by Barry Sadler
The strap cut simultaneously into the esophagus and applied pressure to the carotid artery and the nerves at the base of the neck, thereby cutting off the air and the flow of the blood to the brain and hindering the delivery of messages from the brain to the rest of the body. Once the sentry had stopped his feeble squirming, just to make certain, Temujin drove his knife into the soft spot behind the left ear, pushing the blade in at least four inches, then worked his wrist back and forth, turning the cranial cavity of the Uighar tribesman into stew.
Easing the body away from the entrance to where it would be better concealed by the shadows, Temujin slid on his belly under the flap. Stopping when his head was clear, he saw clearly by the remnants of coals in the center of the yurt.
Zhoutai slept by himself to the left, sword near to hand, his body half rolled over, his face resting in the crook of his right arm. The women were opposite him, sleeping close together for warmth and comfort.
He let the rest of his body slide inside, staying on his stomach. His foot brushed a small brass pot at the entrance, making a small hushed metal sound. One of the women opened her eyes, started to emit a cry, then, looking steadily at Temujin, she turned her back away from him, facing to the outside wall of the yurt. Zhoutai was not well loved inside his own yurt.
A good omen. Temujin had an ally. Sliding closer to Zhoutai, he wondered how to turn him over to get at the key. He could think of no way to do that without taking a chance on waking him, causing a fight that he could ill afford. The rest of Zhoutai's men were within easy earshot. There was nothing to do except...
Once more he took from his waistband the leather cord. Moving as close as he could to Zhoutai, he blew on the Uighar's neck once, then again with more force. Zhoutai grumbled in his sleep. Temujin blew again and Zhoutai moved his arm to whisk away whatever was disturbing his slumber, for an instant leaving his head and neck clear.
Quickly Temujin whipped the leather noose over his head. As soon as the strap touched Zhoutai's throat, he came instantly awake, his body thumping on the ground. Temujin was afraid the sounds of struggle would awaken the rest of the camp.
He hung on, keeping Zhoutai to the ground. The Uighar was stronger than he looked. He fought hard for his life. Though he couldn't scream, he struggled like a castrated camel, his feet thrashing. Temujin began to wonder if he should cut loose and run, and hope to get the Old Young One free another day.
Then someone came to his aid. The woman who had looked at him came with a carving knife in her hand. She covered Zhouti with her body as he had done hers time and again. The knife flashed once, twice, three times, till she reached the great muscle of the heart.
Zhoutai would have let loose a death sigh, except his windpipe was crushed. The woman smiled at Temujin through gapped front teeth; Zhoutai had knocked out three. Handing him the knife, she scuttled back to her bed, laying her body next to the other woman, who, if she had awakened, made no sign of it.
Using the same carving knife, Temujin cut loose the small bag from around Zhoutai's twisted neck. Fumbling inside, he found the key. He had moved one step closer to his goal. Smiling his thanks at the back of the woman, he slid out of the tent, around the side, and past the body of the dead guard. So far it had gone well.
Trying to sleep, Casca heard a thin rustling in the dark. Behind his guard he saw a shadow rise, something bright in its hand. It didn't take him long to figure out that something was happening. He knew the laws of the gathering as well as any. Someone was doing something that could get him killed.
CHAPTER SIX
Temujin didn't wait to unwrap the sling from around the neck of his latest victim. Crouching low, he ran to where Casca watched the action, pushing his face close to Casca. It never occurred to him that the man chained to the post might be dangerous to him. He had been promised. "I shall have you free in a moment, Old Young One, then we must run and hide in the mountains till the gathering is over. We shall have much to do. Are you ready?"
Casca didn't have any idea what the young Mongol was talking about, but he was ready. "Yes, certainly, the mountains, then much to do. Right."
Temujin unlocked the manacles and leg irons, all the time talking in spurts that made no sense to Casca. But he was not about to question the young man. Temujin had just freed his hands from the shackles when they heard a cry of alarm. Someone had stumbled over the body of the guard outside Zhoutai's yurt.
Temujin hastily fumbled with the lock that secured Casca's leg irons. People were coming; a torch. Casca heard cries of anger, then more, this time louder. The torch was starting to move in his direction.
"Hurry it up! Get me free from those damned things so I can at least fight." Temujin's fingers felt the size of sausages when at last the bronze lock sprang open. Temujin ran the links of chain out from the irons around Casca's ankles. The Uighars were almost on them, Casca saw blades reflecting the light of the torch. There was no time to waste now. They were too close. There was no time to run for it.
As soon as Casca felt his legs free, he lunged forward toward the first of them, who had just reached the body of the guard Temujin had killed.
Boddasi, the man with the torch, saw him coming first. When he saw the ragged, long-haired savage rushing him, his bowels let loose as he gripped the torch, which fell in a flutter of sparks to the earth by the body of the guard.
Casca had no idea of how many or exactly who the young Mongol had killed. But right now there were four of them. All Uighars of Zhoutai's band. There had been five, but Boddasi had left the scene in a panic. He wanted nothing to do with the killer beast. The other four, who had consumed prodigiously of the kumass, rushed to meet him, swords drawn, war cries rushing to their throats. They had courage but little skill against one who had been trained for the arenas of Imperial Rome.
Casca hit the Uighar nearest the torch first. Sliding under a wide overhand slice from the Uighar's yatagah, he dropped, came in under the blow, sliding the knife into the abdomen edge up, and laid the Uighar open to the brisket.
Temujin was close behind, throwing his thin body into the path of the next man, who was trying to get a slice at Casca before he could get clear. Temujin hit him low, rolling his body into the man's legs below the knees. The tribesman stumbled and half fell in time to feel the skinning knife enter under his jaw and sink into the roof of his mouth. As the Uighar twisted his body and head, the knife slipped out of Casca's hand, slick from the blood of the first man. Temujin grabbed his sword away from him as the man tried to pull the knife out and at the same time avoid drowning in his own blood. Casca picked up the thick curve-bladed yatagah of his first kill from the earth and prepared to meet the others, who had come to a stop.
Other voices were coming nearer. The camp was aroused, and like dogs, the tribesmen of the high plains were drawn to blood. Casca didn't know if they would get involved or not, but he didn't want to take the chance. Not when he was this close to being free. Grabbing Temujin by the shoulder, he pulled the youngster to his side, waving his yatagah in the faces of the two remaining Uighars.
"Come for me and you die." He swung the heavy blade and separated the head of the man with the knife in his jaws from his shoulders as he rolled on the ground. "A warning: stay and live. Come after me and die."
With that he pushed Temujin to the back, fading into the night they headed for the hills as the first of the other tribesmen from the Black Khitain and Naiman arrived on the scene.
As they ran through the brush, they could hear cries of fury behind them and shouted threats to their sacred parts and those of their families unto the twelfth generation. But there was no pursuit.
Casca would have preferred to have swum the river, but Temujin didn't know how to swim, and as the youngster seemed to know where they were going, Casca was content to let him lead the way. He had the feeling that this young man would have been leading even if Casca had decided otherwise.
It was with some surprise that Casca found Temujin taking him not away from th
e camp but around the other side of Zhoutai's compound where the animals were corralled. The guard normally on them had left and run to the scene of the action to join their comrades in the shouting of threats and waving of weapons at the dark.
Grinning, Temujin quickly slid into the brush-fenced corral and found halters hanging on the limbs of a long dead tree. Casca started to help, but Temujin signed him to stay put. Casca signed himself to watching for the guards to return until Temujin had two animals following him by the reins as he led them out of the corral. Giving the reins to Casca, he put his finger to his lips and, making a hush sound, ran back to the yurt of Zhoutai, stuck his head inside, and a moment later was back carrying a bow – and quiver of arrows. Taking the reins back from Casca, he leapt onto the horse's back. He called to Casca, "Come on Old Young One, we do not have all night."
Casca agreed with that. Throwing his leg up and around the barrel of his horse, he saw that Temujin, with the expert eye of one of his tribe, had picked out the best animals in Zhoutai's string. He had taken the Uighar chief's own animal for his own.
By first light they had made the foot of the mountains, crossing the river downstream where it was shallow enough for Temujin to wade across, leading his horse and filling his leather water bag as he did so.
Casca watched Temujin as the young man led the way through clusters of gray lichen-stained boulders taking them higher above Qura-Qurom.
He didn't think there would be any pursuit. Right now they were probably arguing among themselves about what to do. And Zhoutai had not been very popular among those of his own race, or even his own band, that anyone would lightly consider risking his life to avenge him. Especially when the two they would have to pursue had proven themselves to be skilled and dangerous fighters, as evidenced by the dead and wounded they had left behind in the camp. Fortunately all of the dead and injured were from Zhoutai's band. Therefore, they mattered not to anyone else.
Temujin obviously knew his way around the countryside. He led Casca unerringly through a maze of canyons and gullies till they reached a large cave beneath an overhang of porous sandstone. Below this, they tied their horses in the shelter of the overhang.
Temujin lay his bow aside and began gathering brush for a fire. His face flushed with excitement. He couldn't have put into words how he knew. But that this ugly, heavily muscled, long-nosed man was the one he had been searching for he was certain. Of that he had no doubt. This was the Old Young One, the scarred one. The pale eyes. It was all there. And that meant that soon he would begin the process to retake that which was his and reach the future promised by the heavens.
For his part, Casca was trying to catch his wind. They had been climbing steadily for the last five hours. The youngster leading him had the wind of a mountain sheep. He still couldn't figure out why the young Mongol had helped him. And right at that moment he was too tired to think much about it.
Temujin had a thousand things to ask but knew that first there were still other things to be done. The night would be long and cold, and they would need food. Pushing the bundle of brush inside the mouth of the cave, he took up the bow he had stolen from the yurt of Zhoutai's. Slinging the quiver to his back, he said to Casca, "Wait here, Old Young One. I shall be back soon with food. Rest, for later we have great things to speak of."
He looked at Casca as if the Roman should have understood the significance of his words. Casca gave him only a blank stare and nodded his head in agreement.
"Right. You go and get something to eat and I'll wait. Sounds like a plan to me."
Temujin left him squatting at the mouth of the cave breathing deeply as he tried to suck the thin air into his lungs. As Temujin made his way back down the narrow trail, he felt a bit confused.
It wasn't until after night fell and they were picking over the bones of the large mountain hare Temujin had nailed with his long compound Mongol bow that Temujin at last sat still, expectant, his eyes never leaving Casca.
Casca felt it was a bit odd. The young Mongol who said he was called Temujin of the Merkit seemed to be waiting for something from him, and he didn't know what. And why did the young man risk his life to free him? There were questions he wanted answers to also. So they just sat and stared at each other as they worried over the narrow bones of the stringy-fleshed hare.
It wasn't until the constellation of the Hunter passed over the rim of the ragged peaks that Temujin finally broke their awkward silence with, "Well, Old Young One. What secret things do you have to tell me? I am waiting."
Casca cleared his throat uncomfortably. "I don't know, young master. What do you want me to tell you?"
Temujin looked at him suspiciously, his eyes narrowing. Was the Old Young One playing a game with him or somehow testing him?
Casca saw the puzzlement on his young companion's face. The boy was sincere and he wasn't being stupid. There was an intense intelligence in the pale eyes. A fire burned there, but not one of madness. "Temujin, you want something from me. I owe you for what you have done. If I can, I will give you what you desire. But first I must know exactly what it is you wish from me. Perhaps it would be easier for both of us if you told me why you think I have anything for you."
He tossed the last bone of the hare into the fire and folded his hands across his lap to wait for Temujin's response.
Ahhh, thought Temujin. That is it. He wished to make certain that I am the one for whom he has been sent. "Very well, Old Young One. I will tell you, and then we will speak of the thousand things I have to know and learn, and you will teach me."
His face warmed by the coals of the fire, Temujin began his tale. Of the moment of his birth and the portents of the heavens. Intensely he told Casca of his mother's promises, and the soothsayers', as to what was to come to pass.
How he would meet the Old Young One, who would guide and teach him. Of how he had been expelled from his tribe and his people. Of Jemuga and Bitkichi-khan and how when he saw Casca fighting the Black Khitan and their eyes had touched, he had known without doubt that he was the one of whom the qams had told him. Temujin finished his tale and Casca sat as if frozen. The winds whistled softly outside the entrance to the cave.
Was fate playing another hand with him? That there was magic in the world, he didn't doubt. He was the living proof of that, if his existence could be called living. And if all of this was pure chance, then what difference did it make? He had nothing to lose if he went along with the young Mongol, for there was something about the boy that made him different, as few men had ever been.
Casca had met a few in his long years with the feel to them that this skinny boy carried about him like a king's robes. But they had all been either cursed or blessed with something outside the pale of normal humanity or inhumanity. This one had the touch to him. He was something more than just a wide-eyed boy from an obscure Mongol tribe. And if Casca was to teach him, there was only one thing he knew how to teach. War and fighting!
"Very well, young Temujin. If I understand correctly, you wish to learn of war and the waging of war."
Temujin bobbed his head up and down. "Yes, Old Young One, that and much, much more. Not just the manner of killing but the manner of ruling. To be one of the Great Ones is not just to kill many. There must be an order to things. That is what I must also learn. How to rule. To make something that lasts beyond my time. I have to know everything. Teach me! I promise you I shall never forget anything you say. Teach me everything you know, have seen, and have done. Make me more than I am now, Old Young One. For I weary of being a small person among a small people."
Casca sucked in a deep breath. He was right. There was something about this savage young Mongol boy from the tribe of the Buryat. He would one day walk the earth as a giant among men. With or without his help there would be blood, rivers of it. But perhaps he could give the young man at least part of that which he sought so desperately and, by the giving, perhaps reduce the rivers to a stream.
He knew much; that was true. He had all those long c
enturies of experience. He had known great and small. Had seen empires rise and fall into the dust. Surely there was something he could give this young man, something he could use, for he was different from Casca. Casca knew these things, but to know something and to be able to apply them were two very different things. This one he had no doubt could and would apply all that he learned.
"Very well, Temujin. I will teach you." Temujin moved closer to the fire, with eyes locked on those of Casca. "First let me tell of one called Sun Tzu, who lived behind the Great Wall several hundred years ago. He was a great and famous tactician and strategist. More than that, he knew the hearts and minds of people and how to control them and win them to a cause or person. Listen, then, to the tale of Sun Tzu and his Art of War."
Though weary, Casca talked all that night till the chariot of the sun pushed away the cloak of darkness and shadows. In this first long night, Temujin sat unmoving, his eyes bright in the glow of the fire as he did as he had promised.
Every word Casca told him was permanently set in his mind. He forgot not a word. Especially that Sun Tzu had stated clearly and often, "All war is based on deception. Use deception when you have not the power to confront a foe on the open battlefield. Make him believe you are stronger than you really are. Use deception when you have not the power to win in open battle, and to reduce your losses when you do." For ofttimes one could win a battle and lose the war by the depletion of one's resources. This and a hundred other things more he heard, and more important, with the instincts of one born to command, he understood them.
At last, with the coming of the dawn, he could no longer hold his eyes open, and he slept huddled, half sitting against the wall of the cave. He didn't hear when Temujin left the cave. Temujin was not yet ready to sleep. His heart pounded strong within his thin breast. Sleep was yet far away. He knew now that he had been right. This was the Promised One. The one who would make him whole.
Now there was much to do and things they needed to make the way easier. "Deception," Sun Tzu had said. The first lesson. Good, then that was what it would be. Deception to regain control of his tribe of the Buryat Mongols.