The Khan Series 5-Book Bundle

by Conn Iggulden

  General Zhi Zhong was a man of immense physical presence, with the build of a wrestler. His head was perfectly shaven and gleamed with oil as he bowed. Emperor Wei felt himself straighten automatically as he entered, the legacy of many hours on the training ground. It was reassuring to see that fierce glare and massive head once more, for all it had caused him to quiver as a boy.

  As Zhi Zhong straightened, the emperor saw he looked murderous and once more he felt like a child. He struggled to keep his voice firm as he spoke. An emperor could not show weakness.

  “They are coming here, General. I have heard the reports.”

  Zhi Zhong weighed the smooth-faced young man he faced, wishing it could have been the father. The old man would already have acted, but the wheel of life had taken him and this was the boy with whom he must deal. The general clenched both fists at his sides, standing painfully straight.

  “They have no more than sixty-five thousand warriors, Imperial Majesty. Their cavalry is superb and every one is an archer of extraordinary skill. In addition, they have learned the art of the siege and have weapons of great power. They have achieved a discipline I have not witnessed in my dealings with them before.”

  “Do not tell me of their strengths!” the young emperor snapped. “Tell me instead how we will crush them.”

  General Zhi Zhong did not react to the tone. His silence was enough criticism and the emperor waved for him to go on, a flush staining his pale cheeks.

  “To defeat the enemy, we must know them, my lord, Son of Heaven.” He spoke the title as an aid to control, to remind the emperor of his status at a time of crisis. General Zhi Zhong waited until the emperor had firmed his mouth and mastered his fear. At last, he went on.

  “In the past we would have looked for weaknesses in their alliance. I do not believe the tactic will work here.”

  “Why not?” Wei blurted out. Would the man not tell him how to defeat these tribesmen? As a boy, he had suffered through many lectures from the grizzled general, and it seemed he could not escape them even with an empire at his feet.

  “No Mongol force has ever come past the outer wall before, Imperial Majesty. They could only howl at it.” He shrugged. “It is not the barrier it once was and these Mongols have not been thrown back by superior force as they might once have been. They have grown bold as a result.” He paused, but his emperor did not speak again. The general’s glare lost some of its fierceness. Perhaps the boy was beginning to understand when to keep his mouth shut.

  “We have tortured their scouts, Imperial Majesty. More than a dozen in the last few days. We lost men to bring them in alive, but it was worth it to know the enemy.” The general frowned in recollection.

  “They are united. Whether the alliance will fall apart in time I cannot say, but for this year, at least, they are strong. They have engineers, something I thought I would never see. More, they have Xi Xia wealth behind them.” The general paused, his face showing contempt for their old allies. “I will enjoy taking the army to the Xi Xia valley, Imperial Majesty, when this is over.”

  “The scouts, General,” Emperor Wei prompted, his impatience growing.

  “They talk of this Genghis as beloved of their gods,” the general continued. “I could find no hint of a disaffected group in their number, though I will not cease to search. They have been broken apart before with promises of power and wealth.”

  “Tell me how you will defeat them, General,” Emperor Wei snapped, “or I will find one who can.”

  At that, Zhi Zhong’s mouth became a sharp line in his face. “With the outer wall broken, we cannot defend the cities around the Yellow River, lord,” he said. “The land is too flat and gives them every advantage. His Imperial Majesty must reconcile himself to losing those cities as we move men back.”

  Emperor Wei shook his head in frustration, but the general pressed on.

  “We must not let them choose the battles. Linhe will fall as Xamba and Wuyuan have fallen. Baotou, Hohhot, Jining, Xichen— all are in their path. We cannot save those cities, only avenge them.”

  Emperor Wei rose to his feet in fury. “Trade routes will be cut and our enemies will know we are weak! I brought you here to tell me how to save the lands I inherited, not watch them burn with me.”

  “They cannot be held, Imperial Majesty,” Zhi Zhong said firmly. “I too will grieve for the dead when this is ended. I will travel to each of the cities and spread ashes on my skin and make offerings in atonement. But they will fall. I have given orders to pull back our soldiers from those places. They will serve His Imperial Majesty better here.”

  The young emperor was speechless, his right hand fluttering against the lining of his robe. With a vast effort of will, he steadied himself.

  “Speak carefully to me, General. I need a victory and if you tell me one more time that I must give up my father’s lands, I will have your head right now.”

  The general held his emperor’s furious gaze. There was no trace of the weakness he had seen before. For an instant, he was reminded of the boy’s father, and the notion pleased him. Perhaps war would bring the strong blood to the fore as nothing else could.

  “I can gather almost two hundred thousand soldiers to face them, Imperial Majesty. There will be famine as supplies are diverted for the army, but the Imperial guard will keep order in Yenking. The place of battle will be of my choosing, where the Mongols cannot ride us down. I swear to the Son of Heaven by Lao Tzu himself that I will destroy them utterly. I have trained many of the officers and I tell Your Majesty they will not fail.”

  The emperor raised a hand to a waiting slave and accepted a cool glass of water. He did not offer a drink to the general, nor thought of it, though the man was almost three times his age and the morning was warm. Water from the Jade spring was for the Imperial family alone.

  “This is what I wanted to hear,” he said gratefully, sipping. “Where will the battle take place?”

  “When the cities have fallen, they will move on to Yenking. They will know this city is where the emperor resides and they will come. I will stop them in the range of mountains to the west, at Yuhung Pass, the one they call the Badger’s Mouth. It is narrow enough to hamper their horses and we will kill them all. They will not reach this city. I swear it.”

  “They cannot take Yenking, even if you fail,” the emperor said confidently.

  General Zhi Zhong looked at him, wondering if the young man had ever left the city of his birth. The general cleared his throat softly.

  “The question will not arise. I will destroy them there, and when the winter has passed, I will travel to their homeland and burn the last of them from the earth. They will not grow strong again.”

  The emperor felt his spirits lift at the general’s words. He would not have to stand in shame before his father in the land of the silent dead. He would not have to atone for failure. For a moment, he thought again of the cities the Mongols would take, a vision of blood and flames. He forced it away from his mind, taking another sip of water. He would rebuild. When the last of the tribesmen had been cut to pieces, or nailed to every tree in the empire, he would rebuild those cities and the people would know their emperor was still powerful, still beloved of heaven.

  “My father said you were a hammer to his enemies,” the emperor said, his voice gentled by his changing mood. He reached out and took hold of Zhi Zhong’s armored shoulder. “Remember the fallen cities when you have the chance to make them suffer. In my name, exact retribution.”

  “It will be as His Imperial Majesty desires,” Zhi Zhong replied, bowing deeply.

  Ho Sa walked through the vast camp, lost in thought. For almost three years, his king had left him with the Mongol khan, and there were times when he had to struggle to remember the Xi Xia officer he had once been. In part, it was that the Mongols accepted him without question. Khasar seemed to like him and Ho Sa had spent many evenings drinking airag in the man’s ger, waited on by his pair of Chin wives. He smiled wryly as he walked. They had
been good evenings. Khasar was a generous man and thought nothing of lending his wives to a friend.

  Ho Sa stopped for a moment to inspect a bundle of new arrows, one of a hundred others under a rigid construction of leather and poles. They were perfect, as he had known they would be. Though the Mongols scorned the regulations he had once known, they treated their bows like another child and only the best would do for them.

  He had long since realized he liked the tribes, though he could still miss the tea of his home, so different from the salty muck they drank against the cold. The cold! Ho Sa had never known such a vicious season as that first winter. He had listened to all the advice they gave him just to stay alive, and even then, he had suffered miserably. He shook his head at the memory and wondered what he would do if his king summoned him home as he surely must one day. Would he go? Genghis had promoted him to lead a hundred under Khasar, and Ho Sa enjoyed the camaraderie of the officers together. Every one of them could have commanded in Xi Xia, he was certain. Genghis did not allow fools to be promoted, and that was a matter of pride for Ho Sa. He rode with the greatest army in the world, as a warrior and a leader. It was no small thing for a man, being trusted.

  The ger of the khan’s second wife was different from every other one in that immense camp. Chin silk lined the walls, and as Ho Sa entered, he was struck once again by the scent of jasmine. He had no idea how Chakahai had managed to secure a supply, but in the years away from their home, she had not been idle. He knew that other wives of the Xi Xia and the Chin met in her ger at regular intervals. When one of the husbands had forbidden it, Chakahai had dared to bring the problem to Genghis. The khan had done nothing, but the Chin wife had been free to visit the Xi Xia princess after that. It had taken only a word in the right place.

  Ho Sa smiled as he bowed to her, accepting the hands of two young Chin girls on his shoulders as they removed his outer deel. Even in that was something new. The Mongols dressed only to keep out the cold and had no thought for correctness.

  “You are welcome in my home, countryman,” Chakahai said, bowing in turn. “It is good of you to come.” She spoke in the Chin language, though the accent was that of his home. Ho Sa sighed as he heard the tones, knowing she did it to please him.

  “You are the daughter of my king, the wife of my khan,” he replied. “I am your servant.”

  “That is good, Ho Sa,” she said, “but we are friends as well, I hope?”

  Ho Sa bowed again, deeper than before. As he straightened he accepted a bowl of dark green tea and inhaled with appreciation.

  “We are, of course, but what is this? I have not smelled . . .” He took another deep breath, letting the warm scent into his lungs. He was homesick then and the force of it made him sway as he stood.

  “My father sends a little in his tribute each year, Ho Sa. The tribes have let it grow stale, though this is the freshest batch.”

  Ho Sa sat carefully, cradling the bowl as he sipped. “You are too kind to have thought of me.” He did not press her, but he did not know why she had summoned him on that day. He was aware that they could not spend too much time in each other’s company. As natural as it might have seemed for two of the Xi Xia to seek one another out, a man did not visit a khan’s wife without a reason. Over two years, they had met barely half a dozen times.

  Before she could reply, another man entered. Yao Shu pressed his hands together to bow to the lady of the ger. Ho Sa watched in amusement as the monk too was handed a bowl of real tea and breathed a sigh of delight at the scent. It was only as Yao Shu finished his greeting that Ho Sa frowned. If there was danger in meeting the wife of a khan in private, there was more in being accused of conspiracy. His concern mounted as the two slave girls bowed and left the three of them alone. Ho Sa began to rise to his feet, the tea forgotten.

  Chakahai pressed a hand on his arm and he could not move without throwing it off. He settled uncomfortably and she looked into his eyes. Her own were wide and dark against her pale skin. She was beautiful and no taint of rancid mutton fat lingered around her. He could not resist a delicate shiver running down his back at the touch of cool fingers on his skin.

  “I have asked you here, Ho Sa. You are my guest. It would be an insult for you to leave now, would it not? Tell me, I do not yet understand the manners of the ger.” It was a rebuke as well as a lie. She understood the subtleties of Mongol status very well indeed. Ho Sa reminded himself that this woman had grown up as only one of many daughters to his king. Despite her beauty, she was not innocent in the affairs of the court. He sat back and forced himself to sip the tea.

  “There is no one to hear us here,” she said lightly, worsening his agitation. “You fear conspiracy, Ho Sa, where there is none. I am second wife to the khan, mother to a son and his only daughter. You are a trusted officer and Yao Shu has tutored my husband’s other boys in language and martial skills. No one would dare to whisper about any one of us. If they did, I would have their tongues cut out.”

  Ho Sa stared at the delicate girl who could make such a threat. He did not know if she had the power to match the words. How many friends had she cultivated in this camp with her status? How many of the Chin and Xi Xia slaves? It was possible. He forced himself to smile, though he was cold inside.

  “Well then, here we are. Three friends, drinking good tea. I will finish my cup, Majesty, then I will leave.”

  Chakahai sighed and her face softened. To the astonishment of both men, tears shone on the rims of her eyes.

  “Must I be always alone? Must I be suspected even by you?” she whispered, clearly struggling with herself. Ho Sa would never reach out and touch a member of the Xi Xia court, but Yao Shu had no such inhibition. The monk put an arm around her shoulder and let her rest her head on his chest.

  “You are not alone,” Ho Sa said softly. “You understand that your father has given my service to your husband. For a moment, I thought perhaps that you were conspiring against him. Why else bring us here and send your girls away?”

  The princess of the Xi Xia sat up, pressing a strand of hair back into place. Ho Sa swallowed dryly at her beauty.

  “You are the only man from my home in this camp,” she said. “Yao Shu is the only man of the Chin who is not a soldier.” Her tears seemed forgotten and her voice strengthened as she spoke. “I would not betray my husband, Ho Sa, not for you or a thousand like you. But I have children and it is the women who must look to the years ahead. Will we three sit and watch the Chin empire dragged down in flames? Will we see civilization torn apart and say nothing?” She turned to Yao Shu, who was listening intently. “Where will your Buddhism be then, my friend? Will you see it crushed under the hooves of these tribes?”

  Yao Shu spoke for the first time at that, looking troubled. “If my beliefs could be burned, lady, I would not trust them, nor live by them. They will survive this war with the Chin, even if the Chin themselves do not. Men strive to be emperors and kings, but they are just names. It does not matter which man holds a name. The fields will still need to be worked. The towns will still be thick with vice and corruption.” He shrugged. “No man knows where the future will take us. Your husband has raised no objection to having his sons trained by my hand. Perhaps the words of the Buddha will take root in one of them, but it is foolish to look so far ahead.”

  “He is right, Majesty,” Ho Sa said quietly. “You have spoken out of fear and loneliness, I see that now. I had not considered how hard this must have been for you.” He took a deep breath, knowing he played with fire, but intoxicated with her. “You have a friend in me, as you said.”

  Chakahai smiled then, her eyes bright with fresh tears. She reached out her hands and they each took one, feeling the coolness of her fingers in theirs.

  “Perhaps I have been afraid,” she said. “I have imagined my father’s city being overrun and my heart goes out to the Chin emperor and his family. Can they survive this, do you think?”

  “All men die,” Yao Shu replied before Ho Sa could speak. “O
ur lives are no more than a bird flying through a lighted window, then out again into the darkness. What matters is that we do not cause pain. A good life will defend the weak and by so doing, set a lamp in the darkness that will last for many lives to come.”

  Ho Sa glanced at the solemn monk, seeing how his shaven head gleamed. He did not agree with the words and could almost shudder at the thought of such an earnest and joyless life. He preferred Khasar’s simpler philosophy that the sky father would not have given him strength to waste. If a man could raise a sword, he should use it, and there were no better opponents than the weak. They were less likely to gut you when you weren’t looking. He said none of this aloud and was pleased to see Chakahai relax and nod to the monk.

  “You are a good man, Yao Shu. I have sensed it. My husband’s sons will learn much from you, I am certain. Perhaps one day, they will have Buddhist hearts.”

  She rose suddenly then, almost making Ho Sa spill the dregs of his cold tea. He placed the bowl to one side and bowed to her once more, thankful that the strange meeting was at an end.

  “We are from an old culture,” Chakahai said softly. “I think we can influence a new one, as it grows. If we are careful, it will benefit us all.”