Baidu was executed by Ghazan’s order on the very day of the latter’s triumphant entry into Tabriz. He had been Il-khan for only six months. Ghazan was formally enthroned two weeks later. It was the beginning of November in the year 1295 by the Western calendar. That same winter, Marco Polo, his father and his …
The Tiger and the Cauldron[44]
Chapter 44 ‘She is gone,’ said Sabbah. He rubbed his tears away and bent forward to kiss the dead woman on her bloodless lips. Doquz touched his arm and turned away, moved by his grief but feeling none of her own. She had seen too many of her friends die to mourn a mother she …
The Tiger and the Cauldron[43]
Chapter 43 From the watchtower on the main gate of Tabriz Castle, Doquz looked out over the darkening city. Somewhere in the distance, the cry of a muezzin sounded, echoed across the rooftops, and faded away in the distance. It was followed by a second, then a third. It was the final call to prayer …
The Tiger and the Cauldron[42]
Chapter 42 Rashid was travelling again. Now that the war was almost over, he expected to feel relieved, however there were new daily frustrations to take the place of the old. Since crossing the Alburz into the plain of the Caspian in what Ghazan planned as a victory march, they had encountered the late summer …
The Tiger and the Cauldron(41)
Chapter 41 Sabbah slammed the door shut and turned the key savagely in the lock. He inspected his thumb on which the blood had begun to congeal. ‘You heard?’ he demanded of Sayyid and Mujir, neither of whom had moved from his position as guard. ‘We heard.’ ‘You will forget!’ Sabbah growled. ‘Swear it.’ ‘I …
The Tiger and the Cauldron[40]
Chapter 40 On the third evening after his capture of Baidu, Hassan rode with Doquz at the head of two squadrons of Nauruz’s troops through the gates of Tabriz. Word of his victory had travelled ahead of him and she had met and embraced him openly on the Silk Road half a parasang outside the …
The Tiger and the Cauldron(39)
Chapter 39 ZAGROS The brown dust road stretched out in both directions with no sign of life or habitation save the droppings of countless sheep and goats. Now rising, then falling, it ran with scarcely a bend across the arid terrain between the darker, russet brown of the hills. Fifteen or twenty parasangs on, it …
The Tiger and the Cauldron(38)
Chapter 38 They remained in Qazvin for a week while the war turned around them. General Mohammed Sabbah reinforced the city with a new garrison of sixteen hundred men and took command of them himself while Zanjani went north to the mountains to seek and wipe out any resistance groups of the enemy who had …
The Tiger and the Cauldron(37)
Chapter 37 The skulls and other remains were removed from the square and buried in the public garden. The ash was brushed away and the paving cleaned. Sabbah undertook to supervise the gathering up of all serviceable weapons, which were brought to the citadel, while Khumar attended to the task of digging pits to receive …
The Tiger and the Cauldron(36)
Chapter 36 QAZVIN Sabbah and his party turned the corner into the square. His face, already bloody and grim, puckered in an expression that seemed to mix rage with revulsion. Fakhr ad-Din, who had been leaning on his shoulder for support, sank to his knees with a groan. ‘What in the name of Satan and …
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