs led up to.
I saw a flicker of shadow. I wanted to get back to Brother John, pictured him bleeding to death, or lung-shot and gasping like a landed fish, able to be saved if help was at hand. But the killer lurked yet and I did a desperate, foolish thing: I charged up the stairs.
It took him by surprise and the arrow he had nocked hissed so close to my face that the flights flicked my cheek. I hit him then and heard him whoof out air, heard the bow clatter to the ground and then I was over and rolling, confused, across the flat roof. My elbow banged pain through me.
A shadow sprang up and leaped up a little way to another roof and I scrambled up and after him, grateful to all the gods that, as I only saw now, he had been alone. To my shame, I left Brother John, all thought of last-minute doctoring blasted away in the heat of the chase.
A dark shape – no cloak, I noted – vaulting over the lip of mud-
brick to another roof. A pot clattered and he cursed, though he mangled it, as East Norse often do. One of Starkad’s Danes, then, left to kill me in the dark.
The dark shape plunged down three short steps, fell over and cursed again. Voices yelled and figures sprang up; people, sleeping on their roofs for the cool of it, scattered as he hurled through them, cursing. I saw steel glint and so did they and they pulled apart, jabbering and yowling.
I went through them as if they were reeds and he saw me coming, though I still could not make out who he was. He slashed at someone with the knife, then ran on, leaped a fair gap and landed, stumbling, on a new roof.
I went after, landing better for I had the advantage of seeing what he had done. There were lights now, yellow flares in the darkness, as he raced down tiered rooftops. The smell of cooking hit me and I knew we were stumbling across the roofs above the Street of Poor Cooking.
He skidded to a halt, teetered for a moment, then went over the edge with a sharp cry. I got there a second later and saw him crash into the street, hit a vendor’s charcoal brazier in a spill of coals and hot oil, then sprawl in the middle of the road with a gasp and a grunt.
The vendor and his neighbours went wild, flailing the air with their arms and shrill words. They redoubled this when I landed in the middle of them, went over on my old ankle injury and crashed down in a pool of hot oil. Flames licked dangerously as the oil sludged into the dusty street, washing over spilled embers. Other screamers anxiously sprinted to scatter dust, or beat them with wet cloths.
They dragged up Brother John’s killer, then recoiled as he flashed his knife at them. One, slower than the others, staggered back, put one hand to his side and then looked at the blood on it, before screaming and staggering away, showing this horror to everyone else around. They backed away from him, too, as if he had leprosy.
Hands grabbed me, hauled me up. A black-bearded face screamed into mine, spittle lashing me. I wanted to get round him to the killer, had to find out who he was, but Black Beard belted me one in the ribs, which made me wince. I hit him back and, suddenly, they were all on me, kicking and slapping and trying to tear my clothes, so I went down and curled into a tight ball.