Cranky Ladies of History

by Tehani Wessely

  The fire in her vision danced.

  “I shall write to my cousins,” she said. “To my neighbours, to my peers in the nobility, to all the Protestants everywhere. If the Catholic king takes my land, all of us are at risk, György. Even you.”

  Thurzó nodded. She saw he knew the truth of it. “But your letters shall go undelivered. You will die inside the walls of this castle. And your soul will forever burn in Hell.”

  “No!” Erzsébet lurched backward.

  The guard beside her stepped back as if afraid to touch her.

  Thurzó grimaced. “Still enough childhood Calvinism to fear Hell, Erzsébet? After everything you’ve done, did you really believe you could escape eternal damnation?”

  Erzsébet felt more sharply aware than she had in a long time. She could see and feel and taste everything. Every filthy thing. No bright flickers of light danced in her eyes. No pain troubled her. She could hear the blood rush through her body. She could feel the thick, tainted air on her skin.

  Perhaps Anna had been wrong. It was demons after all.

  And at the end, perhaps even the demons would abandon her.

  ◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊

  The air was full of smoke and the stink of burning flesh the day she stepped into what would become her catacomb.

  If she cared to look again from the narrow window by her bed, she would see the gallows where Ilona and the others still hung.

  She listened to the scrape of rock as the stonemasons walled her in.

  “I need parchment,” Erzsébet told them. “The fine parchment. For letter writing.”

  “There is some on the floor, Lady,” the guard said from outside the wall.

  “This isn’t enough.” She leaned down and fingered it. “And this is too coarse for my noble family.”

  “It’s all you’re allowed, Lady.”

  “If you will not bring me parchment, I shall write my message on the very walls! Báthory is not dead!”

  “As you will, Lady.”

  She was afraid Anna would not visit her behind the walls.

  “Do you hear that?” Erzsébet asked.

  One of the stonemasons hesitated. He glanced at his fellow but the other man kept working. The guard continued to stare at her dully.

  “The demons,” Erzsébet said. “Do you hear them? They sing to me. They sing.”

  And so, the Lady Widow Nádasdy, last Countess of Báthory—Erzsébet of Ecsed and later Csejte and numerous other holdings in Hungary—began to sing to her demons.

  It took her four years to die.

  “Look How Cold My Hands Are” by Deborah Biancotti

  BRIGHT MOON

  Foz Meadows

  “I’ll be Khan, someday,” Esen announced, with all the sage authority of his eleven years. They were out by the corral, watching the new foals trot and totter on spindly legs, their tufted manes waving in the spring breeze.

  “I’ll lead your armies,” Khutulun said, excited by the prospect, “And hunt with a golden eagle!”

  Esen scowled at her. “Women don’t fight, and they don’t fly eagles. You’ll herd sheep and tend the ger, and then you’ll marry a man, and tend his ger, and your sons will fight for me.”

  Khutulun shoved him, hard, though he was nearly two years older. “Well, you’ll never be Khan! Altan will be, or Buri, or one of our other brothers. You couldn’t lead a pig to mud.”

  Angry, Esen shoved her back, and Khutulun clutched the front of his coat to keep from falling. Esen staggered, grabbing her arms, and suddenly they were wrestling in earnest, each one striving to make the other fall.

  “Women don’t wrestle, either,” Esen panted, trying to force her down. “Bokh is a sport for men. Give up and get married!”

  But Khutulun was clever. To win at bokh, you had to make the other person touch the ground with something besides their feet; Esen kept trying to throw her whole body aside, chasing a dramatic victory ahead of an easy one. He was bigger than her, but that meant he had to lean down to her level, overbalancing whenever she made a sudden move. So Khutulun swayed with his shoving, using his strength instead of her own, lulling him into a rhythm. Then, as they hit the patch of muddy ground by the corral gate, she threw all her weight one way when Esen was braced to go another. His feet went out from under him; he fell with a cry, and Khutulun twisted, forcing him to let go of her.

  “Women can wrestle,” she declared, “And I won’t marry anyone who can’t best me at it!”

  “You’re unnatural,” Esen gasped, wiping mud from his face—but there was a hint of respect there, too. When he stood, he clasped her arm and grinned. “But you still can’t have an eagle.”

  Their tussle had attracted an audience, and by evening, everyone knew about it. Reactions to Khutulun’s victory ranged from amused to disapproving, and as her hasty vow was passed from ear to tongue and back again, it warped in shape, until her elder sister, Qutuchin, pulled her aside and demanded to know whether she had really sworn to kill her future husband in single combat.

  Khutulun made a face. “The men in this camp gossip the way chickens scratch,” she huffed, and told her sister what had really happened, unable to keep the pride from her voice as she did so.

  Qutuchin, though, was unimpressed. “One lucky win, and you’re full of yourself.”

  “It wasn’t luck!”

  “That doesn’t mean you could do it again,” Qutuchin shot back. “Even if you could, it wouldn’t matter. You’ll marry where our father says, like I will.”

  “I won’t,” said Khutulun, stubborn as a colt. “Not if they can’t outwrestle me.”

  Deep, male laughter interrupted the conversation. Both girls jumped, wide-eyed as their father, Kaidu Khan, strode into the ger. “Oh, will you not?” he asked, one eyebrow raised at Khutulun. “Tell me, little moon, is marriage such a sour prospect? The right woman married to the right man can be a powerful creature indeed. Sorghaghtani Khatun didn’t outwrestle Tolui to prove her worth.”

  “No,” said Khutulun, “But she didn’t rule until after he died, either. And Toregene Khatun, too—she only became regent after Ogedei Khan’s death, not before it.” She tossed her head, staring defiantly at her father. “Strong wives become powerful when they lose their husbands. But I’m strong now—why should I have to find a man, then lose him, to have others see it?”

  Beside her, Qutuchin stiffened in shock. The Khan’s eyebrows drew together in an expression of disapproval. Khutulun trembled, realising she had gone too far, but she couldn’t make herself look away. For a long moment, her father was silent, the tension between them stretched like an overfull bladder.

  Then Kaidu Khan huffed, and said, “Perhaps you shouldn’t, at that.”

  He turned away from her, and for the first time, Khutulun remembered that they weren’t alone in the ger—that both Qutuchin’s mother and her own, along with several of their brothers, were listening to every word.

  “If Khutulun wishes to wrestle,” Kaidu said to everyone and no one in particular, “then she will wrestle. If she wishes to learn warfare, she will learn warfare. Anyone who opposes her in this will answer to me.”

  And then he strode out of the ger as though nothing extraordinary had just happened; as though Khutulun’s heart wasn’t beating in her chest like a rabbit’s. But it wasn’t fear, not any more. It was pride, and strength, and the knowledge that though Esen was the first boy she had ever thrown in bokh, he wouldn’t be the last.

  ◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊

  “Just once,” Esen grumbled, “you’d think that Kublai Khan had bigger bears to poke than our father, and longer sticks to poke them with, too.”

  Khutulun snorted. Five years had passed since she first fought her brother beside the corral, and now they were both tall enough to comfortably rest their elbows on the fence-top. “Don’t be stupid,” she said, snugging her hands in her sleeves. “Any man stubborn enough to besiege two cities for six years is more than capable of raiding our lands for
spite.”

  “But that’s my point,” said Esen. “He’s up to his balls in war at Xiangyang. Why bother with us?”

  “Because he can. Because he means to be Emperor of China, and he wants our father to remember what he denied him at the kurultai.”

  Esen blinked. “Our father never went to the kurultai.”

  “Exactly,” said Khutulun. “He didn’t go, and didn’t vote, and Kublai still calls himself Great Khan, but by our great-great-grandfather’s laws, he isn’t. So now he besieges Xiangyang, and sends his skirmishers here to say, My strength is great, and my memory long. I haven’t forgotten you.” She clicked her teeth, angry. “And for that, our gers are burned.”

  In the corral, the horses milled, their summer coats limned with dust in the dawn light. “I see that Mongke-Temur’s grey mare is here,” said Esen, almost idly.

  “So she is,” said Khutulun. “I heard her arrive last night.”

  Esen rolled his eyes. “Of course you did. Because sleep is for the weak.”

  “Sleep is for people who don’t share a bed with Qutuchin,” Khutulun said. “I pity her future husband. Beautiful our sister may be, but she snores like a drunk.”

  Esen laughed at that, but his face was grave. “Will the Golden Horde ride with us against Kublai’s men, do you think?”

  “Not against Kublai,” Khutulun said. “The battle is too small to tempt his glory, and it would make us look weak to ask it. But against the Ilkhanate? Certainly.”

  “That may be, but last I checked, the Ilkhantate isn’t responsible for burning our crops. Defending our people might not be glorious work in Mongke-Temur’s eyes, but it still must be done.”

  “And who better to do it than us?”

  For a moment, Esen simply stared. “You can’t be serious. War isn’t bokh, little moon. And even if we do ride out, you’re too young. Our father agreed to let you train, but that doesn’t mean he’ll let you fight.”

  “He will, when he sees me win.”

  “You can’t just sneak into battle!”

  “Watch me.” She bared her teeth, a determined almost-grin. “I love and honour our sister, Esen, but I’m not her, and I’m not about to wait around for the great Kaidu Khan to remember that Qutuchin is not his only marriageable daughter. I will fight, and I will be seen to fight, and that is an end of it. And if you try to stop me—” here the grin turned feral, dark, “—it will be the end of you.”

  Esen lent Khutulun his old armour, and didn’t breathe a word.

  ◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊∆◊

  The next day, accompanied by Mongke-Temur—who came for curiosity’s sake, but left his own men behind—Kaidu led his soldiers out in search of Kublai’s skirmishers. When they rode, it was easy enough for Khutulun to conceal herself, sticking to the rear of the column and speaking only with Esen. At night, in camp, it was harder. Not because of her sex, which was easy enough to hide, but because these men knew her face. Khutulun kept to herself, and prayed for luck to any spirit that might be listening.

  On the morning on the third day, a scout found their quarry. Khutulun saw him returning and nudged Esen, casting her eyes meaningfully towards the front of the column. He frowned, then nodded, curiosity overcoming his fear of being caught. Together, they edged their mounts closer to the front of the line, the better to eavesdrop on the scout’s report.

  Kublai’s men, they learned, were camped in a gorge, with sheer rock behind them and bare ground before. It was a mixed blessing: riding in would mean a pitched battle and no element of surprise, but once encircled, the skirmishers couldn’t retreat. The timing, too, was on their side: the enemy was resting, and if Kaidu marched now, the still-rising sun would be at his back as they entered the gorge, putting Kublai’s men at a disadvantage. It was this last fact that seemed to decide their father. He began issuing battle orders to his noyans, while Mongke-Temur watched the proceedings from atop his grey mare, a small, amused smile on his face.

  Every soldier carried a bow, but for this fight, Kaidu wanted his dedicated archers to hold back, covering the others. This meant splitting the column before moving out—archers to the rear, swordsmen and lancers to the front—which left Khutulun uncertain of where to ride. The archers would hold a safer position, but there would be a greater chance to distinguish herself in the melee.

  Or would there? She paused, conflicted. What would impress her father more: taking on a greater, unnecessary risk for bravado’s sake—unlike Esen, she was better with a bow than a sword, and everyone knew it—or accepting a less glorious role for the greater good?

  Put like that, the answer was obvious.

  Khutulun quickly lost track of Esen, but that didn’t matter; they both knew what they were doing. As before, Khutulun kept to the back, just ahead of the string of spare mounts, and when the signal was given, she readied her bow. She had half expected to feel afraid, but instead, the world became sharp and crisp: the creak of her armour against the saddle, the huff of her gelding’s breath as he moved from trot to canter to gallop, warm sun, blue sky, and the screaming of men around her.

  They burst into the gorge, and the battle began.

  Khutulun had drilled with the archers in practice, and knew what place to take when the noyan shouted his orders. Her hands were steady as she drew an arrow, steady as she nocked the bow, steady as she picked her target—a skinny man, unhelmeted—and steady as she fired. Her arrow took him through the neck, and her own throat clenched in brief sympathy, but then he fell, and her training took over. Not every shot hit home, and once the fight was joined, it was harder to tell if the ones that did were mortal or merely wounding, but she killed at least one man for certain, and likely more.

  The battle surged and screamed like a living thing. For all the skirmishers had been caught unawares, they were Kublai’s men, and knew their trade. An arrow whipped by Khutulun’s head as their archers finally formed up, and she hissed in shock and anger, firing off a retributive shot at whoever had marked her out. The noyan yelled again, and Khutulun groped for another shaft in her emptying quiver, searching for a target, searching—

  The soldier looked so like Esen that, for a freezing moment, she half believed her brother had somehow wound up on the wrong side of the fight. But her enemy was a man grown where Esen, for all his pretensions, was not quite so, yet. There were Esen’s quick eyes and sharp cheeks, but the face that held them was stubbled and lined, the body beneath it armoured in red lamellar and mounted on a quick brown mare whose sleek confirmation and narrow head betrayed more than just takhi blood. Khutulun’s pulse quickened, breath coming sharp and fast.

  Hello, cousin.

  She looked for the noyan, wanting to report her realisation, but the man was too far away and busy with it. The choice was Khutulun’s: speak or not? Fire or not? Her thoughts churned, but as the man on the brown mare moved—giving orders, she realised dimly; not shouting, but moving among his troops, disguised by them—a single choice stood out like a crystal spar in a rockface.

  Khutulun raised her bow, and fired at his horse.

  The mare screamed, rearing up as the shaft punctured her shoulder. Khutulun was already moving, urging her mount out of line as she plunged through the fray towards them. Heart hammering wildly, she steered with her knees and fired twice more, rapid shots to clear her path; her gelding swung and pivoted around a fallen man. Khutulun jerked in the saddle, sending a third shot wide as her gelding swung and pivoted around a fallen man. Almost, she lost sight of her target, but the brown mare screamed again, one leg buckling, struggling to stay upright. She was there, her bow swapped for a blade as she came alongside.

  Up close, her cousin wasn’t much older than Esen, nor—mercifully—much bigger, either. His mouth gaped as he struggled to control his plunging horse, and before he could draw his own sword—he had dropped his bow in a grab for the reins—Khutulun draw back her arm and smashed the hilt of her weapon hard between his brows.

  Her cousin’s eyes rolled back in his
head. Khutulun sheathed her sword, and as her enemy slid one way while his horse shied another, Khutulun used that momentum to haul him out of his saddle, arms screaming with the exertion. She was strong, iron-hard from training and as broad in the shoulders as Qutuchin was narrow, but still, she almost dropped him, sweat-wet fingers slipping against the lamellar scales of his armour. And then, somehow, impossibly, it worked: her gelding snorted in protest, shoving away from the now-collapsed mare. Khutulun swore and heaved and tugged. When they came clear, her unconscious cousin was spraddled across the high front peak of her saddle, half in her lap and half on the gelding’s withers.

  Before she could drop him, she turned about and steered them back at an awkward half-canter towards her own lines, the limp body flopping awkwardly like a badly landed fish. Double-burdened, she was vulnerable and slow, but though she heard new shouts of outrage mixed in with the battle-sounds, no one pursued her; or if they did, other fighters blocked their path. Where was the noyan? Her unconscious cousin groaned and stirred. Khutulun smacked him across the back of his head, willing him silent as she pulled in between two of their own archers, solid men who stared at her like she’d grown wings.

  “What’s this?” one cried, as the other gaped at her burden. “What have you done, boy?”

  Exasperated, Khutulun lifted her helmet. “I’ve captured my cousin. Someone tell the noyan and my father we have a hostage.”

  The two men exchanged frightened glances.

  “Now!” she roared, arms aching as her captive moved again, and this time the man to her left obeyed, a swiftly muttered, Yes, khatun falling from his lips as he wheeled his horse.

  The title took Khutulun off-guard; she had never been called khatun before. It was a word for great women, and she was not yet that. But perhaps, she thought, I will become.