by Ben Bova
A red-haired slave led me out into the watery sunlight, where a pair of Mongol warriors waited on their ponies. They held a third horse, slightly bigger than the other two, for me. Without a word we rode through the muddy streets and past the gate that I had entered the night before.
Out beyond the city wall waited Subotai's personal guard, a thousand hardened warriors who had beaten every army hurled against them from the Great Wall of China to the shores of the Danube River. Mounted on tough little ponies, grouped in precise military formations of tens and hundreds, each warrior was accompanied by two or three more horses and all the equipment he would need for battle.
At the head of the formation Subotai's magnificent white stallion pranced as impatiently as the great general himself must have felt.
"Orion!" he called as I approached. "We are ready to move."
It was a command and a challenge. I knew I had to translate the entire mass of them through spacetime, but I feared to attempt doing it as abruptly as I myself moved through the continuum.
So, playacting a bit, I squinted up at the weak sun, turned slightly in my creaking saddle, and pointed roughly northward.
"That is the way, my lord Subotai."
He gave a guttural order to the warrior riding next to him and the entire formation wheeled around and followed us at a slow pace.
I led them into the dismal dark woods that began a bare half mile from the city's walls. Concentrating with an intensity I had never known before, I uttered a silent plea for help to Anya as I tried to focus all the energy I could tap for the translation through spacetime.
The woods grew misty. A soft gray billowing fog rose from the ground and wrapped us in its chill tendrils. Our mounts trotted ahead slowly, Subotai at my side, his bodyguards behind me, close enough to slice me to ribbons at the slightest provocation. The fog grew thicker, blanketing sound as well as sight. I could hear the muffled tread of the horse's hooves in the muddy ground, an occasional snort, the jangle of a sword hilt against a steel buckle.
I ignored all distractions. I even ignored Subotai himself as I gathered my mental strength and forced the entire group of us across the continuum. I felt the familiar moment of utter cold, but it was over almost before it began.
I realized that I had squeezed my eyes shut. Opening them, I saw that we were still in a forest. But the mist was dissolving, evaporating. The ground beneath us was firm and dry. The sunlight filtering through the tall leafy trees was strong and bright.
We were now in the forest of Paradise, I realized, riding north by east toward the edge of the woods. The time was the early Neolithic. This was the place and the time where Set had determined to make his stand: to wipe out the human race while it was still small and weak, to wreak vengeance upon me and the Creators for destroying his home world, to seize the planet Earth and make it his own forever.
I glanced at Subotai. He rode his pony quietly, his face impassive. But his eyes were darting everywhere. He knew we were no longer in the chill, dank land of the Muscovites. The sun was warm, even under the magnificent trees. He was noting every tree, every rock, every tiny animal that darted through the underbrush. He was building up a map inside his head as we rode through this land that was completely new to him.
At last he asked me, "You say there are no other men here?"
"There are a few scattered tribes, my lord. But they are small and weak. They possess no weapons except crude wooden spears and bows that have not the range of the Mongol bow."
"And few women, also?"
"Very few, I fear."
He grunted. "And the monsters? How are they armed?"
"They use giant lizards to do their fighting for them—dragons bigger than ten horses, with sharp claws and ferocious teeth."
"Animals," Subotai muttered.
I corrected, "Animals that are controlled by the minds of their masters, so that they fight with intelligence and courage."
He fell silent at that.
For most of the day we rode through the forest, the Mongol warriors behind us filtering through the trees as silently as wraiths. There was no pause for a meal, we chewed dried meat and drank water from our canteens while in the saddle.
It was nearly sundown when we reached the edge of the forest and saw the endless expanse of grass stretching out beyond the horizon.
Subotai actually grinned. He nosed his pony out from under the trees and rode a hundred yards or so onto the grassy plain.
"How far does this land extend?" he called back to me.
Making a quick mental calculation, I shouted back, "About the same as the distance between Baghdad and Karakorum!"
He gave a wild shout and spurred his mount into a gallop. His bodyguards, startled, went yowling and charging after him, leaving me sitting in my saddle, staring at the unusual sight of Mongols whooping like boys wild with joyful exhilaration.
Then I saw a pterosaur gliding against the bright blue sky, high above.
"I welcome your return, Orion." Set's cold voice rang inside my head. "You have brought more noisy monkeys to annoy me, I see. Good. Slaughtering them will please me very much."
I clamped down on my thoughts. The less Set knew about who these men were, the better. I had to fight him in the time and place of his choosing, but whatever element of surprise I could hold on to was vital to me.
Subotai returned at a trot after nearly half an hour of hard joyriding, his normally doughty face split by a wide grin.
"You have done well, Orion. This land is like the Gobi in springtime."
"It is like this all year round," I said. In a few thousand years it would become the most arid desert on Earth, as the ice sheets covering Europe in this era retreated and the nourishing rains moved north with them. But for now, for as long as Subotai and his sons and his sons' sons lived, the grass would be green and abundant.
"We must bring the rest of the army here, and our families with their yurts and herds," Subotai said enthusiastically. "Then we can deal with these demons and dragons of yours."
I was about to agree when I spotted the lumpy brown shape of a four-legged sauropod on the horizon.
Pointing, I said, "There is one of the beasts. It is not a fighting dragon, but it can be dangerous."
Subotai immediately spurred his horse into a charge toward the sauropod. A dozen of his guard charged out after him. I urged my mount into a gallop, too, and we all dashed for the hump-backed brown and dun dinosaur as it plodded slowly away from us. I felt the wind in my face and the straining muscles of my pony beneath me; it was exhilarating.
As we neared the sauropod, its head turned on its long, snaky neck to look at us. I realized that Set was using the beast as a scout, examining us through the reptile's eyes. I could sense him hissing with his equivalent of amused laughter.
The animal lumbered off toward a small rise in the land, little more than a grassy knoll where some thick berry bushes grew.
"Be careful!" I shouted to Subotai over the pounding of our horses' hooves. "There may be others."
He was already unlimbering the compact double-curved bow that had been slung across his back, his horse's reins clamped in his grinning teeth. The other Mongols were also fitting arrows to their bows without slowing their charge in the slightest.
I got the strong mental impression of Shaydanians hiding in those bushes and behind the knoll. Mounted on dragons. I kicked my horse into a harder gallop and tried to catch up with the impetuous Subotai.
The sauropod reached the rise of the knoll and, instead of climbing it or going around it, turned to face us. It made a screeching, whistling hoot and raised itself up on its hind legs, its head rearing more than forty feet above us, the talons of its forefeet glinting viciously in the sunlight.
Subotai let loose an arrow that struck the beast squarely in its exposed chest. It screamed and lunged toward him. Subotai's horse panicked and reared up. A lesser man would have been thrown from his saddle, but Subotai, practically born on horseback, held his seat
.
A dozen more arrows flew at the monster, striking its chest, belly, neck. I was close enough to hear the solid chunking thud each missile made as it penetrated the reptile's scales. My sword was in my hand and I drove my horse to Subotai's side, ready to protect him as he regained control of his mount.
Then the trap was sprung. From both sides of the knoll half a dozen fighting dragons sprang, with Shaydanians mounted on their backs, guiding them. All the horses panicked at the sight of these fierce, terrifying carnosaurs dashing toward them. Several of the men were thrown. My own horse bucked and reared, wanting desperately to get away from the sharp teeth and claws of these ferocious monsters.
I controlled my mount mentally, blocking out the vision of the dreadful devils as I drove it headlong into the nearest of the carnosaurs. My one thought was to protect Subotai. Already dragons were crunching some of the downed men in their voracious jaws, their screams rising over the dragons' hissing snarls.
From behind me I heard an enormous deep roar, like a giant enraged lion, and the ground-shaking thunder of thousands of horses' hooves. Subotai's entire guard was charging out of the woods toward the beasts that threatened their lord.
My senses went into hyperdrive as I charged my poor terrified pony straight toward the claws of the nearest carnosaur. I saw bubbles of saliva between its saber-sharp teeth, saw its slitted reptilian eyes turn away from Subotai toward me, saw the Shaydanian mounted on its back focusing his attention on me also.
The carnosaur swung one mighty clawed hand at me. I slid off my saddle and dropped to the ground, sword firmly in my hand. The carnosaur's claws lifted my pony entirely off the ground, gouging huge spurting furrows along its flank, and threw it screaming through the air.
I saw all this happen in slow motion, as if watching a dream. Before the dinosaur finished its clawing kill of my pony I ducked low and leaped between its hind legs, ramming my scimitar into its groin with every bit of strength in me.
Then I saw the Shaydanian topple from the screeching carnosaur's back, an arrow in his chest. Before he hit the ground I glanced over my shoulder to see Subotai already nocking another arrow, reins still in his teeth, lips pulled back in what might have been a grin or a grimace.
The carnosaur started to topple upon me and I had to skip quickly away as it floundered to the ground with a bone-shaking thump. My sword was still buried in its groin, so I dashed to the crushed bloody remains of one of the Mongols and picked up the bow he had dropped in the final instant of his life.
By now the rest of Subotai's thousand were in arrow's range and all the carnosaurs were under relentless attack. The Mongols are brave, but not foolhardy. Their first goal was to rescue their leader, Subotai. Once they saw that he was out of trouble they hung back away from the enemy and attacked with arrows.
Quickly, methodically they picked off the Shaydanians mounted atop the dragons. The carnosaurs themselves were another matter. Too big to be more than annoyed by the Mongols' arrows, they dashed at their tormentors, who galloped off a safe distance before returning to the attack. It was like a bullfight, with the huge monsters being bled until their strength and courage lay pooling on the grass.
As they fired at the milling, screeching carnosaurs I jumped atop one of the riderless horses and followed Subotai as he rejoined his men. He had never let go his grip on his bow, and he was firing at the beasts even as he rode away from them, turning in his saddle to let an arrow fly while his pony galloped toward the rest of the warriors.
The poor outnumbered beasts tried to escape but the Mongols showed no more mercy than fear. They pursued the carnosaurs, pumping more arrows into them until the animals slowed, gasping and hissing, and turned to face their tormentors.
Then came the coup de grace: Mongol lancers charged the weakened, slowed carnosaurs on their sinewy little ponies, a dozen scarred dark-skinned St. Georges spitting a dozen very real hissing, writhing dragons on their spears.
I rode back to retrieve my sword as Subotai trotted back to the carcasses by the knoll and got off his pony to examine the bodies of the slain Shaydanians.
"They do look like the tsan goblins that the men of the high mountains speak of," he said.
I looked down at the dead body of one of Set's clones. Its reptile's eyes were open, staring coldly. Its reddish scales were smeared with blood where three arrows protruded from its flesh. Its clawed hands and feet were stilled forever, yet they still looked dangerous, frightening.
"They are not human," I said, "but they are mortal. They die just as a man does, and their blood is as red as ours."
Subotai looked at me, then past me to where his men were laying out the bodies of the slain Mongols side by side.
"Five killed," he muttered. "How many of these dragons does the enemy possess?"
"Hundreds, at least," I said, watching the Mongol warriors as they tore branches from the bushes around the knoll and began to build a makeshift funeral pyre.
Thinking of Set's core tap that gave him the energy to leap backward in time, I added, "He can probably get more to make up his losses in battle."
Subotai nodded. "And his city is fortified."
"Yes. The walls are higher than five men standing on each other's shoulders."
"This skirmish," said Subotai, "was merely the enemy commander's attempt to determine how many men we have, and what kind of fighters we are. When none of his scouts return home, he will know the second, but not the first."
I bowed my head. He had military wisdom, but he could not realize that Set had witnessed this fight, seeing us through the eyes of his clones.
"You must go back and bring the rest of the army here," Subotai decided. "And do it quickly, Orion, before the enemy realizes that we are only a thousand men—minus five."
"I will do it this night, my lord Subotai."
"Good," he grunted.
I was about to turn away when he reached up and clasped me on the shoulder. "I saw you charge into that beast when my mount was bucking. You protected me when I was most vulnerable. That took courage, friend Orion."
"It seemed the wisest thing to do, my lord."
He smiled. This gray-bearded Mongol general, his hair braided, his face still shining with the sweat of battle, this man who had conquered cities and slain thousands, smiled up at me as a father might.
"Such wisdom—and courage—deserve a reward. What would you have of me, man of the west?"
"You have already rewarded me, my lord."
His dark eyes widened slightly. "Already? How so?"
"You have called me friend. That is reward enough for me."
He chuckled softly, nodded, and took me to the tent his men had pitched for him. As the sun went down we shared a meal of dried meat and fermented mare's milk, then stood side by side as the funeral pyre was lit and the bodies of the slain Mongols properly sent on their way to heaven.
I held my face immobile, knowing that the abode of the gods was nothing more than a beautiful dead city in the far future, a city that the gods had abandoned in fear for their lives. There were no gods to protect or defend us, I knew. We had no one to rely on except ourselves.
"Now," Subotai said to me as the last embers of the pyre glowed against the night's darkness, "bring me the rest of my army."
I bowed and walked off a way from the camp. Moving the entire army and all their families and camp followers would not be easy. Perhaps I could not do it without aid from Anya or the other Creators. But I would try.
I closed my eyes and willed myself back to the bleak city of wooden huts and mud hovels. Nothing happened.
I concentrated harder. Still no result.
Throwing my head back, I stared up at the stars. Sheol glimmered weakly, a poor dulled reflection of its former strength. And I realized that Set had blocked my way through the continuum, just as he blocked Anya when we had first come to this time and place.
He had trapped me here, with Subotai and barely a thousand warriors.
I heard his h
issing laughter in my mind. I had led Subotai into a trap. Set intended to keep us here and slaughter us down to the last man.
CHAPTER 35
I could not face Subotai. He had followed me on faith, believing that I would lead him to a land where he and his people could live in peace once they had conquered the aliens who controlled the area. He had trusted me and called me friend. How could I tell him that I had led him into a deadly trap?
This was my doing, my fault. I could not look upon the battle-hardened face of my Mongol general again until I had corrected the situation. Or died trying.
I had learned one thing of supreme importance from Set. Energy is the key to all powers. Cut off the source of his energy and your enemy becomes helpless. Set's source of energy was the core tap that reached down to the molten heart of Earth. I had to reach it and somehow destroy it.
The tap was deep inside Set's fortress, which lay more than a day's march from where Subotai's troops had camped for the night. I had to get there, and quickly, before
Set unleashed an attack upon Subotai that would slaughter all the Mongols.
But I was cut off from my energy source. Set had put a barrier between me and the heavens that prevented me from utilizing the energy streaming in from the sun and stars. Was this shield merely a bubble that covered the immediate region around me, or had he wrapped the entire planet in a shimmering curtain that blocked the energy streaming earthward from the stars?
It made no difference. The fact was that I was cut off from the energies that would allow me to fight Set. There was only one thing to do: reach his own core tap and either destroy it or use it against him.
There was no way that I could accomplish anything in this one night. I took a horse from the Mongols' makeshift corral and rode toward the northeast and Set's fortress. I only hoped that I could reach it before the devil launched an annihilating attack upon Subotai.