The Words of Daqiqi

Then came the chief of all the army's leaders, the son of brave Jamasp, the king's own minister. A warrior rider whose name was Garami, like Rostam, the son of Zal, son of Sam. He rode a swift chestnut steed, a mount that ran tirelessly and took no harm. The young man drove his fleet chestnut forward; he was like a moving mountain, a rolling boulder. He took his stand before the Chinese ranks and called upon the name of God. He said: Which of you is lionhearted enough to come and face my life-tearing spear? Where is that willful sorcerer? Where is the one who sought fame, and the thousands with him? Just then Namkhast stepped out to meet him; you would think he stood as straight as a pillar. Both skillful riders wheeled and clashed with mace and spear, with sword and arrow. Garami was a champion with a lion's strength; the bold rider could not withstand him. The warrior fled before Garami, for Garami's hand held a cutting blade. Garami surged forward with sharp fury, his heart brimming with rage at the slain. He plunged into the midst of the enemy ranks, and from the mountain's slope a wind arose. The two armies grappled from both sides, and both raised clouds of dust. In that tumult amid the ranks, from the wounds of warriors and the black dust, the blazing banner of Kaveh fell from the hands of the Iranians. Garami saw that banner, blue as indigo, cast down from the back of an elephant. He dismounted and lifted it from the earth, shook off the dust and wiped it clean. When the warriors of China saw him, saw that choice and famous spear, how he had taken it up from the dust, wiped it clean and carried it away, the brave men surrounded him. They charged at him from every side and struck the sword from his hand. He gripped Fereydun's banner between his teeth and, astonishing to see, wielded his mace with one hand. In the end they killed him cruelly and flung him, despised, onto that hot earth. Alas for that warrior rider, brave as a lion, whom the wise old man never saw again. At once came Bastur, brave as a lion, the royal-born son of Zarir. He slew countless of those enemies whom he engaged in that evil hour. At last he returned victorious and glad, went back and stood before his father. Then came that chosen rider, behind him the world's king, mourning. Beneath him rode a swift-footed mount, such as could not be found, one in a thousand. He came onto that dark battlefield and cried aloud: You, chosen army, which of you is a man of renown, worldly-wise, brave, and skilled with the spear, who will come before me spear in hand? For today he faces a real man. The riders of China charged at him, contriving to bring him down. The world-seeking rider, that bold man, was like a fierce elephant, like a raging lion. He wheeled among the men of China; you would think he was tearing up the ground. In those charges he slew sixty champions of the world with his battle mace. At last an arrow from the crossbow came to him; it had come from fate straight to his face. He fell from that fine-hued mount, died and did not escape: such is the end of war. Alas for that noble rider too, struck down for nothing, thrown away on worthless earth, who was like his father and his equal; alas for his handsome face and stature. When that renowned rider was slain, thousands upon thousands of warriors closed around him. On every side they grappled together and raised the dust from the face of the earth. This fighting went on for two weeks, in which not one rider slept for a moment. The ground filled with dead and wounded, and the war tents too were struck down. The doors and the plains all turned the color of tulips; blood flowed across plain and desert. The battlefield was so choked with the dead that one could barely make one's way along the road.