Julian Rathbone - Kings of Albion

So much for rain. Now, wind. Wind is as variable as rain. It can blow from any direction at all, at any time of the day or night, or there can be no wind at all. It may be barely more than a breath or it may be a gale, but even when it is a gale-it comes in bursts and gusts, not continuous twisting blasts of wind such as occasionally fall upon the eastern coasts of our own country.

Although at this time of year the weather is generally cold, it may vary from intolerably cold, so that the water turns solid, to fairly cold so that the water that was solid in the morning is wet again by midday. We have had some snow. You remember about snow? Travellers from the mountains to the far north of our part of the world have told us about snow, and Ali ben Quatar Mayeen warned us that it might be encountered. Well, we have had some snow, but so far, like the hard water or 'ice', it has melted away to water before midday, leaving even where muddy and dirty.

But what I must emphasise above all else is the unpredictability of all this. It is hardly ever the same weather two days running. The only thing you can say about it is that it is almost always, one way or another, uncomfortable. And cold.

I can't tell you how messy it all is. I am writing at a desk in front of a tiny window in a tower overlooking the land that stretches between here and the town twenty miles away. The desk is rough-hewn to the extent that the quill I am using, as you see, splatters and bumps over the ridges beneath. The stone walls are undressed too and irregular, the stones just piled on each other with mortar slopped between them. The window is glazed with tiny pieces of glass, none the same as any of the others, held together by strips of lead. The glass is translucent, just, but not fully transparent. It is cloudy and it distorts the view. My desk is lit by a candle, although it is midday, made from animal fat, mutton from the smell of it, and it smokes. There is a small fire of smouldering logs in a large fireplace. All the heat goes up the chimney. There are hangings on the walls, with hunting scenes crudely stitched into them, spoiled by the grubs of moths that live in the interstices.

Opening the window, which I have to do if I want enough light to go on writing, I look out over sodden fields, fanned in strips, copses of leafless, dead-looking trees, a road that angles round the holdings of the peasants towards the distant town, which is a smudge of smoke on the horizon. The road is not a real road but a narrow strip of mud and puddles, the mud a pale brown except where the rock shows through, not really rock but a softish, powdery, white material at present slimy with rain.

There is no living thing in sight at present but there are a couple of dead ones: on a rise near the road there is a gallows where two bodies, hanged by the neck, slowly twist. Earlier a bird, big and black with a heavy grey beak, pecked and tore at their faces, but even it has now gone. The poor souls were accused of spying on behalf of those Ingerlonders who hold Calais under the Earl of Warwick.

You know what it is, cousin, about this place? I'll tell you. It feels unfinished, half made, as if Parvati, the Creatorix. has been called away to more pressing business only shortly after she has started. Or put it this way. Parvati, having Started the act of creation on the banks of one of our sacred rivers and brought what she created to an early completion and perfection, moved out in a series of concentric circles, and, after many hundreds, indeed thousands, of years has only just begun her work here.

Enough for now. I have just been called to the council chamber of this Duke of Somerset.

I'm back now from the council chamber. This young Duke of Somerset – he's not more than twenty-live – is a proud man and kept us waiting as other supplicants appeared in front of where he sat, like a king, on a throne. When it was our turn, he expected us to make a deep bow when we were first ushered out to stand in front of him. I must confess I am disappointed. I had expected that the nobility at any rate would have manners, a sense of what is fitting. He knows who I am. He knows that I am cousin to an emperor, lie has no cause to give himself airs. As far as I can gather he is as much besieged in this squalid little castle as those in Calais are besieged by him. He has only a thousand men here with him though he says he daily expects reinforcements as soon as the weather is good enough to allow them to land on the beaches.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, Ali has managed things well, as he always does. In return for several pounds' weight each of ginger, nutmeg, coriander, cardamom and cloves, this duke is going to give us a sale-conduct to the gates of Calais, but only if we give an undertaking not to cross the Channel and visit Ingerlond. Instead we have agreed, once we have access to the port, to take a boat up the coast to a Germanic city called Bremen and trade there. Apparently it is an important member of the Hanse. A League. which is a cartel of merchants who rule the ports along the mainland coasts from Bruges to Muscovy and control almost all the trade in the area except that of Ingerlond. Since we have no intention of going there, this is all by the way – Bremen is just Ali's excuse to get us into Ingerlond. I'll let you know how this works out as soon as the situation is clear.

Meanwhile, a quick word about Ali. He really has turned out rather well, for all he remains, in appearance anyway, as uncouth as ever. His mastery of languages is astonishing: he has been able to communicate with the locals in every country we have passed through. This should be no surprise since it is what he promised us, but I confess to being more impressed than I had expected to be. But he has also shown great acumen in dealing with people, getting things organised, trading off the goods we have brought, in what seem to me to be profitable bargains. Like the rest of us he now goes about in furs, in his case a long, shaggy coat, rather mangy and shabby. Shiva knows what sort of animal it came from. Underneath he keeps his old cape with the hole in it for his head, his turban and his loincloth. Yet, as ever, he manages to carry himself with a sort of reserved dignity that usually commands respect.

Anish, too, is turning out well enough, though he suffers from the cold more than most of us… A knock at my door. I'll finish this off when I have seen whoever is calling.

Well, it was Anish and Ali, with bad news. Our soldiers are to be sent home. Apparently the healthy darkness of their skins together with arms and accoutrements that appear strange and even devilish to these superstitious people have attracted hostility and, I would guess, envy. In short, Somerset refuses to let them go on with us. Ali thinks Somerset is afraid they will join Warwick and be used against him and that their magical powers may prove decisive. So. We will press on without them. Ali says we should have no difficulty in recruiting hired bodyguards whenever we think we need them. This reduces our little troupe to some ten or so including a Buddhist monk, who has hung around us since we left, and a fakir, who no longer amuses us – we have seen his tricks too often. However, he usually gets a crowd of the gullible in the villages and marketplaces we pass through who give him food and small change, which he shares with our Buddhist.

That really is all for now. The light is fading, this candle is burning low and stinking more than ever.

Our soldiers can take this with them. I almost envy them, despite the long haul they have ahead.

I remain, dear cousin,

Your devoted servant, Harihara

Dear Cousin

At least we are warmer, our accommodation is almost adequate, and the company merrier, though in a rough, buffoonish way. But, first, the last twenty miles that got us here. The roads we took was never less than ankle deep in mud.