‘If they set us free,’ said Ogmund, ‘we ought to be able to do well for women in this country; for their men are of miserable appearance compared with us.’
‘Every man in this land is allowed to have four wives,’ said Orm, ‘if he has embraced the Prophet and his teaching. But, once having done so, he can never drink wine again.’
‘It is a difficult choice to make,’ said Toke, ‘for their ale is too thin for my palate. But it may be that we have not yet sampled their best brew. And four women is just about what I need.’
They came to a large house, where there were many soldiers, and there they slept the night. The next morning, a stranger appeared and led them to another house not far distant, where they were well bathed and barbered, and where cool drinks were offered to them in beautiful tiny cups. Then they were given softer garments, which chafed them less; for their clothes felt rough against their skin, since they had for so long been naked. They looked at each other, laughing at the change that had been wrought in their appearance; then, marvelling greatly at all this, they were conducted into a dining-room, where a man came forward, greeting them and bidding them welcome. They recognized him at once as Solomon, although he now wore a very different appearance to when they had last seen him, for he had all the bearing and accoutrements of a rich and mighty prince.
He greeted them hospitably, bidding them eat and drink and regard his house as their own; but he had forgotten most of what he had formerly known of the Nordic tongue, so that only Orm was able to converse with him. Solomon said that he had done all that he could on their behalf, as soon as he had heard of their plight, because they had once performed a very great service for him, which he was glad to be able to repay. Orm thanked him as eloquently as he could; but, he told Solomon, what they were most eager to know was whether they were now free men, or whether they were still slaves.
Solomon replied that they were still the Caliph’s slaves, and must remain so; in that matter, he could not help them; but they were now to serve in the Caliph’s private bodyguard, which was recruited from the pick of prisoners that the Caliph captured in battle, and of the slaves that he purchased from abroad. The Caliphs of Cordova, he went on, had always possessed such a bodyguard, regarding it as safer than being surrounded by armed subjects of their own, since the latter might more easily be bribed by their kinsmen or their friends to lay violent hands on the Caliph’s person when discontent pricked the land.
But before they joined the bodyguard, Solomon told them, they would first be his guests for a while, in order that they might in some measure recover themselves after their labours; so they stayed at his house for five days, and were treated as heroes are treated at the table of Odin. They partook of many delicate dishes, and drink was brought to them whenever they cared to call for it; musicians played for them, and they made themselves tipsy with wine every evening, no Prophet having forbidden Solomon to taste of that drink. Orm and his fellows, however, kept a watchful eye on Toke the whole time, lest he should drink too much and so weep and become dangerous. Their host offered each of them a young slave-girl to keep them company in bed, and this delighted them most of all. They agreed unanimously that the Jew was a fine man, and a chieftain, every bit as good as if he had been of Nordic blood; and Toke said that he had seldom made a more fortunate catch than when he had drawn this noble Semite out of the sea. They slept late in the mornings, in feather-beds softer than anything they had previously known; and, at table, they quarrelled merrily as to which among them had the prettiest slave-girl, and none of them would allow that his was not the choicest of them all.
On the third evening of their stay there, Solomon bade Orm and Toke accompany him into the city, saying that there was someone else whom they had to thank for their liberation, and who had perhaps done more for them than he had. They went with him along many streets, and Orm asked whether Khalid, the great poet of Malaga, had perhaps come to Cordova, and whether it was he whom they were on their way to visit; but Solomon replied that they were going to meet a nobler personage than Khalid.
‘And only a foreigner,’ he added feelingly, ‘could look upon this Khalid as a great poet, though he noises it abroad that he is one. Sometimes I try to calculate how many truly great poets there can be said to be nowadays in the Caliph’s dominions; and I do not think that that honour can rightly be allowed to more than five of us, among which number Khalid could not possibly find inclusion, although he has a certain facility for playing with rhymes. None the less, you do right, Orm, to regard him as your friend, for without his help I should never have discovered what became of you and your men; so, if you should meet him and he should refer to himself as a poet, you need not correct him.’
Orm remarked that he knew enough about men not to argue with poets concerning their respective merits; but Toke broke into their conversation with the complaint that he wanted to know why he had been pressed into this evening ramble when it was impossible for him to understand a word of what was being said, and when he had been enjoying himself so much in Solomon’s house. Solomon merely replied that it was necessary that he should accompany them, it having so been ordered.
They arrived at a walled garden with a narrow gate, which was opened to admit them. They entered, walking among beautiful trees and many strange plants and flowers, and came to a place where a great fountain was playing and clear water ran through rich grasses in small coiling streams. From the opposite direction to that from which they had come, a litter was being carried towards them by four slaves, followed by two slave-girls and two black men carrying drawn swords.
Solomon halted, and Orm and Toke did likewise. The litter was lowered to the ground, and the slave-girls ran forward and stood reverently one on either side of it. Then a veiled lady stepped forth. Solomon bowed low to her thrice, with his hands pressed against his forehead, so that Orm and Toke realized that she must be of royal blood; they remained upright, however, for it seemed to them a wrong thing that any man should abase himself before a woman.
The lady inclined her head graciously in Solomon’s direction. Then she turned towards Orm and Toke, and murmured something beneath her veil; and her eyes were friendly. Solomon bowed to her again, and said: ‘Warriors from the north, thank Her Highness Subaida, for it is by her power that you stand liberated.’
Orm said to the lady: ‘If you have helped to free us, we owe you a great debt of thanks. But who you are, and why you have showed us such favour, we do not know.’
‘Yet we have met,’ she answered, ‘and perchance you will remember my face.’
So saying, she lifted her veil, at which the Jew abased himself again. Toke tugged at his beard and muttered to Orm: ‘It is my girl from the fortress, and she is more beautiful now than ever. Her luck must indeed have been good, for, since we last saw her, she has become a queen. I should like to know whether she is pleased to see me again.’
The lady glanced towards Toke, and said: ‘Why do you address your friend, and not me?’
Orm replied to her that Toke could not understand Arabic, but that he said that he remembered her and thought her even more beautiful now than when he had last seen her.
‘And we both rejoice,’ he added, ‘to see that luck and power have come your way, for you appear to us to be deserving of the one and worthy of the other.’
She looked at Orm, and smiled, and said: ‘But you, O red man, have learned the language of this country, as I have done. Which is the better man, you or your friend who was once my master?’
‘We both reckon ourselves to be good men,’ replied Orm. ‘But I am young, and am less experienced than he; and he performed mighty feats when we took the fortress which was your home. Therefore, I hold him to be the better man of us, as yet; though he cannot tell you so himself in the language of this land. But better than either of us was Krok, our chieftain; but he is dead.’
She said that she remembered Krok, and that good chieftains seldom lived to be old. Orm told her how he had died, and she nodded, and said: ‘Fate has woven our destinies