by Harold Lamb
If so, his situation was doubly precarious. Mirai Khan would like nothing better than to separate Khlit's head from his body. If the two were acting together, Kefar Choga's warning would only be accounted for on either of the grounds. Either he deemed Khlit as good as dead already, or he hoped to work on the fears of the Cossack.
Thus Khlit meditated, and a reply to Kefar Choga came into his mind.
“Say to Mirai Mirza that when he tires of waiting, Khlit's saber is ready to meet him.”
Kefar Choga threw back his squat head and laughed harshly.
“To see the jackal fight the wolf—by the god Fo, they would be well matched!”
“Bring us face to face,” continued Khlit calmly, “and you will see the wolf fight the jackal. It will be a good fight.”
He threw out the remark as a gambler casts his dice. If Mirai Khan was actually planning to take his life—and there was no reason to doubt it—it would be better for Khlit to meet the Krim
Tatar in personal combat. And Kefar Choga was a man who would be pleased to see the two slay each other. So much Khlit had read in his eyes, with the wisdom of years.
And at the same instant he understood the reason for their coming to the spot. And that Kefar Choga was indeed banded with Mirai Khan.
He had stepped forward to light his pipe at the torch held by one of the Kallmarks. Still, he watched Kefar Choga. For the first time he saw the Tatar's gaze fall from his, and go, involuntarily, behind him. Just a little, the slit eyes narrowed, and the broad mouth opened. Khlit did not stop to think. He acted, with instinctive caution.
He stepped quickly, not backward, but toward Kefar Choga, past the direction of the Tatar's gaze.
As he did so, he heard a cough behind him, and the figure of Kefar Choga darkened. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the torch behind him whirl over the cliff. Turning, he saw the torchbearer stagger and throw up his am. With a gasping cry the man's knees gave under him and he toppled forward over the cliff. Not too quickly, however, that Khlit did not see the tuft of an arrow sticking out between his shoulder blades.
Shading his eyes with his hand, his glance flitted over the camp, the groups around the fires and the shadows. Some were staring at him. But of the man who had aimed the arrow at him and sent the torchbearer to death by mistake there was no sign.
“It is useless to look,” snarled Kefar Choga irritably. “The man who shot the arrow is gone. He was a servant of Mirai Mirza, and if he is wise he will not return to his master.”
In his speech there was the anger of the man who has wasted his time vainly.
VI
Many times as the Kallmark horde gained nearer to the slope of Uskun Luk Tugra—which they could now see rising before them, above its circling forests of fir—Khlit, surnamed the Wolf, tried to count on his fingers the thousands of warriors that formed the hunters of Tal Taulai Khan, and as many times gave up the task as hopeless.
There were more Kallmarks than he had seen in the Krim encampment, more than the trees in the woods of Muscovy, almost as many, he thought, as grains of salt in the sea that is made of white salt in the land of the Usbeks. All the Cossacks of the Siech army would equal no more than a third part of the Black Kall-marks who followed the road of Kefar Choga with their thousand ensigns.
Before he came to the Kallmark camp, Khlit had heard of the horde, but now he marveled at the human river of horsemen that flowed up the passes toward Uskun Luk Tugra.
Left to himself, Khlit found time to meditate. Since that first day Tal Taulai Khan had not noticed him, and Kefar Choga had said no word. Mirai Khan he saw at a distance, near the person of the Khan.
He himself was free to go where he chose in the camp, but he found that the outposts turned him back when he ventured near the limits of the army. At night fires were kept going to warm the guards, and no chance was offered to slip between them, owing to the snow, which outlined the figures of moving men.
The cold had taken a firmer grip on the hunters. Rivers that they bridged were coated with ice. Winds buffeted down from the mountain heights and searched under their fur tunics. Khlit was glad of his warm svitza, heavy boots, and sheepskin hat.
The court, Khlit among them, had taken refuge one night from the icy air in the pavilion of Tal Taulai Khan. The interior of the building was warmed by torches and fires in brazen kettles. On heaps of furs the chieftains sat on the floor drinking arak and swallowing clouds of tobacco smoke from their long pipes.
On the side usually reserved for the women the bonzes sat, whispering among themselves, with an eye to Tal Taulai Khan, who was playing chess in the center of the pavilion with Kefar Choga. The bonzes were favored, as servants of the god Fo, but even favorites were not anxious to risk the cloud of displeasure which darkened the Khan's handsome face—displeasure at the poor success of the last few days' hunt.
Few stags and no horned sheep had been met with and Tal Taulai Khan had withdrawn that afternoon from the chase in anger, leaving the slaughter of wild swine and deer to his attendants.
These things Khlit considered as his glance wandered from the Khan to Mirai, leader of the Krim folk, whose bald head glittered in the torchlight at Kefar Choga's elbow. Recently, thanks to the influence of Kefar Choga, the Krim leader had enjoyed more favor at the hands of the Grand Khan.
He knew the enmity of Mirai Khan against the Cossacks was such that he would risk much to lead an overpowering horde across the water of the Dnieper. Khlit drew his pipe from his mouth and watched closely, for the chess game had ended and Tal Taulai Khan sat back in his armchair, while Kefar Choga with a low bow acknowledged at once his own defeat, his sovereign's victory, and the celestial goodness of the Chief of Chiefs to engage in the mimic battle of chess with him.
“Great is your skill, O Chief of Chiefs,” he said quickly, “beyond that of other mortals. Honored am I to help display your potency. Yet, if it please you, there is one who has more skill than I—”
Tal Taulai Khan drank of a bowl of mare's milk, which is headier than the strongest wine of Cyprus.
“Another?” he said indifferently. “Let him play—we will see if your words are truth.”
Kefar Choga arose and stepped back. The eyes of the assembly searched for the new player, and rested on the bald head and scarred face of the Krim leader, who occupied the defeated general's seat.
To Khlit the mimic warfare of the chessboard with its jeweled effigies of warrior and castle was a sport for weak minds. Yet he studied the players with intent interest. Tal Taulai Khan, who towered upright in his chair in white furs and silks flaming with gems, held in his hand the war or peace of three nations. Mirai Khan, crouching over the board, swaddled in a gray cloak, was the spirit urging the Tatar hordes toward the Dnieper and Cossackdom.
Outcast from the Siech, Khlit felt a wave of homesickness for the islands in the Dnieper, the familiar kurens of his jovial comrades, and the sight of the wide steppe. Homesickness was strange to him, and he shook himself angrily. Yet, if he had reasoned the matter, he would have found that his old anger against hetman and Cossack had been replaced by the lifelong enmity for Tatar and Mirai Khan.
It did not escape him that at the end of the game, Mirai Khan did not immediately leave the board, but leaned forward to whisper something to the Kallmark chief. When Mirai Khan arose, the Tatar was stroking his mustache with the air of a man well content
At risk of incurring notice and displeasure, Khlit arose from his seat in a corner of the pavilion and swaggered through the throng, pushing his way among the seated groups until he was beside a Kirghiz warrior who reclined, yawning and picking his teeth, a half-dozen paces from the chessboard. The Kirghiz chieftain looked up warily as Khlit squatted beside him, and scowled.
“Harken, Eagle of the Steppe,” observed Khlit, using the favorite Kirghiz salutation, “did not Mirai Khan say to Tal Taulai that his skill was great beyond understanding?”
The reclining fighter closed one eye lazily, as if meditating whether to
reply or no.
“Nay,” he muttered, “Mirai Khan said that the hunt of Tal Taulai was not worthy—that it were better to seek honor beyond the Dnieper where murderous Cossacks were to be found—a tribe that attacks all peoples, as a mad dog bites all he meets—such were worth the attention of Tatars and much spoil was to be got.”
A glance convinced Khlit that the tribesman was too indifferent and too ignorant to make game of him.
“It is the truth,” added the Kirghiz, to vindicate himself of all charge of politeness. “Cossacks are good only to be strung on a spear.”
Khlit ignored the challenge.
“And what did Tal Taulai reply?” he asked in a low tone, for he had not heard.
“Nought,” said the Kirghiz indifferently, seeing that his challenge was not to be taken up.
VII
So drew near its end the great hunt of Tal Taulai Khan on the foothills of Uskun Luk Tugra, when the frozen rivers that came down from the mountains were red, and the annals of Abulghazi Bahadur Sultan told of a hundred camels' loads of human ears borne away from the spot where the hunt ended—the hunt that was to make memorable the Year of the Ape.
The sun warmed the snow on the slope of Uskun Luk Tugra and flickered on the doorway of Khlit's pavilion when he awakened on the last day but one of the hunt and found four men with spears, under the leadership of a Kirghiz horseman, at the entrance,
This was in keeping with many changes Khlit had observed in the camp. The morning hunt did not start as usual. There was much bustle and talking among the Kallmarks. Much arak and mare's milk was drunk. Upon inquiry Khlit learned that it was not permissible for him to leave the pavilion. Kefar Choga had said so.
When the sun was high Kefar Choga came and escorted Khlit to the entrance to Tal Taulai's pavilion. Groups of Kallmarks stared at him as he went by. Khlit realized that he was attracting more attention than usual.
He found the court of the Khan standing in the open air, Tal Taulai on horseback, attended by Mirai Khan. The Cossack's pulse quickened as he understood that he was to be taken before the Kallmark leader.
“Mirai Mirza says,” he heard Choga mutter in his ear, “that you have the cunning of a dozen serpents and the craft of a score of wolves, but I see it not. You have not slain a man, or taken spoil since coming to camp.”
Khlit was silent, watchful of what went on, and especially of Tal Taulai Khan, who was stroking a falcon on his wrist.
The eyes of the chieftains sought out the Cossack and a silence fell upon them as he stood upright before the Khan. A change had taken place in his fortunes, although he was still armed and ostensibly unmolested, and Khlit, who knew the quickness of misfortune in the Kallmark camp, watched the Khan for a sign of what was coming. He did not like the new honor that had come to Mirai Khan. Tal Taulai lifted his gaze from the falcon and his dark eyes swept over Khlit caressingly.
“The Cossacks,” he said softly, and Kefar Choga interpreted, “are a nation of beasts that form a plague spot on the edge of my kingdom. By the words of my good servant Mirai Khan, I have come to know of their iniquity. They must be punished. As a plague spot is burned from a man's body, they shall be scourged.” Khlit made no reply for a space. He had feared that the alliance between the two Khans might be completed. It was not to his liking to listen to insult to the Cossacks.
“Mirai Khan,” he responded to Kefar Choga, “has told you twisted truth out of the evil heart. The Cossacks are a free people. Ask Mirai Khan how often the Tatar horde has entered the Ukraine. Ask him how many times he has made an ally of the Turk to harass Russia.”
Khlit's boldness had little effect an the composure of Tal Taulai Khan, who was not wont to alter decisions once formed. After a short conference with Mirai Khan the Kallmark leader turned to Kefar Choga.
“How is a thief punished in your land, Cossack?” the leader of the army interpreted.
“By hanging,” replied Khlit.
“And a deserter in war?”
“He is shot.”
“And a drunkard in time of war?”
“By drowning.”
“How is a murderer punished?”
“By burial alive.”
Kefar Choga made Tal Taulai Khan acquainted with what Khlit had said.
“The Chief of Chiefs says,” he explained, “out of the depths of his limitless wisdom, that no free people would endure such punishments, wherefore you have lied in saying the Cossacks were free. And he says that a tribe that dealt with each other so harshly would be merciless to others. Wherefore he holds that Mirai Mirza's words must be true—that the Cossacks are no less than a breed of murderers and ravaging dogs that must be exterminated.”
Anger welled up in Khlit.
“Turks and Tatars,” he shouted, “who have faced the Cossack army know that we are not dogs—yet there are few who have lived to tell of it. Tal Taulai Khan will come to grieve for the day he lifts his arm against the Cossacks if his horde is more numerous than the wolves on the plain.”
Kefar Choga frowned.
“Already,” he told Khlit, “costly presents of jewels from Pekin, sapphires from Kabul, gold ornaments from Samarkand, with rare weapons from Damascus and countless silken cloths, are prepared in baskets for the Krim folk to be sent on ahead as an omen of alliance. Krim Tatar and Kallmark Tatar will turn their swords against the Cossacks.”
Tal Taulai Khan was growing impatient of the audience with the captive Cossack.
“Ask him what punishment he deserves,” he told Kefar Choga. “Whether to be hanged as a thief or buried alive as a murderer. Let him decide.”
Khlit's heart was heavy. He saw no mercy in the eyes of the Tatar gathering. Rather, indifference. Yet Khlit had sent many men to death. He drew himself up and crossed his arms.
“Decide,” growled the Kallmark general, “or I will speak for you.”
Khlit shook his head angrily. Neither death was to his liking. He had his sword, and his arms were free. He could go to his death as a Cossack should, weapon in hand. He stepped forward and held up his hand.
“Say to Tal Taulai Khan,” he responded, “that he can see with his own eyes the valor of a Cossack—greater than all else on earth. Say that Khlit, surnamed the Wolf by his enemies, will fight against the Kallmark horde. Say that Tal Taulai Khan can have sport at the hunt for following game that is not stag or tiger.” “How mean you?” questioned Choga.
“This. There can be a hunt tomorrow at the foot of Uskun Luk Tugra. It will begin here, with Kallmark cavalry far out to either side, and continue to the slope of the mountain. There it must end, for the way to the summit of the mountain is hidden. Tal Taulai Khan can see how a Cossack fights.”
“Bah, dog!” Kefar Choga spat derisively. “Think you the Kallmark horde will hunt for one man?”
“You asked,” retorted Khlit, “that I choose a manner of death, and I have chosen. Let me ride away from the camp toward the mountains, and the Kallmarks take up the chase.”
“Nay, that would bring us, perchance, among the Krim ranks —” remonstrated Choga, when a motion from Tal Taulai cut him short.
“The Cossack has chosen,” the Khan cried, “and it shall be so. It will be a great hunt. Better game is this than stags. We will chase the wolf. Guard him until then.”
“That were not wise,” broke in Kefar Choga angrily.
Tal Taulai scowled.
“Who mutters when the Khan of Khans orders?” he cried. “Ke-far Choga! I have ordered. Keep the Cossack in the guarded pavilion where the gifts for the Krim chiefs are stored. See that he is well mounted and armed tomorrow. Let him not be harmed meanwhile. It will be a good chase.”
VIII
As a gambler handles his dice before making a final throw, Khlit, surnamed the Wolf, sat captive that night in the pavilion where the gifts of Tal Taulai Khan to the chieftains of the Krim folk were stored, and thought deeply.
Around him were stacked woven baskets of gems, silks, gold, and weapons. Costly rugs were
heaped on the floor. Incense and curiously wrought Chinese vessels ranged around the wall, with sets of priceless armor, silver and gold inlaid, from Damascus and Milan. He could have taken up in his hand the ransom of a Polish voevod.
It was not the treasure, destined as a bond of friendship between Kallmark Tatar and Krim Tatar, that occupied the Cossack's mind. He could have placed a score of emeralds in his pocket from the nearest basket without being observed by the guards, yet it was out of the question to try to escape from the pavilion. Khlit was a marked man, having been sentenced to run before the Khan's hunt on the morrow.
Even if it had been possible to slip out of the pavilion, the Cossack could not have gone a dozen paces through the camp without being seen and overpowered. By his readiness of wit in the morning he had won himself a chance—a slender chance—for freedom and he was not minded to risk incurring the attention of the Khan again.
Khlit's thoughts were not engaged with his own welfare alone. The success of the Krim leader in leaguing with Tal Taulai Khan was like gall in the mouth to the Cossack whose feud with Mirai Khan dated back to the days when he had first won knighthood in the Siech. More than anything else, Khlit longed for the overthrow of the Krim leader; while Mirai Khan had lost no opportunity to scheme for his death at the hands of the Kallmarks.
The dice of fate, Khlit meditated, were favoring the Tatar. Yet he was not ready to abide by the fall of the dice. It was Khlit's nature to fight while life was in him, and so it happened that he took up his pair of Turkish pistols from his belt. Tearing a strip of silk from a hanging, the Cossack began carelessly to clean his weapons, as if intent on preparing them for the morrow, when Tal Taulai Khan had decreed that he ride armed from the camp.
In doing so, he placed himself in full view of the Kirghiz captain of his guard, who loitered by the pavilion entrance. He did not look up as the warrior approached him.
There was silence while Khlit polished his weapons and the Kirghiz watched.
“Spawn of the devil,” observed the Kirghiz presently, “those are too fine a brace of pistols to belong to an idolatrous Cossack.