thrice. A trail of crescent-shaped dents followed his hand. 'I can scarce move for gorging.'
The fire was banked, and shadows walked the walls. Masrur's table-for he was master here-stood scatter-spread with the bones of small fowl.
Masrur leaned forward and squinted across the table. 'A calf,' he said. 'Fatted.' He belched absently and wiped his mouth with wine-stained sleeve.
Ibn Fahad broke off a thin, cold smile. 'We have indeed wreaked massacre on the race of pigeons, old friend.' His slim hand swept above the littered table-top. 'We have also put the elite guard of your wine cellars to flight. And, as usual, I thank you for your hospitality. But do you not sometimes wonder if there is more to life than growing fat in the service of the Caliph?'
'Hah!' Masrur goggled his eyes. 'Doing the Caliph's bidding has made me wealthy. I have made myself fat.' He smiled. The other guests laughed and whispered.
Abu Jamir, a fatter man in an equally stained robe, toppled a small tower erected from the bones of squab. 'The night is young, good Masrur!' he cried. 'Have someone fetch up more wine and let us hear some stories!'
'Baba!' Masrur bellowed. 'Come here, you old dog!'
Within three breaths an old servant stood in the doorway, looking to his sportive master with apprehension.
'Bring us the rest of the wine, Baba-or have you drunk it all?' Baba pulled at his grizzled chin. 'Ah… ah, but you drank it, Master. You and Master Ibn Fahad took the last four jars with you when you went to shoot arrows at the weathercock.'
'Just as I suspected,' Masrur nodded. 'Well, get on across the bazaar to Abu Jamir's place, wake up his manservant, and bring back several jugs. The good Jamir says we must have it now.'
Baba disappeared. The chagrined Abu Jamir was cheerfully back-thumped by the other guests.
'A story, a story!' someone shouted. 'A tale!'
'Oh, yes, a tale of your travels, Master Masrur!' This was young Hassan, sinfully drunk. No one minded. His eyes were bright, and he was full of innocent stupidity. 'Someone said you have traveled to the green lands of the north.'
'The north…?' Masrur grumbled, waving his hand as though confronted with something unclean, 'No, lad, no… that I cannot give to you.' His face clouded and he slumped back on his cushions; his tarbooshed head swayed.
Ibn Fahad knew Masrur like he knew his horses-indeed, Masrur was the only human that could claim so much of Ibn Fahad's attention. He had seen his old comrade drink twice this quantity and still dance like a dervish on the walls of Baghdad, but he thought he could guess the reason for this sudden incapacity.
'Oh, Masrur, please!' Hassan had not given up; he was as unshakeable as a young falcon with its first prey beneath its talons. 'Tell us of the north. Tell us of the infidels!'
'A good Moslem should not show such interest in unbelievers.' Abu Jamir sniffed piously, shaking the last drops from a wine jug. 'If Masrur does not wish to tell a tale, let him be.'
'Hah!' snorted the host, recovering somewhat. 'You only seek to stall me, Jamir, so that my throat shall not be so dry when your wine arrives. No, I have no fear of speaking of unbelievers: Allah would not have given them a place in the world for their own if they had not some use. Rather it is… certain other things that happened which make me hesitate.' He gazed kindly on young Hassan, who in the depths of his drunkenness looked about to cry. 'Do not despair, eggling. Perhaps it would do me good to unfold this story. I have kept the details long inside.' He emptied the dregs of another jar into his cup. 'I still feel it so strongly, though-bitter, bitter times. Why don't you tell the story, my good friend?' he said over his shoulder to Ibn Fahad. 'You played as much a part as did I.'
'No,' Ibn Fahad replied. Drunken puppy Hassan emitted a strangled cry of despair.
'But why, old comrade?' Masrur asked, pivoting his bulk to stare in amazement. 'Did the experience so chill even your heart?'
Ibn Fahad glowered. 'Because I know better. As soon as I start you will interrupt, adding details here, magnifying there, then saying: 'No, no, I cannot speak of it! Continue, old friend!' Before I have taken another breath you will interrupt me again. You know you will wind up doing all the talking, Masrur. Why do you not start from the beginning and save me my breath?'
All laughed but Masrur, who put on a look of wounded solicitousness. 'Of course, old friend,' he murmured. 'I had no idea that you harbored such grievances. Of course I shall tell the tale.' A broad wink was offered to the table. 'No sacrifice is too great for a friendship such as ours. Poke up the fire, will you, Baba? Ah, he's gone. Hassan, will you be so kind?'
When the youth was again seated Masrur took a swallow, stroked his beard, and began.
In those days [Masrur said], I myself was but a lowly soldier in the service of Harun al-Rashid, may Allah grant him health. I was young, strong, a man who loved wine more than he should-but what soldier does not?-and a good deal more trim and comely than you see me today.
My troop received a commission to accompany a caravan going north, bound for the land of the Armenites beyond the Caucassian Mountains. A certain prince of that people had sent a great store of gifts as tribute to the Caliph, inviting him to open a route for trade between his principality and our caliphate. Harun al-Rashid, wisest of wise men that he is, did not exactly make the camels groan beneath the weight of the gifts that he sent in return; but he sent several courtiers, including the under-vizier Walid al-Salameh, to speak for him and to assure this Armenite prince that rich rewards would follow when the route over the Caucassians was opened for good.
We left Baghdad in grand style, pennants flying, the shields of the soldiers flashing like golden dinars, and the Caliph's gifts bundled onto the backs of a gang of evil, contrary donkeys.
We followed the banks of the faithful Tigris, resting several days at Mosul, then continued through the eastern edge of Anatolia. Already as we mounted northward the land was beginning to change, the clean sands giving way to rocky hills and scrub. The weather was colder, and the skies gray, as though Allah's face was turned away from that country, but the men were not unhappy to be out from under the desert sun. Our pace was good; there was not a hint of danger except the occasional wolf howling at night beyond the circles of the campfires. Before two months had passed we had reached the foothills of the Caucassians-what is called the steppe country.
For those of you who have not strayed far from our Baghdad, I should tell you that the northern lands are like nothing you have seen. The trees there grow so close together you could not throw a stone five paces without striking one. The land itself seems always dark-the trees mask the sun before the afternoon is properly finished-and the ground is damp. But, in truth, the novelty of it fades quickly, and before long it seems that the smell of decay is always with you. We caravaneers had been over eight weeks a-traveling, and the bite of homesickness was strong, but we contented ourselves with the thought of the accommodations that would be ours when we reached the palace of the prince, laden as we were with our Caliph's good wishes-and the tangible proof thereof.
We had just crossed the high mountain passes and begun our journey down when disaster struck.
We were encamped one night in a box canyon, a thousand steep feet below the summit of the tall Caucassian peaks. The fires were not much but glowing coals, and nearly all the camp was asleep except for two men standing sentry. I was wrapped in my bedroll, dreaming of how I would spend my earnings, when a terrible shriek awakened me. Sitting groggily upright, I was promptly knocked down by some bulky thing tumbling onto me. A moment's horrified examination showed that it was one of the sentries, throat pierced with an arrow, eyes bulging with his final surprise. Suddenly there was a chorus of howls from the hillside above. All I could think of was wolves, that the wolves were coming down on us; in my witless state I could make no sense of the arrow at all.
Even as the others sprang up around me the camp was suddenly filled with leaping, whooping shadows. Another arrow hissed past my face in the darkness, and then something crashed against my bare head, filling the nighttime with a great splash of light that illuminated nothing. I fell back, insensible.
I could not tell how long I had journeyed in that deeper darkness when I was finally roused by a sharp boot prodding at my ribcage.
I looked up at a tall, cruel figure, cast by the cloud-curtained morning sun in bold silhouette. As my sight became accustomed I saw a knife-thin face, dark-browed and fierce, with mustachios long as a Tartar herdsman's. I felt sure that whoever had struck me had returned to finish the job, and I struggled weakly to pull my dagger from my sash. This terrifying figure merely lifted one of his pointy boots and trod delicately on my wrist, saying in perfect Arabic: 'Wonders of Allah, this is the dirtiest man I have ever seen.'
It was Ibn Fahad, of course. The caravan had been of good size, and he had been riding with the Armenite and the under-vizier-not back with the hoi polloi-so we had never spoken. Now you see how we first truly met: me on my back, covered with mud, blood, and spit; and Ibn Fahad standing over me like a rich man examining carrots in the bazaar. Infamy!
Ibn Fahad had been blessed with what I would come later to know as his usual luck. When the bandits-who must have been following us for some days-came down upon us in the night, Ibn Fahad had been voiding his bladder some way downslope. Running back at the sound of the first cries, he had sent more than a few mountain bandits down to Hell courtesy of his swift sword, but they were too many. He pulled together a small group of survivors from the main party and they fought their way free, then fled along the mountain in the darkness listening to the screams echoing behind them, cursing their small numbers and ignorance of the country.
Coming back in the light of day to scavenge for supplies, as well as ascertain the nature of our attackers, Ibn Fahad had found me-a fact he has never allowed me to forget, and for which
I have never allowed him to evade responsibility.
While my wounds and bandit-spites were doctored, Ibn Fahad introduced me to the few survivors of our once-great caravan.
One was Susri al-Din-a cheerful lad, fresh-faced and smooth-cheeked as young Hassan here, dressed in the robes of a rich merchant's son. The soldiers who had survived rather liked him, and called him 'Fawn,' to tease him for his wide-eyed good looks. There was a skinny wretch of a chief-clerk named Abdallah, purse-mouthed and iron-eyed, and an indecently plump young mullah, who had just left the madrasa and was getting a rather rude introduction to life outside the seminary. Ruad, the mullah, looked as though he would prefer to be drinking and laughing with the soldiers-besides myself and Ibn Fahad there were four or five more of these-while Abdallah the prim-faced clerk looked as though he should be the one who never lifted his head out of the Koran. Well, in a way that was true, since for a man like Abdallah the balance book is the Holy Book, may Allah forgive such blasphemy.
There was one other, notable for the extreme richness of his robes, the extreme whiteness of his beard, and the vast weight of his personal jewelry-Walid al- Salameh, the under-vizier to His Eminence the Caliph Harun al-Rashid. Walid was the most important man of the whole party. He was also, surprisingly, not a bad fellow at all.
So there we found ourselves, the wrack of the Caliph's embassy, with no hope but to try and find our way back home through a strange, hostile land.
The upper reaches of the Caucassians are a cold and godless place. The fog is thick and wet; it crawls in of the morning, leaves briefly at the time the sun is high,
