Imperial Fire

XXIX

They reached grazing grounds streaming with flocks of sheep and herds of domesticated yaks, the black-hair tents of the nomads dotted on the pastures like pinned spiders. Running the gauntlet of fierce mastiffs, the travellers sought food and shelter at one drokpa encampment. Its occupants were unfriendly until Yonden told them he was a monk at the Palace of Perfect Emancipation, and then the nomads plied their guests with food and drink. Wayland had already sampled tsampa — barley meal ground as fine as sawdust, the staple diet of Tibet. This was the first time he’d eaten it in tea with rancid yak butter. It wasn’t too unpalatable if you thought of it as soup and avoided looking at the hairs floating among the winking beads of grease.

A cheerful woman, two men and three children occupied a pair of smoke-blackened tents pitched on stone slabs. The woman wore a full-length sheepskin gown with the fleece turned inwards, but during the day she let the garment hang from her waist, revealing her naked torso. The men were two of the woman’s three husbands and their relationships seemed not at all strained. The third husband, brother of the other two, was away trading in Nepal. Every spring one of the men would load up a sheep caravan with salt and journey across the Himalayas, returning in the autumn with rice and barley. Usually the second husband was away in the summer pastures. Wayland gave up trying to work out how the ménage worked when all four spouses were together in winter.

He rested three days at the encampment. Mornings and evenings the children milked the sheep into a wild yak’s horn, tying the animals together in two rows facing each other and so closely packed that the head of each animal appeared to be growing backwards out of its opposite number. Before leaving, Wayland exchanged a lame horse for a yak. After two months on the Chang Thang, some of their mounts were so thin that they looked like skeletons sewn into skin.

‘Who’s going to handle the yak,’ Toghan asked.

Wayland cocked a finger at Zuleyka.

Summer was ending. While the sun at noon was still hot enough to burn skin, water in the shade only a few feet away remained frozen. Even with sheepskins piled on top of him, Wayland couldn’t sleep soundly in the open. One night, chilled to the bone by a moaning northerly, he took cover in the tent occupied by Zuleyka. The dog was already inside, curled nose to tail beside her.

‘What are you doing?’ she demanded.

‘What does it look like? It’s freezing out there.’

She tried to push him back through the entrance. ‘I don’t want you here.’

‘It’s my tent. If you don’t want to share it, you sleep outside.’

Zuleyka muttered to herself.

‘What’s that?’ Wayland said.

‘I said I have a knife and I’ll stab you if you lay a hand on me.’

Wayland’s laugh was slightly crazed. ‘A man would have to be desperate to molest you. You look like a witch and you smell like a polecat.’ He wasn’t exaggerating by much. Zuleyka’s lips were black and scabby, her nose sore and flaking, her curls a matted grey rat’s nest.

He settled down and was almost asleep when he registered her tiny rhythmic convulsions. He half-raised himself. Zuleyka was crying. ‘What’s wrong now?’

‘It’s true,’ she wailed. ‘This awful journey has destroyed my charms. Who would marry a hag so aged and coarsened by sun and cold? I should have killed myself when the Vikings captured me.’ She drew her knife. ‘I can still do it. What’s the point of living?’

Wayland grabbed for the weapon, batting his hands against hers before finding her wrists. ‘Stop that! I spoke in spite. If you must know, you’re still beautiful. Too beautiful for your own good or mine.’

Zuleyka settled back and gave a throaty chuckle ‘I know, Master English. I like to tease.’

‘You’re mad.’

Zuleyka yawned and rolled over. ‘Sleep well and meet me in your dreams. I’ll be waiting.’

A day came when Wayland heard the haunting song of geese migrating south, the chevrons passing overhead in squadrons so large they looked from a distance like rain squalls.

Below him spread a shallow grassland basin so wide that its far side was hidden beneath the curve of the horizon. A few clouds cast coloured shadows on a steppe that seemed to emit its own light. A river wandered across the basin in braids more than half a mile wide. On the other bank, etched by the clarity of the atmosphere, a herd of wild yak grazed, arresting in their blackness. At a distance from the herd, two bulls fought like beasts out of a fable, the impact of their collisions carrying as faint concussions through the still air.

The wayfarers rode down to the river. There were at least six main channels to ford, separated by gravel bars and islands. Wayland noticed that the yaks had stopped grazing and fixed their attention upstream, where the river emerged through a gap in the highland rim. He tried to work out what had alarmed them. Probably the pack of wolves stitching themselves into the landscape a mile away. A flock of cranes sprang into clanging flight on the far side and the yaks wheeled, tails upright, galloping away from the river.

Wayland had registered that the current was well below its maximum height, with some channels almost dry. That wasn’t unusual. At this altitude rivers froze at night in their headwaters, only flowing when the sun had melted the ice, sometime late in the day. Wayland had learned not to pitch camp in a dry watercourse after being forced to evacuate a gulley that flooded not long after they’d pitched tents.

He coaxed his horse into the current, the eagle riding on its perch, Yonden close behind and Zuleyka following, leading the loaded yak by a rope tied to its wooden nose ring. The Seljuks tarried on the bank, foraging for dry yak dung — the only fuel on the plateau.

Even with the river so low, progress was slow, the fast-flowing current up to the horses’ bellies in places, the cobbled bottom making it difficult for them to find secure footing. Some of the boulders were two feet across, separated by narrow gaps that could have snapped a horse’s leg if negotiated carelessly. Wayland picked his way across to the first island and waited for Yonden and Zuleyka to join him before fording the next channel. Toghan had just set his horse at the water and the other two Turkmen were making for the bank.

Wayland lurched up onto the next gravel bar and looked back to see the Turkmen strung out, the rearmost rider hampered by the spare mount. Wayland’s horse whinnied and laid back his ears. His dog whimpered, staring upstream.

‘What’s wrong?’ Yonden said.

‘I don’t know,’ Wayland said. He swung his hand at the stragglers. ‘Hurry up.’

Nervousness had begun to infect the other animals. Yonden’s horse balked at entering the water. The yak dug in its heels. The spare horse in the rear tried to break back to the far bank, almost unseating its handler.

Wayland had to kick his horse’s flanks before it would tackle the next channel. This was the widest stream, about seventy yards across, strewn with boulders sunk deep in water that creamed between them, making it difficult to find a path. In one place he found his way blocked and had to detour upstream, forging against the current.

He was two-thirds of the way across the river when he saw it — a white deckled band foaming down the river, its contours frayed and constantly changing, flinging up into spouts of spray. It wasn’t just water. Slabs of ice jostled on the wave.

‘Dear God,’ he murmured. He swung round. ‘Ride for your lives!’

‘What about the yak?’ Zuleyka shouted.

‘Let it go.’

He ploughed through the current, measuring his progress against the oncoming flood. He estimated that it was no more than a quarter of a mile away, surging down at the speed of a cantering horse. He could hear it over the riffling of the current — a malign hissing broken by dull shocks as slabs of ice smashed into obstacles. With only one more channel to cross, he knew he would make it, but when he looked back he realised with visceral horror that two of the Turkmen were doomed. The rearmost of them abandoned the pack horse. It stampeded and fell on its side, thrashing to regain its feet.

The wave was so close that its onrush blotted out all other sounds, the liquid roaring underscored by grating ice and the rumbling of boulders bowled along the riverbed. It sounded like subterranean gates being wrenched open.

Wayland leaped off his horse and dragged it snorting with terror to shore. The bank was undercut and he lost precious time finding a way up. Zuleyka was flogging her horse towards him, Yonden not far behind. Toghan was a long way adrift and the other Turkmen were still in mid-river. Wayland helped Zuleyka and Yonden on to the bank.

‘Keep going,’ he told them.

The torrent had spilled out of its course, swilling a hundred yards beyond the bank. Toghan whipped his horse through the boulders. It stumbled and went down on its knees before recovering its footing.

‘Stay calm,’ Wayland yelled. ‘You can still make it.’

Those last moments stretched into infinity, Wayland measuring the Seljuk’s progress against the surge. Sometimes the wave slowed, backing up in a bulging swell before bursting forward with renewed violence.

Toghan cast a desperate glance. ‘Save yourself.’

Wayland stretched out a hand. ‘Come on. You’re nearly there.’

Their hands linked moments before the wave struck. Toghan drove his horse up onto the bank and dragged Wayland after him. Reaching higher ground, Wayland looked back at the moment the wave of ice and water smashed into the yak and one of the Turkmen and swept them away.

His legs gave way beneath him. He was too stunned by the speed of the disaster to take it in.

‘What caused it?’ Yonden said.

Wayland pointed back with shaking hand. ‘The earthquake must have set off a landslide that blocked the river. The water backed up until…’ He clutched his face. ‘I should have known something was wrong from the yaks’ behaviour.’

‘Nobody could have foreseen it,’ Zuleyka said.

Toghan was beside himself. ‘We must search for our friends.’

Wayland raised his head. ‘They’re dead. We’ll look for them when the river has abated.’

It was still ripping past in full spate, the torrent burdened with ice debris. Shadows were lengthening when the survivors began their search. By nightfall they’d found the battered and shapeless body of the yak, its packs torn off and lost. Of the two Turkmen and the three missing horses, they found no trace.

Over a campfire they took stock of their losses and reached a sober reckoning. The yak had been carrying their tents and most of their food. They had rations for three days.

‘We won’t starve,’ Toghan said. ‘My bow and your eagle will keep us fed until we reach another nomad camp.’

‘How far before we reach your monastery?’ Wayland asked Yonden.

‘One more month.’

Overnight the river shrank to its normal size. The survivors went on, refugees rather than wayfinders, the least regarded of all the creatures in that wilderness. They ate only what they could catch, feeling the pinch of hunger when their arrows missed or the weather was too stormy to risk flying the eagle. Wayland had to take care about Freya’s slips, making sure there were no foxes about before releasing her. She’d become wedded to them, sometimes ignoring a hare and beating after a fox a mile away. Once she checked at a half-grown wolf and might have bound to it if it hadn’t taken cover in a lair.

Camps were sombre occasions, with little conversation to leaven the oppressive mood. Wayland kept thinking about the disaster at the river, berating himself for not interpreting the warning signs. Soft living had dulled his instincts. It was as if some sense amounting to a virtue had deserted him.

Nor was he prepared for the tragedy that would befall them on the next stage. A keening wind from the north blew snow parallel to the ground, sculpting icy arrow heads in the lee of each tussock. Toghan rode ahead, humming a tuneless song. Wayland swayed in his wake, half-frozen, sunk in a torpor.

He snapped awake as what looked like a blur of black smoke erupted through the streaking flakes. It was a wild yak bull charging at Toghan. In the instant of recognition, Wayland registered arrows stuck in its flank.

‘Toghan!’

The Seljuk hadn’t seen the yak and wrenched his horse right into its path. The horse went over as if hit by a wall, flinging Toghan backwards onto a boulder. The yak, blood drooling from its mouth, mashed the screaming horse with its horns, tossing it about as if it weighed no more than straw. One last gouge spun the horse around its axis and the yak trotted away, spotting the snow with the blood dripping from its flanks.

Wayland saw all this while fighting to control his crazed mount. Somewhere Zuleyka was screaming. He jumped off and dragged his horse over to Toghan. The Seljuk lay splayed across the boulder, his face the colour of putrid cheese and something unnatural about the way he was lying.

Wayland took his hands. ‘You’re a lucky fellow.’

‘My back’s broken.’

Everything went dark inside Wayland. He turned to glimpse Zuleyka in the whirling snow. She shook her head.

He knelt by Toghan. The Seljuk’s eyes projected weary resignation, as if he were already looking across death’s door. ‘I can’t move. My back’s broken.’

‘Close your eyes.’

Toghan’s lids slid shut. Wayland squeezed the Seljuk’s hands. ‘Do you feel that?’

‘It’s my legs I can’t feel. Everything’s dead below my waist.’

Wayland thumped Toghan’s knee. He twisted his ankle and prodded it with the tip of a knife. The Seljuk didn’t react.

Toghan’s eyes flickered. ‘When I was a boy, a friend broke his back in a horse race. An elder smothered him as an act of mercy. I don’t want to die like that. Cut my throat so that I have one last glimpse of this earth.’

‘I can’t do that.’

‘You’d do it for your dog.’

‘You’re not a dog. You’re my friend, even though your singing drives me mad.’

Toghan tried to smile. ‘Then end the tune. I don’t want to be singing it when you’ve left me and a bear claws my face.’

‘We won’t leave you.’ Wayland said. He rocked back on his haunches. ‘Keep talking to him,’ he told Yonden.

He opened his pack and pulled out a flask Hero had given him. It contained a liquid the Greek called ‘drowsy mixture’, formulated to dull pain during surgery. Hero had cautioned him about the dosage — more than three or four spoonfuls and the patient might not wake up. With shaking hands Wayland emptied half the contents into a beaker and bore the lethal chalice to Toghan.

‘Drink it,’ Wayland said. ‘It’s a cure-all prepared by our friend Hero.’

Toghan managed a crooked smile. ‘I enjoyed our time together,’ he said, and swallowed the mixture.

Wayland stroked the Seljuk’s brow. ‘There,’ he murmured. ‘I’ll watch over you until you fall asleep. When you wake, you’ll find yourself in paradise.’

Toghan would have died in the night anyway, but this way was much faster. His eyes wandered and he whispered a halting air before his eyes glazed and closed. Yonden was chanting prayers for a good rebirth. Wayland hauled him upright and spoke through chattering teeth.

‘Toghan’s gone. We’ll follow him if we don’t get out of the cold.’

That night Wayland lay wide-eyed in the dark, thinking about death and the infinite variety of ways it could strike. He recoiled from Zuleyka’s gentle touch.

‘Don’t.’

Burial wasn’t possible in the frozen barrens. Wayland and Yonden interred Toghan’s corpse under a cairn of stones facing the rising sun.

‘You go on,’ Wayland told the others.

The words he struggled to articulate were directed at himself more than Toghan. He’d challenged the wilderness and lost, just as Vallon had predicted, and his pride had cost three men their lives.

Wayland rose and stood looking towards the north, wondering where his companions were and heartsick that he would never see them again.

Four days later he checked his horse, amazed at the sight of a moon rising in the south while another moon slid to rest in the west. A rub of his eyes showed that the rising moon was a snow pyramid isolated against a slaty sky.

Yonden dismounted and prostrated himself. ‘The Precious Snow Jewel,’ he said. ‘Our journey’s nearly over.’

Wayland learned that the mountain was sacred to Buddhists, Bon-pos, Hindus and Jains. To Buddhists it was the centre of the universe, the axis on which the world turned and the fount of four great rivers — the Indus, the Tsangpo or Brahmaputra, the Karnali and the Sutlej, all of which breached the Himalayan range. To the Bon-pos, who had grafted the teachings of Lord Buddha onto their shamanistic traditions, it was the Nine-Stacked Swastika Mountain. Hindus called it Mount Kailas or Meru and believed that Shiva resided on its summit. For Jains it was the place where the founder of their faith achieved liberation from the endless cycle of death and rebirth.

It took three days to reach the sacred mountain. The huge clefts that isolated it from the other peaks formed a pilgrim trail marked by shrines called chortens and walls constructed from slabs incised with holy texts and planted with prayer flags. The travellers encountered hundreds of pilgrims circumambulating the mountain, the Buddhists keeping it to their right, the Bon-pos taking the opposite direction. Some of the pilgrims had spent years journeying to their goal and made their final devotions by dragging themselves around the circuit on bleeding hands and knees.

From the south the mountain was even more beautiful, its chiselled mass rising above two huge lakes, its vertical banded walls inscribed by slashes that did indeed resemble a swastika. What dispelled its aura of spirituality was the squalid settlement thrown up by merchants to milk the pilgrims of every last penny. Wandering through a bazaar, fending off touts offering charms, medicines and souvenirs for unholy prices, Wayland emerged to see the Himalayas filling the southern sky.

They stayed only long enough to buy provisions before turning east. After a week following the Tsangpo along a road that led to Lhasa, Yonden struck south through shattered hills. Three days later he led the way up onto a ridge.

Wayland doffed his hat. Before him spread a grassland plain stirred into gentle waves by a breeze. On the other side clouds rising up from dark and hidden valleys smoked about the golden roofs and white walls of a monastery built on a spur jutting over a precipice. Above the fastness rose mountain walls with three tremendous ice summits soaring behind them. Dhaulagiri, Manaslu and Annapurna, Yonden said. Peaks no mortal could scale.

The way to the monastery had been hacked out of rock and it was nearly dark by the time the party reached the top of the mountain staircase. Yonden tugged on a bell and a monk opened a door with timbers six inches thick.

‘I’ve returned,’ Yonden said.

‘We were expecting you,’ said the monk.

He led the way into the monastery, the lugubrious blast of conch shells and the clash of cymbals echoing off the cliffs.