Vladimir Bartol - Alamut

“So you’ve never loved me in the slightest?”

“Far more than that. I’ve needed you and still do. But why don’t you answer my question?”

“The game you’re playing with me is painful.”

“But think what a unique opportunity I’m giving you tonight,” Hasan went on in the same ironic tone. “You’re going to need all your intellect, all your skill, all your charm if you want to ensure that this young man believes in paradise.”

“You’ve destroyed me.”

“I didn’t think my feelings were that important to you. But what’s decided is decided. I expect you to carry out your assignment. Otherwise I won’t be able to make an exception.”

Miriam collected herself. I’ve got to be strong , she told herself. I can’t let him see all of my weaknesses .

“I’m ready,” she said.

“Thank you.”

He returned to the girls.

“Zuleika!” he called out. “Pick seven companions. They’ll help you welcome Yusuf, and you’ll be responsible for your success.”

“Yes, Our Master.”

She turned to face the others and began boldly calling out.

“Hanafiya! Asma! Habiba! Little Fatima! Rokaya! Zofana!”

“And take that little one that fainted too,” Hasan said. “Then you’ll have enough.”

Next it was Fatima’s turn.

“Zainab! Khanum! Turkan! Shehera! Sara! Leila! Aisha!”

Halima looked beseechingly at Fatima. When she didn’t call her, she insisted.

“Take me too!”

At the same instant Hasan spoke.

“That will be enough.”

But when he heard the girls laughing at Halima’s plea, he said with a gleeful grin, “Go on, take her too, Fatima.”

With Fatima, Sara and Zainab, whom should she be afraid of now? She rushed up to Hasan, fell to her knees, and kissed his hand.

“Just be smart, tadpole,” he said.

He patted her kindly on the cheek and sent her back to join the others. She got back in line, blushing and dizzy with happiness.

Miriam checked to see who was left. Safiya, Khadija, Sit, Jovaira, Rikana and Taviba were still there. Now she had herself under control again.

Hasan called the leaders to join him.

“The eunuchs will bring the heroes to the gardens while they’re asleep. Fortify them with milk and fruit to begin with. Before the visitors arrive, each girl is allowed to drink one cup of wine for courage. No more than that! You can have more after the youths are drunk themselves, but don’t overdo it! You’ll report to me about everything in detail afterwards. Listen for the signal to wrap things up. The horn will sound three times. Then you should take a cup of wine and dissolve a substance in it that you’ll get from Apama. The youths are to drink it immediately. They’ll fall asleep and the eunuchs will carry them back out.”

When he had made all these arrangements, he looked toward the girls one more time. Then he bowed slightly in farewell. Adi and Apama were waiting for him by the boats. He gave them his final instructions.

“Give this to the leaders. Don’t let the visitors see you. But keep an eye on Miriam. She mustn’t be left alone with her hero.”

Then, with his entourage, he returned to the castle.

Once in the castle, Hasan dismissed his two friends. He had himself hoisted to the top of the second tower, where his bodyguards, the eunuchs, lived. A horn announced his arrival. Captain Ali came running toward him and reported that everything was ready.

Fifty black giants stood in two rows the length of the hallway. Armed, motionless and erect, they stared fixedly ahead. Hasan reviewed them without saying a word. Every time he stood before them, a sense of danger came over him. It wasn’t a disagreeable feeling, in fact it gave him a peculiar kind of pleasure. He knew that if a single one of those hundred arms reached out, he would never again see the light of day. And yet, why didn’t any of them do that? Because all fifty eunuchs had been prepared to execute his every order blindly? Where did he get this power that he exerted over people? “That’s the power of intellect,” he explained it to himself. These castrated beasts feared nothing in the world, except strength of character.

When he had finished reviewing all his men, he called Captain Ali aside to issue orders.

“After last prayers wait for me in the cellar with nine men. I’ll bring you three sleeping youths from my tower. You’ll take them to the gardens on litters. Adi will be waiting for you there. Tell him the names of the sleeping heroes, and he’ll show you where to take them. Don’t let it bother you if they moan or toss and turn on the way there. But if any of them lifts the cover or gives a sign that he’s woken up, have whoever is accompanying that litter cut his throat. The same holds for the trip back. You can turn any corpses over to me. Do you understand everything?”

“I understand, Sayyiduna.”

“After last prayers, then.”

He gestured to the captain farewell, walked back past the motionless rows of guards, and took one lift down and the other up into his tower.

Abu Ali lived in rooms within the center of the supreme command building. He had given one of his rooms to Buzurg Ummid when the latter had arrived at the castle. When they returned from the gardens, they changed clothes and then locked themselves in Abu Ali’s quarters.

For a while they looked at each other silently, trying to guess each other’s thoughts. Finally Abu Ali asked, “What’s your feeling about this?”

“I was just about to ask you the same thing.”

“Ibn Sabbah is a great man, no doubt about it.”

“Yes, a great man…”

“But sometimes I think… this is just between the two of us, what we say here. Agreed?”

“Absolutely.”

“Sometimes I think he must be terribly overwrought, that maybe he’s not completely right in the head…”

“Indeed, sometimes his ideas strike me as insane… at least the ones that are alien to us ordinary mortals and even provoke horror in us.”

“What do you think of his plan, this unusual testament that he plans to leave us as his legacy?” Abu Ali queried.

“King Naaman comes to mind for me in this case. Senamar built the magnificent palace at Habernak for him. In gratitude, the king ordered him thrown over the battlements of his own building.”

“Right, the fedayeen are going to get Senamar’s reward for their devotion.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Me?”

Abu Ali thought for a moment. His life had been empty since he had lost his two wives and his two children. Some fifteen years ago, because of his proselytizing, he had had to flee Qazvin for Syria. He had left two wives at home: Habiba, who had borne him two children, and the younger Aisha, who was the joy of his life. Three years later he went back. Habiba told him that during his absence Aisha had had an affair with a rich youth from the neighborhood. Abu Ali went mad with jealousy. First he slaughtered the seducer, and then his unfaithful wife. He also hated Habiba for revealing Aisha’s unfaithfulness to him. In his first flush of anger he loaded her and the two children onto camels and took them to Basra. There he sold them into slavery. Later he searched everywhere for them, but in vain. Finally Hasan had called on him to unite with him. Now his work for the Ismaili cause was the entire substance of his life.

He replied, “It’s not for me to choose. I’ve said ‘a’ and that means I’ll say ‘b,’ as well.”

Buzurg Ummid stared gloomily at the floor. He was a tough soldier at heart. In Rudbar he had once ordered fifteen men beheaded for breaking their vows and trying to leave the Ismaili ranks. Against an enemy he found any trick, any violence permissible. But pulling a trick like this on your own most faithful adherents?