Until the Sun Falls

by Cecelia Holland

  “The Khan wishes. Shall I take him with me to the commissary?”

  “Yes. He’s been wounded, I think, so don’t burden him. Arnulf.” He dragged his mind back to Arabic. “Don’t try to escape. We kill slaves who run away. And we would certainly catch you. I’ll probably send you as a gift to your Khan before the end of the winter.”

  “Why?”

  “Why send you?” Psin snapped his fingers at Dmitri and pointed to his boots, and Dmitri knelt to unlace them. “I’d have to feed you if I kept you, and I’ve got slaves enough. Or will have, when my women get here. I’ll find you again, when we take Rome.”

  Dmitri drew off the boots, and Psin rose, barefoot. “Go on. Dmitri, give him the bay mare.”

  “The Khan wishes.”

  All the peasants had fled into the forests and the hills. Psin released the prisoners he had taken from the sacked villages, telling them that any who submitted to the Mongols would have his land back and the protection of the khans. He moved his campgrounds from the open plain to a wood, so that they would have shade in the heat of the summer. Two stone forts held out against his attacks, and he invested them tightly and let them starve. Tshant was not taking orders, as usual; they fought over it halfway through the spring.

  Djela said, “Why do you fight?”

  “Because he won’t admit that I have authority over him.”

  “Oh.” Djela looked at his hands. “Are my fingernails made of hair, like cows’ horns?”

  “I don’t know.”

  The summer came in, hot and dry. Most of the peasants returned to Psin’s section and rebuilt their villages. Psin rode around to see them all, taking Djela with him. Near each village a hundred Mongols made a camp. The village was to supply the camp with grain and hay, and the Mongols gave over a part of their hunting to the village, when they had more than they needed. Much of their plunder was in cattle and horses, which they herded.

  Tshant said, “Sabotai says I am to stay here, with you.”

  Psin grunted. “I’ll send him a message. He can put you with Mongke, if he wants.”

  “Anywhere but here?”

  “Exactly.”

  Tshant leaned back on his elbows. “Suppose I don’t want to go?”

  Psin’s temples throbbed. “You’ll go. I can’t take too much more of you.”

  Dmitri and Arnulf were chopping up lamb’s meat in the back of the yurt, their eyes fixed on the two Mongols. Psin glanced at them and they looked quickly down. Tshant said, “But it’s so dull, Father. And fighting with Mongke hasn’t got the zest.”

  “You’ve got your own yurt. Get out of mine.”

  “No.”

  Psin lunged at him; Tshant bounded up and to one side, his fists cocked. Psin stood up straight and tried to stare down his nose. Tshant was too tall to let the gesture work. “Get out before I call my men.”

  Tshant whooped. “Gladly, gladly. Just to hear you admit that—” He dodged Psin’s kick and ducked out the door. Psin hunkered and yelled obscenities after him.

  From the slaves’ quarter came a muffled gasp. He looked back and saw the knight laughing, one hand clamped over his mouth. Dmitri was horrified.

  “Arnulf,” Psin shouted. “There’s nothing funny about a son’s lack of respect for his father.”

  Arnulf collapsed backward, weak with laughter. Psin picked up a bowl and threw it at him. The knight got up, wiping juice from his face.

  “I beg your pardon. I wasn’t laughing at you. It was what you said. Your swearing was… imaginative.”

  “Oh. Don’t Europeans swear?”

  “Yes. But not so well.”

  Psin sat down. “Even the Chinese say we’re masters at it. Someday you should teach me your language. German. So that I can talk to your old master when I catch him.”

  “He speaks Arabic.”

  All the laughter had drained out of the knight’s face; he looked as grave as usual. Psin thought he was wary of being questioned. Psin said, “Tell me about him.”

  “I… would rather not.”

  “How can it harm him? I’m sending you back to him, aren’t I? You can tell him all about us.”

  The knight nodded and smiled. “That’s right.”

  “It will make no difference. There is nothing that can stop us.”

  “God can stop you.”

  The knight used the Mongol word, Tengri, and Psin smiled. “Or God can help us. Without God’s help, could we stand one day against you?”

  “Nothing is possible without God.”

  “But now we rule Hungary. And well, too. All the peasants are very happy with us, they’ve made no rebellion.”

  “Serfs don’t fight. Only knights may fight. Serfs grow food.”

  “Oh? You don’t think if we were unbearable masters they would fight us?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Rijart, that Englander I had with me when I came to Pesth the first time, he says your Khan is irreligious.”

  The knight looked down. “So they say. I don’t know. He likes to frighten people. Perhaps he only pretends. Or sees God differently than the rest of us.”

  “You are a priest. How can you follow him?”

  “Because I love him. He is a great man. Nothing confuses him.”

  “Only God?”

  The knight looked up quickly, smiling. “I doubt even God confuses Frederick. He may mislead him.”

  Psin smiled. “You’ve learned the language well enough to quibble in it. Maybe Europeans are born to that. We have news from the west that all your khans and noyons are asking each other for help, should we attack them. But they haven’t attacked us. Are they afraid of us?”

  “Who is not? Don’t judge them by their words. They are all good fighters. I think sometimes if we had planned our attack better, at Liegnitz, we would have beaten your son and his men.”

  “He says you should have—he was taking orders from one of the Altun, you know, and the way he talks the orders must have been terrible. He lost almost all his men.”

  Arnulf shrugged. “It’s done and over with. Shall I help Dmitri now?”

  “Yes. Go on.”

  Psin’s section contained one of the important roads from Europe to the east, and in the early summer merchants began to move along it. He questioned them carefully and gave them safe conducts throughout the dominion of the Kha-Khan, hoping that they would keep coming back with their information. What they told him didn’t please him. There was no steppe to the west, and the forests were thick. Mountains crowded up the countryside. He reported it to Sabotai, who said, “You’ll have to do thorough reconnaissance.”

  “Yes. I’ll start in the late fall when the river freezes.”

  “When are you going to get to that village?”

  “Oh. Yes. Pretty soon.”

  There was a village on an island in the Szajo River that hadn’t been plundered, mostly because no one was sure whether it was Psin’s or Kaidu’s, who held the land on the far bank. In the middle of the summer Kaidu sent to Psin that if Psin would give him some troops he would take the village and they would divide the plunder evenly.

  “I want you to go,” Psin told Tshant.

  “Ask me.”

  “Will you go?”

  Tshant’s eyes were opaque. He lifted the hand that held his reins and scratched his cheek, and his horse shifted. “Yes. I’ll take Djela and my guard.”

  Djela was behind Tshant. He said, “Oh, good. I can try my new bow.”

  Tshant said, “But your share of the plunder is mine, Psin.”

  Psin took a short breath. “Don’t anger me.”

  “I’m doing the work.”

  “We’ll divide it. It’s a rich village.”

  “I want it all.”

  Psin swiped at him and knocked him off his horse. Tshant’s horse reared out of the way, and Djela caught the rein. Psin made his dun back up so that Tshant couldn’t reach him.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” he called. “If you need help, chil
d, Mongke and his men are half a day’s ride south of that village.”

  Tshant said, “Come back here and face me.”

  Psin laughed at him and rode off. He could hear Tshant’s voice, but not the words, which he decided was fortunate. When he looked back, Tshant and Djela were riding off. He would have to go; he had accepted the order. Psin rode quickly home.

  The knight was tending the bake oven behind Psin’s yurt, and when Psin rode up he came over to hold the dun horse. He saw the expression on Psin’s face and looked back the way he had come.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing. The world is full of pleasure. Have you milked the mares yet?”

  “Dmitri did.”

  Psin dismounted. The knight went back to the oven and made sure there was enough fuel. He wore a Mongol shirt and boots; the fair skin of his neck was red from the sun. Psin had expected him to refuse to do slave work, but the knight had done everything asked him.

  Every time he thought of Tshant his chest grew tight with anger. Tshant was going to great lengths to provoke him. He thought, He wants to prove that he can beat me. Let him try. This time—

  The village surrendered as soon as the Mongols approached. In the summer’s heat the river ran so shallow that they could ride straight over to the island. Kaidu and Tshant stayed on the bank. Kaidu said, “We’ll burn it.”

  Tshant looked over at him, surprised. “Why? The Khan’s order is that they may live in their villages, as long as they have no weapons.”

  “They held out against us.”

  “No one came to attack them.”

  Kaidu’s face darkened and he raised his hand. “I give the order to burn it.”

  Tshant looked over at the village. His men packed it, while Kaidu’s, more numerous, waited half in the water. “I hold it. No. It doesn’t burn.”

  “You Merkit pig—” Kaidu struck him in the face. Tshant rolled with the blow, straightened up in his saddle, and dove at Kaidu. He caught a glimpse of Djela’s face, white and amazed, a little way from them. They fell together into the dry grass along the river bank. Kaidu kicked and scratched. Tshant reared back and slugged Kaidu in the jaw, and Kaidu bucked him off. He rolled down the bank into the water. Kaidu’s voice rose in a wild shout over his head. He got up and clawed back to dry ground and grabbed Kaidu around the waist.

  Djela called out. Horses were coming, and Tshant thrust Kaidu away, not wanting their men to see them fighting. Hands caught him from behind and flung him down. His blood hammered in his veins, and he sprang up, looking for the men who had laid hands on him. They were Kaidu’s, and he lunged for them. They backed off.

  “Hold him,” Kaidu yelled.

  Djela said, “Father. This way.”

  The men around Tshant seized him. He drove his fists and his knees into them. One man whined, and he felt bone break under his knuckles, but they clutched him, they brought him down with his face pressed into a smothering coat and his arms hauled behind him. He flung himself violently to one side, got an arm loose, and wrapped it around the nearest neck. His breath rasped through his teeth. Half a dozen hands pried his arm from around the neck.

  Far off, people were shouting. He got both feet under him and stood up, six men hanging on his arms and shoulders. Kaidu was standing in front of him, smiling. Tshant took an awkward step toward him, dragging them all, but a boot caught him in the back of the knee and he fell on his face. They locked his wrists up between his shoulders. He tried to roll over. Boots pressed into his back. He couldn’t move.

  “Hold him,” Kaidu cried, in a voice high as a girl’s. “Stand clear.”

  The weight swung off his back and he started up. A whip slashed across his shoulders. In his rage he howled at the top of his lungs. The whip laced his back. They stretched out his arms and flipped him over, and he saw Kaidu’s smiling face and the dark frightened faces all around him, and the whip coming down. He drove his heels against the ground but he couldn’t break the hold. The whip tore at his face. He squeezed his eyes shut, ashamed that Djela should see his father whipped like a slave. The whip opened up his cheek, and blood soaked his collar. He threw his weight against the hands wrapped around his arms, but it did no good. The whip caught him right across the eyebrows. He could feel the pain, in spite of his anger. He gathered up his strength and heaved against the men holding him and sagged back, exhausted.

  Abruptly they let him go. He lay still, panting. There was fighting, somewhere. Hoofs beat the ground around him. Djela’s voice rose, young and sharp. Someone dragged him up and flung him facedown across a saddle. He locked his fingers around the girth, and the horse began to gallop. His fingers were cut; the horse’s sweat stung ferociously. Someone was hanging onto his belt. He could not open his eyes; he felt himself losing consciousness.

  Djela said, “Is he all right? Let me see him. Arcut—”

  “He’s cut up,” Arcut said. “We have to get him somewhere safe, so he can rest. Look at the blood.”

  Djela put out one hand toward his father’s head. The hair was painted with blood. He looked back toward the river. They had outdistanced Kaidu’s men in the first rush, but dust spiraled up along their track; they were still being followed. Ahead was a spur of forest, and he nodded toward it.

  “We’ll go into the trees.”

  Arcut said, “Someone should go tell the Khan. Get us help.”

  “Yes. Ugen, you go, And—Tian, go to the camp of Batu Khan and tell him what has happened.” Djela gnawed at his lip. Someone else. Someone else. “Kiak, Mongke Khan is camped down the river a little. Go find him. Tell him that I am his cousin and I beg his protection.”

  The three turned their horses and galloped off. Kaidu’s men were closing in on the rest of them. Djela reined his horse around and headed for the trees at a gallop. Once inside the trees they could hold Kaidu off. His heart danced in his chest when he remembered the beating. Kaidu had enjoyed it. He had watched with a little smile on his face. Djela clenched his teeth. If he dies, he thought. What if he dies?

  Tshant heard people talking. At first he thought they were far away, but he realized after a moment that they were only whispering. Feet stamped on a rough floor. He was lying belly-down on a couch, but he couldn’t open his eyes, and he felt weaker than he ever had before.

  “Wake up, Djela,” Arcut’s voice said. “Your grandfather is here.”

  Another couch sighed. “Grandfather—” Djela’s light feet ran on the floor. By what Tshant heard he knew the building wasn’t big enough for a yurt. He could smell meat simmering, and his mouth watered. He heard his father’s footsteps come into the hut.

  “Djela. What happened?”

  “Kaidu whipped Ada. He’s over here.” A weight plunked down beside Tshant. “Ada, are you awake?”

  “I can’t open my eyes.”

  Psin was swearing in a soft voice. The light cloth covering Tshant’s back lifted off. Psin’s voice seemed to come from everywhere at once; it was vast, it was terrible. He said, “The blood’s clotted his eyelids shut. Arcut. Get out of here.”

  Arcut left. Psin’s voice dropped still lower. Something wet and cool touched Tshant’s face, infinitely gentle. Djela said, “Will he be all right?”

  “Long before Kaidu will,” Psin said softly.

  Tshant forced one eye open. Psin’s hands were trembling. He began to murmur again, speaking Tshant’s name over and over.

  “Be quiet, old man. You’re saying too much.”

  “Ingrate. If I didn’t honor your mother I’d say she got you from a demon.” His voice was dead flat. “How do you feel?”

  “Hungry.” Tshant opened both eyes. Psin’s face was expressionless, but the eyes burnt; he tried to smile and could not, and his mouth twisted monstrously in the effort. He turned and spoke in Magyar, and a woman came over with a bowl of meat. Tshant pushed himself up onto his elbows. They were in a woodcutters’ hut, and a small Magyar family huddled in one corner. The woman banged her spoon against the edge of the
pot and went to join them. Psin stood back and Tshant gobbled food.

  “He’ll live.” Psin started toward the low door.

  “Father,” Tshant said. “I fight my own feuds.”

  Psin turned back. A muscle twitched along his jaw. “I’ll leave you enough of him to flay for a saddle blanket.” He took the gold chain from around his neck and handed it to the Hungarian woman and left.

  Tshant gulped the last of the meat, drank the gravy, and sat up, groaning. The pain raced up and down his back. “Go get Arcut. We have to go after him. How many men did he bring?”

  “I don’t know.” Djela got up. The Hungarian woman was stroking the chain. Tshant put his bowl down and stood, shuddering. He took the rings out of his ears and gave them to her. His shirt and coat lay on the couch Djela had been sleeping on, and he put on the shirt. The lightest touch on his back made him wince. His legs felt weak. Djela came back in.

  “Arcut says he has orders not to let you leave until you’re well.”

  “I’m well. Go tell him he’s my officer, not Psin’s. Tell him we’re riding.”

  “He says—”

  Tshant swore. He ducked out the door and looked around for Arcut. The trees grew thick around the hut; a goat and some chickens stood in a pen to the right. Arcut rode up and said, “The Khan—”

  “Damn him. How many men does he have?”

  “At least two hundred—his home guard.”

  “Where’s my horse? Those are better men than Kaidu’s. Does he have remounts?”

  “Yes.”

  Tshant’s horse came up, and Arcut took it by the bridle so that Tshant could mount. He looked back over his shoulder. Djela was in the doorway of the hut. A Hungarian child stood beside him, one hand in its mouth. Arcut said, “It was the noyon who called us up to get you out of the fight, and who brought you here.”

  Tshant tried to smile, but his face hurt. “He’s a good boy.”

  Djela beamed. He moved away from the Hungarian child; their horses were trotting toward them. Tshant climbed stiffly into his saddle and tied his coat to the pommel. The stripes on his back had opened. He could feel the blood running down his spine. He rode quickly off through the trees, hoping the blood wouldn’t soak through his shirt too fast and let the others know.