( IC) From Kiri Umoor and South.
Muttabah and his entourage set out at the head of a small fleet bound for Khitai. Gifts from the King to the Khitain Emperor included 200 slaves, singers and dancers, 15 pages, 100 horses, and great amounts of cloth, dishes, and swords. There were 100 soldiers under his command to protect the treasure and supplies until they could board ships to Khitai.
The fleet was composed of four ships. Three were large dhows to carry to the gifts, including the horses and slaves and pages. The fourth was a war ship which carried the soldiers to defend them against attack from pirates.
Using the monsoon winds to propel them, the four ships headed south and arrived in the port of Kalik. There they were received with drums, trumpets, horns, and flags.
Muttabah wrote in his log, " We entered the harbor amid great ovation and pomp, the likes of which I have not seen in these parts."
The crew noted that in the harbor were 13 Khitain chuán. The chuán were much larger ships than the dhows they sailed on.
Muttabah was impressed with the Khitain ships, some with five decks and five masts or more! They had interior cabins and even private lavatories! The crew of a chuán might be up to 1,000 workers!
It would be on three of these large ships that they would continue to Khitai. So the crew transferred the gifts including horses and slaves to the junks. Mattubah spent the day in the dockside mosque and planned to board the ship that afternoon.
But before he got on his new ship, a terrible event occurred, a violent storm came up.
Because the harbor was not very deep, the captains of the chuáns ordered the ships to wait out the storm in deeper water out to sea. Muttabah waited helplessly on the beach all night and the next morning watched in horror as two ships were pushed onto shore, broke apart, and sank. Some of the crew on one of the junks were saved, but no one survived from the other ship - the one that he was supposed to be on.
As he later related bereftly to Karash and Nafu, "The slaves, pages, and horses were all drowned, and the precious wares either sank or washed up on the beach, where the local soldiers struggled to prevent the townsfolk from making off with the loot."
The other surviving ship carried Muttabahs luggage, servants, and slave-girls - one of whom was, he related, carrying his child. The captain of that ship had immediately set sail for Khitai without him, Karash and Nafu.
Muttabah was now alone, penniless, and ashamed - a failure as the leader for the trip to Khitai - but lucky to be alive. There was still a chance that he could catch up with the other ship, so he tried to track it down.
Dragging the other two with him he boarded a coastal dhow headed south. After ten days he arrived in another port and waited for the ship which never turned up.
Knowing if he returned to the King, he would be executed for his failed trip. He decided it was safer to seek employment and protection from another ruler in southern Minj. To gain favor with this King he leaned upon contacts he had made in the northern courts. He managed to somehow talk his way into being named a general and three weeks later Karash and Nafu found themselves at his side as their dhow entered battle.
Muttabah wrote later, "On the third evening we reached Sapur and entered its creek and found the inhabitants ready for the fight. They had already set up catapults. So we spent the night near the town and when the morning came drums were beaten, trumpets sounded and horns were blown, and the ships went forward. The inhabitants shot at them with the catapults, and I saw a stone hit some people standing near the king. The crews of the ships sprang into the water, shield and sword in hand... I myself leapt with the rest into the water... We rushed forward sword in hand. The greater part of the heathens took refuge in the castle of their ruler. We set fire to it, whereupon they came out and we took them prisoner. The king pardoned them and returned them to their wives and children."
A month later the next battle seemed to be an inevitable defeat, Muttabah managed to escape with Karash and Nafu through the battle lines and headed down the coast reaching Jalpur.
Here he decided to continue on to Khitai on his own. And despite their growing reservations Karash and Nafu accompanied him.
Their dhow sailed south-east passing around the southern most point of Minj and making port at the Maala Divaina archipelago.
The islands were important in the region for their exports: coconut fiber used to make ropes and cowrie shells.
Muttabah and the other two were amazed to find the people of the archipelago were Ta'ashim, apparently having converted when a pious young Ta'ashim explorer from Opalar rid the land of a terrible demon. (The demon had demanded a young virgin each month - and the Ta'ashim hero offered to take the place of the girl. Before the sacrifice, he recited the words of the Illuminated throughout the night, and the demon could do nothing out of fear of the Sacred Word.....or so went the tale at least.)
Muttabah had not planned to spend much time here as he arrived at the capital, Mepe. But the rulers happened to be looking for a chief judge, someone who knew Opalarian and the laws of the Ta'ashim. The rulers were delighted to find a visitor that fit their requirements. They sent Mattubah slave girls, pearls, and gold jewelry to convince him to stay. They even made it impossible for him to arrange to leave by ship - so like it or not, he stayed. He agreed to remain there with some conditions, however: he would not go about Male on foot, but be carried in a litter or ride on horseback, just like the king or queen! He even took another wife after staying there less than two months, a noblewoman related to the queen.
He was now part of the royal family and the most important judge. And once again, Karash and Nafu found themselves surrounded by luxury, this time in a tropical paradise.
He set about his duties as a judge with enthusiasm and tried with all his might to establish the rule of strict Muslim law and change local customs. He ordered that any man who failed to attend Friday prayer was to be whipped and publicly disgraced. Thieves had their right hands cut off, and he ordered women who went "topless", as was local tradition, to cover up.
He said to Karash, "I strove to put an end to this practice and commanded the women to wear clothes; but I could not get it done.", but Karash doubted the old goat had tried particularly hard.
Muttabah took three more wives who also had powerful social connections, and bragged to Nafu. "After I had become connected by marriage ... the rulers and the people feared me, for they felt themselves to be weak."
And so, as seemed inevitable and to the two younger mens despair, he began to make enemies, especially the governor. After several nasty arguments and political plots, Mattubah decided to leave after almost nine months in the islands. He quit his job as judge, though he really would have been shortly fired.
He took three of his wives with him, but he divorced them all after a short time, even though one of them was pregnant. He travelled to another island, and there he married two more women, and divorced them, too.
Karash and Nafu became more and more disenchanted with their old captain, seemingly unphased, Mattubah would say, "It is easy to marry in these islands because of the smallness of the dowries and the pleasures of society which the women offer... When the ships put in, the crew marry; when they intend to leave they divorce their wives. This is a kind of temporary marriage. The women of these islands never leave their country."
In their time on the islands Karash and Nafu enjoyed eating many products of the coconut (coconut milk, juice, "meat", and sweet honey from the sap of the tree), as well as rice, fish, salted meat, fowl, quail, and numerous fruits.
Mattubah again secured a dhow with remnants of his wage and travelled east once more until they arrived on the island kingdom of Ilan.
When Muttabah arrived on Ilan, he met with the king. The king was interested in his travel stories, and he entertained Muttabahs party for three days. The king gave them permission to climb a sacred peak where it was said wishes could be granted - and he gave Muttabah a small purse with pearls and rubies, two slaves, and supplies as a parting gift.
The small party of pilgrims climbed to the summit up the nearly vertical cliffs by means of little handholds held in the stone by iron pegs. Making it to the top, they camped there for three days which they spent in prayer and admiration of the spectacular view.
After their visit to the peak, the party returned to the coast and boarded another ship which was provided by the king. After setting sail, again a storm threatened their lives.
The crew managed to cut down the mast and make a crude raft which they lowered into the sea. Muttabahs two companions and his slave girls got down onto it, but there was no room left for him. And besides, he was not a strong swimmer. He had to stay with the ship and hope for the best. Darkness fell and Muttabah huddled in the front of the sinking ship throughout the night. In the morning a rescue party suddenly appeared and the remaining passengers were all taken to shore. There he joined his companions with what few of his belongings he had salvaged.
From here he got on a Khitain chuán and continued on his much delayed trip to Khitai....
( Feel free to detail what you got up to on this leg of the journey and I will drop goodies as before)