Julian Rathbone - Kings of Albion

'And do you follow the Brahmins in their pursuit of union with the godhead and spiritual perfection through reincarnation?'

'Not at all.' Suryan expressed some disgust at the very idea. 'The goddesses and gods I have spoken of are all human creations, outward manifestations of the goddess within us, and our exercises are devoted to achieving the ecstasies that enable us to become one with that deity.'

This approached very closely the beliefs and practices of the branch of Islam in which I was brought up, until I suffered that cruel sword-stroke and the loss of all those I loved, beliefs I later learnt to understand better in the fastnesses of the Hindu Kush. I was to discover that this Kaula version went to a far deeper level even than that taken by the dervishes who, amongst us, achieve similar if cruder ecstasies m their whirling dances.

By now we had reached a shaded corner of the great square within the portico of one of the buildings that enclosed it. After first promising to return before sunset, I left Suryan there with his back to a less than aniconic linga. the phallic symbol of Shiva, and made my way back up into the Royal Enclave. I had no difficulty getting there: casual passers-by were ready with directions and, as I began to move through the Royal Enclave, minor officials and doormen also helped me.

My access to the Prince's presence was, indeed, unchallenged though it did involve a wait of several hours. Meanwhile messengers, petitioners, mendicants, suppliers of war materials, inventors of new weapons, and who knows what else?, came and went, singly or in groups, while vendors selling slices of melon or cups of cold water, coconut milk and lassi in their rounds. I asked the doormen who stood at the various entrances that led into the further parts of the building if, how, or when I could be granted an audience with Prince Harihara. My requests were met with polite assurances that I would be taken to him in no time at all. However, I soon realised that similar answers were being returned to almost all who approached them, so at last I did what I had not done in two years and more: I parted with my precious bundle. 'Take it,’ I insisted to a doorman, an elderly but kind-looking man who carried an ebony staff with silver mountings, 'and tell the Prince that, if he needs to know more about its provenance, to send for me before dusk.' I then sat down with my back to the doorpost and waited. An hour or so later I saw him picking his way through the crowd and guessed that it was me he was looking for. Again I presented myself to him.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, with some relief. 'I was beginning to tear you had gone. Prince Harihara will see you now.'

His ebony staff was clearly a symbol of some authority for doors opened to him as I followed and door-keepers stood aside. The halls and courtyards he led me through were beautifully proportioned, not grandiose now that we had left the public area but not lacking dignity either, many with slender pillars, intricately carved ceilings and others with small ponds and fountains. Songbirds fluttered at liberty and butterflies cruised low banks of almond-scented purple flowers. Unglazed windows looked out over the lower town and the great valley beyond. It put me in mind of the Alhambra Palace on the hill above Granada but with this advantage: there, following the Kor'an, the decorations are either abstract or repeat endlessly in fine calligraphy the mantra ' Wa-la ghaliba illah-Llah' (There is no Conqueror but God), while here wall-paintings and low-relief depicted the joys of an earthly paradise in realistic detail.

We came at last to a loggia set behind a pool with views of the mountains we had crossed the day before framed in its arched windows. Prince Harihara Raya Kurteishi was standing in one of them. He turned to face us as we came into his presence.

He was tall and well-built, his dark skin glowing with the sheen so typical of his race. He wore a rich gown made of fine buttery-yellow cotton, embroidered with silver, which added to the easy grace of his movements. He also wore a necklace of filigree gold and precious stones, which might have been a badge of office but whose function, I later decided, was probably decorative. His hair was long, worn to his shoulders, and thick, a lustrous black, not unlike the mane of the leader of a pride of lions; his hands were large and strong. He carried with him an aura that was almost godlike, the charisma of the anointed. And, for as long as he was more than twenty feet from you, you would swear he was in the prime of life, not more than thirty years old. It was only as he came nearer that you saw the deep lines in his face, particularly on either side of his mouth, giving a sharper delineation to his cheeks and jaw, the crow's feet at the corners of his deep-set eyes, the furrows in his brow, the thinness of his lips. He smiled often, but always with a hint of melancholy. In short, he was fifty years old at least, about ten or fifteen years younger than I was at that time.

He welcomed me with a nod. 'You are Ali ben Quatar Mayeen, a merchant?'

I assented.

'And you brought me this packet?' A slight gesture indicated a small table on which it lay, but now with its thongs of faded red leather unknotted and its outer cover of oiled cloth peeled back to reveal the leaves of parchment it contained. My bowed head signalled agreement.

'Then it is possible we have much to talk about.'

My well-being, and indeed my continued existence, have often depended on an ability to make quick, accurate assessments of the people I am dealing with, and particularly of their weaknesses. Prince Harihara, I decided almost immediately, was vain of his appearance, and had a high regard, perhaps not fully justified, for his own abilities – characteristics I associate with younger brothers of heirs apparent, cousins of royalty, people who owe their position to birth but would prefer to think that they have got where they are through merit. They bask in the light shed by those yet more privileged by birth than they, and presume upon it – yet they resent it.

And what did he see?

The man standing in front of him looked like a scarecrow. He wore a large, greasy turban above a black voluminous sheet, torn in places, laded to rust in others, and grubby with the food that had been spilt on it. A diagonal scar traversed a face that a straggly moustache and goatish beard did nothing to make more prepossessing. Below the sheet his shins were stick-like and the nails on his long sandalled feet were turned down like claws over his toes. In his right hand he held a staff, as tall as himself, ash-white and barkless with age, on which he leant, his body tilted to the left so it made a zigzag against the straightness of the pole. In short, dear Mah-Lo, he had before him what you see now, though perhaps a little less ruined by age and pain-racked joints.

Prince Harihara was, therefore, probably disinclined to believe a word of my story: it would seem to him, on the face of it, an unlikely concoction put together to cover the fact that I had either stolen the package from a traveller or picked it up on the quay of some Levantine port. Yet this magnifico was ready to listen to the vagabond: that surely said something about the package I had brought.

Had he not already perused the parchment leaves I doubt he would have given me the time of day, let alone a full personal audience. However, having established that it was indeed I who had brought the packet, he went on to question me as to how it had come into my possession. Reserving judgement tor the time being on my veracity he concluded, 'No doubt you expect some reward for bringing it to me.'

I shrugged and murmured, 'It's a long way from Calais to Vijayanagara. But my main purpose was to fulfil the request of the man who gave it me.'