Read Online Silk Road by Colin Falconer - Free Book Online

shall see who learns to speak Tatar first, you or your horse!’

    One evening, not long after they had set out from Aleppo, one of the Tatars was bitten by a scorpion. He spent that entire night sobbing with pain, and died early the next morning. The incident chilled William to the marrow.
    But visions of his Christ helped him endure. If this was to be his cross, his purgatory, then so be it. He would welcome his tribulations as scourge for his impure thoughts.
    Horse dung clung to their damp clothes; the atmosphere inside the tent was ripe with it. William wiped his eyes, which were streaming, smarting from the fire smoke.
    ‘You think they will eat us next?’ he said to Josseran.
    He had heard the legends about these people; that they drank blood and ate dogs and frogs and snakes, even each other. Watching them now, it was not difficult to imagine. He stared in disgust at the mess of sheep’s intestines on the soaking grass in front of him. The Tatars laughed and encouraged him to eat as they wrenched tubes of offal from the steaming pile of guts with grease-blackened fingers. The rest of the animal, the fleece, the head and bloodied bones lay in a heap to one side.
    The owner of the yurt had slaughtered the animal in their honour. Josseran had never seen an animal killed in such a fashion; the man had simply thrown it on its back, pinned it down with his knees and slit its belly with his knife. He had then thrust his arm into the animal’s twitching guts up to his elbow and squeezed off the aorta, stopping the heart. In a few moments the sheep’s head had flopped to the side and it died, with barely a drop of blood spilled.
    Their method of cooking the beast was just as brutal. Only the stomach contents were discarded; everything else, the tripe, the head, the offal, the meat and the bones were tossed in boiling water.
    William felt faint with hunger but his stomach rebelled at eating any of the pink and parboiled mess in front of him.
    Juchi carved off a piece of almost raw meat from the carcass with his knife and thrust it in his mouth. William could hear small bones crunching between his teeth. Grease glistened on his chin.
    There was a goatskin bag at the doorway. Juchi lurched to his feet and poured some of the liquid from the bag into a wooden bowl and thrust it into William’s hands. He motioned for him to drink.
    It was what they called koumiss, the fermented mare’s milk that they drank with every meal. This at least was not unpleasant, now he had become accustomed to it. It was clear and pungent, like wine, and slightly effervescent; it left an aftertaste of almonds.
    William lifted the bowl to his lips and downed the contents in one gulp. Immediately he clutched at his throat, gasping for breath. His insides were on fire. The Tatars burst into laughter.
    ‘You have poisoned him!’ Josseran shouted.
    ‘Black koumiss,’ Juchi said. He patted his stomach. ‘It’s good!’
    And so nothing would do but they forced William to drink more, standing in front of him and clapping their hands at each swallow. He knew what they were doing. This black koumiss was as strong as sack and William knew that soon he would be as drunk as they were. After he had downed several cups of this foul liquor they tired of their game and sat back down on the wet grass and resumed their meal.
    ‘Are you all right, Brother William?’ Josseran asked him.
    ‘Will you join me . . . in prayer?’ he answered. His tongue felt suddenly twice the size and he realized he had slurred his words.
    ‘My knees are already blistered and raw from your constant supplications.’
    ‘We should ask for divine guidance . . . so that we may win these people for the Lord.’
    The Tatars watched him as he fell on his knees beside the fire and lifted his clasped hands to the sky. Their eyes followed the direction of his gaze to the smoke hole and the single evening star that hovered above the yurt.
    ‘God’s bones, just stop it,’ Josseran told