The Second Empire

Ramusian novitiate it seemed perfectly adequate. He had a bed with a straw pallet which was surprisingly free of vermin, a small table and rickety chair and even a stub of candle and a tinderbox. There was one small window, heavily barred and set so high up in the wall that he had no chance of ever seeing out of it, but at least it provided a modicum of light.

He shared his cell with sundry spiders and an emaciated rat whose hunger had made it desperate. It had nibbled at Albrec’s ears in the first nights he had been here, but now he knew to set aside for it some morsel of the food which was shoved through a slot in the door every day, and it had come to await the approaching steps of the turnkey more eagerly than he. The food was not appetising—black bread and old cheese and sometimes a bowl of cold soup which had lumps of gristle bobbing in it—but Albrec had never been much of an epicure. Besides, he had much to occupy his mind.

Every so often his solitary reveries were interrupted by a summons from the Sultan, and he would be hauled out of the cell, to the grief and bewilderment of the rat, and taken to the spacious chambers within which Aurungzeb had set up his household. The eunuchs would fetter him ceremoniously—more for effect than anything else, he thought—and he would stand in a discreet corner awaiting the pleasure of the Sultan. Sometimes he was left forgotten for hours, and was able to watch with avid fascination the workings of the Merduk court. Sometimes Aurungzeb was dining with senior army officers, or venerable mullahs, and Albrec would be called upon to debate with them and expound his theory on the common origin of the Saint and the Prophet. The Sultan, it seemed, liked to shock his guests with the little infidel. Not only were Albrec’s words, often translated by the western concubine, Heria, inflammatory and blasphemous, but his appearance was agreeably bizarre. He was a court jester, but he knew that his words and theories shook some of the men who listened to them. Several of the mullahs had demanded he be executed at once, but others had argued with him as one might with a learnt adversary—a spectacle that Aurungzeb seemed to find hugely entertaining.

He thought about Avila sometimes, and about Macrobius, and could not help but wonder how things were in the Torunnan capital. But for some reason he thought mostly about the cavalry officer he had once briefly encountered outside the walls of Torunn. Corfe Cear-Inaf, now the commander-in-chief of all the Torunnan armies. The Sultan seemed obsessed by him, though to the Merduks he was known only as the leader of the scarlet cavalry. They had not yet learnt his name. Albrec gained the impression that the Merduk army in general existed in a state of constant apprehension, awaiting the descent of the terrible red horsemen upon them. Hence the current emphasis on fortification.

And Heria, the Sultan’s chief concubine, pregnant by him and soon to become his queen—she could very well be this Corfe Cear-Inaf’s lost wife. Albrec locked that knowledge deep within himself and resolved never to divulge it to anyone. It would wreck too many lives. It might even tip the balance of the war. Let this Torunnan general remain nameless.

And yet—and yet the despair in her eyes was so painful to behold. Might she not take some comfort from the fact that her husband was alive and well? On this matter Albrec was torn. He was afraid he might inflict further pain on someone who had already suffered so much. What good would it do her anyway? The situation was like some ethics problem set for him during his novitiate. The choice between two courses of action, both ambiguous in their outcome, but one somehow more spiritually correct than the other. Except here he held in his hands the power to make or break lives.

A clamour of keys and clicking locks at his door announced another summons. The rat glanced once at him and then bolted for its hole. It was not mealtime. Albrec sat on the edge of his bed. It was very late; unusual for him to be wanted at this hour.

But when the door swung open it was not the familiar figure of the turnkey who stood there, but a Merduk mullah, a richly dressed man with a beard as broad as a spade, and the cloaked and veiled figure of a woman. They entered his cell without a word and shut the door behind them.

The woman doffed her veil for a brief second to let him see her face. It was Heria. The mullah sat down upon Albrec’s solitary chair without ceremony. His face was familiar. Albrec had spoken to him before at a dinner.

“Mehr Jirah,” the mullah said. And in heavily accented Normannic: “We talk four—five days—” He looked appealingly at Heria.

“You and Mehr Jirah spoke last week,” she said smoothly. “He wished to speak to you again, in private. The guards have been bribed, but we do not have much time and his Normannic is sparse, so I will interpret.”

“By all means,” Albrec said. “I appreciate his visiting me.”

The mullah spoke in his own tongue now, and after a moment’s thought Heria translated. Albrec thought he sensed a smile behind the veil.

“First he asks if you are a madman.”

Albrec chuckled. “You know the answer to that, lady. Some have labelled me an eccentric, though.”

Again, the speech in Merduk, her interpretation of it.

“He is an elder in the Hraib of the Kurasin in the Sultanate of Danrimir. He wants to know if your claims about the Prophet are mere devilment, or if they are based on any kind of evidence.”

Albrec’s heart quickened. “I told him when we spoke before that they are based on an ancient document which I believe to be genuine. I would not make such claims if I did not believe in my soul that they are true. A man’s beliefs are not something to make a jest out of.”

When this was translated Mehr Jirah nodded approvingly. He seemed then to hesitate for a long while, his head bent upon his breast. One hand stroked his voluminous beard. At last he sighed and made a long speech in Merduk. When he had finished Heria stared at him, then collected herself and rendered it into Normannic in a voice filled with wonder.

“The Kurasin are an old tribe, one of the oldest of all the Merduk Hraib. They had the privilege of being the first of the eastern peoples to hear the preachings of the Prophet Ahrimuz, almost five centuries ago. They hold a tradition that the Prophet crossed the Jafrar Mountains from the west, alone, on a mule, and that he was a pale-skinned man who did not speak their tongue but whose holiness and learning were self-evident. He dwelled with the Kurasin for five years before travelling on northwards to the lands of the Kambak Hraib. In this way the True Faith came to the Merduk peoples: through this one man they deemed a Prophet sent by God, who came out of the west.”

Albrec and the mullah looked at one another as Heria finished translating. In the Merduk cleric’s eyes was a mixture of fear and confusion, but Albrec felt uplifted.

“So he believes me then.”

Merduk and Normannic. A long, halting speech by Mehr Jirah. Heria spoke more swiftly now. “He is not sure. But he has studied some of the books which were saved from the Library of Gadorian Hagus in Aekir. Many of the sayings of St Ramusio and the Prophet Ahrimuz are the same, down to the very parables they used to illustrate their teachings. Perhaps the two men knew each other, or Ramusio was a student of Ahrimuz—”

“They were one and the same. He knows that. I can see it in his eyes.”

When this was translated there was a long silence. Mehr Jirah looked deeply troubled. He spoke in a low voice without looking at Albrec.

“He says you speak the truth. But what would you have him do about it?”

“This truth is worth more than our lives. It must be declared publicly, whatever the consequences. The Prophet said that a man’s soul suffers a kind of death every time he tells a lie. There have been five centuries of lies. It is enough.”

“And your people, the Ramusians, will they wish to hear the truth also?”

“They are beginning to hear it. The head of my faith in Torunn, Macrobius, he believes it. It is only a matter of time before men start to accept it. This war must end. Merduks and Ramusians are brothers in faith and should not be slaying one another. Their God is the same God, and his messenger was a single man who enlightened us all.”

Mehr Jirah rose.

“He will think upon your words. He will think about what to do next.”

“Do not think too long,” Albrec said, rising also.

“We must go.” The Merduk opened the cell door. As he was about to leave he turned and spoke one last time.

“Why were we chosen to do this thing, do you think?”