The Eagle and the Dragon, a Novel of Rome and China

by Lewis F. McIntyre

  “Then that is fortunate!”

  People came in carrying bowls of food, goat and beef, some leafy vegetables of an unidentifiable source, and white kumis. Bohai excused himself to bring in some bottles of rice and grape wine, gifts for Bei’s clan. Bowls of kumis, wine and food were placed in the middle of the circle and everyone reached in.

  The kumis kept coming. Although it was not strongly alcoholic, it was plentiful. The wine, while not plentiful, was strong, and reserved for the hosts, a rare treat for them.

  “What is this white wine?” asked Aulus of Bohai.“It is sweet, almost like almonds.”

  “Fermented mare’s milk,” answered Bohai, causing Aulus to choke in mid-swallow.

  The tall woman came to sit beside Marcia. She sat down cross-legged, in such a manner that her tight-fitting felt leather breaches left little to the imagination, a posture Marcia found unladylike. But that was from her upbringing in faraway places where ladylike behavior had meaning. The woman seemed even more powerful up close than at a distance, her ruddy hair framing a green-eyed face. She still wore her sword and bow across her shoulders, a fine scar running along her right forearm.

  “You are from Liqian, then. Are you and your brother Han?”

  “We are descendants of Da Qin soldiers many generations back. My ancestor gave me my blue eyes, and the women on my mother’s side gave them their shape. My brother and I both carry his Da Qin name, him Marcus, me Marcia.”

  “How did someone from such a small place in Gansu attract the attention of He the Horrible?”

  “We speak both Da Qin and han-yu, and Emperor He’s people took me, my brother and others to Luoyang to be trained as translators. I was twelve, he was twenty; we never saw our families again. I would like to see them, if they are still alive, or learnwhat happened to them.”

  “Perhaps you shall. For now, I am glad you and your brother are not full-blooded Han. As you were taken from your family at Liqian, so they took my family from me at the same age. I despise the Han.” She straightened up and left without further words. Not once had she smiled.

  Bohai walked up to Marcia as the woman strode off.“Looks like Hina likes you.”

  “She certainly didn’t sound like it. How can you tell?”

  “She talked to you. She’s one of their best fighters, but not very sociable.”

  “How did she lose her family?”

  “After the battle of Ilkh Bayan, thousands upon thousands of Xiongnu were killed, captured or driven off. She never knew which fate befell her family, and became a fighter at a very young age to avenge them. And she has avenged them, several times over.”

  “How do you, as an Hanaean, trade with them, if they are so hostile to your people?”

  “Same as you, I am not full-blooded Han. My grandfather was Xiongnu, Xubu clan.”

  The following morning, the clan arranged entertainment for the guests: horseback riding and archery. The men along with Hina fired at various targets from a full gallop with deadly accuracy, culminating in hitting a stationary target through a small swinging ring, impaling the ring.

  Also included was a game played on horseback with a dead goat. The object of the game was to snatch the carcass from whoever had it and run with it through one of two goal posts, with a great deal of cheering and betting from the enthusiastic crowd. There seemed to be no other rules, and the game continued until the carcass disintegrated from rough handling.

  Antonius sauntered up to Gaius, and made a proposition:“Gaius, I think you and I oughter put on a demo of Roman swordsmanship.”

  “You’re on, Antonius!” answered Gaius.

  They made the announcement in han-yu, and the clan gathered around the two. Their wooden training swords were brought out, which caused some amusement among the Xiongnu. Antonius explained that wooden swords allowed more aggressive training that could result in death or injury if they used real swords, which mollified their skeptical audience a bit.

  The two men distributed their swords for the Xiongnu to examine. Short and broad, less than two feet in length, all the swords were virtually identical, no guard, leather-wrapped wooden grips. Antonius had painstakingly made these out of the toughest wood he could find, carving and sanding them until they were a near perfect replica of a Roman gladius, about two feet long and perhaps two inches wide.

  Bets were made, and the game was on.

  Gaius and Antonius engaged in a round of well-rehearsed parries and thrusts which went on about five minutes, and ended up with the heavier, bearded Antonius taking advantage of a poorly-executed sword shift by Gaius to his left hand. Antonius charged, kicked his Gaius’ feet from under him, and ended up straddling him with his wooden sword tip at Gaius’ throat. This elicited a round of cheers, and then Antonius called out the rest of their party in turn to spar with him, ending with Marcia. She was overmatched, basic maneuvers poorly executed. He quickly knocked her sword from her grip, spinning on its lanyard around her wrist, his point at her throat. The crowd cheered loudly, which caused Marcia to flush angrily as she glared back at the crowd.

  Then Hina stepped into the ring, proffering Antonius a steel Xiongnu sword. Antonius cast aside his wooden sword, and she tossed the blade to him across the five feet separating them. He caught it easily by the hilt, and she withdrew hers from across her back with a deadly hiss. She descended into a crouch, her green eyes bright, and beckoned with the fingers of her left hand. “You and I, real swords!”

  The crowd went wild.

  Antonius and Hina circled, crouched, sizing each other up. Then they exchanged thrusts and parries, the metal swords clanging like bells. The two were warming up, breathing easily through wolfish grins.

  The two were well matched, but decidedly different in size and style. Antonius was full and brawny, black-bearded and perhaps fifty pounds heavier than Hina, though none of it fat. He fought with force and precision, with a dogged determination to wear her down through blow after fearsome blow.

  Hina was a well-muscled Amazon of a woman, lithe and whippet-like, making up in speed and agility what she lacked in shear power. Parry and thrust, thrust and parry, their ringing blows beat out a slow, deadly rhythm throughout the camp.

  Antonius saw his opportunity, and presented a vicious overhead stroke that would have cleft Hina in two, but she quickly presented her sword crosswise across her face to block it. This stopped the deadly downstroke, but left her locked in the contest of shear strength that she had thus far avoided. Immobilized, her sword locked in the horizontal parry, she had to resist the inexorable downward pressure of Antonius' sword. She braced the flat side of her sword against her left hand, but his strength and gravity were against her, forcing her downward. The veins on her arms stood out in etched relief against the straining muscles.

  Hina executed a high-risk pirouette from that awkward position, gracefully sliding out from underneath the downward press, and her sword hissed free. Relieved of the pressure of the defensive parry, Antonius' sword sliced forcefully through empty air where only seconds before the woman’s body had been, staggering him momentarily off balance. But Hina was not quite in position to take advantage of the new situation. Completing her pirouette, she stepped backwards to assess the situation. She recognized the aching fatigue in her right arm, and began a retreat to change sword hands, fumbling with the thong securing the sword to her wrist. As she began her switch, Antonius, in a sudden burst of speed, brought his sword up in a slashing attack from below. The woman’s sword, not yet secured to her left hand, spun free, whirling scythe-like through the air, spectators scattering to avoid its deadly blade. The woman, now defenseless, continued to back up, stumbling over a pot someone had left near a yurt at the perimeter of the field. Antonius completed the attack with a swift kick, taking her feet out from under her and dropping her gracelessly onto her back. Antonius’ sword struck like a serpent, thrusting its single fang into the hollow of her throat.

  "I think you should watch your feet, or some Han bastard will tak
e your head off for a souvenir!” He mocked her in han-yu, poised for the death blow. Antonius chuckled at her discomfort as he stood over her. “I think that was a nightpot you stumbled over.” The acrid smell of stale urine filtered up from the foul pool of liquid in which the young woman lay.

  But the game was not yet over. Antonius was spread-legged, straddling her with the sword tip at her throat. While he savored victory, Hina brought her left foot up in an arc directly into his crotch. All signs of amusement left Antonius’ face as the air left his lungs with a "woof", and his chest muscles struggled ineffectively to bring in another gulp of air. Hina had time to aim and concentrate her next blow, coiling her legs up to her abdomen and launching them into Antonius’ exposed belly, rocking him backward. Antonius’ sword clattered uselessly from his hand, and he was driven by the force of the blow to collapse on his back.

  Hina slipped a nine-inch dagger from her scabbard as she leaped to her feet, continuing with one fluid motion to straddle the man's chest. She laid the dagger blade-edge across the hairy throat, the tip at the spot directly below the point of the jaw where the carotid artery throbs.

  “Turnabout, Da Qin!" she hissed, "You should not be so quick to celebrate your victory!” She grinned wolfishly, and continued. “Hmm, I like this beard. Perhaps I should remove just a bit of it, starting say...here, as a souvenir” as she dug the knife point delicately into the skin, drawing just a drop of blood.

  “Arggh...Hina! You already poured piss all over the campground. Will you now spill my blood on it, too?”

  Hina stood up, sheathed her blade, and proffered a hand to Antonius, who took it, and she hoisted him to his feet. “That was a good match, not many men can last as long as you did,” she said, shaking off grass and debris from the ground. Someone from the crowd had retrieved her sword and handed it to her, which she returned to its scabbard.

  “Hina, I have not been bested in many years. You did well,” answered Antonius, smiling ruefully and massaging his testicles.

  “It seems that I will need a change of clothes. Perhaps you will accompany me to my yurt?” she said, softly so as to not be heard by too many people.

  “Ummh, Hina, I’m honored, but… I am taken now,” he replied, nodding toward Marcia.

  Hina strode over to where Marcia stood. She had been close enough to overhear the exchange. “Ah, the girl from Liqian! It seems you have a loyal companion. That’s rare, keep him satisfied, or I will seek him out again later!”

  With that, Hina walked off, still in search of male companionship, as fighting of any kind usual left her quite lustful. It was the Xiongnu custom to request companionship from visitors who might bring new blood into the well-inbred clan lineage. Her eyes fell on Galosga, the second-largest besides Antonius. They exchanged a few words, and the pair went to her yurt.

  Inside the yurt, Hina wasted no time.“We will be alone for a while,” she said. She stripped off her fouled clothes and threw them in a corner, then pressed her body full against Galosga’s, her mouth on his in a wet but very sweet kiss that lingered a long time. She thrust her pubis against him, feeling him rise to meet her advance. They stood that way for several minutes, locked in an embrace, exploring each other’s bodies. Then she broke away, peeling up his shirt over his head, kneeling to pull down his pants and cast them off his feet. She took his erect manhood in her hand and admired its length, licking it and then taking it fully in her mouth.

  Galosga moaned in pleasure, caressing her red hair.

  Hina released him, grabbed his hands and lay on the ground in front of him, legs spread to reveal her womanhood. She pulled him down to her, saying “Let’s go! I need you now!”

  Hina made love like she fought, fiercely. In fact, it was not lovemaking at all but sheer physical rutting. Galosga felt that he was mating with the same tiger he had watched earlier besting Antonius, as she twisted and turned under him in a frantic search for relief. With a great deal of concentration, he hoped to bring her that release before his own.

  He succeeded. Her movements became more insistent, more urgent, her breathing more rapid, until she arched her back under him and cried out in a paroxysm of pleasure. He could feel the pulsating pleasure rage through her body, and he kept moving gently until she began to go limp. She was wet with sweat, breathing like she had just run several miles.

  He let her savor the afterglow for several minutes, then he smiled and said, “It is my turn now. You enjoy, I ride you.” He thrust into her gently, feeling her tremble with each slow stroke. It was lovemaking as Galosga understood it, but it seemed to be new to Hina, for she trembled, building to a second climax. He kissed her on the mouth, one hand found a breast, the other cupped her butt. She began to return his thrusts with her own, and as the second wave broke over her, Galosga gave himself over and spent himself inside her, over and over, and yet over again, until they both lay limp, depleted in each other’s arms.

  It was a long time before either wanted to move, each savoring the contractions of residual pleasure where they were coupled together. When at last they were capable of speaking, she whispered into his ear, “I chose wisely. I beat one man in battle, but you have beaten me on the bedroll. No man has ever done that.”

  “I have never made love to a huldaji before,” gently kissing her on the nose. His lip was bleeding and swollen from some intense kiss.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  “It is a word in my language; I don’t know the word in han-yu, but it is a large cat, about the size of a man, that roams the mountains, very wild and fierce.”

  “That is a tiger. And yes, a tigress is my persona.”

  “Well, I have heard you roar, huldaji, and I have heard you purr. I like the purr better.”

  She snuggled up against him, and they half-dozed for a few minutes. Then Hina propped herself up on an elbow, and tapped his almost hairless bronze chest.

  “So how long have you been riding, strange man? You look awkward on horseback.”

  “Only a few weeks. We don’t have horses in my home.”

  “No horses?”

  “None.”

  “Perhaps you learn to ride while you are with us.”

  “I have much to learn.”

  Galosga’s straightforward answer took Hina aback. Another man might have been insulted, or blustered, or gotten angry. He knew he rode poorly and had no problem admitting it.

  “Perhaps I could teach you.” She was breaking a long-standing rule, to rut once with a stranger and then let them go their way, having nothing to do with them afterwards in any way. She enjoyed the way they reacted to being cast aside after having been used for her satisfaction.

  “I would like that.” He paused to rummage around in his pouch, and drew out a flint arrowhead, and handed them to her to examine. “And many other things are different there. No metal… we make our tools out of stone. Like this. We farm, but we don’t have livestock.”

  She examined the curious object in her hand. “So where is this strange land, Galosga?”

  “If I knew, I would go back there.”

  “How did you get here then? Surely the wind didn’t blow you here to land in my arms.”

  Galosga repeated the story of his kidnapping and impressment, and arriving in a land of marvelous cities with wondrous things he had never before seen. “I learned I was a ‘deckhand,’ someone that works on the ship. It was not until I learned han-yu that I found a language that I could speak easily. I feel like I am speaking like a child, but everyone understands me, and tells me I speak the best of all the Da Qin.”

  “You do. An odd accent, some words a bit strange, but good for a stranger.”

  “So tell me your story, huldaji.”

  “I am what I am, a fighting woman. I live in the here and now, and there is no story.”

  “There is, but it is painful to you. Maybe later.”

  “Maybe not.”

  She levered herself off the blankets, rummaged through her belongings to find clean cloth
es, slid on her black breeches, slithering them up to her waist, and tying them with a thong. She reached down for her shirt, and pulled it over her ample breasts.

  “That was enjoyable. But you must go now.” The door between Hina and other people was slamming shut. She wanted to get back to the casual laughter of the camp, get drunk on kumis, and be ready to pack out tomorrow for their final trek. “Get dressed!” she said abruptly.

  Galosga stood, and kissed her fully on the mouth. “It was enjoyable, but I will leave you to yourself,” he said, holding her struggling in his arms. Then he turned and walked out of the yurt without a word.

  He was about ten yards outside the door when she put out her head and broke her own rule. “Would you like to ride with me tomorrow? First light before breakfast?”

  “My tent is over there,” he said, pointing in its direction, but not turning to look back. “Slap on the side of it tomorrow morning.”

  CHAPTER 61: A VISIT FROM A GHOST

  The clan celebrated the evening before their departure on their final trek from the Hetao plateau. There was abundant kumis, and various meats roasting on spits in the encampments: familiar ones, like sheep, goats and yak cattle, and to the Romans’ surprise, an occasional horse. A big bonfire after dark sent sparks shooting high into the heavens, drums, clanging cymbals, stringed instruments that played a wailing tune as the singers sang monotones through their throats, in a drone almost like that of a bagpipe. It reminded Gaius and Antonius of German tribal festivities along the Danube, and Galosga of events at home.

  The clan reverted to their native Xiongnu language, and for a while, the Westerners wandered throughout the encampment, sitting to listen to storytellers tell stories that they couldn’t understand, but enjoying the animation that went with them, partaking freely of kumis and the various foods proffered them. After a while, they found their way back to their tents around the large oxcart for which they had traded their Tongchuan horse cart. The oxcart, drawn by two yaks, would stand up better on the roadless steppes, and with much better payload for tents and supplies, protected from the weather by its canvas shelter over the bed. They had bought or traded for heavier Xiongnu clothing, woolen felts better suited for the rapidly cooling fall weather, and some heavy winter gear as well, because that season would set in soon, and harshly. The oxcart freed up two more horses for riding, and they garnered two mares and a stallion from the clan to round out their little herd to thirteen, mounts for all plus spares.