Swords of Arabia: Warlord Read online

  Swords of Arabia

  Warlord

  Anthony Litton

  © Anthony Litton 2013

  Anthony Litton has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 2013 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Author’s Note

  Extract from Arthur Britannicus by Paul Bannister

  Chapter 1

  ARABIA 1904-1905

  The rider sat motionless as the deep black of night turned opalescent, heralding the dawn. It arrived swiftly and the rider's sharp black silhouette became outlined in palest rose as the first rays of the rising sun broke out, pouring down onto the vast reaches of sand where nothing yet stirred. Not even the horseman. Not even the Bedouin encampment he was watching; his black, hooded eyes assessing and weighing every possible avenue of escape. For there would be none. His men were not to let one person escape. Should they do so their blood would mingle with that of his enemies in a river which would irrigate the deserts. So he had sworn. And so he would do.

  Moving at last, he turned and beckoned to his followers massed below him, hidden from the camp by the rolling dunes. Oblivious to the danger to himself if he was seen from the sleeping tents below, he waited whilst his riders gathered around him. The muster complete, he rose in his stirrups and giving throat to his battle cry “For Allah and Fouad!” he plunged down the slope, his horse nimbly making light work of the heavy, shifting sand.

  The surprise was complete as Fouad’s horsemen hit the black tents with the deadly ferocity of striking cobras. The camp struggled to panicked life as its stunned occupants awoke in belated panic, and warriors reached for their weapons. With only the one drowsing watchman, they were caught completely unprepared. Those that awoke before dying realised, much too late, how grievously flawed had been their belief that, deep within their own tribal lands, they were secure.

  Armed with ancient rifles pillaged from foreign traders, the mounted attackers fired into the tents. Screams from within gave satisfying evidence that their bullets were hitting flesh. Some died sleeping; some woke briefly and had the horror of a living nightmare to face before they too were killed. Others, more awake, rushed outside to briefly attempt the impossible, before they too fell. Flames from the raging fires set by the riders engulfed many who avoided the bullets. The killing was great; this was blood feud.

  Fouad’s scimitar flashed, rising and falling with bewildering speed and deadly precision. Only in the first moments of his entry to the camp was its silver steel visible. After that it poured crimson; so covered in blood it was like liquid red. His horse, as black as his robes, pushed through the carnage, his master set on reaching the tent of Ibrahim ibn Fawwaz, Sheikh of the tribe and sworn enemy to Fouad of the Shawaq. Within seconds of launching the attack, he was at the entrance to the chief’s tent. Reining in, he steadied his mount as it slipped in the bloody entrails of a child and he flung himself down from his horse. With two followers, he forced his way past the ill-prepared guards and he found himself face-to-face with his rival on the very threshold of his home.

  Caught sleeping, like his people, and separated from his gun and sword in the confusion, Ibrahim ibn Fawwaz was prepared for his death, if it came. He vowed, however, to take at least one of Fouad’s people with him, preferably Fouad himself. Armed with only a dagger, he faced his attacker without fear.

  “Jackal of the desert! Slinking through the desert’s night to despoil helpless women and children! I spit on you!” he hissed, slashing at Fouad’s unprotected cheek and cutting it to the bone.

  He had the momentary satisfaction of seeing the wound, before Fouad, roaring with anger and pain, cut his enemy’s head from his shoulders with one sweep of his whirling blade. Ignoring the body even as it fell, Fouad swept through into the richly furnished interior of what was once Ibrahim’s home and was now his mortuary.

  His henchmen shepherded out the survivors huddled inside, roughly shoving them to join the group of other prisoners, penned in by Fouad’s men on the one hand and the roaring flames devouring their previous lives on the other. Oblivious to either them, or the looted goods his men were loading onto camels brought up for the purpose, Fouad remounted his horse and led his force away without a backward glance at the still blazing ruins of his blood enemy’s camp.

  Men called him Fouad the Hawk. Anyone brave enough to look into his face thought they saw why. His black eyes, as hooded and merciless as the desert hawk, set deep in a face of high cheekbones and a hooked nose indeed made him look such; yet he hadn’t got his name just from his looks. By the age of fifteen, some twelve years before, his actions had earned him the name. As patient as the bird soaring high above, he waited for the moment to strike. When that moment came, he launched his attack. Deadly and unstoppable; never misjudging; never missing his prey. Silent and implacable; never showing mercy. His reputation was soon feared outside the small desert kingdom his family ruled as hereditary sheikhs. Carrying the Arab sport of raiding to new heights, he extended his family’s sway over neighbouring tribes. Like today. Avenging centuries-old feuds in the process.

  It took the war-party three days to get back to the camp deep in the desert from which their attack had been launched. It would have taken them longer had Fouad considered the weakened state of many of the prisoners and stopped to aid them when they fell. He didn’t. Only on the night they reached their camp, and, feasted and seated outside his own large tent, war banner furled beside him, did he seem to recall the prisoners and had them paraded in front of him. They shuffled in, heads bowed, many with burns still raw on their bodies. He looked them over coldly, as he glanced up from gently stroking the damaged wing of a falcon on his wrist. Mainly young, and, once their wounds had healed, fit and strong for work. Very few old or very young. The desert journey made sure of that. It always did. Fouad looked them over briefly, then dismissed them indifferently; the older women and men to be allocated work with the herds immediately, the younger women and boys to be kept separately whilst choices were made, decisions fought over.

  “Wait!” he suddenly commanded. His ears had picked up the mewling of a tiny infant. “Who has the child?” His eyes began to burn as no reply came. His men started to shoulder their way through the prisoners, searching each one.

  “I have, Lord,” a voice responded, and a slight figure stepped forward. A frightened hush descended as all waited to see what the savage ruler would do.

  “Raise your head,” he commanded, as the figure was halted by his guards a few paces away. Obediently the prisoner pushed back the robe covering its head and shoulders, exposing both the face of a young girl and the tiny infant clutching her neck. Fouad, no great lover of the female, gazed at her with little interest. He was interested, however, in the infant. �
�How did it pass through the desert and live?” he asked, and suddenly found himself impaled on the blaze of her glance.

  With little thanks to you, murderer and desert scum, its glitter clearly said, as she replied, “It was the will of Allah, Lord.” She would never tell this pig’s breath the struggle it had taken to protect her child from the harsh sun and the raging thirst and hunger they all had endured through their captor’s callous indifference to their fate. Of how she had fed her child from the few scraps of food, had it drink from the little water jar, all that she’d managed to scoop up when she realised what was happening that terrible morning. No, she would never tell him, but she would never forget.

  “Where is your husband?” he asked, despite knowing the near certainty of her answer. His men rarely left able-bodied men alive.

  “He died at the camp, Lord,” she replied.

  “It is the will of Allah,” he responded gravely.

  She shrugged her shoulders. “He was a tyrant, Lord.” Her glance touched his for a moment and Fouad clearly saw the word “also” hovering, unspoken but crystal clear, on the air between them. Intrigued by her evident courage, unbroken despite her ordeal, he looked at her calmly for a moment or two, which to the onlookers seemed an age. Her face was unveiled, as the blue face mask, traditional to her tribe, had been ripped away in the fighting. Olive-skinned, with black eyes, her hair, deep ebony and glossy, fell down her back. No more than fifteen or so, he judged, yet with the strength and maturity of an older woman.

  “Put her in there,” he gestured abruptly to the rear of his tent where the women’s quarters traditionally were. On the verge of ordering the infant to be separated from her, he stopped and signalled them both through. He knew already, his sharp-honed instinct telling him, that she would die first, and she intrigued him sufficiently for him not to want that, yet. Once out of his sight, however, he promptly forgot her.

  The women of the tent were initially hostile, sneering and giggling at her dishevelled state, until stopped by an older woman of immense authority. “Fetch water and bathe her,” she ordered, to the girl’s stupefaction. Like most desert dwellers water was too precious a commodity for them often to think of washing their hands in it let alone their whole body. Calmed out of her instinctive pulling away, she allowed the woman’s attendants to remove the sand and blood-encrusted clothes of herself and her child and they both were immersed in warm, scented water in what she discovered later was a portable canvas bath.

  “What is your name, child?” the older woman asked gently, as the girl stepped out of the bath feeling more revived than she had ever thought she would again.

  “Zahirah, Lady,” she replied, instinctively giving her questioner the courtesy of rank. She was right. Her benefactress was of high status. She was Fouad’s mother, the Sheikha Firyal.

  “You have courage, child. You now must learn when to use it and when to bend with the desert wind.” Zahirah, startled, glanced quickly at her, realising she had observed the hidden parts of her exchange with her son. “Come. You’re tired. You must sleep now and gain strength for whatever tomorrow will bring,” she said, escorting her to a sleeping place near her own on the carpeted floor of the cordoned-off area.

  The morning brought her nothing except rest. Nor did the day after that produce any major alarms or events, although, as she was now deemed recovered from her ordeal, she was expected to help with the duties of the campsite. Fouad was rarely in the tent, so busy was he with further planning. Pleased to have the respite, she performed her duties well and quickly, merging into the shadows of the large tent whenever he appeared. She was well content to do so. She didn’t want to attract his attention. Not yet. Not until she was stronger. Then she would. When the time was right. When her son was safe, either smuggled back to the remnants of his people, or a grown man; then she would kill Fouad the Hawk.

  Chapter 2

  Working toward the end she had set herself, Zahirah went about learning all she could about her people’s killer. The other women were wary of her and were guarded in their speech when she was around. What she did glean, however, gave her some pleasure. Fouad, it appeared, was in serious trouble. However much the all-powerful conqueror he appeared to her, he was, in reality, struggling for survival. So much she learned from two half-heard conversations, hurriedly terminated when it was realised she was within earshot. Expressionlessly, she continued sweeping the sand from the rich carpets and stored the information away.

  On the fourth day of her arrival at the camp, a young girl of similar age to herself hesitantly struck up a conversation. Wary at first, Zahirah warmed when she found that the girl’s circumstances were similar to her own. Plucked from her own people in a dawn raid similar to that suffered by herself, she had been one of ten carried away into captivity. In one respect though, her story was tragically different. Her child had been at the opposite end of the camp when the attack hit, and she had been dragged away with no time to run and get him.

  Appalled Zahirah, looked at her. “How long ago was this? Did he survive?”

  Ayesha wearily shook her head, tears spilling from her heavily kohled eyes. “It was over a year ago. I don’t know whether he survived,” she whispered. Zahirah felt her own tears starting in sympathy. Whether it was a reflection of her own grief, she didn’t know but she felt, looking into Ayesha’s eyes, that she could see the smoke, hear the guns and the other girl’s screams as she was dragged away without her child. “I think he probably did though. The raid was very swift with little burning or killing,” Ayesha concluded.

  Zahirah nodded. Desert raids usually were swift with little, or even no, killing, though even these raids Fouad carried out with more savagery than many other leaders. It was only when a blood feud existed that real slaughter occurred. Sometimes such feuds were centuries old and no one could recall how they had started. This didn’t lessen their impact though, as she well knew.

  The two girls became fast friends and Ayesha helped Zahirah look after her infant. This relieved Zahirah of one worry. She had been frightened of letting Ahmad out of her sight while she did her work, even though the other women had shown him no animosity.

  It was due indirectly to Ayesha also that she gained access to a valuable source of information about Fouad and his tribe. Immediately after morning prayers on the eighth day of her captivity, word came that they were to move camp. Completing her own tasks she went to help the other girl dismantle the inner hangings of the tent.

  Entering the richly furnished private apartments of the Sheikha, believing they were empty, they were startled to see the older woman still inside, reclining and engrossed in something she was holding. The two girls stopped and lowered their heads with murmured apologies. Waving their stammered words aside, the older woman indicated they start. Both daughters of Bedouin, such packing and unpacking was second nature to them and they made light work of it. The Sheikha, also used to the way of life adopted in her own youth, sat quietly as they worked around her and continued to be engrossed in the object she held in her lap.

  Ayesha, as totally incurious as her people over things outside their normal run of experience, paid no attention to what she was doing. Zahirah was different. She had an avid curiosity, live and vibrant despite it never being satisfied in the slightest. The nomadic life of a camel herding tribe gave little time for anything outside of the daily struggle for survival. Being a woman didn’t help either. Though far less restricted than her more settled kinswomen, her access to life outside the tents of her own people was still circumscribed enough to stop her ever consciously realising that there were questions to ask, let alone expect to receive answers to them.

  The ornate inner hangings down and carefully folded, the beautifully patterned carpets neatly rolled up, she helped Ayesha fold the heavy goats’ hair outer walls of the tent whilst covertly watching the still handsome older woman, wondering what kept her so still. Firyal suddenly looked up and saw the young captive gazing at her. Caught totally unawares, Zahira
h blanched but had no chance to avert her gaze.

  “Come over here, child. Don’t be frightened, I’ll not harm you,” the Sheikha added, as Zahirah instinctively shrank away. Obediently the young girl moved nearer, marvelling as she always did when near the princess, how sweetly she smelt. “You seem curious about something. Is it this?” Firyal asked, quietly indicating the square object in her hands.

  Zahirah nodded, her heart slowing as she realised she wasn’t to receive a beating for the impudence of staring at one so much above her.

  “This, child, is a window to the world. A magic carpet which takes me beyond the sands,” she added, seeing that the young desert dweller hadn’t followed her reference to windows. “It is called a book.”

  Zahirah gazed at it, bewildered but entranced also by the evocative words of the Sheikha.

  “Here, hold it,” Firyal closed the book and held it out to Zahirah who took it gingerly. Rising, the older woman stood next to the girl and opened the book.

  Zahirah gazed in incomprehension at the lines of black signs on the creamy white sheets inside the gold embossed covers.

  “It is a way of telling stories. As the Sulubba tell tales by their mouths,” she added, referring to the travelling storytellers of the region, “so this tells by the symbols written here.” Looking at the girl, she saw only partial understanding, but total interest and she resolved to show her more.

  Given that they all had the time left to them, she thought suddenly. She made the sign to avert the evil eye as her thoughts turned to the extreme danger they were all in. Hopefully, the gathering they were preparing to travel to would ease that danger, but she knew it would need a miracle from Allah to save her house from ruin.

  For two days they travelled even deeper into the desert; the very journey itself, was, Firyal well knew, an indication of their position. Once, those they were going to see would have travelled to the coast to see them. Indeed, even had her son made such a journey he would not – had the times not been as they were – have travelled with his mother and most of the other women of his family.