Emissary Chapter 2 The beginning

My name is Yehya Ibn (son of) Sharif al-Hamadani and I was born in the city of Cairo the capital of the Fatimid Caliphate in Egypt. I had always been called John which is the Latin abbreviation of my name even among my Arab friends. I was born in the year 447 of the Muslim Hijra calendar or 1055 of the Christian Era. It was the year the Seljuk Turks invaded Baghdad. The Seljuks had always been the archival of the Fatimids and the fall of Baghdad was just another step into their continued expansion in the region. According to an astrologers who read my natal chart the fact that I was born in that year is a bad omen. I believe he was right.

I have been told I was a descendant from a long line of Emirs who ruled Aleppo many years ago. I don’t know if this was true or not. I have not known my father for he died just before I was born. However my mother, may God rest her soul, told me about him. She said that he was prince Sharif Ibn Said Ibn Saed the grandson of prince Ali al-Hamadani the Emir of Aleppo. Prince Ali was famously known as Sayf al-Dawla (the sword of the state). Most of those names have now been forgotten and I am not a man who dwells on the past nor on the deeds of his ancestors. I have made my own fortune and will continue to make my own future until I am long dead and buried and no one remembers my name.

I most certainly do not considered myself a prince although I have used the title to my advantage in many occasions whenever the situation deemed it necessary. Ever since I was a young boy I had always been a Mamluk or a slave. I am still a slave even to this day. It is ironic because it was my mother who gave me up as a slave when I was ten years old. It was not really her fault. I do not blame her for our misfortune. She thought that she was sending me into a better world. A world without hunger or fear. At that time Egypt was engulfed by a terrible famine that nearly wiped out half of its population from the Nile delta to the Nubian plains. The famine was followed by a terrible plague which killed most of my family and neighbors including my mother who gave me up to be a Mamluk. I pray for her every time I perform my five daily rituals. I pray that God blesses her soul so that she can concede on my behalf on the day of judgment. I certainly need every help I can get to atone for the many sins I have committed; sins of the soul as well as sins of the flesh and how plenty those have been.

My mother was herself a concubine. She was a slave who was given as a gift to my father a few years before as I was born. She was originally a young Greek girl captured in one of many skirmishes between the Byzantine and the Fatimid army in the lower Anatolian mountains. That is why I am of white skin with blue eyes and golden hair. This was another reason I was picked by my master for the tasks which I would eventually do for the Caliphate. 

After my father died my mother thought of leaving Egypt and go back to her hometown. Unfortunately for her she stayed in Cairo. Having no one to return to after knowing that all her family were long dead. However in order to remind herself of her heritage she tried to speak to me in her native tongue. Therefore as a young boy, I was fluent in two languages, Arabic and Greek. My mother also tried to teach me how to read and write what little Latin she knew but it wasn’t much. Eventually I learned Latin. I also learned French and German in addition to Arabic and Greek.

The years of my childhood with my mother were very difficult. I remember that we were always hungry and scared. The famine which had devastated the country was one of the worst in its history. People were killed right on the streets just for a small loaf of bread. Riots spread, people sold their souls as well as their bodies. I remember how soldiers used to come into the homes of our neighbors and they didn’t leave until the next day. I also remember the cries of the women which echoed all night. Some were cries of fear but many were also cries of lust. I was a little boy then and could not distinguish between the two but every night my mother used to lock the door to our small room and hold me tight until I slept.

The Fatimid empire almost collapsed during that famine and the army was scattered into factions that fought each other more than the enemy. The Caliph locked himself up in his palace unable to do anything. It is well known that the Fatimid Caliph al-Mustansir even requested aid from the Holy Roman Empire as well as the Byzantine Empire and he had to give up large areas of lands in Syria and elsewhere to pay for it. Unfortunately this little aid wasn’t enough to feed the entire Egyptian population and people continued to die and the Caliph remained in his palace.

My mother worked at the estate of one of the army’s generals who would later become my master. We were living in a small room close to the estate and I used to play out in the barren fields which were once lush with vegetation of all kinds. My mother always managed to bring home a little food. I do not know how she did it or if she was forced to sell herself to do it but whatever she did I believe that God will definitely forgive her sins after all the hardship she had been forced to endure.

One day my mother came back home feeling sick. Her health deteriorated rapidly but she kept going to the estate to work every day. She came back one afternoon almost unable to stand up but she was excited. She told me to pack up what little clothes I had and that she was going to take me to live at the estate. I didn’t know that she arranged to give me up as a Mamluk. I was told of that a few weeks later after she died in her sleep. As I said I have forgiven her and I hope she forgives me as well.

The first day I arrived to the estate I was immediately put to work in the stables. The owner of the estate and the one who claimed my thralldom was Badr al-Jamali an ethnically Armenian general in the Fatimid army. He was originally a mamluk himself. He told me once that he was purchased by a Syrian Emir called Jamal al-Dawla Ibn Ammar for a relatively small price. Master Badr later became the grand Vizier and the general commander of the Fatimid army. At that time master Badr was already an important figure and the governor of the city of Acre in Palestine where he spent most of his time. However he kept a large estate near Cairo, a city that was established by the Fatimids north of Fustat, the old capital of Egypt. Cairo was a newly constructed city. It was built less than a hundred years earlier to hold the palace of the Fatimid Caliph and it is continuing to grow every day. Badr used to visit Cairo every few months to see the Caliph and to look over his holdings. 

In the first few months of living at Badr’s Cairo estate I used to sleep in the stables and work as the only stable boy in his household. There were only two horses in the stable because most of the other horses either died of hunger or were themselves eaten because of the famine. I learned all there was to learn about horses taking care of those two animals. I was taught from Jaafar, the stable master, how to clean them, feed them, saddle them and walk them around the estate for exercise but I was not allowed to ride them, not until I met my own master a few months later.

Master Badr al-Jamali arrived one evening from Acre with a company of his men and he went right to his quarters where he kept a few slave girls for his pleasure at his Cairo estate. We only heard the laughter of the women and sometimes their load cries of pleasure as they served the master. The next day I saw him for the first time as he entered the stable to inspect the two horses. Badr was an imposing figure. He towered above most men by more than a foot. He was well built, bold with a short black beard that he kept well trimmed at all times. 

First he spoke with the stable master then he looked at me and said, “you are Maghda’s boy.” I just nodded. I didn’t know that he knew my mother’s name. I asked him one day how he came to know my mother but he didn’t answer so I figured that some matters were not meant to be discussed.

“She was a good woman. I have heard she died, may God bless her soul,” he continued. I remained silent not knowing what to say. 

Then I was surprised when he spoke to me in Greek, “What is the matter boy? The horse got your tongue!” He shouted.

I answered him back in Greek, “no Sir, but you didn’t ask me anything so I didn’t know what to answer you about.” I immediately regretted blurting out my reply so quickly and I thought that I was going to get punished for my insolence. 

He looked at me for a few seconds which I thought had lasted for hours and he said again in Greek , “you are right. I didn’t ask you anything but now I will. How do you find my two horses?”

All this time the stable master was looking at us bewildered. He was even more surprised that I knew how to speak Greek. He didn’t understand what we were saying so he was a little agitated for being left out of the conversation. 

I immediately answered the master in Arabic, “the stable master is teaching me how to take care of the horses. He is a good teacher and he is taking good care of them. They are a little lean because of the lack of food but they are strong and they can hopefully carry the weight of a rider once they are properly fed.”

From the smile on his face I knew that the stable master approved of my answer. Jaafar was an old man but a descent individual. He didn’t shout or punish me except when I really did something unforgivable. He was glad that I came along when I did to help him in the stables since the last stable boy ran away and never returned. 

Jaafar put one hand on my back and added, “John is a good boy and he is learning fast.”

Badr noticed how I reacted and he appreciated my keen perception for a young boy my age. Then he asked me again, “You mean you have not ridden them all this time?” This time in Arabic.

“No sir. I am not allowed to ride the horses and besides I do not know how,” I replied.

Badr looked at the stable master and said, “good job Jaafar. However from now on you are to teach John how to ride so he can better help you take care of the horses.”  

He strolled out of the barn and into the house and back to his women. I thought then that my master’s sexual appetite was insatiable but I later came to learn that mine was even worse. Badr kept a large number of slaves and concubines in his harem. I used to see them walking outside the house and sometimes flirting with the few soldiers guarding the estate but no one was allowed to enter the house except for a few eunuchs and the women servants who looked after them. The next day Badr left the estate and went back to Acre.

From that day on I was taught how to ride and I became a good rider in a relatively short time. Unfortunately one after the other the horses fell ill and they died of malnutrition and hunger. As I said we were still living in the days of the great famine and food was mostly meant to feed the men and women of the estate. What ever food remained was fed to the horses and that was not enough. The stable master and I were left guarding a stable without horses and we were afraid of what the master was going to do the next time he comes back to Cairo.