“They won't leave a soul alive. . . The slightest
resistance—just
the caliph's facing them in the field—has
condemned us all.” The sentiment in Baghdad expressed by a young Muslim scholar is blunt and
accurate. Hulegu Kahn, grandson of Genghis Khan, has arrived at the gates
of Baghdad. Mongols threaten to overrun what has been the cultural and
spiritual center of Islam for half a millennium. Genghis Khan and his
successors have overrun much of the Islamic world, substantially
depopulating central Asia in the process. They have overrun Russia, and
much of eastern Europe, devastating eastern Orthodox and Catholic lands
with equal ferocity. No one seems capable of opposing this seemingly
unstoppable tide of history.
Southwest of the coming cataclysm, an exiled
slave-soldier named Baybars, a huge blue-eyed, brown-skinned Kipchak Turk,
returns to Egypt. Within three years, armies under the command of Baybars
and Hulegu Khan will meet in a decisive battle at Ayn Jalut. History will
be made as a result of this confrontation between Mamluks (the
slave-soldiers of Egypt and Syria) and Mongols. Seventy years after Richard the Lionheart invaded Muslim territory, an even more militarily gifted,
ruthless enemy confronts Islam from the opposite direction. And this time
Islam will need to offer a leader with more than the gentle, magnanimous
qualities of Saladin. Baybars will need to counter viciousness with
viciousness to save Islam. And there will be no deals short of surrender
with this enemy.
The Sultan and the Khan is the story of this historic
confrontation, told through the viewpoints of Baybars and Hulegu, as well
as through the eyes of two fictional characters, a Muslim scholar from
Baghdad, and a Christian adventurer from western Europe who learns that
embracing evil in the cause of a greater good is dangerous, and that love
is not exclusive to just one religion.
EMAIL RICHARD WARREN FIELD