The Saracen: Land of the Infidel Part 58

On the day Daoud decided to act, the Bhari Mamelukes, the slaves of the River, rode out to play mall. Emir Baibars al-Bunduqdari led them across the bridge from Raudha Island to the Nasiri race course, their training and playing ground, within sight of the great pyramids built by the ancient idol-worshipers of Egypt. The people of El Kahira watched with shining eyes as their guardians a.s.sembled on the field. Baibars's tablkhana, his personal mounted band, playing trumpets and kettledrums, cymbals and hautboys, rode before them. Sultan al-Mudhaffar Qutuz came down from the citadel of El Kahira to watch the games as the guest of his Mamelukes.

The troops of julbans, Mamelukes in training, brought up the rear of the parade on their little ponies, with their naqeebs riding before them, the oldest boys in the lead and the first- and second-year boys on foot at the end. They wore plain brown shirts and white cotton trousers and caps. No special marks of rank were allowed these young slaves until they became full-fledged Mamelukes.

Daoud's troop, the boys in their fifth year of training, rode immediately behind the Mamelukes. Each boy carried a mallet, which was as much part of his equipment as his bow, his rumh, his dabbus, and his saif. The mallets were made of cedar and were large and heavy. They had to be, to drive a wooden ball half the size of a man's head.

Slaves had pulled perforated water barrels in carts over the field to lay the dust. Baibars and the sultan and the highest-ranking emirs seated themselves on cushions in an open pavilion facing the center of the field.

Daoud's teammates chattered excitedly. They loved mall, and to play before the sultan was a special honor. Ka.s.sar, the captain of their team, boasted that he would make ten goals that day. Theirs was to be the second match.

Hefting his mallet, Daoud watched the first match, also between two teams of fifth-year trainees. Each team of eight riders tried to drive the wooden ball between a pair of stone pillars painted with red and yellow stripes, defended by the other team. With every crack of a mallet against the ball, a roar went up from the watching Mamelukes.

A judge with an hourgla.s.s called time halfway through the match, to let the field be watered again and the teams change ponies. By the end of the match, the dust was so thick Daoud could not see who had won. But he did not care. He felt utterly calm. He was past anger and past fear. He thought only of watching for the right moment.

Now it was time for their team.

Ka.s.sar, Daoud, and the other six riders lined up on the east side of the field, the eight members of the troop they were playing against forming on the other side.

The judge set the wooden ball, yellow with a bright red stripe around its middle, in the center of the field. The sultan held out a blue silk scarf and dropped it. Ka.s.sar and the captain of the other team raced at the ball from opposite goals, screaming their war cries. Ka.s.sar whirled his mallet over his head, and his pony's legs were a blur in the dust.

He reached the ball an instant before his opponent. His mallet slammed into the ball with a crack like the splitting of a board, and the ball flew halfway toward the enemy goal.

The ball was in play, and now the other riders could join in.

_You will make not even one goal today, Ka.s.sar_, Daoud thought as he galloped across the field with his team.

The players on the other side were trying to hit the ball away from their goal. Ka.s.sar had ridden into their midst, his pony nimbly following the ball. He held his mallet low to hit through the legs of the opposing team's ponies. Two of the opponents had stayed back by their goalposts to deflect the ball should Ka.s.sar hit it.

Ka.s.sar was on top of the ball. Daoud kicked his pony's ribs hard and galloped after him.

As Ka.s.sar swung low from his saddle to hit the ball, Daoud drove in on him. Ka.s.sar glanced up, fear flashing across his broad face. Whatever pa.s.sed through his mind was his last thought. Daoud swung his mallet up from the ground, smashing it into Ka.s.sar's jaw. The force of the blow knocked the white cap from his head. His pony ran free of the melee.

Ka.s.sar reeled, unconscious, but his horse nomad's instinct held him in the saddle.

Daoud jerked his pony around to race after Ka.s.sar. In an instant he was beside his enemy.

He was about to kill a khushdashiyin, a barracks comrade, in open defiance of the code of the Mamelukes and in front of his emir and his sultan.

_I am a dead man_, he thought as he swung the mallet high.

His body felt cold as death, and he hesitated. As he did so, Ka.s.sar turned his head, and Daoud saw consciousness struggling to return to his glazed eyes.

This was Daoud's last chance to avenge Nicetas.

He heard a distant roar of command from the naqeeb Mahmoud, but he ignored it.

He brought the mallet down with all his strength on the Kipchaq's glistening black hair. The shock of the contact ran up his arm and into his shoulder. Ka.s.sar started to fall. Daoud struck again with the mallet.

Ka.s.sar pitched from his pony's back. As he struck the ground, Daoud smashed the mallet into his head a third time, just as if he were hitting a ball. He tried to hit hard enough to knock Ka.s.sar's head right off his neck. Daoud saw the head suddenly distorted, flattening, and knew the skull was crushed. Ka.s.sar lay on the ground on his back, only the whites of his eyes showing, his mouth hanging open. Dust half obscured his body.

Daoud heard shouts from the bystanders, but he paid no attention to what they were saying. He saw riders, the other players, racing toward him.

A silence fell on the playing field.

"Get down from your horse." It was Mahmoud, who had run out into the field on foot.

As Daoud and Mahmoud walked across the field, the naqeeb said, "You will answer to El Malik Qutuz and to Emir Baibars for this. Fool, whatever your quarrel was, could you not have settled it in private? Have you forgotten that Baibars is a Kipchaq? He will not forgive you."

Despite his joy at seeing Nicetas's murderer dead, Daoud now felt terror clutching his throat as he approached the two seated figures in their splendid robes at the side of the field. Now that the deed was done and could not be undone, he dreaded facing these two mighty judges.

_Baibars is a Kipchaq, but it was Baibars who bought me for the Mamelukes_, Daoud thought. _I wonder which will mean more to him this day._

Baibars and Qutuz sat side by side on cushions in the shade of a silken canopy. Baibars wore an egret's plume, symbol of valor, on his green turban. His wide, harsh mouth was tight under the red mustache, his good eye as empty of feeling as the blind one that was crossed by a vertical saber scar.

_Beneficent G.o.d, if I must die for what I have done, let it be a quick and clean death. And then I will join Nicetas._

El Malik al-Mudhaffar Qutuz, Sultan of El Kahira, a Mameluke of a Kurdish tribe, was somewhat older than Baibars. His face was criss-crossed with tiny wrinkles. His beard, greased so that it jutted like the prow of a galley, was such a flat black that it must surely be dyed. He wore a large black turban and full black robes with gold embroidery.

Daoud fell to his knees and prostrated himself before the sultan.

"Get up and take off your cap," said Qutuz without preliminary. Daoud rose to his feet, lifting his cap from his head.

"Look at that blond hair," said Qutuz wonderingly. "I thought he had the look of a Frank about him, Bunduqdari."

"I could have told you that," said Baibars flatly. "He belongs to me. He is known as Daoud ibn Abdallah. His parents were Franks. We took him when we freed Ascalon." He talked to Qutuz, Daoud noted, as if they were equals.

Baibars turned his one eye on Daoud. "Why did you do this?" he said softly. "You are not a fool, and you would not kill out of foolishness."

"Effendi, he killed my friend," said Daoud, making himself stand straight and look levelly at Baibars. The emir might sentence him to death, but he would show himself a true Mameluke. He would not cringe or beg. He would honor Nicetas.

"How do you know?"

Daoud told Baibars how he had found Nicetas in the desert and what he had said to him. He kept his voice level, trying not to let his fear show.

"You should have reported this to me!" shouted Naqeeb Mahmoud, his white beard quivering. The naqeeb would bear some blame, Daoud thought, for this breach of discipline.

But Daoud only turned to him and threw his own words back at him, "Among Mamelukes, he who is strongest rules."

Perhaps he should not be so defiant, he thought. Both the sultan and Baibars liked to show themselves to be men of great generosity.

_Yes, but not to a julban who has broken the law._

"He cannot kill his comrade and go unpunished," said Qutuz. "He should be beheaded."

At the words, even though he had thought himself prepared for them, Daoud felt something shrink with dread inside him. He felt the blade slicing through his neck. The sultan had spoken. His life was over.

"He is too valuable to be beheaded," said Baibars. "Believe me, My Lord."

_Valuable?_

Daoud felt as if he had fallen from a cliff and a strong hand had reached out and was dragging him back. He was breathless with a relief he barely dared to feel. He tried to keep his face and body still as the two great ones debated his fate, but he could not stop his fists from clenching.