The Khalifah's Mirror Page 7

  And there was no filthier place to be, on that filthy day in that filthy year, than Atil-Khazaran, capital of the Khaganate of the Khazars. They are nomads, the Khazars, by tradition and by inclination, and no amount of wealth and empire has brought them to an appreciation of the refinements of urban living. Atil is not so much a city as an overgrown trading camp, a noisy huddle of yurts that has taken root on the coast of the Qazvin sea and run wild. Its streets are unpaved, and churned to mud by the horses which act as the nomads’ transport and which are also their currency, their tools, their livestock and their companions.

  There are few solid buildings in Atil. Their construction is not forbidden as such, but is nearly impossible in a land with no architects, no masons or brickmakers, not even quarries for the raw materials. The synagogue had started out as a particularly large felt tent, then over time had acquired a kind of shell, of ill-assorted timber and stone, which gave it a veneer of permanence. Of course it could not accommodate all the Jews of Atil, who numbered in their thousands, but it served as a centre for important ceremonies, and a meeting place for the elders in times of trouble.

  I pushed aside a door of oxhide stretched over a wooden frame, and ducked into the yurt. The orange glow of the fire hindered rather than helped my attempts to pierce the darkness within. I pulled the crud-caked boots from my feet, then, without thinking, the leather riding cap from my head.

  “There is no need to remove your footwear — this is not a masjid — although I am grateful for the sake of our carpets. However I would prefer you to leave your hat on.”

  “Rabbi ha-Sangari?”

  He was a small man, both in stature and in girth. He had the long nose of his people, and dark hair which fell in locks not unlike my own. His eyes examined me busily, though his mien was not unfriendly.

  “You are welcome to our temple, Abu Ali al-Hakami.”

  My sight had cleared, now, and I took in my surroundings. The fire sat at the centre of the circular tent, so that the smoke could rise through the wooden lattice above. On the other side of the hearth was a wooden platform with a bookstand, and a plain chest where the holy scriptures were kept.

  Ha-Sangari led me across the synagogue floor, which was strewn with grubby but dry carpets. A few men sat around in two and threes, deep in muttered discussions. I had expected to meet the rabbi privately, but the fact that we were not alone paradoxically made me feel safer, less conspicuous. We seated ourselves away from the other men, and away from the walls that might have hidden an eavesdropper. Nonetheless I spoke cautiously.

  “Tell me about the shaman.”

  “His name is Papatzys. Much more than that, I cannot tell you. I do not know why the Romans are so interested in him, but their agents have been going around the city offering gold for information about him.”

  “This shaman, he is a priest of some kind?”

  “Of some kind. He is a go-between, an intermediary who can cross the boundary between this world and that of the spirits. In order to be initiated, the shaman must die, travel to the spirit realm, then return to his body. Once he has made this journey, he can come and go as he pleases, seeking in the other world succour and guidance for his people. It is to the shaman, rather than the physician, that we look to for healing at times of sickness.”

  “We? You mean the Jews?”

  “No, I mean we Khazars.”

  “But you are not a Khazar. You are a Jew.”

  “A Jew, and a Khazar. Anybody can be a Khazar. You do not have to be a hairy horseman herding on the plains, or to worship the sky god. You just need to live in Khazar lands, and under Khazar law, and pay a tithe of your trade. It’s the secret of our success. I was born here, therefore I am a Khazar.”

  “But you are what they call a Black Khazar, are you not?”

  Ha-Sangari smiled ruefully, as though I had exposed an embarrassing family secret, a mad grandmother or an uncle who should not be left alone with children.

  “I see that you have not come to our lands entirely unprepared. Yes, I, like the great majority of my compatriots, am a Black Khazar. The White Khazars, with their pale skin and red hair, are a small elite within our nation, who only marry from within their own ranks.”

  “Then your society is not as equitable as you like to imply. You are permitted to pay taxes, but could never aspire to high office. And surely, as a Jew, you cannot put your health in the hands of these fraudulent shamans? Is your God not a jealous God, who will punish your children to the third and fourth generation if you worship false idols?”

  The rabbi shrugged.

  “The sky god Tengri is the creator, the supreme deity. In the language of the Khazars his name is used to refer to the God of the Jews and the Muslims. Perhaps he is the one true God, only seen from a different perspective. Perhaps, what they call spirits, I would describe as the Malakhim, the Cherubim and Seraphim and other messengers of God.”

  It seemed to me that ha-Sangari was an odd choice to represent the Jewish faith at the disputation. I doubted that the rabbis of Jerusalem would look kindly on his unorthodox indulgence of the local pagan deities.

  What really surprised me, though, was that the Jews had chosen a mere local teacher as their spokesman at the disputation. To speak for the true faith of Islam, the Khalifah had nominated Abu Yusuf, Baghdad’s foremost authority on holy scripture. It was as a reluctant member of Abu Yusuf’s entourage that I had come to Atil-Khazaran. The Christians, too, had sent a famous scholar from New Rome to argue for their creed: one Brother Theodore, from the monastery of Stoudios.

  The Jews, however, were scattered through the world, with no land to call their own, and no Khalifah or Emperor to elect their representative. The bek must have delivered his summons to the most prominent local rabbi, who, in the absence of any central authority, simply decided to answer it himself.

  “So the Romans are looking for a shaman. What does this have to do with me?”

  “I hear that you, too, are looking for somebody.”

  “Your sources are good, rabbi. I seek a Roman agent, a man known as al-Sifr.”

  “Al-Sifr: the Void? A curious name. What does he look like, this al-Sifr?”

  “That, rabbi, is the problem. Al-Sifr is a spy, an assassin, saboteur and subversive. It is said that he was once a performer in ritual storytelling, the theatron, and that he can take on the guise of anyone that suits his purpose: old or young, man or woman. We do not know his real name or appearance, and so we call him al-Sifr: the Void, the Nothing.”

  “So you are hunting for a man, but have no name or description, and cannot even be sure that he is a man at all? I admire your optimism, but do not envy you your task. Well, perhaps you will discover him by his deeds. Whatever the Romans are up to, it seems likely that he is behind it. Find the shaman Papatzys, and you may find al-Sifr.”

  I took my leave of ha-Sangari, and set off back to our camp. It is not always easy to find your way, in a city without permanent structures. Of course most of the tents had been in place years, or, like the synagogue, decades; but all the dwellings were portable, at least in theory. It was not unknown for significant landmarks to disappear overnight. I found myself relying on tricks I had learned in the desert, simply to navigate through the streets. Mud sucked at my feet, and my legs were weary by the time I got back.

  “Peace be upon you, Father of Locks. I suppose I would regret it, if I were to ask you where you have been?”

  Abu Yusuf the Qadi was an unpredictable man. At times he was so deep in his learning that he seemed to speak from a great distance away. On occasion, however, he could be sharp as a needle. I said nothing in response, but gestured with my eyebrows. Sighing, the qadi sent away the slaves and attendants, so that the three of us were left in the yurt: Abu Yusuf, myself, and Ilig the Khazar.

  I had been surprised when Ja’far al-Barmaki ordered his bodyguard to travel with us. Ostensibly he was with us as guide and interpreter, but he rarely spoke, and in truth there was little need for him to
do so. The disparate peoples of the khaganate used Arabic as their common tongue, not the Khazar language, just as they used dinars and dirhams minted in Baghdad as their currency.

  The real reason Ja’far had ordered him to accompany us, I suspected, was so that he could keep an eye on me. Ilig himself seemed to resent being away from his master, and his surliness suggested he blamed me for it. I tried to ignore him and addressed Abu Yusuf, as we settled on a carpet near to the hearth at the centre of the yurt.

  “This morning I received a messenger from Yitzhak ha-Sangari, the Jewish speaker at the disputation. He said he had some information that might be of interest to me…”

  I told him about my meeting with the rabbi, and about the shaman Papatzys. The qadi listened to me intently, then sat back with eyebrows raised.

  “I see. And if the rabbi has this valuable intelligence about a Roman plot, why has he divulged it to you, instead of taking it to the bek himself, and gaining favour for the Jewish cause?”

  I was dumbfounded. The scholar had seen the angle, where the spy had seen only opportunity. I gaped foolishly, and Abu Yusuf shook his head.

  “No, Abu Ali. I agreed to have you join my party, in place of a more learned man, because Ja’far al-Barmaki wished it. However I will not permit you to get involved in this kind of sordid intrigue. You will not jeopardise our entire mission, and the souls of millions, for the sake of the Barmakid’s politicking.”

  I began to protest, but he silenced me with a gesture.

  “That is my final word on the matter. We will convert these people to the true faith because it is true, and we will demonstrate it to be so, and because God will help us. If the Romans resort to such duplicity, they will be punished for it in the end. And if we do not prevail, then it is because God does not will it to be so. It is not for us to question his judgement.”

  He stood up.

  “Come. We must prepare for the disputation.”

  We spent the rest of the day in the communal yurt, poring over the qadi’s speech, checking each scriptural reference and debating the resonance of every word. Even though there were a dozen scholars, scribes and students gathered around, Abu Yusuf made a point of consulting me often. I suspected that he was making sure I had not crept away to find the shaman. I had to wait until after the night-time prayer, when everyone had bedded down and the yurt was filled with snoring, grunts and farts, before I could slip out.

  I was hopping around on the track outside, trying to pull my boots on, when a voice disturbed me, causing me to tumble over in the mud.

  “If you are going to sneak around at night, you had better be coming to visit me.”

  I was pleased to see that it was Abu Lu’lu’ah; but then, I was generally pleased to see Abu Lu’lu’ah. In repose his oval face resembled a pearl, so bright and smooth and shapely it was. When he smiled, however, the pearl warmed, and his eyes danced with wit and fun.

  He was a young scholar, who had been studying under Abu Yusuf in Baghdad, and had shown such promise that he had been selected to accompany him to the land of the Khazars. I cannot imagine what the strict qadi would have done, had he seen what I was teaching his pupil on the long journey north. Although, in my defence, Abu Lu’lu’ah taught me a few things, when we were able to escape camp together and meet up beyond the firelight.

  I picked myself up and strolled over to him, trying to appear nonchalant despite dripping with mud. I raised a hand to stroke that lustrous face, but he pulled away from me.

  “I don’t think your new friend would be very pleased if he saw you doing that.”

  “What new friend?”

  “The one you are skulking off to see. Maybe I should wake the qadi, and tell him of your desertion.”

  I grew serious.

  “My love, you know who I am and what I am. I have to venture out tonight, to defend the honour of the Ummah.”

  “Perhaps. But your outing does not have the approval of Abu Yusuf, or you would not have been rolling around in the mud like that.”

  “Ah, your cleverness is as infuriating as it is beguiling. Can I buy your silence with a kiss?”

  “That coin is somewhat devalued by the filth smearing your face. You know what I want, Father of Locks.”

  “Now? Here? This is neither the time nor the place —”

  Abu Lu’lu’ah folded his arms and gave a petulant little toss of the head.

  “Then I am sure the qadi will be very interested to hear about your nocturnal wanderings.”

  I sighed.

  “Very well. As it happens, I have something new, something that might please you.”

  Lowering my voice, so that he had to put his ear to my lips to hear, I recited:

  “O you oathbreaker, you covenant killer,

  O you king of cruelty, of coldness bitter,

  O you, proud as Qarun, like Urqub in false promises,

  You whose name I will not speak, nor whose secrets utter.

  O you fragrant as incense, smoother than cream,

  O you who are sweeter than candy and sugar,

  O you with a heart hard as diamonds — no, harder,

  O you like the stars — no, even remoter —

  You who, if a drink, would be beer sweet as honey,

  O you who, if balm, would be musky grey amber.

  And you who could only be a rose, if a flower.

  No! By gambling and wine, by saffron and lavender,

  Jamil did not suffer as I’ve had to suffer,

  Nor did Qays who loved Lubna, nor Amr, Da’d’s lover,

  Will I ever get my hands on your wayward tiller?”

  Abu Lu’lu’ah said nothing when I had finished. Instead he seized my head with both hands and kissed me passionately, pressing his cheek against mine so that the mud daubed his face too. He whispered in my ear.

  “Nothing that I ever do will be as worthwhile, as magnificent, as being your muse.”

  “Hush. You are young, and brilliant. You will accomplish things that neither of us can yet even imagine. Now, have I bought your silence?”

  “That, and more. You will lay your hand on my tiller tonight, I promise you.”

  I reached inside his coat, and through his thin linen pants I could feel his zabb, throbbing with pride. He tried to push me away, without conviction.

  “No… not like this. Later.”

  “There might be no ‘later’. I could be dead before the dawn.”

  It was true, I suppose, but the flare of shock and desire that lit his eyes was my real purpose in saying it. He stepped closer to me, pushing his hand under my waistband, and I shivered as he brushed my quivering member.

  I would have preferred to prolong the pleasure, but the risk of being discovered heightened our excitement to an almost unbearable degree, as well as making haste advisable. I stroked and pulled in the way I wanted him to touch me, and our breathing grew hot and quick together. My legs shook, and my spine shuddered in mounting convulsions. Then, for a few seconds, we were no longer standing in a quaggy field in the pissing rain, but soaring to the stars, pulsing with ecstasy, our gross nature briefly transcended.

  Once our lust was spent, we stood forehead to forehead, arms around each other’s waists, laughing in delirious relief at the madness of it all. At last Abu Lu’lu’ah stepped away, and recomposed his clothing.

  “I suppose I could bring myself not to tell the qadi, after all.”

  “Then I can go?”

  “Wait, just a moment, while I get my boots.”

  “What?”

  “I am coming with you.”

  I stared at him, horrified, and gripped his hands.

  “You crazy boy, you have no idea what you are suggesting. Unknown perils threaten on every side. You are a scholar, not a warrior —”

  “Have I not learned much about subterfuge and deceit? For you and I to pursue our love under the nose of the qadi has required cunning and care. The unspoken signals, the casual lie, the evasion of watching eyes: I am now practised in
such things. Besides, are two together not safer than one?”

  He kissed me again, and something gave way within me. After all, Atil-Khazaran was rough, but it was not enemy territory.

  “All right. Be quick.”

  I was glad of his company as we made our way through Atil, not so much because I thought we were safer together, than because I had someone with whom to share the thrill of exploring a new city at night. For the traders and nomads who visited there, Atil represented a brief respite from long months in the saddle, an extravagant contrast to the emptiness of the steppes. In any city worthy of the name, each man can find the object of his desire, however obscure or outrageous, and despite the lateness of the hour, many were out seeking it.

  We did not need to blunder far in darkness before we found a reveller willing to light our torches from his own. Then, we simply followed the sound of laughter and music, tightly holding each other’s hand.

  I had no real plan for how we were to foil the Roman plot, or find al-Sifr or the shaman Papatzys. We stopped at a variety of inns, brothels and other dives in search of information. All were packed with roisterers, drinking, boasting and singing. The music came mostly from long-necked string instruments called dombras, similar to our tunburs, augmented by the twang of the mouth harp and the coo of clay flutes. The nomads danced side by side in lines, turning and waving their arms in woozy unison, and laughing uproariously when one fell over or got the sequence wrong.

  It is one of the few benefits of travelling beyond the Land of Islam to be able to purchase a drink without the need for discretion, and enjoy it free from the lurking fear that the shurta might kick down the door at any moment and arrest everybody. When I asked for wine, though, the serving boy laughed at me. The nomads, it seemed, preferred fermented horse milk, which they called kymyz.

  Reluctantly, I ordered two cups, but as soon as I took a mouthful I immediately spat it out again, with a grimace that made Abu Lu’lu’ah laugh.