Tim Severin - The Emperor's Elefant

My head swam. ‘A future? How is that? You know no one. How will you find employment? Somewhere to live?’

‘I hope to be taken on as a member of Nadim Jaffar’s household.’

‘As what?’ I demanded. I was so taken aback that I spoke more sharply than was justified.

Osric spread his hands in a gesture of apology. He knew he had shaken me. ‘I have some medical knowledge, or I could join Jaffar’s secretariat. As a senior vizier he needs a large staff. I could be useful to him.’

My thoughts were in turmoil. ‘Have you approached Jaffar about this?’ I demanded bitterly, my voice tailing away as I realized the truth.

The voyage back from Zanj had been long and sombre, overshadowed by the memory of Walo’s death. On most days Osric and Zaynab had spent many hours together, sitting on the foredeck and talking quietly.

‘Zaynab is asking Jaffar on your behalf, isn’t she?’ I said, trying not to sound accusing.

‘Sigwulf, I’m hoping you will understand my decision,’ Osric explained gently. ‘I feel more at home here in Baghdad than I ever did in Aachen.’ He gave a wan smile. ‘Even with the summer heat, the weather suits me better. I have fewer aches and pains than in the damp northern climes.’

‘And what happens if Jaffar will not add you to his staff?’ I demanded.

My friend’s answer was firm. ‘Then I will offer my services to the royal librarian. My knowledge of Hispania and the northern lands will help them in compiling maps and registers of foreign countries.’

‘Are you sure about this?’

Osric shifted on his feet, but his steady gaze held mine. ‘I’ve thought long and hard about the best thing to do. I would hate you to think that I am abandoning you, but I see my future here in the caliphate.’

‘And Zaynab? Is she in your future too?’ I knew I was sounding resentful.

Osric shook his head. ‘She’s less than half my age, more like a wise daughter that I never had. Remember that we share an experience of slavery and that makes one dream of a quiet settled life in charge of one’s own daily existence.

‘Yet Zaynab is still a slave,’ I said.

Osric was patient with me. ‘A slave for now, and a valued singer. Jaffar is generous, and he’s more of a patron than a master. Last year he promised to give Zaynab her freedom as well as a present of money if she would continue to sing so beautifully. He says that the gift of freedom would remove the sadness from her voice.’

‘And Zaynab agreed to his proposal?’ A lump gathered in my throat as I asked the question. I already knew the answer.

My friend regarded me with such profound sympathy that I realized he had guessed my feelings for Zaynab. ‘Yes, Zaynab has agreed. When she has her own house, she says, there will be room for me to live there if I wish.’

I felt as if I had been punched in the stomach with all the wind knocked out of me. In a single moment I had lost my friend and companion since childhood, and the woman I dreamed of had passed out of reach.

I could have wept with frustration and disappointment. I knew Osric well enough to know that he would not change his mind. I had no right to expect him to fall in with my own plans. Long ago he had ceased to be my slave or servant. He was my friend and now I should wish him happiness.

What cut me to the quick was to be told that Zaynab saw her own future with no place in it for me or, perhaps, for anyone else. Given a choice, she preferred to be alone. For a bitter and savage moment, I felt betrayed. I loathed her for misleading me into a false dream. Then, with a great effort, I pulled myself together. I told myself that I should never have presumed on what Zaynab would wish. Her beauty and my delight in her company had been so overwhelming that I had projected onto her a desire for a loving partner that she did not share. Zaynab had not intended to deceive me. For whatever reason – her nature, her past experiences as a slave – she had built a wall around herself and was unattainable.

Nevertheless, I was crushed. I knew that if I saw Zaynab again, it would tear me to pieces. At that moment all I wanted to do was to leave Baghdad as soon as possible. From somewhere in the back of my mind rose an image of bald, sweating Musa seated in his room in the royal library consulting his star books for Osric and me. He had predicted from the star conjunctions that the future held death and great happiness and a return. Walo had died, and Osric was finding happiness. I, however, would return to Aachen on my own and this time I would ensure that fewer obstacles and dangers were put in my path.

*

There was a strained silence between Osric and me as we left Jaffar’s palace. Neither trusted himself to speak without the risk of causing further disquiet. The steward brought us to the same lodging house in the Round City that we had occupied months earlier, and at the doorway I muttered something about needing to have some time to myself. I told Osric that I would join him later. Then I set out to walk the streets. My thoughts were crowding in on me – memories of Osric from my childhood, of when I was sent into exile, of campaigning with him in Hispania, and, most recently, the journey to the Northlands in search of white beasts. Osric had been with me either as guardian, companion or advisor – and always friend. He would no longer be a constant presence. I felt disoriented. The recollections of Osric mingled with painful visions of Zaynab. I struggled to stop myself from thinking of her but it was impossible. She was so easy to picture in all her loveliness. Zaynab was deeply entwined in my emotions and it would take months, maybe years, to disentangle her.

It was late afternoon, and I walked for an hour or more, with these notions tumbling back and forth in my head. Eventually my footsteps brought me by chance to the tall double doors of the massive building that housed the royal menagerie. There it occurred to me to check on how Madi and Modi were faring. It would divert me from my inner turmoil. I went inside. The interior was just as I had remembered it – vast, smelling of hay, piss and dung, while muffled snufflings and other unidentifiable animal noises came from behind lines of closed doors to the stalls. I walked down the central aisle to where I had last seen the ice bears. The door to their pen was open. Their enclosure was empty.

I turned away, intending to find a keeper to ask what had happened to the bears. But there was no one about.

As I walked back along the central walkway I heard a gentle clinking sound. I stopped and went to look over the open upper half of a door to one of the larger stalls. A great grey elephant was standing in the straw. The sound came from a slim chain, polished from much use, around the ankle of its back leg. The other end of the chain was fastened to a metal hoop set in the wall.

I was standing there, gazing in at the great animal and wondering why it had been tethered when I was conscious of someone standing at my shoulder. I half turned. It was Abram, the dragoman.

‘There’s a certain season of the year when a male elephant is dangerous,’ he said quietly. ‘They become difficult to handle, treacherous even. That dark matter oozing from near his eye and then down his cheek is a sign.’

He gazed over the door thoughtfully.

‘Will you be accompanying the new mission to Aachen?’ I asked him.

‘No,’ he said. ‘Another of my people will act as dragoman. While you were away, I’ve been building up my commercial contacts in the caliph’s empire. There’s a fortune to be made here.’

I looked back at the elephant. It was standing swaying gently on its feet, the ears fanning slowly.

‘Was the first elephant that Haroun sent really white?’ I put the question casually and waited for an answer.