Down in The Bottomlands (and Other Places)

“Do you see what a liar this Christian is, qadi?” Muawiyah the pilot said. “We have been fighting these pagans since our ancestors crossed the sea to bring Islam to this newer land, and never yet have we seen one sign of a scripture among them. Now he invents it out of his own head. Let him show it to us, if it is there.”

“With pleasure.” Park dug into the trunk. He pulled out the sheets Ankowaljuu had written as they’d traveled down the Amazon, presented them with a flourish to Muhammad ibn Nizam. “I’ll read this if you like, and translate into Arabic.”

“No,” Muawiyah burst out. “I’ve already said the man is a liar, ready for anything. Who knows what these papers say, and whether he translates them truly?”

“Yes, that is so,” the qadi said thoughtfully, “the more so as lying would be to his advantage. Have we any other man here who knows the pagans’ tongue as well as our own?”

One of the armed guards, a thin, grizzled man somewhere in his fifties, spoke up: “I do, excellent qadi. I was raised not too far from here, before Tawantiinsuuju stole this province from us, and learned to read and write the language so I could better deal with the folk who knew it but no Arabic.”

“Good,” Muhammad said. “Read, then, Walid, and translate for us. By Allah, I charge you to translate the words here as they are written.”

“By Allah, I will, Excellency.” Walid took the papers from the qadi, studied them. “They do speak of Patjakamak, the Tawantiinsuujans’ false god,” he said grudgingly. “I begin: ‘How Patjakamak made the sun and the world and the stars…’ ”

“Enough,” Muhammad said, some time later.

“More than enough,” Muawiyah said loudly. “I will take these two now, as the excellent qadi has justly agreed is my right. They are not Muslims; what we just heard proves that. Therefore their religion must be false.”

“In essence, the pilot is right,” Muhammad said. “The Qu’ran recognizes but three faiths as failing under the status of Peoples of the Book: those of the Christians, Jews, and Sabians. All others are pagans. Truly, I admit there is more that approaches truth in the religion of Tawantiinsuuju than I had thought, but under the shari’a that has no bearing.”

“What of those who follow Zoroaster?” Park said. Not for nothing had he spent his time on the steamboat immersed in books. On this point of Islamic law, if on no other, he was ready to do battle with the subtlest of sages.

The qadi frowned. “They are not specifically mentioned in the Qu’ran either. What of them indeed?”

“No, not in the Qu’ran,” Park agreed. “But when Arabs conquer Persia, Zoroastrians write down their holy book, their Avesta. Till then it had only been recited”-he used the word on purpose, for the literal Arabic meaning of Qu’ran was recitation-“just like faith of Patjakamak now. And Arabs recognize Zoroastrians as People of the Book. Do you see, excellent qadi? Precedent for what I say.” Precedent was one Arabic legal term he’d made sure he knew.

Of course, all his research would go down the drain if Muhammad ibn Nizam was the kind of judge who used the law only to justify what he had already decided. Park had known enough judges like that, in New York and New Belfast both. Not all of them were, though. He waited for the qadi to reply.

What the Muslim judge said was: “Are you sure you are a Christian? You should be made to convert to Islam, for you argue like one of us.”

“La ikraha fi’l-din,” Park answered: “ ‘There is no compulsion in religion.’ ”

“You even quote the holy Qu’ran at me.” Muhammad shook his head. “I find that your precedent has some validity.” Muawiyah let out a howl of outrage; Ankowaljuu, and a moment later Waipaljkoon, cheered. “Be still, all of you,” the qadi said sternly. “More learned men than I must make the final decision in this case. Until they do, I — declare these two Tawantiinsuujans People of the Book, under the protection of the Christian qadi here. If I am overruled, however, they shall become the property of the airwain pilot Muawiyah. I have spoken.”

“Now what?” Park asked him.

“Now I send you on to my more learned colleagues, which means, in the end, on toward the court of the Emir, Allah’s blessings upon him.” The qadi’s eyes were shrewd. “Which, no doubt, is what you had in mind.”

“Who, me?” Park gri

“You did that aforethockly,” Ankowaljuu said the next day as they jounced along in one of the Emirate’s military goodwains toward its ruler’s headquarters.

“Did what aforethockly?” Park asked. They used English for privacy’s sake; had Park been in Muhammad ibn Nizam’s shoes, he knew he would have salted away a Ketjwa-speaker or two among the guards who made sure nobody tried diving out over the rear gate. Park had no intention of escaping but, since he’d fallen into the Emirate’s hands in the company of two enemy citizens, was certain the Moors would not believe that.

“Had me make that faithly writing,” Ankowaljuu said. “You never pla

“Who, me?” Park said, just as he had to the qadi.

“Aye, you, and don’t naysay it, either. You made me so hopeful of the ghostly good coming to you that I forgot to think straight through, as a tukuuii riikook ock. But tell me this, Thane Ready-for-Aught: how were you thinking of getting the writing to the Muslims had we gone on to the Son of the Sun as we reckoned we would?”

“I’d have had you take me over the lines,” Park answered calmly.

“I’d nay do that!”

“Oh yes, you would, if you’re as hot for peace as you say you are. The best chance to get it is to show the Muslims you’re no heathen country, but earnful of being treated like other folk with a godshown faith. I’d have talked you into getting me over there, all right, never fear.”

“You just might have,” Ankowaljuu said after a pause in which he seemed to be examining his own feelings. “I thock I was good at fingertwisting men into doing what I want, Judge Scoglund, but I own I’ve met my thane in you.”

“That’s sooth,” Eric Dunedin put in. “He even got me to learn Ketjwa. He’s the slyest man I ken for-”

Park never did find out why Monkey-face thought he was so sly. Just then, a beetle almost the size of a kitten flew into the goodwain’s passenger compartment. Christians, Patjakamak-worshipers, and Muslims spent a couple of frantic minutes knocking it down and squashing it. By the time the remains were finally scraped off the floor and tossed out, the conversational thread was broken.

When they arrived at the base from which the Emir was directing his war, Park did not find the Arabian Nights-style encampment he had half expected. Instead, the neat rows of mass-produced shelter tents reminded him only of the Vinlandish camps he’d seen the year before. The Industrial Revolution, even this world’s less complete one, inevitably brought industrialized warfare with it.

He had hoped he and his companions would be whisked straight to the Emir, but that did not happen. Muhammad ibn Nizam led them to a qadi he knew, one of hardly higher reputation than himself. That judge listened with the same skepticism Muhammad had shown, and only slowly came round to reluctant acceptance of the possibility that the Tawantiinsuujans might have had some long-ago share of divine revelation, however much their current doctrine distorted it. Ankowaljuu bristled at that; Park could not even kick him under the table, as they were sitting on rugs again instead.

The qadi said, “How ancient are these beliefs of yours?”