Julian Stockwin - THE SILK TREE

They pressed on. The hours passed and then the sky lost its velvety blackness, an almost imperceptible lightening that softened the harsh shadows and eased the menace of the hulking shapes.

Then the monochrome gave way to colours and with just a few fading stars the last of the night fled. The edge of the sun lifted above the far horizon in a searing blast of light.

In minutes it had risen clear. The landscape was laid bare in all its appalling beauty – a grey plain of stone fragments and sand ripples, occasional red outcrops of weathered rocks and behind them, the far away snow-capped peaks of the Tien Shan range.

Nicander knew that somewhere in that direction the caravan would be stirring, Su would be making a show of discovering them missing but adamantly refusing to start a search. It happened: a merchant would take the risk of leaving the caravan in the hope of arriving before the others and cornering the market. Sometimes it worked, but often they would be taken and murdered by brigands or claimed by the desert. No doubt Korkut and the others would be shaking their heads in disbelief that their friends had left without a farewell. However this played out, they would never see the little band again.

They trudged on, enduring. Arif broke the silence and timidly suggested they take a rest at a sandy ridge.

Meng Hsiang was made to kneel then hobbled with a rope around his folded front legs; the two younger animals would not stray far from him.

A makeshift awning was fashioned from one of the tents and the little group collapsed to the ground under it. They had gone all night and put in a full day previously and soon sleep brought surcease for aching bodies.

Marius shook his friend with a rough smile. ‘Wake up! Wake up, you slack bastard!’

Nicander came to, trying to orient where he was. By degrees it penetrated: the wasteland around them, the Tien Shan still in view, and nearer, a crackling fire tended by Arif.

‘We thought you were going to sleep all day!’ Ying Mei teased. She was sitting with her hands clasped around her knees.

‘Oh, as we had nothing else to do…’

‘You’ll never make a legionary, Nico. Every hour we spend on our arse is one less on the march!’

‘So. Are we thinking of eating anything?’

‘Arif has a right fine-smelling mutton hotpot ready for us – be a shame if you were asleep while we finished it off.’

‘Just like to know we’re on course,’ Marius said, as he wiped his plate clean. ‘Hey, Arif – tell me we’re off in the right direction?’

‘Why, make no difference, Ma sheng , we be up with the Tarim river which go across our path, like this.’ He gestured from west to east. They were going south.

‘So everything square, then.’

‘There is something.’ Tai Yi’s tone was earnest.

‘For myself and the Lady Kuo, we need to know there’s someone in charge. A caravan master, even if we’re just a little one. Who will this be, who’ll make the decisions?’

When there was no reply she said firmly, ‘I think it should be Arif. He-’

‘No, no! I can’t!’ The cameleer scrambled to his feet in consternation. ‘It cannot be me!’

‘Why not?’ Tai Yi snapped. ‘You’re the only one who knows what he’s doing in this… this journey.’

‘I… I too y-young.’

Ying Mei came in, ‘Perhaps this does need an older man, one who can carry us through with wisdom and strength when things get bad.’

She looked across encouragingly at Nicander, whose pulse began to race. To be the hero who pulls them through against all the odds! Who would be admired and respected ever afterwards! In fact, who Ying Mei would owe her life to… But this was a matter of sheer survival – requiring swift and merciless decisions and hard leadership.

He pointed to Marius. ‘You’ve marched with the legions in the Syrian desert, been up against the Persians, you know what it’s like. You should be our leader in this.’

Marius stared out over the dead, parched landscape for a long moment.

When he looked back his face was grim and uncompromising. ‘If I do this it’ll be under one condition only.’

‘What’s that, Marius?’

‘I’m in charge. And I mean that – I give orders and you do as I say, even if you think ’em wrong. And I make the decisions! Could be there’s going to be some bloody hard ones and I don’t need arguments. You want me, this is my price.’

Nicander was well aware that in an army you sent men in to die; what if there was a situation here of only enough water to keep four of them alive? Who would he condemn to save the others? He recognised it was a choice he could never make but he knew Marius would stand by his decisions whatever it took, seeing them through even with physical violence.

‘If that’s what you want, Marius. How about the rest of us?’

Tai Yi tried to object but Ying Mei quietened her and it was agreed.

‘So. What is your first order, Caravan Master Marius?’ Nicander asked.

‘Everyone on their feet!’ he rapped.

‘What…?’

‘We’re moving out!’

They reached the Tarim river late the next morning – and the miracle of unlimited sparkling water in a lethal desert. Broad and shallow, the stream lazily progressed to the east. They took their fill before resting in the shade of a group of wild poplar as the camels drank deeply and grazed on the greenery that fringed the river.

Nicander glanced at Ying Mei, who was looking out over the formidable landscape with a distracted expression.

What was going through her mind? She was a noble lady who had left a home at the highest levels of the imperial court and was now cast down to this existence, a life-threatening plight. He thought of what he’d learnt from Dao Pa. Could it be that she was more advanced on the path to Tao?

This was a woman of talents and beauty both. That it could never end in… a uniting, there was no reason he should not take pleasure in her close company while he could. He let his gaze linger.

All too soon, however, it was time to plan the next move. Marius turned to Arif. ‘So – if we’re looking for your river to Khotan from the south, all we need to do is follow this one until we reach it?’

‘I not done it, Ma sheng , never this way, but this what I heard.’

‘Then that’s what we’ll do.’

It was pleasant going along the flat, hard sand next to the agreeable sight of so much water and they were almost sorry when they spotted the much smaller Ho T’ien, sliding in to lose itself in the larger river.

Now was the point of commitment.

If they turned to the right they could rejoin the world of man. If they chose the other way, each day would take them further still into the wilderness, deep into the wastes of the Taklamakan that would see them beyond any kind of help.

‘Last water for the camels – and I want to see the water skins and personal gourds filled right up. Then no one takes a drop unless I say!’ Marius ordered.

He surveyed them grimly. ‘Arif, you take Meng Hsiang. Nico, I want you to be rearguard, and with a fucking serious duty. If you see anyone – anyone at all – who falls out of the line o’ march, you shout! Loud! They get lost, there’s nothing on this earth that’s going to save ’em, and I’m not going to try.’

They moved off. In the lead was Marius, stepping out with stubborn purpose. Then it was Meng Hsiang plodding forward with Arif at his halter and the two younger camels strung out behind, Tai Yi and Ying Mei walking next to them.

On his own at the end Nicander tried to dismiss the worry of what would happen if he himself took dizzy and fell. No one would notice until…

At day’s end the comforting sight of the Tien Shan had disappeared. There was nothing to show their direction in the unknown landscape apart from the sprawling glitter of the Ho T’ien, meandering from the south in great curves into the distance.