Raiders from the North

Chapter 21

Dreams of greatness came easily. Achieving it was harder. It had taken Baburi and his Turkish mercenaries six months to create a corps of troops skilled at firing the cannon and muskets he had brought to Kabul. Meanwhile, as the citizens of Kabul had grown used to the flashes and booms around their city, Babur had despatched an embassy to the Turkish sultan, with a message from Baburi and bags of gold coin, to buy six more cannon and four hundred muskets from the foundries and gun-makers of Istanbul.

Even more satisfying to Babur had been the knowledge that his own armourers were learning to make the new weapons under the expert guidance of Ali-Quli, the grey-bearded Turkish master-gunner who had accompanied Baburi to Kabul. His ability with both cannon and musket was extraordinary — especially as five years ago, two fingers of his right hand had been blown off by an exploding matchlock with a cracked barrel.

Night after night, Babur had sat late with Baburi, questioning minutely his accounts of battles in which cannon and matchlocks had been deployed. In what circumstances were they most effective? In open battle or siege? How could you best protect your gunners and matchlock men against archers or cavalry charges? How did these weapons change the traditional methods of attack? Before he tested them in battle, he must understand everything.

Babur also sent men out into the city to linger in the large, arched caravanserais where the merchants of many lands displayed their wares on raised stone platforms in the middle of the courtyard, trading gossip as well as goods. Babur’s agents listened carefully, asking the occasional discreet question. They heard much boastful talk from the Hindustani merchants about Delhi’s vast palaces of carved rose-pink sandstone and the grandeur of Sultan Ibrahim’s court but not the faintest rumour that he — or any other ruler of Hindustan — had acquired cannon and matchlock muskets.

But now, at last, on a cold, clear January day, Babur was leading an expedition to see for himself the effect of these weapons against an enemy unused to them. That enemy was the new Sultan of Bajaur, a dependency of Kabul, who had taken it into his foolish young head to refuse Babur the customary annual tribute in grain, sheep and oxen.

The Bajauris, living high in the mountains in dense forests of oak, olive and wormwood, noisy with rasping mynah birds, were an idolatrous, infidel people with strange beliefs. When a Bajaur woman died the men placed her corpse on a stretcher and, taking each of the four corners, raised it up. If she had lived a good life, the Bajaurs believed her spirit would cause the men holding the stretcher to shake so violently that her body would be thrown to the ground. Only then would the people don black mourning garb and begin their lament. If, on the other hand, a female corpse induced no such motion, it was considered proof of an evil life and the body was tossed unceremoniously on to a fire to be reduced to nothing.

The ruler of these singular people had provided him with a fine opportunity, Babur thought, as, with Baburi by his side, he rode out of Kabul at the head of a column that included a detachment of newly trained matchlock men and gunners, all hand-picked by Ali-Quli, and four cannon. They circled northwards up through hilly terrain towards Bajaur. In the old days, Babur and his men would have ridden fast and hard on a raid like this, taking their enemy by surprise. But the heavy cannon in their trundling bullock carts slowed their pace, providing more opportunity and time for observers to raise the alarm.

Babur brooded on this as he rode, not noticing the chill wind in his face. He was also reflecting on a passage he had come across in a chronicle shortly before leaving Kabul: ‘Timur prized bold and valiant warriors by whose aid he opened the locks of terror and ripped in pieces men like lions and through them and their battles overturned the heights of mountains. .’ It also told of Timur’s loathing for cowards. Any man, whatever his rank, who failed him in battle had had his head shaved and his body painted red. Then, dressed in women’s clothes, he had been dragged through the camp to be beaten and reviled by his comrades before being executed. Mercy had been unknown to Timur.

Babur understood the need for ruthlessness. Just three nights ago, on a surprise tour of inspection, he had found five men asleep on picket duty and had ordered an example to be made of them. Their left ears had been sliced off and the men paraded before the rest of Babur’s force, bleeding and with the severed ears on a string round their necks. But if he was to succeed, as Timur had done, in forging and holding an empire, he would have to find even greater reserves of toughness within himself, an even greater ability to sacrifice others to his ambition without the appearance of a second thought.

‘Majesty.’ One of Babur’s scouts, well muffled in sheepskin against the cold, rode up to him. ‘The sultan has fled from his capital ten miles ahead of us to a fortress on banks of the Bajaur river in the hill country twenty miles east of here. He has taken all his army, two thousand soldiers, with him.’

‘You’re sure of this — it isn’t a trap?’

‘We saw him ride out with his troops, accompanied by many camp-followers and citizens, and tracked him all the way.’

‘Tell me about the fortress.’ Babur leaned forward in his saddle, green eyes glinting above his face-cloth.

‘It’s a large rectangular mud-brick structure, two storeys high, on the brink of a river gorge. . Let me show you.’

The scout dismounted, cleared a patch of earth and, with the tip of his dagger, marked out a square tower with a river running through the gorge beneath its north wall. ‘See, Majesty. Rising scrubland surrounds it on three sides. This single gateway in the southern wall is the only way in — or out. .’

Baburi and Babur exchanged a glance. It couldn’t be better. The sultan thought himself in a stronghold. In fact, he was in a trap.

Four days later, Babur drew on his leather gauntlets in his scarlet command tent in his camp on one of the few stretches of flat land not far from the fortress. As he had expected, the sultan had ignored his invitation the previous evening to surrender and find mercy. Now he would face the consequences. Under cover of the night men and oxen had dragged the four guns into position four hundred yards from the gateway to the fortress. As quietly as they could, Ali-Quli’s men had dug mounds of earth on which to rest the guns, then concealed them with brushwood until the moment for action came.

And that moment was fast approaching. Each of Babur’s commanders had had his orders. The main force was to advance openly on the fortress’s southern side and immediately launch a frontal assault. Meanwhile, the matchlock men would follow them, ready to pick off defenders on the battlements. Finally, when he judged the time was right, Babur would reveal his cannon.

Under a steely grey sky, Babur gave the signal for the attack to begin. From a new vantage-point on the edge of a copse three hundred yards below the western corner of the fortress, where he and Baburi sat side by side on their horses, he watched his mounted archers charge up the stony slope to the fortress, loosing arrows as they rode. Dismounting, they began to hoist the broad wooden ladders they had dragged with them up against the fortress walls, to the left of the gateway. While they worked, Ali-Quli and his matchlock men fired at any defender rash enough to expose himself on the battlements above.

Two Bajauris fell immediately. Even from where he was, Babur sensed the defenders’ consternation and dismay. More fell. As the Bajauris realised that the red-hot balls could penetrate even shields and chain-mail, they began vanishing from the battlements.

Babur’s men were already swarming up the rough ladders two abreast. Keeping themselves pressed as close to the walls and ladders as possible, they held their round shields high to protect themselves against any missiles from above. Ali-Quli had already signalled the matchlock men to hold fire for fear of hitting their own side. Baba Yasaval, a courageous warrior from near Herat, was the first to reach the battlements and, fighting his way to the gatehouse, at once got to work with his men, trying to winch up the black metal grille blocking the main gateway. But now that the muskets had fallen silent, the defenders had regained their courage. Babur could see them running back on to the battlements, striking at Baba Yasaval’s outnumbered men with spiked maces and battleaxes, forcing them to fall back from the gatehouse.

Babur exchanged a brief glance with Baburi who, understanding exactly what was in his mind, rode swiftly to the cannon and their teams, concealed further down the slope. Babur watched as the gunners dragged the brushwood from around the weapons and adjusted the angle of elevation of each barrel.

Next, they rammed in the bags of gunpowder and the stone shot, inserted their spiked awls into each touch-hole and quickly sprinkled a little more gunpowder around. Finally, four more men advanced to light the charges — Babur could just see the glowing tips of the lengths of oil-soaked cord. Baburi looked across at him and, seeing him circle his sword above his head, gave the order to fire. All of a sudden, above the ordinary noise of battle, booming, cracking sounds never heard before in Bajaur tore the air.

The first cannon ball smashed into the lower storey of the agreed target, the fortress’s twenty-foot-high south-eastern wall to the right of the gateway. It struck about ten feet above the ground, spraying chunks of brick and dust in all directions. The second ball hit just below as did the third and fourth. When the dust and smoke cleared, a small part of the wall had collapsed and there was a large fissure in a neighbouring section. A detachment of Babur’s men, held in reserve till now, were already scrambling over the piles of rubble into the fortress.

Stunned defenders were fleeing, some letting themselves down from the battlements on ropes, slipping and falling in their haste to get away before the unknown weapon that had destroyed part of the walls roared again.

While Babur’s archers provided covering fire, the matchlock men moved closer, set up their forks and fired at the fugitives. Babur saw two Bajauris tumble over, one in complete silence with a musketball hole in his forehead, the other — a yellow-turbaned giant — screaming and clutching at his chest with twitching fingers that dripped blood. But so many were running, stumbling and falling down the eastward slope beneath the fortress and away from Babur’s men that it was impossible for the matchlock men to deal with them all.

‘Ride them down!’ Babur ordered a troop of his guard. Then, sword in hand, he galloped up the incline towards the main gate where his men had now succeeded in retaking the gatehouse and raising the grille. Baburi joined him just as he reached it and they rode in together.

‘Majesty.’ Baba Yasaval, his face shiny with sweat from his efforts and blood running from a jagged cut above his left ear, greeted Babur as he emerged into the courtyard. ‘The sultan is dead — he threw himself from the battlements into the gorge. We have taken many prisoners. What are your orders?’

‘Timur opened the locks of terror and overturned the heights of mountains. .’ Those words — cruel, perhaps, but very clear — resonated in Babur’s head. ‘Execute the royal council. They had the opportunity to submit but rejected it. Round up the rest — women and children too — to be sent to Kabul to work as slaves for our people.’

‘Well? What do you think? How did we do?’ Baburi asked, as they inspected the conquered fortress and the damage inflicted by the cannon.

Babur struggled to put his feelings into words. Because of his new weapons the fortress had fallen in hours, not days, weeks or months. The possibilities seemed limitless. He gripped Baburi’s shoulder. ‘Today we fought in a way my ancestors never knew, that would have amazed them. .’

‘So why don’t you look more cheerful?’

‘Too often I’ve let myself be seduced by grand prospects that did not materialise. Haven’t you often said so yourself? I don’t want to rush into an attack against Hindustan until I’m sure we’re ready.’

‘But today was a beginning, wasn’t it?’

The weeks that followed provided further chances for Babur to test both weapons and tactics. Leaving a conquered and subdued Bajaur, he took his men south-eastwards into the wild, mountainous country bordering Hindustan. Again, none of his opponents had any response to the crash of his cannon or the crack of his muskets.

Indeed, on learning of Babur’s approach nervous chieftains fell over themselves to send gifts of sheep, grain, horses, even women, accompanied by grovelling messages. Their eagerness to placate him and preserve from destruction their villages and mud fortresses perched on hilltops provoked a wry amusement in Babur. Some even presented themselves before him with grass in their mouths — the gesture of submission Babur had seen among other wild tribes in his youth.

But his interest in subduing petty chiefs was waning. At night, when he tried to sleep, different images filled his mind. A conqueror — ‘eyes like candles without the brilliance’ — surveyed the great river, the Indus, that lay between him and his objective. Timur had had no difficulty is overcoming men. Neither had he let any physical barrier stand in his way — no mountain or river had stopped him. Babur must be the same. Fifteen years ago, in blistering summer heat, he and Baburi had gazed on the Indus. Waking with a start he felt a fierce desire to do so again that he could not later explain — not to Baburi or even to himself. . But it persisted and strengthened.

Putting aside thoughts of further campaigning, Babur turned his column eastward until, on a chill March morning, a broad, swift-flowing river finally came in sight. Without waiting for any of his men, he galloped ahead over cold, hard earth. Reaching the bank, he jumped from his horse, ripped off his clothes and dived into the snow-fed waters that had flowed all the way from the distant mountains of Tibet.

The water was so cold that he gasped and swallowed a freezing mouthful that seemed to constrict his throat with ice. The strong current was already sweeping him away and cries of alarm were coming from his men on the bank. Taking another deep breath — but this time keeping his mouth well above the water — he struck out with powerful strokes, defying the elemental force that wanted to carry him off. With elation he realised he was not only holding his position but making headway. He was winning. There was a splash beside him and Baburi’s head pushed up out of the water beside him.

‘You idiot, what are you doing?’ Baburi’s face was almost blue. ‘And why are you laughing?’

‘Swim with me to the other side and I’ll tell you.’

Together they forced themselves through the eddies and currents until they reached the far bank and, grabbing handfuls of coarse, sage-green grass, hauled themselves out. Babur flung himself on to the ground, still chuckling though he was shuddering and his chilled skin was puckering with goose-pimples.

‘So what’s this all about?’ Baburi looked down at him, shaking his hair out of his eyes and slapping his sides to keep warm.

‘Last night I was unable to sleep. The thought of the Indus so near made my blood roar in my ears like the waters of the river itself. I made a vow that if God grants me victory in Hindustan, I’ll swim every river in my new empire.’

‘You didn’t have to start so soon. . you’re still a long way from conquering anything.’

Babur sat up. ‘I had to do it. How could I look at the Indus and not cross it. .? Though we must return to Kabul it won’t be long till we’re back. And when I return, this earth will know I have already claimed it. It will welcome me. .’

‘And now I suppose we have to swim back?’

‘Of course.’

In the hour before dawn, eight months after his swim in the freezing Indus, Babur left Maham’s chamber where, for one last time, he had lost himself in the silken folds of her body, and her long, sandalwood-scented hair, and returned to be alone in his private apartments. He listened as the war drums boomed out their sombre rhythm across the meadows beneath the citadel of Kabul. Going on to the balcony, he looked out into the soft half-light, pricked by the glow of thousands of campfires. Yesterday, on this same balcony, with Baburi close behind him, he had announced his grand design to his people.

‘From the time Timur invaded Hindustan it has been the rightful property of his descendants. As chief among them I will ride tomorrow to claim what is mine from those who have usurped my birthright. Four months ago I sent a hawk to the self-proclaimed ruler of much of Hindustan — Sultan Ibrahim Lodi of Delhi — as a gift. I told him if he would acknowledge me as his overlord I would give him lands to govern as my vassal. He sent the hawk back — without its head. Now he will lose his throne for insulting the House of Timur and the ruler of Kabul.’

Babur’s people had roared out their approval of his martial tone even if Sultan Ibrahim was just a name to them and they knew nothing of his palaces and fortresses in Delhi and Agra, his great treasuries and vast armies or the confederation of rulers — some Muslim like himself, others infidels — who were his vassals. Babur had smiled inwardly at their unthinking acceptance of his words. True, he had a claim to Hindustan but his greater birthright was to Samarkand. The memory of it still moved him but he knew he would never rule there again.

‘Majesty, your sister wishes to speak to you.’ An attendant interrupted Babur’s thoughts.

‘Of course. Does she wish me to go to her?’

‘No, Majesty, she is here.’

Khanzada stepped out on to the balcony. As soon as she and Babur were alone she lowered her veil. The light falling on her face from a torch in a bracket on the wall softened her angular features and smoothed away the lines. Babur saw again the girl who had solemnly brought their father’s sword, Alamgir, to him in the fortress of Akhsi the night he’d claimed the throne of Ferghana.

‘I know that later you will return to the women’s quarters to bid your wives and myself goodbye, but I wanted a moment with you alone. You and I are the only ones who remain from the happy days of our childhood in Ferghana when life seemed so secure, so full of promise. We have experienced much since then, both great highs and lows. .’ She paused. ‘Our lives might have been easier and less eventful but fate made them otherwise. Now you go on this great expedition of yours into Hindustan, which will decide the place of our family in history. I pray it may bring you everything you and I desire, just as our father, mother and grandmother would have done. Victory and conquest will give a point to what we have lived through. . but take care, my little brother.’ Khanzada’s raisin eyes — so like their grandmother’s but darker — shone with tears.

‘I will, just as when you scolded me to be careful after I fell from my first pony when I was trying to turn too tightly.’ Babur put his arm round her. ‘Whatever happens, you know that I’m following my destiny and trying to live up to my birth. The signs are favourable. Hasn’t the court astrologer predicted that if I launch my expedition now, in late November, while the sun is in Sagittarius, I will be victorious?’

For a brief moment, Khanzada held his face in her hands and kissed his forehead. ‘Goodbye, brother, till we meet again.’

‘I will send for you when victory is ours.’

Then she was gone, hastening back to the women’s quarters where he knew that, in the months ahead — whatever her own anxieties — she would be the strong hub, the comforter rather than the comforted. Humayun would accompany him on the campaign but he had appointed Kamran as regent in Kabul. Even though he would have the wise guidance in public of Baisanghar and Kasim who would both also remain, Khanzada’s astute advice would be the best guarantee of Kabul’s safety and good governance in his absence. He knew also that she would prevent too many jealousies arising among his wives, listening, conciliating and consoling, just as Esan Dawlat had done.

Out of the darkness came the sound of a trumpet, a reminder that in the meadows below the citadel, more than ten thousand horsemen were stirring. Soon they would be checking their weapons and equipment and saddling their horses. The standard-bearers would be unfurling the banners that Babur had decided to stripe with yellow and green — the colours of his homeland, Ferghana, and of Timur’s capital, Samarkand — and emblazon with the three circles that Timur had painted on his banners, to represent the perfect conjunction of the planets at his birth.

The gunners and matchlock men, their skills honed by rigorous, relentless training, would also be preparing. The cannons, muskets, gunpowder and shot were already loaded on to the carts. So were the huge amounts of equipment needed to set up camp — the heavy hide tents, their supporting poles and the great cooking pots needed to feed so many mouths.

As soon as the sky began to pale, the teams of oxen would be yoked. The long lines of pack-beasts — double-humped camels, donkeys, ponies — would be loaded with their burdens of grain, cured meats and other stores. The merchants who would follow Babur’s army to set up the camp market would also be preparing their baggage and animal trains — a long, successful campaign offered the prospect of huge profits. With them would come the usual mass of camp-followers — labourers, scavengers, water-bearers, women with children at the breast, anxious to be near their men, other women hoping to survive by selling their bodies, the acrobats, dancers and musicians who knew soldiers would pay well for a bit of entertainment to distract them from thoughts of war. A whole city was on the move.

A few hours later, just before midday, with the winter sun shedding its silvery light over the landscape, Babur rode out from the citadel of Kabul, Timur’s gold ring on his finger and Alamgir as his waist, to a glorious cacophony of trumpets. As he passed the high walls of the city a knot tightened in his stomach — apprehension, anticipation, excitement? It was all of those things and he had known them many times.

But this time it was different. He felt an awesome solemnity. Truly, fortune was extending her hand. . if only he could grasp it, all that had gone before — his fight for his throne in Ferghana, his attempts to overcome the Uzbeks and hold Samarkand, his rule over Kabul — would prove simply stepping-stones to a greater destiny for himself and his dynasty. .

‘The astrologer was right. Fortune is favouring us,’ Babur told Humayun and Baburi, lounging beside him on cushions beneath leather awnings on a large raft being navigated by oarsmen down the swift-flowing Kabul river. Around them, on a string of larger craft, were the cannon and much of the heavy baggage, while the bulk of the army made its way along the banks.

‘You did well, Humayun, to raise so many troops among the northern nomads.’ Ten days after Babur and the main force had left Kabul, his son had joined them with more than two thousand soldiers from the wilds of Badakhshan.

‘It wasn’t difficult, Father — not with all the gold we had to offer.’

‘They’re good fighters, the Badakhshanis, though they’re quick to quarrel among themselves or with others,’ said Baburi, drawing his blue cloak more tightly round him against the chill air blowing off the water.

‘The pace they’re having to keep up should sap their surplus energy,’ Babur said.

The sight of the rushing jade waters bearing him downriver towards Hindustan pushed thoughts of troublesome tribesmen from his mind and filled him with euphoria. Soon he’d call for some bhang mixed with opium. Once it had provided an escape from reality but now it enhanced the happiness of the present and heightened his optimism for the future. Each time he took it, even the austere, stony grey landscape they were passing through seemed drenched in a golden light and every feature — every tree, every flower, even the flocks of fat, shaggy sheep — was endowed with a fresh, startling beauty. When he closed his eyes, other images crowded his mind — of his men galloping joyously across battlefields strewn with the bodies of his enemies, their horses’ hoofs scarcely touching the ground, of himself wearing a golden crown glittering with rubies and sitting on a golden throne beneath an infinite sky. .

‘What are you smiling about?’ asked Baburi.

‘I’m thinking about what’s ahead. Where we’ll be in a year from now.’

‘In Delhi, I hope. .’

‘And where d’you think we’ll be, Humayun?’

‘I don’t know, Father. . but, God willing, we’ll have slain your enemies and won an empire.’

Babur and Baburi exchanged an amused glance at his naivety but then their expressions sobered. Grandiose words, perhaps, for one so young but weren’t their sentiments exactly the same?

‘Majesty, the scouts have returned. They have found a suitable place to cross the Indus.’

Babur’s heart leaped. This was the news he had been waiting for ever since, leaving the Kabul river behind, he had marched his army safely beyond the bare, pebbly defiles of the Khyber Pass and south-eastwards towards the Indus. He and Baburi had just set out to go hunting — villagers had reported two rhinoceroses browsing beneath the interlaced branches of an oak wood five miles beyond his camp — but that would have to wait.

‘Come!’ Babur called to Baburi, then galloped back to where the scouts were waiting outside his scarlet campaign tent.

‘Majesty, there is a place a day’s march from here where, if we build rafts, we can float everything across,’ the commander of the scouts reported.

‘What about the currents?’

‘The crossing place is just below a sharp bend in the river that reduces the strength of the current at that point — we experimented, floating three pack-mules across, and it went well. Also, there are enough trees to cut down for the rafts and there was no sign of any habitation along that stretch of the bank. We should be able to cross unmolested.’

Next day, Babur and Baburi looked for the third time in their lives on the Indus.

‘You’re not going to go swimming again, are you?’ Baburi asked. ‘Because if you are, I’m not coming in this time. .’

‘No more swimming until I have my empire. We’re in luck — the level of the river is lower than when we last saw it.’ Babur stooped, picked up a stick and flung it in. ‘The scouts were right. That bend in the river does reduce the force of the current — the stick is floating away quite slowly. .’

‘You sound almost disappointed. Do you want some symbolic epic struggle to get across?’

‘I don’t want it but I expected it. We’ll camp here, and as soon as our carpenters have built enough rafts, we go over.’

Constructing the rafts — felling trees, hewing wood into rough planks, securing them together with rope and covering the surface with hide cut from spare tents — took three days. On the fourth, they crossed. Although a thin veil of cold rain was falling, turning the banks to oozing mud and making the rafts slippery, getting so many men and beasts over the Indus took only from first light until midday. The advance guard went first, then the horses, camels, bullocks, and the all-important cannon and muskets. Next came the soldiers, merchants and the camp baggage, leaving the camp-followers to make their own crossing. The only losses were three camels that, badly laden and not properly tethered, had capsized a small raft and drowned.

As soon as he arrived on the other side, Babur ordered a small tent to be erected. Entering it alone he fastened the flaps. Then, he knelt, leaned forward and pressed his lips to the bare earth. ‘I claimed you once and I do so again,’ he whispered. ‘I claim you for the House of Timur, for myself and my descendants.’ Taking a small agate locket that hung on a chain round his neck, he opened it and very carefully, with the tip of his dagger, dug a few grains of earth and tipped them inside. Then closing the locket again he tucked it back inside his tunic where it rested against his heart.

In the February sunset, the waters of the Sutlej river beside Babur’s camp glowed amber. It was the final great waterway before the north-west plains of Hindustan and Sultan Ibrahim’s great city of Delhi. They had done well to get there so quickly, Babur thought. After crossing the Indus, the winter rain had stayed with them for a while. The soft ground had slowed their pace as the horses and pack-animals had struggled, especially the beasts drawing the cannon. But at last the rain had ceased and they had advanced steadily, crossing the network of tributaries of the Indus.

So far they had faced only wild, lawless tribes. One — the Gujars — had descended on Babur’s men as they negotiated a narrow pass but his rearguard had easily repulsed them. The piles of Gujari heads left in neat stacks had been an effective deterrent and no others had dared attack. Once across the Sutlej, it would be a different matter. They would be entering the lands of powerful chiefs who were vassals of Sultan Ibrahim. A few days ago, Babur had sent messengers over the river with an ultimatum to one of these — Firoz Khan — whose lands lay directly between him and Delhi: ‘Your lands once belonged to Timur and I claim them as my birthright. Surrender them and pledge me your allegiance. Then you may continue to rule as my vassal and there will be no pillage or plunder.’

In reply, the chieftain had sent back the gift of a fine, mail-clad horse, the colour of pale almond blossom, with a message: ‘Your claim is artificial. My allegiance is to Sultan Ibrahim in Delhi, the rightful ruler of Hindustan. After your long journey into lands that do not belong to you, your own horse will be tired and thin. May this beast carry you swiftly back to Kabul.’ Babur had laughed at the man’s arrogance and given the horse to Baburi.

Firoz Khan would regret his impudence, Babur thought, as he made his way back to his campaign tent. Humayun had begged to be allowed to take a small advance force of his Badakhshani nomads over the Sutlej to spy out the terrain in preparation for the advance of the main force on Firoz Khan’s stronghold and Babur had agreed. Soon, God willing, he would rendezvous with his son after crossing the river and show Firoz Khan weapons he had never seen. . In his tent, he paced up and down, restless and conscious that the success of his long-pent-up ambition would soon be decided. Towards midnight, he ordered his attendants to bring him some opium mixed with wine. It would help him relax, maybe even sleep — something he was finding it harder and harder to do.

The heady concoction did its work and Babur’s mind began to wander down pleasant paths. . he’d no idea how long had passed when suddenly the crack of thunder intruded into his dreams. The day had been hot and humid. Perhaps the rains would bring freshness to the air.

Soon heavy rain was pounding the roof of his tent. After a while, droplets started to ooze through the seams. He began to count them — one, two, three, splash. . one, two, three, splash. . His eyelids were drooping when suddenly he heard Baburi’s voice and felt a strong hand shaking him to full consciousness. ‘The river’s burst its banks! The camp’s being washed away.’

‘What?’ Dazed with the opium, he found it hard to take in Baburi’s words.

‘We’re being flooded. The river’s turning into a lake. We’ve got to move.’

Grabbing Alamgir in its scabbard and chaining it to his belt, Babur rushed outside and could hardly believe what he saw: the whole camp was already beneath a foot of muddy water. His commanders, struggling through it towards his tent from all directions, were looking to him for orders.

His poppy-induced languor vanished. ‘Abandon the tents and the heavy baggage. Get the horses and the men to higher ground.’ Through the rain — falling so heavily that it stung — he could just make out the low hills to their rear. ‘Carry with you as many of the muskets and as much of the gunpowder as you can. Leave the cannon — the water cannot move them. Untether the pack-animals. They must fend for themselves, as must all in the camp. . There is little time.’

Babur shouted through the teeming rain to his attendants to bring his horse and Baburi’s. Together they rode through the rising waters, encouraging men to save what they could, but then — when the water was almost up to stirrup level — they made for the hills. Their frightened horses, half swimming, struggled at first. Bending low over their necks, Babur and Baburi whispered encouragement into their ears. Detritus from the camp floated all around them — cooking pots, riding boots, drowned chickens and sheep. When they finally reached the higher ground, Babur found many of his horsemen already gathered there. Some had managed to bring others to safety with them — women and children, sodden and miserable, were among those sheltering beneath the trees.

About dawn, the rain stopped and a few hours later the floodwaters were receding. Closing his eyes, Babur gave thanks. At least nearly all of the army seemed to have survived. As soon as the waters had subsided they would return to the camp and retrieve everything they had abandoned — the cannon, their chain-mail, armour, weapons, tents and whatever provisions were still fit to eat. Then they would round up the pack-beasts. He would take no more opium till Hindustan was his.

The whine of a mosquito landing on the back of his sunburned neck distracted Babur and he slapped it, leaving a smear of dark-red blood — his own. But it was others’ blood that was about to flow. He had no need of his court astrologer to tell him that. First Firoz Khan’s, and then anyone else’s who opposed him on the road to Delhi. Nobody would stand in his way.