Until the Sun Falls

by Cecelia Holland

  “Maybe. We’ll see. Ana, get your things, if you have any.”

  She got up and stumbled into the back of the yurt. Her back was stiff, as if she expected a blow.

  “Quyuk is getting troublesome,” Tshant said.

  “Inaction. Where is he?”

  “You brought him here. You should know.”

  “I don’t. Where is he?”

  “He’s kicked my aides out of their yurt. He’s dead drunk. Dead. Since last night. They tell me when he snores the fumes drench the fire.”

  “Then he can’t be very troublesome.”

  “No. Sabotai will be here by nightfall, and there was a courier from Karakorum.”

  Ana came out from the back of the yurt, a bundle in her arms. Tshant glanced at her and said, “Go back behind the hanging.”

  She turned and crept away.

  “There was a dispatch for Sabotai. A dispatch for Quyuk from his wife.” Tshant’s mouth worked. “And one from Kerulu to me.”

  Psin waited. Tshant was nervous, and that made Psin uneasy. Tshant glanced toward the hanging again.

  “She says Ogodai is sick.”

  Psin pursed his lips and whistled softly.

  “She says he will live, but he sickens. Not so much day to day: month to month, she says.”

  “Has Quyuk gotten his dispatch yet?”

  “He’s been too drunk.”

  “Keep him drunk. Send one of your men over there and see that he stays drunk.”

  Tshant’s eyes glittered. “Now, listen—”

  “You listen to me. Keep him too drunk to read until Sabotai hears of this.”

  He stared at Tshant, and when Tshant’s expression altered, said, “Do as I say.”

  “I will. If he finds out—”

  “Let him. Out here, what can he do?”

  “Nothing, I suppose. There were messages for you. From the Volga camp. They must have gone there for the winter.”

  “Wonderful.” Psin swore. “I suppose you sent them to my yurt?”

  “Yes. Shall I—”

  “You might, when you feel free.” He lifted his head. “Ana? Come with me.”

  He went out into the fading sunlight. Ana followed, clutching her belongings. She would not look at him; she rode back to his camp behind him on the dun horse. She said nothing, and he was boiling because Tshant had forgotten that he could not read and sent him messages that would have to wait until the afternoon to be read. At his yurt, the Kipchak woman and Dmitri were waiting for him. Dmitri stepped forward to hold his horse.

  “Your help,” Psin said to the Kipchak, and shoved Ana through the door. He turned to Dmitri. “Where are they?”

  “Here.” Dmitri took two rolls from his belt and handed them over. Psin thrust them up his sleeve.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be with the herds?”

  “They don’t need me,” Dmitri said. “And I don’t ride well, you know.”

  “All right. I can use you. Come inside.”

  He went in and opened up one of the scrolls. Chan would have written it to Artai’s dictation. As usual she had mixed Uighur script and Chinese characters indiscriminately. That meant over half the letter would remain a secret forever. He threw the scroll down and opened the other.

  This was not from his wives. This was in plain Uighur, and the seals were Jagatai’s. Psin bellowed wordlessly.

  “What’s wrong?” Dmitri said.

  “My imbecile son. Kuchuk!” He shouted Kuchuk’s name so loudly Dmitri flinched.

  Tshant, excited at the dispatch, hadn’t bothered to check the seals on either of Psin’s messages. He had assumed, since the first was from the Volga camp, the second was also. Kuchuk came in.

  “Go to Tshant’s yurt and bring him back here. Tell him I have a letter from Karakorum.”

  Kuchuk bounded away. Psin sat down and growled. Ana said, “Dmitri, what’s wrong with him?”

  Dmitri shrugged. Psin said, “Nothing for either of you to know. Someday I’ll have to learn to read.”

  “Shall I teach you?” Ana said.

  “You can’t read Uighur. Or Chinese, which my ignorant second wife insists on interpolating into the letters she writes.”

  “She can’t be ignorant if she can write.”

  He lay down on his couch. “She is. She’s the most ignorant woman I’ve ever known.” In some ways. “What happened?”

  Ana turned away. “What do you mean?”

  Her face was wooden. Fresh tears clung to her lashes. Dmitri studied her and looked over at Psin and shrugged.

  “You know what I mean.”

  She collapsed, sinking down onto her hams. “He has another woman.” On the last word she nearly choked, and the tears spilled down her cheeks.

  “I asked you once if you were in love with him and you said, ‘Of course not.’“

  “I am. I am, I am.”

  “I know.”

  She wailed. Dmitri retreated hastily into the back of the yurt. Psin lay on his side, watching Ana carry on, and wondered how much of it was anger.

  “This has been happening to people since the world began,” he said. “Tshant has a wife in Karakorum. If you had told me—”

  “I told you.” She was screaming. Her face was dark. “I just didn’t tell you in words.”

  He got up and went to the door to watch for Tshant. “You are a lovely girl, but you should—”

  “Don’t tell me anything.” She beat her fists on the floor. “You’re a man—you take a woman and use her and throw her away—”

  “Have I had a woman since you’ve known me?”

  “You must have. You’re animals. You never think about what you do, you just do it.”

  Tshant was coming. Psin turned back to her. She was staring into the fire. Her eyes, puffed and red, burnt with rage, and she snuffled.

  “Go into the back. He’s almost here. Stop thinking about him.”

  “How can I? I’m going to have his baby.”

  “You can very easily. If you’re going to have a baby, and you can’t be sure so quickly, we’ll deal with that in due course. In the meantime you can work and take care of me like any other good slave. Get into the back.”

  She got up and shambled off. The hanging swung shut behind her just before Tshant walked in.

  “I didn’t see any—”

  “You were too excited to think straight. Use your eyes next time.” He picked up the scroll from Jagatai and handed it to him. “Read it.”

  Kuchuk was in the doorway; Psin glared at him and he backed quickly away. Tshant read through the scroll once in silence.

  “Whom is it to, you or me? Read it.”

  “He says—”

  “Speak dialect.”

  Tshant licked his lips. He probably hadn’t spoken the Merkit dialect for years. Psin scowled at him.

  “He says—that you are to keep Quyuk here if you can. On his strictest order.”

  “Read it to me.”

  “‘From Jagatai Khan of the Altun Uruk to the Khan of the Black Merkits, Psin. Dispatches ac-accompanying this will tell you why I… command you to keep my nephew Quyuk the Kha-Khan’s eldest son with the army in Russia. This is my strictest order.’“

  Psin nodded and switched back to Yek Mongol. “He’s quick, Jagatai.” Another Mongol would have understood the dialect, but Kuchuk, a Kipchak, and the two Russians wouldn’t.

  “Why you?”

  “Who else? Quyuk would never listen to the Altun. They hate him. Besides, one of them—Kadan, for instance—would interpret this to mean that Quyuk could be killed if he tried to go back to Karakorum. Sabotai is in charge of the war and has no leisure. Jagatai thinks I have.”

  Tshant snorted. “That isn’t why. You’ve shown you can handle him, and they know you won’t use him.”

  “Possibly.”

  “Possibly.” Tshant said a graphic obscenity. “Use him. You have the power. The Kha-Khan’s own brother gives you the power. Bargain with Quyuk. If you do not keep him
here, he will be the Kha-Khan, if Ogodai dies. Make that clear to him.”

  “No, thank you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I serve the Kha-Khan, and not Quyuk.”

  Tshant elaborated on the graphic obscenity.

  “Temujin could have killed me plenty of times. He did not. I was of use to him. If I stop being of use to him—”

  “Temujin is dead.” Tshant hunched his shoulders; his head sank down between them.

  “Yes, but I was loyal to him when he was alive, and I am a man of strong habit. Lamentable, perhaps.”

  “It is.”

  Ana came out and said, “Do you want something to eat?” She spoke to Psin.

  “No. Leave.”

  She went back. Tshant said, “What’s wrong with her?”

  “Nothing. She was upset when I burned Susdal.”

  “I need somebody to take care of Djela.”

  “Get your new woman to do it.”

  Tshant glanced back after Ana and looked at Psin again. One of his eyebrows cocked up. “Is that it?”

  “No.”

  “Women are odd.”

  “You don’t need her. Let me keep her here.”

  “I don’t understand you anymore. I used to think I did. The older I get, the more complicated you get.”

  “When you’ve got great-grandsons I shall be worse than a Chinese puzzle. Here. Read me your mother’s letter.”

  He tossed the scroll to Tshant, who caught it, and sat down again. Tshant settled himself on his heels. “God. She’s got Chinese mixed up in it again. Unh—’Artai Khatun to her something something.’ Probably most sweet husband or some other nonsense. ‘We have settled ourselves in the Volga camp because of the something wretched something Chan something all since something left.’” He looked up. “Learning anything? ‘Something something news makes me very proud, although something wishes—’ Chan, that must be— ‘you would come back.’ Can’t be Chan. ‘The Volga camp is very something but something is very dear so that we are eating nothing but something and gruel.’”

  Psin groaned. “Pork. Pork is very dear. Chan won’t eat anything but roast pork.”

  Tshant was grinning. “‘Something something something something.’” He glanced up. “Remember that. It’s important. ‘The Khatun and I something something all day long, while Chan plays with the cat.’ The Khatun? Oh. Batu’s wife. ‘She wants you to give her a cat to take back to something.’ Have you noticed when Chan wants something—” He laughed. “When Chan wants to tell you… something ... it always comes through in very clear Mongol? ‘We shall something until you return.’ That’s all.”

  “That’s enough.”

  “It certainly is. I have to go. I’m soaking Quyuk in wine. When Sabotai comes up we’ll have a conference.”

  “How’s your hand?”

  “Mending.”

  Tshant left the yurt. Psin looked up at the ceiling and thought of Chan playing with Batu’s cats. He thought of Artai saying the words and Chan with her brush writing them down. She said she used the Chinese when it made the page look prettier. He looked at the half-rolled scroll. He wished Artai were with him. Artai would know how to handle Ana, and Artai would tell him he was right not to be ambitious, and Artai would tell him how he was going to keep Quyuk in Russia. Artai would sleep beside him at night and listen when he talked. He shut his eyes. Later. Later.

  The vanguard of Sabotai’s army reached Tver in the mid-afternoon and pitched a camp opposite the east gate of the city; the clatter of their arrival lasted until nightfall. Batu and half the tumans had stayed in the north to comb out the last resistance. At sunset, Sabotai himself and Baidar and Kadan rode into Psin’s camp.

  “You don’t know how glad I am to find you standing on your own feet,” Sabotai said. He embraced Psin. “When I left you were screaming and thrashing around.”

  “Weakness comes to us all. Have you seen Tver’s defenses?”

  “Yes. Imaginative.” Sabotai sat down on Psin’s couch. “Ah. You heard about the battle?”

  “Quyuk told us.”

  “All we need do now is accept the submission of some minor towns.”

  “The army is tired,” Baidar said. ‘‘Let them rest—Psin, we are all down to two horses apiece.”

  “I brought a herd. And cattle and reindeer.”

  Kadan looked up from his wine. “Good.”

  “There are dispatches from Karakorum.” Psin reached for the wine jug.

  Baidar rose. “Shall we leave?”

  “No. This concerns you.” Psin looked at Kadan, and Kadan’s face grew wary. “Your father is dying.”

  Silence. Kadan’s mouth trembled; he glanced around. Sabotai got up. “Where is Quyuk?”

  “In Tshant’s camp, stone drunk.”

  “How old are the dispatches?” Kadan said.

  “A month and a half.”

  “Then he maybe—”

  “Where are they?” Sabotai said.

  “With Tshant.”

  Kadan said, “He may be dead already.”

  “No. We would have heard.” Psin took him by the arm and made him sit down. “He’s not an old man. He’s not yet so sick he can’t recover.”

  “My father ...”

  Psin handed him some wine, and Kadan took it. His hands shook. Psin went around the fire and sat down. “He’s been very sick before, Kadan. And lived.”

  “I know. Quyuk is drunk, you said.”

  “Yes.”

  “Does he know?”

  “No. Jagatai sent to me to keep him here.”

  “When my father falls sick they take the drink away from him and he gets well very soon. Doesn’t he.” Kadan licked his lips. “Doesn’t he?”

  “He has before.”

  “But the women are there. My brother’s wife and—”

  “And your mother. Oghul Ghaimish may be a witch but she can’t suborn your mother.”

  Kadan drank the wine. “I have to go see to my men.”

  Psin nodded. Kadan paused at the door and looked out.

  “I would sooner be a slave than the Kha-Khan,” Kadan said. “I would sooner be dead.”

  He went out. Psin followed him to the door and watched Kadan ride off. The dusk was thickening, blotting out Tver’s walls. He felt sorry for Kadan, and he tried to think that it was stupid because Kadan was what he was by choice, but that only made him feel worse.

  Mongke was riding up toward him. Psin stepped outside. The cold wind touched him. Mongke trotted up and dismounted.

  “Psin. How pleasant to see you alive.”

  Faced with Mongke, he could not think about Kadan. “Come inside. It’s going to rain.”

  “Yes. Splendid fortifications, those. Have you been inside them?”

  Psin followed him into the yurt and called to Ana for more wine. Mongke sprawled out, sighing.

  “Tshant and I went in. We got about one bowshot down the wall and turned around and came back.”

  “Why?”

  “The walls are full of tunnels, and the Russians duck in and out and shoot at you when you aren’t looking. Tshant got an arrow in the hand.”

  “Pity it missed his head. What will we do?”

  “Don’t be so eager, child. We may have to wait until the walls melt.”

  “That would be too bad, because we should miss Novgorod for sure, then. Where is Quyuk?”

  Mongke’s face was bland, his eyes wide with innocence. Psin watched Ana pour the wine. She looked even redder around the eyes than before.

  “Quyuk is in Tshant’s camp.”

  “I thought perhaps he might have gone back to the Gobi. After he and Batu had the argument. It was a display, Psin. You should have been there.”

  Psin studied him. Mongke’s wife and his mother Sorghoktani lived in Karakorum, and because Mongke was a khan they would have certain power. The women always had ways of getting news out. “How much do you know?” he said.

  Mongke arched his brows. “Why, le
ss than you.”

  “That’s an answer. Get out. I’m going to Tshant’s camp.”

  “Someday, Psin, you’re going to have to learn how to speak to princes, you know.” Mongke got to his feet in one supple motion. “I overlook it, in view of your rough but useful qualities. Other people are not so forbearing.”

  Psin put on his coat. “A man has to keep his self-respect somehow.”

  “Why, how humble of you. I might be tempted to believe that, if I didn’t know you better.”

  “Would you.”

  He went out and pulled the reins of his horse loose from the tether pin. Mongke strolled along behind him. The wind filled the darkness, and Mongke sniffed; his face in the torchlight looked suddenly tense and watchful. His nostrils flared.

  “Psin,” Mongke said. “When you need help, Psin, come to me.”

  Psin rolled back in his saddle and looked down at him. “When I need the kind of help you can give me.” He kicked the dun into a trot. Behind him Mongke cursed softly.

  The smell of meat cooking and the happy babble of voices followed him to the edge of his camp. Riding out between the watch-fires, he felt the first icy raindrop on his face. Rain wouldn’t help. He gave the dun its head and galloped through the dark toward the clot of fires at the edge of Tshant’s camp. The rain was streaming down, hissing into the snow, and when the wind blew a gust of it into his face he felt the sting of ice.

  Before he went to Tshant’s yurt he stopped to see Quyuk. Tshant’s aides had packed themselves into another yurt, leaving Quyuk stretched in solitary abandon on the couch in the middle of the yurt. Under the grate, fire flickered, and a little pot of gruel was steaming over it, but there was nobody else there. Quyuk was snoring. He stank.

  Psin sat on his heels beside him and slapped his face. Quyuk groaned, licked his lips, and was still again.

  A woman came in from the back and stirred the pot. Psin said, “Does he eat?”

  “Sometimes.” She knocked the spoon against the rim of the pot. “When he wakes up.”

  “How often?”

  “Two, three times a day.”

  The yurt was clean, except for an empty jar lying next to Quyuk; a puddle of wine lay on the floor around it. The entire yurt was carpeted in cheap cloth.

  “He gets sick,” the woman said. “When he does I take up the cloth and burn it.”