Tim Severin - Sworn Brother

'The Serklander says he will visit you tomorrow after his prayers,' our interpreter reported. 'He asks that you prepare your wares for his inspection.'

'The land of silk, that's Serkland.' Ivarr said to me, wiping the beads of sweat from his scalp. He was sweating more than usual. 'I've never been there. It's beyond the mountains, far to the south. Their rulers like to buy slave girls, particularly if they are beautiful and accomplished. And they pay in honest silver.'

Thinking back to my time with Brithmaer the royal moneyer and his clever forgeries, I hoped that Ivarr was right. 'If it's called the land of silk why do they pay in silver?'

Ivarr shrugged. 'We'll be paid in silk when we sell our furs in the great city but the Serklanders prefer to use silver. Sometimes they exchange for gems which they bring from their country, like these.' He tugged at his pearl ear studs and the diamond.

I wondered if, yet again, my life was turning back upon itself. It was Brithmaer who had told me the rumour that fire rubies came from lands beyond the mountains.

So I awaited the arrival of the mysterious Serklander with great interest to see what he was like.

I do not know what I had been expecting, perhaps a giant clad in glistening silks or a gaunt bearded sage. Instead the Serklander proved to be a small, jovial, tubby man with a pale brown skin and dark eyes. He was dressed in a simple white cotton gown, with a cloth of the same material wrapped around his head, and plain leather sandals. To my disappointment he wore no jewellery of any kind. His affable manner was emphasised by the dourness of his escort of Black Hoods, who looked every bit as suspicious as when they had warned us off. By contrast the Serklander smiled at everyone. He trotted round our camp on his short legs, beaming at everyone, kholops and Rus alike. He patted Ivarr's two children on the head in a fatherly way, and even laughed at himself when he tripped over a tent rope and almost went headlong. But I noticed that his alert gaze missed nothing.

Finally Ivarr brought him to where the slave girls were waiting. Their tent was like a market booth and Ivarr had ordered that the front flap should be hanging down as we approached. Our little procession consisted of Ivarr, the Serklander and his guards, the Serklander's interpreter and our own, and myself as Ivarr's lucky mascot. Everyone else was kept well back by the Black Hoods. We came to a halt, facing the curtain. There was a pause and I saw two of the Black Hoods exchange a quick glance. They suspected an ambush and made a move as if to step forward and check. But the little Serklander was too quick for them. He was enjoying Ivarr's showmanship. He made a small restraining gesture and waited expectantly, a cheery smile on his face. Ivarr stepped forward, took hold of the edge of the tent curtain and threw it open, revealing the tableau inside. The slave girls had been arranged so that they stood in a line, hands demurely clasped in front of them. They were dressed in all the finery that Ivarr's concubine had been able to muster — flowing gowns, bright belts, coloured necklaces. Their hair had been washed and combed and arranged to best advantage. Some had flowers braided in their hair.

I watched the Serklander's face. His glance swept along the line of the dozen women on offer and the cheerful smile remained on his lips as if he was highly amused. Then I saw his gaze halt and — just for an instant — his eyes widened a fraction. He was looking at the far end of the line of slave girls where Ivarr's woman had positioned the twins, so that the sunshine filtering through the tent cloth bathed them in a luminous light. Daringly she had decided not to decorate the two girls at all. They wore only plain, cotton gowns, belted with a simple pale blue cord. Their feet were bare. The twins looked virginal and pure.

I knew instantly that Ivarr had made the sale.

Nevertheless, it took a week to settle a price for the girls. Neither the Serklander nor Ivarr were involved directly. The trading custom was that the two interpreters proposed bid and counter-bid, though of course their masters were the ones who dictated the value of their offers. Ivarr mistrusted the man whom the Khazar Jew had provided, so instructed me to accompany our interpreter whenever he visited the Serklander camp to negotiate, to keep an eye on him. I found this difficult because the two men carried on their negotiation entirely by touch, not word. After the usual formalities and a glass of some sweet drink, they would sit down on the ground facing one another and clasp their right hands. A cloth was then placed over the hands to shield them from the gaze of onlookers and the bargaining began. It must have been done by the varying pressures and positions of fingers and palms in a code to signal the offers and responses. All I could do was sit and watch, and try to read their faces.

'It's impossible,' I said to Ivarr after returning back to his camp after one session. 'I can't tell you if the trading is fair and honest, or if the two of them are making a private deal and you are being cheated.'

'Never mind, Thorgils,' he said. 'I still want you to be there. You are my good luck.'

So I continued with my visits to the Serklander's camp, and thus I came to his attention. His name was Salim ibn Hauk, and he was both merchant and diplomat. He was returning from an embassy to the Bolgars of the river on behalf of his master, whom he referred to as Caliph al-Qadir. Meeting with our felag had been as much a stroke of good fortune for him as it had been for us. He had been charged with collecting information about the foreign lands, and wished to know more about the Rus.

A Black Hood was sent to fetch me to ibn Hauk's tent.

'Greetings,' said the cheerful little man, speaking through his interpreter. Ibn Hauk was seated cross-legged on a carpet in his tent, a light airy canopy spread over slender supports which allowed the maximum of breeze. In front of him was a low wooden desk and he held a metal stylus in his hand. 'I would be very grateful if you could tell me something about your people.'

'Your excellency, I'm not sure that I can tell you very much,' I answered.

He looked at me quizzically. 'Don't be alarmed,' he said, 'I only want to learn about your customs. Nothing that would be considered as spying.'

'It's not that, your excellency. I have only lived among the Rus for a few months. I am not one of them.'

He looked disappointed. 'You are a freed slave?'

'No, I joined them of my own wish. I wanted to travel.' 'For profit?'

'To fulfil a vow I made to a friend before his death. They are on their way to the great city, to Miklagard.'

'How remarkable.' He made a note with his stylus on the page in front of him and I saw that he wrote from right to left. Also he used a version of the curving script which had haunted me since I had seen it on Aelfgifu's necklace coins.

'Excuse me, your excellency,' I asked. "What is it that you write?'

'Just a few notes,' he said. 'Never worry. There's nothing magical in making marks on paper. It does not steal away the knowledge.'

He thought me illiterate like most members of the felag.

'No, your excellency. I was wondering just how your script conveys the spoken word. You write in the opposite direction from us, yet you begin at the top of the page just as we do. If there is more than one page of writing, which page is the first? I mean, do you turn the pages from left to right, or in the other direction? Or is there perhaps another system?'

He looked astonished. 'You mean to say that you can read and write!'

'Yes, your excellency, I have been taught the Roman script and the Greek. I know also the rune letters.'

He laid down his stylus with an expression of delight. 'And I thought that I had found only two gems for my master. Now I discover that I have a treasure of my own.' He paused, 'And just for your information, yes, I do write letters from right to left, but numbers in the opposite direction.'