Chapter 2

“What is the business of the Akar in the city of Kich?” demanded the gate watchman.

“The Akar bring horses to sell to the Amir,” replied Khardan somewhat irritably, “as we have done yearly since before the mud of Kich’s first dwellings was dry. Surely you know this, Gate Master. We have always been granted entrance to the city without question before. Why this change?”

“You will find many changes in Kich now, kafir,” the Gate Master replied, giving Khardan and his men a smug, scornful glance. “For example, before you enter, I must ask that you turn over all magical charms and amulets to me. I will guard them well, you may be certain, and they will be returned to you when you leave. Any djinn you possess you will take with you to the temple, where they will be given up as a show of respect to the Imam of Quar.”

“Amulets! Charms!” Khardan’s horse, sensing his master’s anger, shifted restlessly beneath him. “What do you take us for— women? Men of the Akar do not travel under the protection of such things!” Checking his horse, bringing it once more under his control, Khardan leaned over the saddle, speaking to the Gate Master eye-to-eye. “As for djinn, if I had one with me—which I do not—I would throw it into the Waters of the Kafir before I would give it to the Imam of Quar.”

The Gate Master flushed in anger. His hand strayed to the stout cudgel he carried at his side, but he checked the impulse. He had his orders concerning these unbelievers, and he was bound to carry them out no matter how much he might dislike it. Swallowing his rage, he bowed coldly to Khardan and with a wave of his hand, indicated that the nomads could enter.

Leaving the herd of horses outside the walls under the care of several of his men, Khardan and the rest of his spahis entered the gate of the city of Kich.

An ancient city that had stood for two thousand years at least, Kich had changed little during that time. Centrally located, built in a pass between the Ganzi mountains to the south and the Ganga mountains to the north, Kich was one of the major trading cities of Tara-kan.

Although under the suzerain of the Emperor, Kich was—or had been during most of its history—an independent city-state. Ruled by the family of the Sultan for generations, Kich paid annual rich tribute to the Emperor, expecting in return to be left alone to pursue its favorite pastime—the amassing of wealth. Its people were primarily followers of the Goddess Mimrim—a gentle Goddess, a lover of beauty and money. For centuries the people of Kich led an easeful life. Then matters began to change. Their goddess had never been demanding in the matter of daily prayers and so forth—such solemn things tended to disrupt both business and pleasure. The people began to turn from Mimrim, putting more faith in money than in their goddess. Mimrim’s power dwindled and she soon fell victim to Quar.

The people of Kich knew nothing of the war in heaven. They knew only that one day the Emperor’s troops, carrying the ram’s-head flag—symbol of Quar—swept down on them from the north. The gates fell, the Sultan’s bodyguards—drunk as usual—were slaughtered. Kich was now under the Emperor’s direct control, the spearhead of an army pointed directly at the throat of the rich cities of Bas to the south.

The city was turned into a military stronghold. Kich was ideally suited for this, being surrounded by a wall seven and a half miles long. Dotted with towers, punctured by loopholes for archers, the wall had eleven gates that were now closed day and night. A curfew was imposed upon its citizens. Movement of any type around the city after eleven at night was forbidden by strict edict, enforced by severe penalty. Cudgel-carrying night watchmen patrolled the streets, banging on the gates of every courtyard they passed, ostensibly in order to frighten away thieves. In reality they were making certain that no fires of rebellion smoldered behind closed doors.

There were, in addition to these watchmen who walked the street, those who walked the roofs of the bazaars. Covered to protect them from the sun, the boothlike shops were provided with skylights every hundred feet or so. The watchmen patrolled these roofs, beating a drum and peering down through the skylights to see if there was any suspicious movement below.

There was no rebellion brewing in Kich, however. Although the people resented these measures at first, they soon found compensation. Business increased threefold. The roads to the north, previously too dangerous to travel because of raiding batir, were now guarded by the Emperor’s troops. Trade between Kich and the capital city of Khandar flourished. The people of Kich began to look upon their new God, Quar, with a friendly eye and did not begrudge him his tribute or his demands for strict obedience.

By day, the souks of Kich were crammed with people. The jabbering and shouting and yelling of their bargaining mingled with the cries of the sellers enticing would-be customers. Shrieking, shrill-voiced children darted about underfoot. The air rang with curses, cajolings, and the laments of beggars, all tangled up in a confusion of growling, snorting, bleating, barking animals.

Space within the city was at a premium, for no one was foolish enough to dwell outside the protective walls. The streets were cramped and narrow, laid out in a crazy labyrinth in which a stranger was instantly, invariably, and irrevocably lost. Windowless houses made of clay covered over with plaster piled up against each other like ships run aground, facing any and every direction along streets that wound around and in and over and upon themselves, sometimes ending inexplicably in a blank wall, sometimes wandering up or down stairs that appeared to have been carved out of the houses themselves.

Entering the city, Khardan glanced about uneasily. Before, he had always found the noise and the smells and the excitement exhilarating. Now, for some reason, he felt trapped, stifled. Dismounting, the Calif motioned to one of the older men riding with the group.

“Saiyad, I don’t like this talk of changes,” Khardan said in a low voice. “Keep everyone together until my return and wait for me here.”

Saiyad nodded. A cleared area inside the gate was used as a standing place for carts that had been brought into the city by traders. Seeing his men and their horses settled there and trusting to Saiyad to keep them out of trouble, Khardan and his younger brother Achmed turned their footsteps toward the Kasbah.

They did not have far to go. Combination palace and fortress, the Kasbah stood near the northern end of the city wall. The graceful minarets, tall spires, and cupola of the late Sultan’s palace could be seen rising above its own protective wall that kept the palace aloof from the city. Made of crystalline quartz, its bulbous domes capped with gold, the palace itself shone like a jewel in the bright sunlight. Delicate, lacy latticework decorated the windows. The waving fronds of palms, visible above the walls, hinted at the pleasure gardens within.

It was Achmed’s first visit to the city, and his eyes were wide with wonder.

“Watch where you are going,” Khardan remonstrated, pulling his brother out of the path of a donkey, whose rider lashed out at them with his long stick. “No! Don’t trouble yourself! Ignore him. He is beneath your notice. Look, look there.”

Distracting his brother, who was glaring threateningly after the donkey rider, Khardan pointed to an octagonal-shaped stone building that stood on their left, opposite the walls of the Kasbah.

“That must be the new Temple they have built to Quar,” Khardan said grimly, eyeing with disfavor the golden ram’s head that gleamed over the entryway. “And over there”—he gestured to a tall minaret, the tallest in the city—”the Tower of Death.”

“Why is it called that?”

“Thus do they deal with condemned criminals in Kich. The offender is bound hand and foot, then tied up in a sack. He is dragged to the top of the tower and hurled alive over its balcony, plummeting down into the street below. There his body lies unburied as a warning to all who would break the law.”

Achmed gazed at the Tower of Death in awe. “Do you suppose we will get to see such a thing?”

Khardan shrugged, grinning. “Who knows? We have all day.”

“Where do we go now? Don’t we want to visit the palace?” Achmed asked in some confusion, noting that they seemed to be walking away from it.

“We must enter through the front gate, and that stands across the city, on the other side of this wall. To get there, we must go through the bazaars.”

Achmed’s eyes glistened with pleasure.

“Careful,” added Khardan teasingly, “you keep swiveling your head like that, you’ll break your neck.”

“I want to see everything!” Achmed protested. Gasping, he grasped Khardan by the arm and pointed. “Who is that?”

Moving with sublime calm through the chaos and turmoil that swirled around him like seawater around an ‘efreet was a man who outshone the sun. Dressed in bright yellow velvet robes—every inch of which was covered with golden embroidery and studded with jewels—the man wore loops of heavy gold chains about his neck. Silver and golden bracelets covered his arms; his fingers could not be seen for the rings that adorned them; his earlobes had been disfigured by the weight of the gold that hung from them. His skin was an olive color, his eyes slanted and painted with bright colors, outlined by stripes of black that ran from the lids to his ears. Behind him scurried a servant, holding a huge palmetto leaf over the man’s head to shade him from the sun. Another servant walked beside him, cooling him with the constant breeze of a feathered fan.

“He is a moneylender, a follower of Kharmani, God of Wealth.”

“I thought everyone in Kich worshiped Quar.”

“Ah, even Quar dares not offend Kharmani. The economics of this city would come to a sudden halt if he did. Besides, the followers of Kharmani are few in number and probably not worth Quar’s attention. They have no interest in wars or politics, being concerned only with money.”

Achmed gazed at the man, who strolled along through the crowd with grand aplomb, seeming to thrive on the glances of envy and lust that were cast at him.

“Do they ever ride alone into the desert, these followers of Kharmani?” Achmed whispered to his brother. “One of those bracelets would support a man and three wives—”

“Don’t even think such thoughts!” Khardan returned hastily. “You will bring down the wrath of the God on all of us! None dare rob one of Kharmani’s chosen! The last time I was in Kich I saw a follower of Benario, God of Thieves, who had tried to pick a moneylender’s pocket. The moment he touched the man’s purse, his hand froze to it, and he was forced to spend the rest of his life trudging after his victim, his hand always in the man’s pocket, never able to free himself.”

“Truly?” Achmed appeared skeptical.

“Truly!” Khardan averred, hiding his smile.

Achmed was gazing regretfully after the moneylender when a strange, clanking sound coming from the opposite direction drew the young man’s attention. Looking over his shoulder, he tugged at the sleeve of his brother’s tunic. “Who are those poor wretches?”

Khardan’s lip curled in disgust. “Slaves being taken to the slave market.” He pointed to a row of tents standing a few feet from them. “I detest that part of the city. The sight leaves a bad taste in my mouth for days. See the white palanquin being carried behind them? The slave trader. Those men riding around him are goums, his bodyguards.”

“Where do the slaves come from?”

“These are from Ravanchai, most likely.” Khardan glanced coolly at the line of men and boys chained together, shuffling through the streets, heads bowed. “The people of that land are farmers”—he spoke with disdain—”living in small tribes. A peaceful people, they are easy prey for the traders and their bands of goums, who periodically sweep down on them, round up the strong young men and the comely young women, and carry them off to sell here in Kich.”

“Women? Where are they?” Achmed studied the line of slaves with renewed interest.

“Probably in that covered cart, right in front of the palanquin. See how closely guarded it is? You can’t see them, of course. They will be veiled. Only when they get to the selling block will the dealer remove their veils so that the buyers can see what they are purchasing.”

Achmed licked his lips. “Perhaps with my share of the money I could—”

Khardan, with a quick, easy motion, cuffed the young man on the side of the face.

Putting his hand to his stinging cheek, his skin burning with embarrassment and pain, Achmed glared at his older brother. “What did you do that for?” he demanded, stopping in the middle of the street, where they were immediately surrounded by a group of half-naked children, begging for coins. “Father owns slaves. So do you—”

“Indentured servants!” Khardan rebuked him sternly. “Men who have sold themselves to pay back a debt. Such slavery is honorable, for they work to buy their freedom. This man”—making an angry gesture toward the palanquin—”trades in humans for personal gain. He captures them against their will. Such a thing is forbidden by Akhran. Besides”—Khardan smiled, cuffing his brother on the cheek again, this time playfully—”the women you could afford you wouldn’t want, and those you would want you couldn’t afford.”

They started on their way again, the beggar children setting up a wail of protest.

“Here,” said Khardan, turning down a street to his right, “are the bazaars.”

Gaping in wonder, Achmed immediately forgot his pain. He had never imagined such wealth and splendor, such an array of goods for sale, such a confusion of noise. Walking along, he looked down street after street of covered booths surrounded by gesticulating buyers.

Sections of the bazaars and sometimes entire streets in Kich were dedicated to selling specific types of merchandise. Directly across from the palace wall, on the southern side, was the Street of Copper and Brass—dazzling to the eye as sunlight glinted off its wares. Next to that stood the Baker’s Bazaar, the smells from this street causing Achmed’s stomach to rumble loudly. Canting away at an angle from this row of covered booths was the Carpet Bazaar—a blur of fantastic colors and designs that made one dizzy to look into it.

“Down that street,” Khardan said, indicating a branching road that traveled farther south, “is Silk and Shoe bazaar. We will buy presents for our mothers there.”

“And something for your wife?” Achmed said slyly, to pay for the blow.

“Perhaps.” Khardan flushed and fell silent.

This not having been the answer Achmed expected, the young man glanced at this brother in some astonishment. Khardan saw rose-colored silk in his mind’s eye. Smelling again the fragrance of jasmine, he hurriedly continued pointing out the sights. “Beyond that is the Wood and Straw sellers, then the Street of the Dyers and Weavers, the Street of the Rope-makers, the Potter’s Bazaar, the Goldsmith’s and Jeweler’s, the Moneylenders, the Tobacco and Pipe dealers, and the Teahouses and the arwat—the rest-houses. Down that direction are streets where you may purchase magical charms and amulets, salt, sweetmeats, furs, ironware, and weapons.”

“Weapons!” Achmed’s eyes shone. His father had promised him a sword with a share of the money. He peered down the crowded street in a vain effort to catch a glimpse of shining steel. “We will go there first.”

“Undoubtedly. Watch out.” Khardan caught his brother just as the young man was about to stumble into a huge pool of water standing between the street and Kasbah wall.

“What is that?”

“A hauz. There are many different such artificial ponds in the city. The water comes from the mountains, carried by ariqs. It has many uses…” Khardan nudged Achmed, pointing out a man washing camel dung from his hands in the pool while a veiled woman filled a drinking jug not half a yard away. “Thirsty?”

“Not now!”

“City dwellers,” Khardan said in the same tone in which he might have said “jackals.” Achmed nodded, his young face solemn with newly acquired wisdom.

Mindful of the importance of their errand and knowing that the Amir’s audience hours lasted only during the cool of the morning, Khardan hurried his brother along, keeping him from falling into the clutches of the vendors, who would soon have relieved the young man of the ten silver tumans he had brought with him. Seeing that the sun was nearing its zenith, the brothers left the bazaars and made their way to the great entrance of the Kasbah.

Two stalwart towers of stone flanked the massive wooden doors that stood open beneath an arched passage. Above the door, on the second story between the towers, ran a colonnaded porch. A third story, open to the air, was atop that. From the roof of this third story, directly above the door, hung a gigantic sword.

Suspended by strong iron chains, the magnificent sword was the symbol of the Amir, a powerful symbol that reminded all who looked upon it that they were under his iron rule. The sword was so large and so heavy that it had taken a veritable army of men and seven elephants to move it over the mountains from the capital city of Khandar.

The day the sword arrived in Kich had been a day of ceremony in the city, marking the ascension of the Amir to the throne. The ‘efreet Kaug had hung the sword himself, the immortal’s hands easily lifting the heavy weapon from the huge cart on which it traveled. The Imam blessed the sword, prophesying that it would hang there to glorify the new order of Quar, whose reign would last until the sun, the moon, and the stars fell from the skies. The people of Kich had, needless to say, been impressed.

Khardan was not. Staring grimly at the sword suspended above his head, he remembered regretfully how things had been in the past.

A solid-silver crescent moon had hung there in the days of the Sultan—a simple, pleasure-loving man who paid his annual tribute to the Emperor at Khandar and then promptly did his best to forget about politics for another year. There had been no questions asked at the gate under the Sultan’s rule, no nonsense about bringing djinn to the Temple of the Imam. The guards in the tower that stood to the right of the great gate had languished half-asleep in the afternoon sun. There had been no curfew. Every night the city’s men gathered around the hauz outside the great gate, coming there to relax, share the day’s gossip in whispers, or listen to storytellers recalling days gone by. The soldiers in the barracks, located in the inner court to the gate’s left, had lounged about, gambling, eyeing the veiled women who came to the hauz, or indulging in swordplay.

Now the guards in the tower were alert, scrutinizing all who entered. People still came to the hauz for water, but they did not linger long under the baleful gaze of the guards.

The wooden doors stood open, but there were guards here, too, who insolently questioned Khardan about everything from the lineage of his horses to his own—at which point the Calif nearly forgot himself. Only the remonstrating hand of his younger brother on his arm made Khardan—literally—bite his tongue to keep back the angry words.

Finally the guards ungraciously let them pass. They entered the cool shadows of the Kasbah; Achmed stumbled over the paving stones, his head craned at a painful angle to view the gigantic sword. Khardan strode beneath it without a glance, his face grim and stern and dark with suppressed anger.

The price of horses was going up.