Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree

Chapter 9

ZAHRA WAS BURIED THE very next day. Her body had been carefully and lovingly bathed by Ama long before the sun rose. As the early morning breezes danced to welcome the first rays of the sun, the job was finished.

‘Why did you want me to do this, Zahra? My last punishment? Or was it a final gesture of friendship? If it hadn’t been for you, my lady, I would have married that man on the mountain who now gives himself airs and calls himself al-Zindiq. Borne him three children. Perhaps four! Made him happy. I’m talking like an old fool. Forgive me. I suppose God meant us to live apart. There! You’re all ready now for the last journey. I’m so glad you came back here. In Gharnata they would have put you in a wooden box and stuck a cross over your grave. What would Ibn Farid have said when you met him in the first heaven? Eh?’

Dressed in a pure white shroud, Zahra’s body lay on the bed, waiting for burial. News of her demise had travelled to the village and, such had been her reputation amongst the weavers and peasants, who saw in her a noblewoman prepared to marry one of them for love, that they had rushed to the house, before they began their day’s work, to pay their last respects and help lay the old woman’s body to rest.

Slowly four pairs of hands lifted the bed and placed it gently on four sets of sturdy shoulders. Umar and Zuhayr lifted the head, while Ibn Daud and the Dwarf’s strapping twenty-year-old son brought up the rear. Al-Zindiq and Miguel were in the centre, too old to offer their shoulders, but too close to the dead woman to leave her exclusively to a younger generation. Yazid followed closely behind his father. He had liked the old woman, but since he barely knew her, he could not grieve like Hind.

The women had mourned earlier. Early that morning Ama’s wails as she sang the praises of Zahra had woken every section of the household. Streams of sorrow had poured out of Hind’s eyes as she sought the comfort of Zubayda’s lap. They had all spoken about her human qualities. How she had been as a child, a young woman, and then there had been silence. Nobody wished to discuss what had befallen her in Qurtuba, or to mention that the bulk of her life had been lived in the maristan in Gharnata.

The funeral procession was moving very slowly on purpose. The family cemetery was situated just outside the perimeter of the high stone walls which guarded the house. Zahra would be buried with her family. A space had been reserved for her next to her mother, Lady Najma, who had died sixty-nine years ago, a few days after Zahra’s birth. She lay buried underneath a palm-tree. On the other side of her was Ibn Farid, the father she had loved and hated so much. The hadiths had insisted that followers of the Prophet should be buried simply and, in strict accordance with this tradition, none of the graves were marked. The Banu Hudayl claimed descent from one of the Companions of the Prophet and, regardless of whether this was true or pure invention, even the most irreligious members of the clan had insisted on the tradition of a simple mound of mud over their graves. Nothing more. The tiny, hand-made hillocks were covered with carefully tended grass and a dazzling array of wild flowers.

Zahra was lifted from the bed and laid in the freshly dug grave. Then Miguel, thinking he was Meekal, scooped up a handful of mud and threw it on his sister’s corpse and cupped his hands together to offer prayers to Allah. Everyone followed suit. Then each of the mourners embraced Umar bin Abdallah in turn and departed. It was only when Miguel saw Juan the carpenter crossing himself that he was reminded of his own ecclesiastical identity. He dutifully fell on his knees and prayed.

The Bishop of Qurtuba must have been in that posture for several minutes, for when he opened his eyes he found himself alone by the freshly built mound. It was at this moment that his powers of self-control seemed to desert him. He broke down and wept. A pain, long suppressed, had welled up inside him. Two little waterfalls poured down his cheeks and sought refuge in his beard. Miguel knew perfectly well that whoever is born must die. Zahra had reached her sixty-ninth year. All complaints to the Almighty were out of order.

It was the suddenness of his sister’s departure that had shaken him, just like the time, all those years ago, when she had left the house without saying goodbye to him. He had wanted so much to tell her all that had happened to him after that fateful day of shame; to describe the explosion of passions which had propelled him into an unknown space to defy the time-honoured taboo, and the horrendous aftermath; to discuss for the first time the death of Asma, a death which had deprived him of someone to blame for his own inner torment and unhappiness; the layers of guilt which still lay congealed somewhere in his mind; the disintegration of the old household and the birth of its successor. For the last three days he had been thinking of nothing else. Miguel now realized that he himself would die without one last conversation with the only member of the family who had belonged to the same vanished world. It was an unbearable thought.

‘All of it happened after you had left us in disgrace, Zahra,’ Miguel moaned in a soft voice. ‘If you had stayed everything might have been different. You took truth and generosity with you. We were left with fear and sorrow and malice. Your absence disfigured us all. I think our father really died of grief. He missed you more than he would ever admit. Almost half a century has now passed and I have not been able to talk about any of this with even a single human being. This failing heart of mine was preparing to unburden itself to you. On the day I was ready to talk, you, my sister, went and died. Peace be upon you.’

As he rose and looked one more time at the piece of earth that covered his dead sister, a familiar voice disturbed his solitude and startled him.

‘I did talk to her, Your Excellency!’

‘Ibn Zaydun!’

‘I was weeping on the other side of the grave. You did not see me.’

The two men embraced. Al-Zindiq told Miguel of how he had finally been rejected by Zahra; how the pride of the Hudayl clan had at long last reclaimed its prodigal daughter; how the real kernel had been thoroughly camouflaged; how, in the weeks before her death, she had actually suffered at the memory of their love; how she had come to feel that the worst of her injuries had been self-inflicted, and how she had begun to regret the break with Ibn Farid and her family, for which she accepted sole responsibility.

‘I always knew,’ Miguel commented, ‘that our father was the most important thing in her life.’

The happiness Miguel felt on hearing this news was as great as the sadness it had caused al-Zindiq. Bishop and sceptic, for a moment they remained motionless, facing each other. They had once belonged to the same sunken civilization, but the universe which each inhabited had been separated by an invisible sea. The woman who had tried to bridge the gap between their two worlds, and had been punished for her pains, lay buried a few yards from where they stood.

The fact that, during her last days on this earth, she had, in her heart, returned to the family, consoled her brother. For al-Zindiq, sad, embittered al-Zindiq, it was but another example of the deep-rooted divisions in al-Andalus, which had torn the children of the Prophet asunder. They had failed to build a lasting monument to their early achievements.

‘All that is left,’ al-Zindiq whispered to himself, ‘is for us to be inquisitioned. Yes! And to the very marrow of our sorry bones!’

Miguel heard, but kept silent.

As the two men returned to the house, one to join his family, the other to have breakfast in the kitchen, Zuhayr was on his way to Gharnata. He was riding at a fair pace, but his thoughts were on those whom he had left behind. The parting with his young brother had upset him the most. Yazid, as if guided by a mysterious instinct, had felt that he would not see his older brother ever again. He had hugged Zuhayr tight and wept, pleading with him not to go to Gharnata and certain death. The sight, witnessed by the entire household, had brought tears to the eyes of all, including the Dwarf, which had surprised Yazid and helped to distract him from the principal cause of his distress.

‘I will remember this red soil forever,’ thought Zuhayr, stroking Khalid’s mane as he rode away from the village. When he reached the top of a hill, he reined in the horse and turned round to look at al-Hudayl. The whitewashed houses were glistening in the light, and beyond them were the thick stone walls of the house where he had been born.

‘I will remember you forever: in the winter sun like today, in the spring when the fragrance of the blossoms makes our sap rise to the surface, and in the heat of the summer when the gentle sound of a single drop of water soothes the mind and cools the senses. Then, a few drops of rain to settle the dust, followed by the scent of jasmine.

‘I will remember the taste of the water from the mountain springs which flow through our house, the deep yellow of the wild flowers which crown the gorse, the heady mountain air filtered through the pines and the majesty of the palms as they dance to the breezes from heaven, the spicy breath of thyme, the fragrance of the wood fires in winter. And how on a clear summer’s day the blue sky is suddenly overpowered by darkness and little Yazid, clutching a piece of glass which belonged to our great-grandfather, waits patiently on the terrace outside the old tower for the stars to become visible once again. There he stands observing the universe till our mother or Ama drags him downstairs to bed.

‘All this,’ Zuhayr told himself, ‘will always be the passionate heart of my life.’

He pulled on the reins and, turning his back on al-Hudayl, gently pressed his heels on the horse’s belly, causing the animal to gallop towards the road which led to the gates of Gharnata.

Zuhayr had been brought up on a thousand and one tales of chivalry and knighthood. The example of Ibn Farid, whose sword he was carrying, weighed heavily on his young shoulders. He knew those days were over, but the romance of a last battle, of riding out into the unknown, taking the enemy by surprise and, who knows, perhaps even winning a victory, was deeply embedded in his psyche. It was this which had inspired his impulsive behaviour.

But, as he often told himself and his friends, his actions were not exclusively inspired by fantasies associated with the past or dreams of glory for the future. Zuhayr may not have been the most astute of Umar and Zubayda’s children, but he was, undoubtedly, the most sentimental.

When he had been half Yazid’s age news had come to the village of the destruction and capture of al-Hama by the Christians. Al-Hama, the city of baths, where he used to be taken to see his cousins once every six months. For them the baths and the hot-water springs were part of everyday life. For Zuhayr a visit to the famous springs, where the Sultan of Gharnata himself used to bathe, was a very special treat. They had all died. All the men, women and children had been massacred, and their bodies thrown to the dogs outside the city gates.

The Castilians had waded in blood and, if their own chroniclers were to be believed, they relished the experience. The entire kingdom of Gharnata, including many Christian monks, had been mortified by the scale of the massacre. A loud wail had been heard rising from the village as the citizens had rushed to the mosque to offer prayers for the dead and swear vengeance. All Zuhayr could think of that day was the cousins with whom he had played so often. The thought of two boys his own age and their three older sisters being killed without mercy had filled him with pain and hatred. His father’s sombre face as he announced the news: ‘They have destroyed our beautiful al-Hama. Ferdinand and Isabella now hold the key to Gharnata. It won’t be long before they take our city.’

Zuhayr had entered the deepest recesses of his memory and had begun to hear the old voices. Ibn Hasd was describing the reaction in Gharnata as news of the carnage in al-Hama reached the palace. Zuhayr pictured the old Sultan Abul Hassan. He had only seen him once, when he was two or three, but he could never forget that weather-beaten, scarred face and the trim white beard. It was this old man whose courageous but crazed attack and capture of the frontier town of Zahara had provoked the Christian response against al-Hama. He had rushed with his soldiers to save the town, but it was too late. The Christian knights had forced him to retreat. The Sultan had sent town-criers all over Gharnata, preceded by drummers and players of tambourines, whose loud but sombre music had alerted the citizens that a statement from the palace was on its way. People had crowded the streets, but the town-crier had uttered only one sentence:

‘Ay de mi al-Hama. Woe is me, Al-Hama.’

The memory of those atrocities raised Zuhayr’s temperature, and he began to sing a popular ballad which had been composed to mark the carnage.

‘The Moorish Sultan was riding

through the city of Gharnata,

from the Bab al-Ilbira

to the Bab al-Ramla.

Dispatches were brought him:

Al-Hama had been taken

Ay de mi al-Hama!

He threw the letters in the fire,

and killed the messenger;

he ran his hands through his hair

pulled at his beard in a rage.

He got off his mule

and rode on a horse;

along up Zacatin

climbed to the al-Hamra;

he ordered his trumpets top blast,

and his silver bugles,

so the Moors would hear

as they ploughed the fields.

Ay de mi al-Hama!

Four by four, five by five,

a large company assembled.

An old sage spoke up

from the depths of his thick grey beard:

“Why do you call us, Sultan?

What do your trumpets announce?”

“So you can hear, my friends,

of the great loss of al-Hama.

Ay de mi al-Hama.”

“It serves you right, good Sultan,

good king, you well deserved it;

you killed the princes

who were the flower of Gharnata;

you took the turncoats

from Qurtuba the renowned.

And so, king, you deserve

very great punishment,

your own and your kingdom’s ruin

and soon the end of our Gharnata.

Ay de mi al-Hama!”’

The ballad reminded him of his dead cousins. Their laughter rang in his ears, but the joyful recollections did not stay long. He saw them now as dismembered bodies and felt a chill. In turn he became frenzied, disdainful and bitter as he spurred his steed on faster and faster. Suddenly he found himself removing Ibn Farid’s sword from the scabbard. He held it above his head and imagined that he was at the head of the Moorish cavalry, riding out to relieve al-Hama.

‘There is only one God and Mohammed is his Prophet!’ shouted Zuhayr at the top of his voice. To his astonishment there was a resounding echo, but in dozens of voices. He reined in his horse. Both beast and master stood still. The sword was gently sheathed. Zuhayr could hear the noise of hoofs and then he saw the dust. Who could they be? For a moment he thought they were Christian knights who had responded to his cry in order to entrap him. He knew that no other horse in the kingdom could outpace his steed, but it would be cowardly, against the rules of chivalry, to run away. He waited till the horsemen neared the road and then rode out to meet them. To his great relief all fourteen wore turbans, and on each of these there was planted the familiar crescent. There was something unusual about their attire, but before Zuhayr could determine where the strangeness lay, he found himself being addressed by the stranger who appeared to be the commander of this small group by virtue of his age.

‘Peace be upon you brother! Who are you and where are you headed?’

‘I am Zuhayr bin Umar. I come from the village of al-Hudayl and I am on my way to Gharnata. Wa Allah! You are all followers of the Prophet. I was frightened when I first saw the dust raised by your horses. But pray who are you and in which direction do you travel?’

‘So!’ replied the stranger. ‘You are the great-grandson of Ibn Farid. Al-Zindiq has told us a great deal about you, Zuhayr al-Fahl!’

At this the stranger roared with laughter and his followers joined him. Zuhayr smiled politely and studied each in turn. Now he saw what had first struck him as eccentric. On the left ear of every single one of them there hung a silver ear-ring in the shape of a crescent. Zuhayr’s heart froze, though he tried hard to control his fear. The men were bandits, and if they realized he was carrying gold coins in his purse they would deprive him of the burden, but they might also steal his life. He would much rather die in battle against the Christians. He repeated his question.

‘You say you know my teacher, al-Zindiq. This makes me happy, but I still do not know who you are or what your business is.’

‘We ride through this land far and wide,’ came the jovial reply. ‘We have flung away our pride and have no cares or troubles. We can slow down the speeding torrent, tame a troublesome steed. We can drink a flask of wine without pausing for breath, consume a lamb while it still roasts on the spit, pull the beard of a preacher and sing to our hearts’ content. We live unconstrained by the need to protect and preserve our reputation, for we have none. We all bear one name in common. The name of al-Ma’ari, the blind poet who lived between Aleppo and Dimashk some four hundred years ago. Come and share our bread and wine and you shall learn some more. Come now, Zuhayr al-Fahl. We shall not detain you long.’

Zuhayr was startled by the nature of this response, but it calmed his fears. They were far too eccentric to be cold-blooded killers. He nodded his agreement to the offer and as they wheeled their horses he rode alongside them. After a few miles they reached the boulders. These were carefully removed and they turned off the track through the concealed entrance. After a ten-minute ride he found himself in an armed encampment. It was a village of tents, strategically placed near a tiny stream. A dozen women and half that number of young children were seated outside one of the tents. The women were grinding corn. The children were playing an intricate game with stones.

The captain of this band, who now introduced himself formally as Abu Zaid al-Ma’ari, invited Zuhayr into his tent. The interior was austere, apart from a rug on which lay a few ragged cushions. As they sat a young woman entered with a flask of wine, two tiny loaves of brown bread and a selection of cucumbers, tomatoes, radishes and onions. She put these in front of the two men and hurried out, only to return with a bowl full of olive oil. It was at this point that Abu Zaid introduced her to Zuhayr.

‘My daughter, Fatima.’

‘Peace be upon you,’ muttered Zuhayr, charmed by the young woman’s carefree demeanour. ‘Will you not break bread with us?’

‘I will join you later with the others after we have eaten,’ replied Fatima, flashing her eyes at Abu Zaid. ‘I think my father wishes to speak to you alone.’

‘Now my young friend,’ began Abu Zaid al-Ma’ari as his daughter left them alone, ‘it is not fate that has brought us together, but al-Zindiq. As you can see we are men who live by what we can steal from the rich. In line with the teachings of the great al-Ma’ari, we do not distinguish between Muslim, Christian or Jew. Wealth is not the preserve of one religion. Please do not be afraid. I noticed the alarm in your eyes when you first caught sight of the silver crescent which pierces our left ear. You wondered, did you not, whether your gold was safe?’

‘To be frank,’ confided Zuhayr, dipping the bread in the olive oil, ‘I was more worried for my life.’

‘Yes, of course,’ continued Abu Zaid, ‘and you were right to be so worried, but as I had begun to tell you it was that old man in the mountain cave who told me that you had embarked on a wild venture to Gharnata. He pleaded with me to try and stop you; to persuade you either to return to your ancestral home or to join our little band. We are thinking of leaving this region and moving to the al-Pujarras, where there are many others like us. There we will wait for the right moment. Then we shall seize the time and join the battle.’

‘In these times,’ confessed Zuhayr as he sipped the fermented juice of dates, ‘it is much harder to make new friends than to keep old enemies. I will think carefully before I decide whether or not to accept your kind proposal.’

The bandit leader chuckled, and was about to respond when his daughter, carrying an earthenware jug full of coffee, and followed by three of her five brothers, interrupted his thoughts. The aroma of the brew, which had been freshly boiled with cardamoms, filled the tent and reminded Zuhayr of the home which he had left only an hour ago. The new entrants settled down cross-legged on the rug as Fatima poured out the coffee.

‘I do not think,’ Abu Zaid informed the assembled company, ‘that our young friend will join our ranks. He is a caballero, a knight who believes in the rules of chivalry. Am I not correct?’

Zuhayr was embarrassed at being discovered so quickly.

‘How can you talk like that, Abu Zaid al-Ma’ari? Have I not just told you that I will think before I make up my mind?’

‘My father is a good judge of people,’ Fatima broke in. ‘His instinct can tell him in a flash whether you are the sort of person who plays chess with an extra piece. It is obvious even to me that you are not such a man.’

‘Should I be?’ Zuhayr asked her plaintively.

‘What is good for the liver is often bad for the spleen,’ she replied.

Her brother, who could not have been more than eighteen years of age, felt that Fatima had been far too diplomatic.

‘My father has always taught us that people are like metal. Gold, silver or copper.’

‘Yes, that is true,’ roared Abu Zaid, ‘but a knight might think, and with good reason from his own point of view, that he is the gold, while a bandit is the copper. Since we are discussing the relative values of metals, let me put another point to our young guest from al-Hudayl. Would he agree with us that nothing cuts iron, but iron?’

‘Why of course!’ said Zuhayr, pleased that the discussion had taken a new course. ‘How could it be otherwise?’

‘If we agree on that, Zuhayr al-Fahl, then how can you resist my argument regarding the war against the occupiers of Gharnata? Our Sultan was built of straw, whereas Ximenes de Cisneros is a man of iron! The old style of war ended on the night the Christians destroyed al-Hama. If we want to win, we must learn from them. I know that al-Zindiq thinks it is too late, but he may be wrong. Al-Andalus could have been saved a long time ago if only our wretched rulers had understood the teachings of Abu’l Ala al-Ma’ari. That could have made them self-reliant, but no, they preferred to send messages to the North Africans pleading for help.’

‘The North Africans did save us from the Christians more than once, did they not?’

‘True. The only way they could save us was to destroy the foundations of what we had built. They saved us as the lion saves the deer from the clutches of the tiger. The Islam of which they spoke was neither better nor worse than Christianity.

‘Our preachers are stumbling, Christians have gone astray,

Jews are bewildered. Magians far on error’s way.

Humanity is composed of but two schools.

Enlightened knaves or religious fools.’

‘Al-Ma’ari?’ asked Zuhayr.

Everyone nodded.

‘You sound like al-Zindiq,’ commented Zuhayr. ‘You must pardon my ignorance, but I have not read his work.’

Abu Zaid’s outrage was genuine. ‘Did not al-Zindiq educate you?’

‘He did, but he never once lent me an actual book of al-Ma’ari. Simply recited his poetry, which I agree is a stronger stimulant than your date wine! Are you, by any chance, descended from him?’

‘Before he died,’ Fatima explained, ‘he left instructions that a verse should be inscribed on his grave:

This wrong was by my father done

To me, but ne’er by me to one.

‘He was so unhappy about the state of the world that he thought procreation was unwise. The species was incapable of curing itself. So you see we decided to act as though we were his children, and live by his teachings alone.’

Zuhayr was confused. Till this moment he had been sure that the path he had chosen was the only honourable course for a Muslim warrior, but these strange bandits and the philosopher who commanded them had succeeded in implanting a seed of doubt in his mind. He was only half-listening to Abu Zaid al-Ma’ari and his followers as they recounted the greatness of the freethinking poet and philosopher whom they had adopted as their collective father.

Zuhayr was floundering, his mind in turmoil. He felt on the edge of an abyss and in danger of losing his balance. He was overcome by an overwhelming urge to return to al-Hudayl. Perhaps the date wine had gone to his head. Perhaps a few more cups of coffee followed by a couple of hours in the hammam in Gharnata and everything would have become clarified once again. We shall never know, for in the midst of the intellectual haze which had overpowered him, Zuhayr heard them mock the al-koran, and this was something which he knew he could never accept. The blood rose to his head. Perhaps he had misheard the words. He asked Abu Zaid to repeat what he said a few minutes ago.

‘What is Religion?

A maid kept hidden so that no eye may view her;

The price of her wedding gifts and dowries baffles the wooer.

Of all the goodly doctrine that from the pulpit I have heard

My heart has never accepted so much as a single word.’

‘No! No!’ Zuhayr shouted in frustration. ‘Not his poetry. I’ve heard this one already. You mentioned the al-koran, did you not?’

Fatima looked him straight in the eye.

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘I did. Sometimes, but not always, Abu’l Ala al-Ma’ari could not stop himself from doubting whether it really was the word of God. But he truly loved the style in which the al-koran was composed. One day he sat down and produced his own version, which he called al-Fusul wa-’l-Ghayat.’

‘Blasphemy!’ roared Zuhayr.

‘The faqihs certainly called it heresy,’ explained Abu Zaid calmly and with the tiny glimmer of a smile, ‘and it was a parody of the sacred book, but even our great teacher’s friends declared that it was inferior in every way to the al-koran.’

‘To which charge,’ continued Fatima, ‘our master responded by saying that unlike the al-koran, his work had not yet been polished by the tongues of reciters over four centuries.’

This gem from the master’s treasury was greeted with applause and laughter. Abu Zaid was disturbed by the sombre expression on Zuhayr’s face and decided to reduce the temperature.

‘When he was charged with heresy he merely looked his accuser in the eye and said:

I lift my voice to utter lies absurd,

But when I speak the truth, my hushed tones are barely heard.

‘Tell me, Abu Zaid,’ Zuhayr asked. ‘Do you believe in our faith?’

‘All religions are a dark labyrinth. Men are religious through force of habit. They never pause to ask whether what they believe is true. Divine revelation is deeply ingrained in our mind. After all it was the ancients who invented fables and called them a religion. Musa, Isa and our own Prophet Mohammed were great leaders of their people in times of trouble. More than that I do not believe.’

It was this exchange that decided Zuhayr on his course of action. These people were impious rogues. How could they possibly hope to remove the Christians from Gharnata if they themselves were unbelievers? Once again he was irritated by Abu Zaid’s voice, which indicated that his thoughts had been read.

‘You are wondering how people like us can ever defeat the Christians, but ask yourself once again how it has come to pass that the most ardent defenders of the faith have failed in this very task.’

‘I won’t argue any more,’ replied Zuhayr. ‘My mind is decided. I will take my leave now and join my friends who await me in Gharnata.’

He rose and picked up his sword. Fatima and the others followed him out into the cold air. It was getting late and Zuhayr was determined to reach his destination before sunset.

‘Peace be upon you, Zuhayr bin Umar,’ said Abu Zaid as he embraced the young man in farewell. ‘And remember, if you change your mind and wish to join us, ride to the al-Pujarras till you come to a tiny village called al-Basit. Mention my name to the first person you meet and within a day I shall be with you. May God protect you!’

Zuhayr mounted his horse, raised his cupped right hand to his forehead in a salute, and within a few minutes found himself back on the road to Gharnata. He was glad to be alone again, away from the illicit company of heretics and thieves. He had enjoyed the experience, but he felt as unclean as he always did after he had been with Umayma. He expanded his lungs and breathed in the fresh mountain air to cleanse his insides.

He saw the city as he reached the top of a hill. In the old days when he was riding to court with his father’s entourage, they would stop here and drink in the view. His father would usually recount a tale from the days of old Sultan Abul Hassan. Then they would race down the slope in childish abandon. Once the gates were reached, dignity would be restored. For a moment Zuhayr was tempted to charge down the hillside, but better sense prevailed. Christian soldiers were posted at every entrance to the city. He had to behave in as calm a fashion as his brain would permit. As he reached the city gates he wondered what Ibn Daud would have made of his strange encounter with the bandits. Ibn Daud was such a know-all, but had he ever heard of al-Ma’ari?

The Christian sentries stared hard at the young man coming towards them. From the quality of his robes and the silk turban which graced his head, they saw that he was a nobleman, a Moorish knight probably here to visit a lover. From the fact that he openly carried a sword they deduced that he was no criminal intent on murder. Zuhayr saw them inspecting him and slowed his horse down even further, but the soldiers did not even bother to stop him. He acknowledged their presence with a slight nod of the chin, an action subconsciously inherited from his father. The soldiers smiled and waved him on.

As he rode into the town, Zuhayr felt serene once again. The confusion unleashed by that unexpected meeting with the heretics a few hours ago already seemed like a strange dream. In the old days or even a month ago, Zuhayr would have headed straight to the house of his uncle, Ibn Hisham, but today it was something that could not even be considered. Not because Ibn Hisham had become Pedro al-Gharnata, a converso, but because Zuhayr did not wish to endanger his uncle’s family.

His dozen or so followers had reached Gharnata the previous day, and those who did not have friends or relations in the city were settled in rooms at the Funduq. To stay in a rest-house in a city full of friends and relations, and a city which he knew so well, seemed unreal. And yet it concentrated his mind on what he hoped to achieve. He did not wish to feel at home in Gharnata on this particular visit. He wanted during every minute of the day and night he spent here to be reminded of the tasks that lay ahead. In his fantasy, Zuhayr saw his future as the standard-bearer of a counter-attack which true Believers would launch against the new state under construction. Against the she-devil Isabella and the lecherous Ferdinand. Against the evil Ximenes. Against them all.

Later that evening Zuhayr’s comrades came to welcome him to the city. He had been given one of the more comfortable rooms. A six-branched brass lantern decorated with an unusually intricate pattern hung from the ceiling. A soft light emanated from the oil burners. In the centre of the room stood an earthenware brazier, densely packed with burning coal. In one corner there was a handsome bed, covered with a silken green and mauve quilt. The eight young men were all sitting on a giant prayer mat which covered the floor in the corner opposite to the bed.

Zuhayr knew them well. They had grown up together. There were the two brothers from the family of the gold merchant, Ibn Mansur; the son of the herbalist, Mohammed bin Basit; Ibn Amin, the youngest son of the Jewish physician assigned to the Captain-General; and three of the young toughs from al-Hudayl who had arrived in Gharnata on the previous day. The reconquest itself had not changed the pattern of these young men’s lives. Till the arrival of the man with a bishop’s hat and a black heart, they had continued to lead a carefree existence. Ximenes de Cisneros had compelled them to think seriously for the first time in their lives. For this, at least, they should have been grateful to him. But the prelate had threatened their entire way of life. For this they hated him.

Nature had not intended any of these men to become conspirators. When they first arrived in Zuhayr’s room all of them were feeling tense and self-conscious. Their faces were glum. Zuhayr saw the state they were in and made them feel at home by inaugurating a round of restorative gossip. Once they had dissected the private lives of their contemporaries, they became more cheerful, almost like their old selves.

Ibn Amin was the only one who had refrained from the animated discussion taking place around him. He was not even listening. He was thinking of the horrors that lay ahead, and he spoke with anger in his voice.

‘By the time they’ve finished with us, they will not have left us any eyes to weep or tongues to scream. On his own the Captain-General would leave us be. It is the priest who is the problem.’

This was followed by a chorus of complaints. Inquisitors from Kashtalla had been seen in the city. There had been inquiries as to whether the conversions which were taking place were genuine or not. Spies had been posted outside the homes of conversos to see whether they went to work on Fridays, how often they bathed, whether new-born boys were being circumcised and so on. There had been several incidents of soldiers insulting and even molesting Muslim women.

‘Ever since this cursed priest entered our town,’ said Ibn Basit, the herbalist’s son, ‘they have been making an inventory of all the property and wealth in the hands of the Moors and the Jews. There is no doubt they will take everything away unless we convert.’

‘My father says that even if we do convert they will find other means to steal our property.’ The speaker was Salman bin Mohammed, the elder of the gold merchant’s two sons. ‘Look at what they’ve done to the Jews.’

‘Those bloodsuckers in Rome who set themselves up as Popes would sell the Virgin Mary herself to line their pockets,’ muttered Ibn Amin. ‘The Spanish Church is only following the example of its Holy Father.’

‘But at our expense!’ said Ibn Basit.

Ever since the fall of Gharnata, Zuhayr had been a silent witness at many such discussions in Gharnata and al-Hudayl. Usually his father or uncle or some village elder directed the discussion with a carefully timed intervention. Zuhayr was tired. The wind was beginning to penetrate the shutters and the brazier would soon run out of coal. The servants of the Funduq had gone to bed. He wanted to sleep, but he knew that the conversation could meander on in the quivering lamplight till the early hours unless he brought matters to a head and insisted on certain decisions being made tonight.

‘You see, my friends, we are not difficult people to understand. It is true that those amongst us who live on landed estates in the country have, over the centuries, become cocooned in a world which is very different to life in the cities. Here your life revolves round the market. Our memories and hopes are all connected with the land and those who work on it. Often there are things which please us country people which none of you would care about. We have cultivated this land for centuries. We produced the food that fed Qurtuba, Ishbiliya and Gharnata. This enriched the soil in the towns. A culture grew which the Christians can burn, but will never match. We opened the doors and the light which shone from our cities illuminated this whole continent. Now they want to take it all away from us. We are not even considered worthy to be permitted a few small enclaves where we can live in peace. It is this fact which has brought us together. Town and country will die the same death. Your traders and all your professions, our weavers and peasants — all are faced with extinction.’

The others looked at him in astonishment. They felt that al-Fahl had matured beyond recognition. He noticed the new-found respect reflected in their eyes. If he had spoken like this even two years ago, one of them would have roared with laughter and suggested a quick visit to the male brothel where such loftiness of thought could be transcended by a more active choreography. Not today. They could sense that Zuhayr was not play-acting. They were only too well aware of the changes that had brought about this transformation in all of them. They had, however, no way of knowing that it was his curious encounter with the al-Ma’ari clan, even more than the tragedy of al-Andalus, which had sharpened his mind and alerted his senses. Zuhayr felt it was time to unveil the plan.

‘We have had many discussions in our village. There are now twenty volunteers from al-Hudayl present in this town. The number may be small, but we are all dedicated. The first thing that needs to be done is to build a force of three or four hundred knights who will challenge the Christians to armed combat, every single day in the Bab al-Ramla. The sight of this conflict will excite the passions of the populace and we will have an uprising before they can send reinforcements to the city. We will fight the war from which our Sultan flinched.’

Ibn Basit was blunt in his rejection of the plan.

‘Zuhayr bin Umar, you have surprised me twice this evening. First by your intelligence and second by your stupidity. I agree with you that the Christians want to destroy us completely, but you want to make it easier for them. You want us all to dress up and play their game. Chivalry is a thing of the past — that is, if it ever really existed and was not a chronicler’s invention. Even if we defeated them — and I am not at all sure that our ardour could compete with their butcher’s skills — it would still make no difference. None whatsoever. Our only hope is to prepare our men and take them out of the city to the al-Pujarras. From there we must send ambassadors to establish links with believers in Balansiya and other cities and prepare a rebellion which will erupt simultaneously throughout the peninsula. This is the signal for which the Sultan in Istanbul has been waiting. Our brothers will come to our aid.’

Zuhayr looked around for support, but none was forthcoming. Then Ibn Amin spoke.

‘Both Ibn Basit and my old friend Zuhayr are living in a world of dreams. Basit’s vision is perhaps more realistic, but equally remote from our realities. I have a very simple proposal. Let us cut off the head of the snake. Others will come in his place, but they will be more careful. What I am suggesting is not very complicated and is easy to accomplish. I propose that we ambush Ximenes de Cisneros, kill him and display his head on the city walls. I know he is guarded by soldiers, but they are not many and we would have surprise on our side.’

‘It is an unworthy thought,’ said Zuhayr in a very sombre tone.

‘But I like the idea,’ said Ibn Basit. ‘It has one great merit. We can actually carry it out ourselves. I suggest we prepare our plan carefully over the next few days and meet again to agree on the timing and method.’

Ibn Amin’s suggestion had enlivened the evening. Everyone present spoke with passion. Zuhayr reflected on the future and warned of a repetition of al-Hama in the old quarter of Gharnata. They could say farewell to any thought of victory, farewell to any notion of finding some support amongst the Dominicans. If Cisneros was killed he would become a martyr. Rome would beatify him. Isabella would avenge her confessor’s death in an orgy of blood which would make al-Hama pale in comparison. Despite the intellectual strength of his arguments, Zuhayr found himself totally isolated. Even his followers from al-Hudayl were impressed by the stark simplicity of the plan to assassinate Cisneros. It was on the basis of this rickety enthusiasm that Zuhayr accepted defeat. He would not be party to a killing which went against every principle of chivalry, but nor would he try to obstruct their plans.

‘You are too touchy and proud,’ Ibn Basit said to him. ‘The old days will never return. You are used to your shirts being washed in rose-water and dried with a sprinkling of lavender. I am telling you that everything will be washed in blood unless we decapitate these beasts which Allah has sent to test our will.’

After they had gone, Zuhayr washed himself and went to bed, but sleep would not come. Once again he was racked by doubts. Perhaps he should ride out of the city and link his fate to that of the al-Ma’aris. Perhaps he should just go home and warn his father of the catastrophe that threatened them all. Or, and this thought shocked him greatly, should he flee to Qurtuba and ask Great-Uncle Miguel to baptize him?