A short woodle I wrote in between chapters of "Song of a Peacebringer." Here's to hoping you all enjoy it.
"And whoever pays heed unto God and His Apostle, him will He bring into gardens through which running waters flow, therein to abide: and this is a triumph supreme," Nasir Imad al-Din al Isfahani quoted softly to himself, glancing around this cluttered, disorganized space they had the nerve to call a garden in the Citadel of David. True enough, there were plants and paths, but it was not a garden as was here in the days when the Fatimid caliphs had control of the city. Under the supervision of their gardeners the flowers would have been perfect, the vines pruned just so, the date palms and lemon trees just tall enough not be a nuisance but to provide shade in which to sit, eat sharbat and recite suras to a soft breeze.
This Frankish garden was hard to look at – with low beds enclosing each flower just so and no trees to speak of, it was not the cool respite that Nasir thought of when he quoted what his Holy Book had to say about the Gardens of Paradise.
He would rather not have been in Jerusalem at all, but when a Sultan commands, a man of honor obeys, and Nasir had always considered himself a man of honor. But he had not gone as Imad al Din Al Isfanani, Commander of Cavalry, good friend of the Sultan Saladin, but rather as Nasir, a simple adjutant to the ambassador, merely observing, content to remain silent and unheard. The meetings between the Ambassador and Count Raymond of Tiberias had gone according to plan, and Nasir was confident that Salah Al Din would be pleased with his observations of Tiberias and the general state of the Frankish Court.
"It is a beautiful day today," a woman said from somewhere to his left, and Nasir, surprised, turned to see who it was. She could not have been more than twenty, with dark hair bound under a light, gauzy veil, and fair Frankish skin. Nasir recognized her as the lone woman who had been sitting to the right of Tiberias in the Haut Cour, taking notes of her own alongside the scribes who kept the official transcript of the court. Truly, she was prettier than he had previously thought – but he had not paid much attention to her when he had noticed her with the other scribes. They had strange customs among the Franks, and he was not about to call into question the scandal of having a woman observe court. "We have not had such a beautiful day in a long while," she mused aloud again.
"Is it the custom of the Franks to interrupt visitors while they are in private thought?" Nasir asked, his voice a little cold. The lady -- no, really more of a girl – looked down at the ground demurely, a small smile on her lips.
"Forgive me, my lord," she said smoothly, curtseying in the Frankish fashion, eyes cast downward. "I meant no intrusion, but only to tell you that if you are a great enjoyer of gardens, and of bushes like this one, there is a specimen of superior quality in that corner, and I would be happy to show it to you," she explained, looking him straight in the eye. What a bold one! Nasir thought to himself. Most women here avoid me with their eyes.
"If it is amenable to you, I will see this superior planting," he said, nodding solemnly and following her. "Do you behave thus to all your visitors?" he asked with veiled interest.
"I try to. It is a personal rule of mine that hospitality should be extended to all who come here in friendship, even if they be Muslim or Jew, regardless of their station."
"It is a good rule to follow." Did not the Prophet reveal to us the same? "Be, then, conscious of God, and disgrace me not by assaulting my guests. Is there not among you even one right-minded man?" Did not good things come to Ibrahim, who received guests into his home with dignity and kindness?
"This is the place," she said, pointing to the bush in question, which was without doubt in much better care than its brother across the garden.
"Your gardeners should know this grows better beside a wall, as it is here," Nasir said with the faintest hint of disdain in his voice.
"I will speak with the gardener, and see if we cannot transplant the other. It is too pretty a plant to waste with such misuse," she replied. Nasir nodded, and contemplated the bush in silence. "For a man who only accompanies the Ambassador, you know many things about the nature of gardens," she remarked, her voice almost teasing him.
"In my house we have many great gardens, and good men to tend them," Nasir said evasively.
"I do not think you are who you are told to be, my lord," she inserted, without confrontation. "You speak the Frankish tongue too well to be a mere adjutant."
"And what else have you considered about me that you have reached this conclusion?" Nasir asked, wondering what he had done that had given him away and interested, at the same time, by what a mere woman would have noticed.
"You stand close to the Ambassador, as if you wish to be noticed, but yet you say nothing, as no man looking for advancement would do. You offer him no advice, give no suggestion to his ears, as only a man confident in his position does. You dress well, but not ostentatiously, which means that you have seen much of the world and known your rank. As I have said, you speak Frankish exceptionally well, which means you are a man of learning, and you linger to speak it with me, a woman, which means you know something of my people and our custom, and you do not readily dismiss it as do the other, younger men."
She has eyes like a man, to see all that! "Truly, the women of this court are very observant," Nasir commented with a hint of a smile.
"Only this woman, my lord. It is my profession to be so."
"And what profession is that?" To let their women go without veils, I understand. Are their women so bold here that they take up professions aside from those of motherhood?
"I am a poet," she said, and Nasir almost sighed in relief. Were there not female poets among his people in the jawari of the harim, whose skill it was to please the ear with singing and recitation?
"And for whom do you compose your poetry?" he asked, interested. "For your husband?"
"For the king," she said simply. She is like me, then, Nasir noted to himself, somewhat amused by this observation. "What is your name, my lord?" she asked. "I do not mean to be bold, but it occurs to me we have been talking and I do not yet know it. It seems discourteous not to inquire."
"It is Nasir," he responded.
"My name is Audemande," she said, "But I know it is not the custom of your people to address women who are not related to them by their given names."
"We are in a Frankish territory," Nasir conceded, "And should thus act in accordance with Frankish rules."
The girl-poet, Audemande, let herself laugh, and Nasir smiled – if there was one thing he enjoyed hearing in his own harim, it was the sound of women's laughter. "Nasir," she repeated, siphoning the sounds over her tongue. "It has a good sound," she pronounced. "What does it mean?" she asked curiously.
"The Victor, or The Victorious," Nasir explained simply.
"It is a very good name, then. Audemande means nothing special in my language," she added.
"It is the custom of the Muslims to give another name, more fitting to the individual, when they have reached adulthood. Salah Al Din, for instance, means Righteous of Faith."
"I suppose that I, too, have a second name. I am called the Little Dove by those who know me," Audemande replied.
"And why is that?" Nasir asked, thinking the name appropriate for one so soft-spoken and fair of skin.
"They say that I am peaceful – a dove among the hawks of war. That like the dove who brought Noah the olive branch while his ark rested against Ararat, I bring joy and hope and respite from trouble into their lives."
"In our Holy Book, it is God who brings word that Noah may return to land," Nasir commented.
"But he is in your book," Audemande pointed out. "I find that so wonderous, that we share stories and so little else. It is strange, that we should share a story about the mercy and kindness of God, and yet share precious little of that kindness amongst our two peoples."
"It is very strange indeed," Nasir said, admitting silently to himself that she was very right. He had thought the same thing many times, although not as boldly as she had – the mullahs and imans of his people did not take kindly to comparing the faith of the Prophet to the earlier, less enlightened ideas of the Christians and the Jews.
"My lord Imad al Din," Count Raymond of Tiberias said, coming into the garden to speak with them, interrupting their conversation with a genial smile. "How did I know you might be here with our Little Dove?"
"You know me too well, Count, to guess that I might be in the garden," Nasir said, bowing to the Prince of Galilee, acknowledging him in a somewhat sheepish fashion. When Raymond had been a hostage at the court in Damascus, Nasir had spent many hours playing chess with him – he knew that the older man had recognized him in the Haut Cour as negotiations were going on, and he should have known that the count would have come looking for him in the place he had always professed to love the best in any house, the garden.
"Imad al-Din?" Audemande repeated, looking at him oddly. I was not who she expected, just as she was not who I expected, Nasir thought to himself. I know they hear of me here in Jerusalem – she's probably heard my work.
Nasir looked at the ground, and Tiberias, glancing between them, smiled knowingly. "Have I revealed a secret, then, my lord Nasir?" he said, pronouncing the name with a mocking flourish. "Have you been lying to our Audemande? I am sure she's found you out – she knows the truth too well for a woman," he accused.
Nasir looked apologetically at Audemande. "You were right, my lady – I am not who I profess to be," Nasir admitted. "I am Imad al-Din al Isfahani, and I, like you, am also a poet to my king."
"We have more in common than we thought, then," Audemande realized with a slim smile.
"It would appear to be thus, my lady," Nasir said smoothly, smiling in an impish manner until they both broke out laughing, unable to contain the silence any longer. "I am sorry, for deceiving you."
"And I am sorry, my lord Nasir, for allowing Tiberias to reveal you so. He has so little tact," she commented, as if apologizing for a wayward child.
The Prince of Galilee rolled his eyes. "What a pair you two make," Tiberias commented flatly. "Between the both of you you'll write down all of history -- If I linger too long you will certainly write something terrible about me."
"I would never write anything terrible about you, Tiberias," Audemande assured him, laying her hand on his arm comfortingly. She could be his daughter, the way she cares for him, Nasir thought to himself, his gaze lingering on her hand on Raymond's sleeve.
"My master calls me," he said quickly, seeing one of the ambassador's other companions in the hallway beyond the garden, watching them with contemptuous eyes. "My lady, it was a pleasure to meet you," he said, bowing and making his leave. He did not hear if she said anything in farewell.
"Your mother and sisters would be ashamed to see you speaking so boldly with a woman who had no veil," the other young man said censoriously when Nasir reached his side in the passageway, glancing contemptuously at Audemande, still in the garden.
"It is not against the custom here," Nasir commented in an equally critical tone, walking with him back to the Ambassador's suite.
"That was Al-Khinzir's poet, a most bold and unassuming woman. They have told me that she studies with great scholars and debates with the men in the council chamber, and that both Al-Khinzir and his sister follow her advice," the young companion said dismissively.
"Do not many of our women offer advice to their kings and husbands? Do not many of our women compose poetry?" Nasir asked, wondering if the young man had forgotten that he was Nasir Imad Al-Din al Isfahani, who commanded cavalry and was much respected by the Sultan, and not merely some cavalier who had come with to gain advancement.
"She recites where all men can hear, and is immodest, like all these Frankish women," the younger man said dismissively, looking evilly at a maid as they passed by – the frightened young woman scurried past, fearful. "You were wrong to speak with her as you did – it is unbecoming."
"Thus, if they let you be, and do not make war on you, and offer you peace, God does not allow you to harm them," Nasir quoted shortly, striding ahead of the younger man so he would not have to listen to him any longer. And what God would want me to harm someone who spoke so eloquently about peace?
He heard very little as time wore on about Lady Audemande the Little Dove who was poet in Jerusalem, but he heard enough to know that she was doing well, and sometimes there was occasion for them to exchange pleasantries when he was in the city on Saladin's business, disguised again as Cavalier Nasir, not as General Imad Al Din. The last time he saw her was when he brought the news of Saladin's refusal to take the killing of Mamud Al Fiesz at the hands of the new Baron of Ibelin as a cause for war. After that, he heard no more from her as communication between Damascus and Jerusalem slowed to a trickle, and then stopped abruptly when Baldwin died.
When they besieged the city, Nasir mentioned every night to Allah in his prayers that the Merciful, the Infinite, and the Compassionate should show his mercy to the Christian woman who had shown him respect, and when they entered the walls, he went straight to the citadel of David, looking for her.
She was not there. Balian, who met him with a company of bedraggled and dusty knights as the Franks were leaving the city, assured him she had left with Raymond for his castle at Tiberias, well before the siege had started. She had not had time to take all her possessions, though, he added, and showed Nasir the rooms that she had called her own.
It felt strange to the Muslim, stepping inside a woman's private rooms. It seemed like a sacrilege – the rooms still smelled of parchment and ink, the writer's sacred perfumes. It had been packed away in a hurry, papers scattered this way and that by rushed servants with frantic hands. He gently shuffled through the papers on her desk, finding only scraps of poetry in Frankish and practice bits of parchment with scribbling in very badly formed Arabic. So she was still trying to learn, Nasir thought to himself. He'd heard she had mastered the Latin her religion used, had moved on to Greek and was now also trying to learn his own mother tongue. Truly a remarkable woman.
Her books were all still on their shelf, the thin wooden covers enveloped over in cloth, neatly hiding the open bindings in reds, blues and greens.
He pulled a volume from the shelf and, unclasping it, opened it to a random page, stroking the illuminated capital with a single finger and thinking of his own library, filled with much less ornate volumes – it was against the will of God to replicate His Creation in art, especially in something so petty as the beginning capital of a page. The Frankish letters were much less pretty than his own native script – blocky and heavy, the letters marched across the page where Arabic calligraphy would have floated.
"But for David's sake the LORD his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem, to raise up his son after him and to establish Jerusalem…" Nasir read, tracing his finger along underneath the words. It was the Franks' holy book, he realized, and put it quickly aside – should Mullah Nasruddin find him reading it, he'd surely be in some sort of trouble. For a man of god, he showed perhaps a little too much interest in making life difficult for some, Nasir thought to himself.
A verse came to his mind, the product of many, many years of memorizing the Holy Book, this quotation from Shu'ara, the book of Poets. "But, indeed, We did endow some of the prophets more highly than others -just as We bestowed upon David a book of divine wisdom in token of Our grace."
Nasir looked at the Bible, wondering what he should do with the little library here. Mullah Nasruddin would advocate burning it, surely, and the Sultan, not wanting to appear more lenient than he already was, would probably agree with him. No, this was definitely a private matter, discussed best between one man and another, and concluded secretively.
And so it was done in secret: He left Jerusalem early in the morning, right after morning prayers were concluded, with two camels and one five or six of his most trusted men, setting out for Tiberias, on the Sea of Galilee to the north of the city, some five days ride, with a steady horse. But it was easy going, with a pass signed by the Sultan and the right amount of deliberate reminders of what rank Nasir really held.
The Castle of Tiberias was in a sorry condition, having been besieged by Saladin to draw the Franks out to Hattin, where the main bulk of their army had met their demise. But the Count had signed his own treaty with Saladin, and now he was allowed to stay in his castle, unlike many of the other Frankish nobles, who were at this moment trying to find ransom money to leave Outremer.
"My lord Imad Al Din," Tiberias said, coming into the courtyard of his castle after a servant summoned him at Nasir's request. "Please tell me you have not brought this valiant knights of yours to bruise my walls a little more."
"I came to return these," Nasir said, gesturing forth the crates that held the books, and watching as the bearers brought them into the courtyard of the castle. "They made very poor hostages, and we decided to release them, as a sign of our benevolence."
"From whence do they come?" Tiberias asked, glancing inside one of the crates.
"From David's Citadel, from a room belonging, one can guess, to the Court Poet," Nasir revealed.
Tiberias laughed loudly. "I'm sure you've made Audemande very happy today, General," Raymond said, turning around when the young woman in question came out of the main doors to the house, picking up her pace into a bit of a run when she saw the boxes.
"My books!" she said happily, looking through the familiar volumes with rapturous joy on her face. "You do not know, sir, what this means to me," she said, looking up at him and starting in surprise. "Nasir?" she asked, standing up and brushing the dust off her dress where she had been kneeling in the dust. "Or should I call you Imad Al Din? Which is it today?"
"Unfortunately, today I am a general, Lady, and not merely a poet," Nasir said, bowing his head to her. "I found the books and decided they were better back in your hands. I saw you do not have many Arabic texts," he added, gesturing at the crates, "And so I have added a few volumes of my own. I saw from your notes that you have begun studies, and wished to help them," he explained.
Audemande blushed. "I am still a very young student of your tongue, General, and I read it very poorly. But I thank you, anyway, for the gift."
"I will see that you are sent a good grammar, then, so that you may read some of the poetry I have left you," Nasir said with a slim smile.
"Perhaps we could share our poetry, General. Although I am sure you would find mine ridiculous," Aude assured him.
"You would probably find mine ridiculous as well, Lady," Nasir said with a smile.
"It would not be so different than comparing holy books, then, would it?" Audemande asked, grinning mischievously. The Arab nodded.
"It would not be any different, Lady, and I would treasure it just as much. Alas that my master would have me return to Jerusalem with my riders, as soon as can be contrived."
"The responsibilities of war," Audemande said sadly. "I understand. Perhaps we will see each other again," she proposed, her voice hopeful. "In a time of peace."
"I do not foresee peace in the near future, Lady Audemande. I fear the only place we will ever meet again is in Heaven," Nasir admitted.
"In my heaven or yours, General?" Aude asked with a hinting grin.
"Perhaps, to spite our petty feuds on Earth, God will show us they are the same," Nasir suggested with a chuckle. "Then we would be no different at all."
"And will we compose poetry in the midst of the Gardens of Paradise?" Audemande asked with a reminiscent smile.
"Yes," Nasir said. "I think we would."
"Do not let us detain you here – return to your master, and wish him joy in his victory," Tiberias said. "We hold no ill will over Jerusalem. Baldwin would have wished it so."
"I will give him your compliments," Nasir said, nodding to Tiberias and then to Audemande, spurring his horse back into the desert, back on the road to Jerusalem.
When he returned to his house in the city, washed the dust from his feet and changed his robes, he went into the garden, ink and paper in hand. And sitting under the tireless gaze of the lemon trees, he began composing a poem about the gardens of paradise, and the other poets he would doubtless meet there.