Monsoon

by Wilbur Smith

  He rebound his wounds, found that the bleeding had stopped, and that black scabs had formed. Then he tightened the straps of his sandals, and spread the shawl over his head to fend off the brutal sunlight. Without looking back at Ibrisam he struck out along the tracks of the Prince’s party, towards a horizon that was already wavering with the blue heat mirage.

  An hour or so later he fell for the first time. His legs seemed to turn to water under him and he went down face first. His open mouth was filled with dry chalky earth, and he almost choked as he tried to spit it out. There was no saliva left in his mouth, and the dust was sucked into his lungs as he panted for air. He struggled into a sitting position, coughed and gasped. The effort saved him from sinking into coma. He wiped his face with the tail of his headdress and there was no spittle on his lips or sweat on his face. He forced himself back on to his feet. Though he lurched and staggered, almost fell again, he kept himself upright and some little strength returned to his legs.

  He walked on and the sunlight burned deep into his eyes, seeming to cook the contents of his skull. He felt his dry lips tear like parchment as he tried to swallow, and there was the slow metallic weep of salty blood into his mouth.

  The pain and thirst slowly receded, and he entered that dreamlike state where there was no feeling. He heard music, sweet and melodious. He stopped and looked about him blearily, saw Tom and Yasmini standing together on the crest of the slope he was climbing. They were both waving and laughing.

  ‘Don’t be a baby, Dorry!’ Tom shouted.

  ‘Come on, Dowie.’ Yasmini danced like a dainty elf beside him, swirling her skirts. He had forgotten how pretty she was. ‘Come with me, Dowie, I will take you down the Angel’s Road again.’

  Dorian broke into a shambling, unsteady run, and the pair on the hill turned and waved at him before they disappeared over the crest. He felt as though each pace he took was through deep loose sand, and he stumbled over a rock, had to windmill his arms to prevent himself falling, but he reached the crest and looked down into the valley beyond.

  He stared in amazement, for the valley was filled with green trees laden with ripe, red fruit, and there were fields of lush English grass leading down to a lake of sparkling water. Tom had gone, but Yasmini stood naked at the edge of the lake. Her body was sleek and slim, her skin a lovely golden shade and her hair, with its silver blaze, rippled down to her waist. Her little apple-shaped breasts peered shyly through the shimmering curtain of her hair. ‘Dowie!’ she called, and her voice was as sweet as the dawn call of a desert thrush. ‘Dowie, I have waited for you so long.’

  He tried to run down to her, but his legs gave way again and he fell. He was too weary to lift his head. ‘Just let me sleep a little, Yassie,’ he pleaded, but no sound came from his swollen throat, and his tongue seemed to fill his mouth and cleave to the roof.

  With another huge effort he opened his eyes, and with a terrible sense of loss he realized that Yasmini and the lake were gone. There was only the harsh, burning wilderness below him, rock, thorn and sand. He rolled over to look back down the hill and saw the patrol of Ottoman cavalry. They were coursing along his back track, fifty men on racing camels, still two sea miles behind him, but coming on apace. He knew that they, at least, were not phantoms.

  He crawled a short way on hands and knees, then launched himself to his feet. His knees buckled but he fought off the weakness, and staggered over the crest of the hill. The gradient helped him to run on.

  He heard the music again, but now it filled the heavens: hundreds of voices were singing. He lifted his eyes and saw the heavenly choir, a throng of angels clustered around the sun, so glorious that they starred his vision like the reflections from the facets of a great diamond.

  ‘Come to God!’ they sang. ‘Surrender yourself to the Will of God!’

  ‘Yes!’ he mumbled, and the sound of his own voice was strange in his ears, coming from a great distance. ‘Yes, I am ready.’

  As he said it, a miracle occurred. God appeared to him. God was tall, he wore a robe of blinding white and the rays of the sun behind his head formed a golden nimbus. His countenance was beautiful, noble, handsome and filled with great compassion. God lifted his right hand in a gesture of blessing, and his eyes were filled with love as he looked down at Dorian. Dorian felt as though God’s strength was flowing into his body, charging his soul with an infinite sense of holiness and reverence. He fell to his knees and used this new strength to shout aloud, ‘I bear witness that there is no God but God, and Muhammad is His Prophet!’

  God’s beautiful face shone with benevolence. He strode forward, lifted Dorian to his feet and embraced him, kissed his blackened, bleeding lips.

  ‘My son!’ God said, but he spoke with the voice of Prince Abd Muhammad al-Malik. ‘Your acceptance of the one true faith fills my heart with joy. Now the prophecy fulfils itself, and I give thanks to God that we have found you in time.’

  Dorian sagged in the Prince’s arms and al-Malik shouted to the men who followed him closely, ‘Water! Batula, bring water.’

  Batula squeezed cool, sweet water from a sponge between Dorian’s lips and lifted him onto the litter they had prepared for this moment. A dozen men of the Awamir raised it onto the back of one of the baggage camels.

  High on the swaying litter, Dorian rolled his head and, through bloodshot eyes, between swollen lids, saw the hordes of the Awamir coming across the plain.

  Then, on the skyline above, the Turkish patrol appeared and reined in their camels in their own dustcloud. They gazed down in astonishment, and sudden trepidation, on the army of the Awamir.

  A great shout of ‘Allah akbar!’ went up from the ranks of the Awamir, they couched their long lances, and swept forward to battle. The Turks turned and fled before them.

  Dorian sagged back on the litter, closed his eyes and let the darkness overwhelm him.

  There were almost six thousand fighting men in the column of Awamir that streamed back through the Pass of the Bright Gazelle. The salt flats beyond the pass were clear of the enemy. Their scouts had reported the approach of the Prince’s army and they had fled back into the north towards Muscat.

  Al-Malik paused at the pass to give decent burial to the broken bodies of the Saar who had died there. Dorian was still too weak and sick to rise from his litter, but he had Batula and four others carry him to the graveside, and for the first time he prayed as a Muslim in the community of other believers as they recited the prayer for the dead.

  Then the army went on across the salt flats to the bitter wells at Ghail ya Yamin, where the warriors of the Saar had already assembled, adding another three thousand lances to the Prince’s array.

  The sheikhs of the Saar came to the tent where Dorian lay that night, crowded around his litter and demanded that he tell them every detail of the fight at the Pass of the Bright Gazelle. They interrupted the recitation with exclamations of wonder as he told them how each of the Saar had died, the fathers and brothers of the dead men weeping with pride.

  ‘By Allah, a fight in which Hassan would have been happy to die!’

  ‘In God’s Name, Salim was a man.’

  ‘Allah will prepare a place in Paradise for my son, Mustapha.’

  They were fierce for war and revenge, for the blood feud could be settled only in blood, and they spat in the sand and swore their oaths of retribution against Zayn al-Din and the Turks. In his heart Dorian swore the same oaths with them.

  Then each noon and evening that the army camped at Ghail ya Yamin they came again to his tent to hear the story repeated, and they corrected Dorian if he left out a single detail, pleading with him to remember every blow and shot, and exactly what each of the Saar had done and said before he died.

  From Ghail ya Yamin, the army set out north on the next leg of the long journey to Muscat. At each well and pass through the mountains the other tribes came to join them, the Balhaf and the Afar, the Bait Kathir and the Harasis, so that by the time they reached Muqaibara they were fiftee
n thousand lances together, a mighty host that spread back ten miles across the desert.

  Batula whispered the story of Dorian’s conversion to one of his companions. No Arab could keep a secret, certainly not one as poignant as this, and the tale was told around every camp-fire, and the warriors repeated the prophecy of the ancient St Taimtaim, for many had read the text of it on the walls of his tomb. They debated it endlessly and swore in God’s Name that al-Salil was verily the orphan of the prophecy, and that with him in their company the victory was assured. Before Ramadan came again, they would install Prince Abd Muhammad al-Malik on the Elephant Throne in the halls of Muscat.

  In the weeks that it took the army to travel from Ghail ya Yamin to Muqaibara, Dorian’s injuries healed cleanly, for in the desert there are no evil humours to make wounds corrupt and mortify. When he was ready to take his place in the ranks once more, the Prince sent for him. As he strode through the encampment every tribe cheered him and followed him to the tent of the Prince. They massed around the open doorway as Dorian knelt before al-Malik and asked of him, ‘Give me your blessing, Father.’

  ‘You have my gratitude and my blessing, son, and much more besides.’ Al-Malik clapped his hands, and Batula led forward four beautiful thoroughbred racing camels. Each was richly caparisoned and carried lance, sword and jezail in the scabbards on their backs. ‘This is my gift to you, to repay in a small coin what you lost at the Pass of the Bright Gazelle.’

  ‘I thank you for your generosity, Father, though I look for no reward for what was only my duty.’

  Al-Malik clapped his hands again, and two heavily veiled old women of the Saar came to Dorian and laid a bundle of folded silk at his feet. ‘These are the mothers of Hassan and Salim, who died at the pass,’ the Prince explained. ‘They have begged me for the honour of sewing and embroidering your battle pennant.’

  The women spread out the banner upon the floor of the tent. It was six feet long, of azure blue silk, and embroidered upon it, in silver metal thread, was the prophecy of St Taimtaim. The elegant script flowed and swirled upon the silken ground, like the currents and whirlpools in the surface of a swift blue river.

  ‘Father, this is the pennant of a sheikh,’ Dorian protested.

  ‘And that is what you are now.’ Al-Malik smiled fondly at him. ‘I have raised you to that rank. I know that you will bear it with honour.’

  Dorian stood up and held the banner high above his head, then ran with it out into the sunlight. The crowds opened before him, shouted their acclamation and fired their muskets in the air. The banner streamed out behind Dorian, like a blue serpent on the wind. He came back to the Prince’s tent and prostrated himself before him. ‘You do me too much honour, lord.’

  ‘In the coming battle, you shall command the left flank, Sheikh al-Salil,’ the Prince told him. ‘I shall place four thousand lances under your pennant.’

  Dorian sat up and looked gravely into the Prince’s eyes. ‘Father, may I speak to you in secrecy?’

  Al-Malik gestured for the leather sides of the tent to be lowered, for al-Allama and his retinue to retire and leave the two of them together. ‘What more do you ask of me, my son?’ Al-Malik leaned closer to him. ‘Speak, and you shall have it.’

  In reply Dorian spread the azure banner and traced with his finger the words of the prophecy. ‘“He shall bring together the sands of the desert which are divided,”’ he read aloud.

  ‘Continue,’ the Prince ordered, frowning. ‘I do not know your meaning.’

  ‘It seems that the holy saint placed a further duty upon me. It comes to me that when he speaks of the sands of the desert, the saint was speaking of the tribes who are divided and at war with each other.’

  Now the Prince nodded. ‘This may well be true,’ he admitted. ‘Although most of the tribes have come to us, the Masakara, the Harth and the Bani Bu Hasan still beat the war drum for Yaqub and the Sublime Porte.’

  ‘Let me go to them under this banner,’ Dorian pleaded. ‘Let them see the colour of my hair, and I shall debate the prophecy with them. Then, if Allah is kind, I shall bring over another ten thousand lances to your side.’

  ‘No!’ Al-Malik started up in alarm. ‘The Masakara are treacherous. They will disembowel you and peg you out in the sun. I cannot allow you to run such a risk.’

  ‘I have fought against them,’ Dorian said softly. ‘They must accord me the respect of an honourable foe. If I came to them alone and placed myself in their power as a traveller, then they dare not go against the teachings of the Prophet. They must listen to what I have to say to them.’

  The Prince looked unhappy, and stroked his beard in agitation, but what Dorian had said was true. The Prophet had placed a duty of host on his believers. They were obliged to protect the traveller in their midst. ‘Still, I cannot allow you to place yourself in such jeopardy,’ he said at last.

  Dorian argued, ‘One life at risk, but ten thousand lances as the stake. Father, you cannot deny me this chance to fulfil my destiny as it is written.’

  At last the Prince sighed. ‘How can the Masakara prevail against your eloquence? I cannot. You may go to them, al-Salil, as my emissary. But I swear on the red beard of the Prophet that if they harm you in any way there will be such a lopping of heads as will gorge every vulture in Araby until they cannot fly.’

  At sunset the following evening the Prince sat alone on a rock on the crest of a low hill beyond the oasis. Four camels slipped out of the encampment of the army and rode past his hilltop, heading northwards into the purple shadows. Dorian rode the first, leading the second on a long rein. Batula followed him, also leading a second camel. Both men were veiled. When he looked up at the Prince, Dorian dipped his lance in salute and the Prince lifted his right hand in blessing.

  Then Abd Muhammad al-Malik watched them ride away into the wilderness, his expression sad and bereft. It was dark and the stars were a blaze of glory overhead when at last he rose from the rock on which he was sitting and went down towards the glow of the camp-fires that filled the wide valley of Muqaibara.

  In the cool season, when the winds came off the sea, in the month before the feast of Ramadan, the army of al-Malik lay before Muscat and watched the Ottoman and the host of tribes loyal to the Caliph come out in battle array to meet them.

  Al-Malik sat with his staff under a leather awning on a promontory that jutted out into the plain, his own army drawn up beneath him. He raised the long brass telescope to his eye and studied the formations of the enemy as they evolved before him. The Turks were in the centre, their cavalry squadrons in the van, and their camel men behind.

  ‘How many?’ he asked the men around him, who argued as though they were counting goats at a market.

  ‘Twelve thousand Turks,’ they decided at last. The centre glittered with bronze and steel, the green banners of the Sublime Porte waved and flapped in the sea breeze, the cavalry squadrons cantered forward then settled into a solid phalanx ready to advance to the attack.

  ‘And the Masakara?’ the Prince asked. ‘How many?’ They were on the right flank, a milling throng of camel men, restless as a flock of starlings.

  ‘Six, seven thousand,’ said a sheikh of the Harasis.

  ‘At least that many,’ said another. ‘Perhaps more.’

  Al-Malik looked to the other flank of the enemy where the black veils and headdresses marked them as the Bani Bu Hasan and the Harth. They were the wolves of the desert and there were as many of them as there were of the Masakara.

  Al-Malik tasted once again the bitter gall of disappointment in the back of his throat. They were outnumbered almost two to one. Al-Salil had failed in his attempt to bring over the northern tribes: al-Malik had heard nothing of him since he had vanished into the desert almost two moons ago. He knew in his heart that they had miscalculated, that he should never have sent al-Salil to them. Every day he had dreaded receiving a gift from the Masakara, the severed head of his red-haired son in a leather bag. Although the grisly trophy had not arrived,
the proof of his failure was out on the plain: almost fifteen thousand rebel lances drawn up against him.

  Suddenly there was a disturbance along the centre of the Turkish line. Despatch riders galloped forward with orders from the Ottoman staff, and the horns sounded the advance. The Turkish cavalry moved forward, rank upon rank, rippling with sunlight off their accoutrements, but the Arab formations on the flanks held their positions, and allowed gaps to open in the front. This was unusual, and through his telescope the Prince watched with a sudden, keener interest.

  There was another commotion among the enemy, and this time the staff gallopers sped out from the Turkish command in the centre, waving their arms, clearly urging their Arab allies to join in the general advance and close the dangerous gaps in the front.

  Then at last the Arab formations began to move, but they wheeled right and left, towards the centre, where the Turks stood uncertainly, confused by this unexpected evolution.

  ‘In the sweet Name of God,’ whispered al-Malik, and he felt his heart swell so that his breath came short.

  In the centre of the front rank of the Masakara he saw a strange new banner unfurl, carried by a tall rider on a honey-coloured thoroughbred camel. He turned his glass upon this warrior and saw that the banner was azure blue, shot through with gleaming silver script, and as he stared in wonder the rider threw off his headdress and couched his lance. His hair was red-gold and his lance was aimed at the Turkish flank.

  ‘Allah! All praise to Allah! Al-Salil has done it. He has turned the rebel tribes to our cause.’

  As he stared in wonder, the Arab formations on either flank of the Turks started forward, catching the Ottoman in enfilade, closing upon them like a fist of steel.