Golden Lion by Wilbur Smith Read Free Book Online Page B

the carpenter test the hooks from which the cot was suspended to make sure they could handle any conceivable strain.

 
     
     
     
    hen the Buzzard had first sailed north to seek his fortune in the service of the Arab invasion of Ethiopia, caring not a jot for the religious or political issues at stake but choosing the side he believed most likely to pay him best, he barely spoke a word of Arabic. He considered it an ugly tongue, one beneath his dignity. He soon realized, however, that his ignorance was a great disadvantage since men around him could converse without him having the first idea what they were saying. So he began to study the language. His endeavours had continued during his convalescence so that it was now no difficulty for him to comprehend the Maharajah Sadiq Khan Jahan when the latter said, ‘I must congratulate you, your lordship, on your remarkable recovery. I confess, I had not believed you would ever rise from your bed. But now just look at you.’
    In his pomp, the Buzzard had been a master of sly condescension and insincere compliments and he was not inclined to believe that the haughty figure before him meant a single one of his honeyed words. The contrast between the Indian prince in his silk and gold-threaded finery, dripping with more jewels than a king’s mistress, and the Buzzard, a decrepit, one-armed Caliban, with his skin like pork crackling and a face uglier than any gargoyle ever sculpted was simply too great to be bridged by words. But the Buzzard was a beggar and could not afford to be a chooser, so he gave a little nod of his head and wheezed, ‘You’re too kind, your royal highness.’
    And, in all truth, his recovery, however partial it might be, was indeed the product of an extraordinary effort of will. The Buzzard had lain in bed and made an inventory of his body, concentrating on those parts of it that still functioned at least moderately well. His legs had not been broken, and though they were covered with burns and scar tissue, the muscles beneath the ravaged skin seemed to be capable of supporting and moving his body. Likewise, though his left arm was no more, his right arm was still whole and his hand could still grasp, so he might yet hold a sword again one day. He had the sight of one eye and hearing in one ear. He could no longer chew properly and his digestion seemed to have become unduly sensitive so that he could only eat food that had already been broken down into a soft, mushy porridge. But it was enough that he could still eat at all, and if his food was nothing more than a bland, tasteless porridge, it hardly mattered, since his tongue seemed unable to distinguish flavour any more, no matter how much salt, sugar or spice was added.
    Above all, however, the Buzzard’s mind was still sound. He had suffered terrible headaches and the pain in every part of his body – including, strangely, those that no longer existed – was unrelenting. Still he was able to think, and plan, and calculate, and hate.
    It was that hatred above all that drove him on. It had forced him to keep getting up when at first, unused to the imbalance of his body, he kept falling. It drove him through gruelling physical activities, in particular the building up of his surviving arm’s strength by the repeated lifting of a sack of millet, procured from Jahan’s kitchens, when with every single breath he took the air cut through his throat and lungs like caustic acid.
    The black, burning fire in the Buzzard’s soul seemed to fascinate Jahan. ‘Please, don’t let me interrupt you. Pray continue with your exertions,’ he said, and stepped right up to his guest, making no effort to disguise the mix of revulsion and fascination he felt in the presence of such a foul and monstrous distortion of a man.
    The Buzzard felt Jahan’s lordly eye upon him and the urge to defy him drove him on. He lifted the sack, which he held in his hand by the neck, again and again, though his exhausted muscles and