Yet Jelme did not move a muscle and his glare seemed to make the men around the king nervous. Their darting glances were wasted on the silent warriors as they stood and waited for a certain outcome. The city of Songdo had less than sixty thousand inhabitants and an army of no more than three thousand. The king could assume whatever airs he wanted, but Chagatai knew the truth of the situation. When the answer came at last, it was no surprise.
“We are honored that you would accept so many young men into your service, General,” the king said. His expression was sour, but Jelme responded to the interpreter, mouthing further expressions of goodwill that Chagatai drowned out. His father had called Jelme home after three years of scouting the east. It would be good to see the mountains again and Chagatai could barely restrain his impatience at the thought. Jelme seemed to think this paper would be important, though Chagatai doubted Genghis would value it. In that at least, his father was predictable. It was a good thing Jelme had demanded silk and hard woods as well. Those things were worth having.
Without an obvious signal, the bell sounded again in the courtyard outside, ending the audience. Chagatai watched the servant girls as they readied their master to stand and fell in behind him. He sighed as the room relaxed subtly around him, taking pleasure in scratching his armpit once more. Home. Jochi would be coming back as well, with Tsubodai. Chagatai wondered how his brother would have changed in three years. At seventeen, he would be fully grown, and no doubt Tsubodai had trained him well. Chagatai cracked his neck with his hands, relishing the challenges to come.
In the southern half of Chin lands, warriors of the third army of Genghis were drinking themselves senseless. At their backs, the citizens of Kaifeng waited behind high walls and gates, already despairing. Some of the Chin had accompanied the emperor himself as he had come south from Yenking three years before. They had seen the smoke in the northern sky as that city burned. For a time, they thought the Mongols had passed them by, but then the army of Khasar came after them, drawing lines of destruction across the ground like a hot iron across flesh.
The streets of Kaifeng were almost empty and would have been eerily silent if not for the distant cheering of the Mongol host. Those who had armed guards could climb to the walls and look down on the besieging army. What they saw brought no comfort or hope. To the Chin, even the casual nature of Khasar’s siege was an insult.
On this day, the Great Khan’s brother was amusing himself with a wrestling competition amongst his men. Khasar’s host of gers lacked a clear pattern, and his vast herds of animals wandered aimlessly over the land, only rarely disturbed by the long whips of herdsmen. The Mongols had not so much surrounded Kaifeng as made camp there. To the Chin who hated and feared them, it was galling to see the enemy enjoying games and sports while Kaifeng began to go hungry. Though the Chin were no strangers to cruelty, the Mongols were more callous than they could comprehend. Khasar’s army cared nothing at all for the suffering inhabitants of Kaifeng and only resented them for delaying the fall of the city. They had been there for three months and they showed a terrible, limitless patience.
The emperor’s city of Yenking had fallen to these primitive horsemen. Its great armies had not held them. With that example, no one in Kaifeng had real hope. The streets had become lawless and only the strong dared go out at all. Food was distributed from a central store, but some days they had nothing. No one could know if the food was running out, or if it had been stolen on the way.
In the camp, Khasar rose to his feet, roaring in excitement with Ho Sa as the wrestler known as Baabgai, the Bear, heaved his opponent up over his head. The vanquished man struggled at first, but Baabgai stood unmoving, beaming like a stupid child at his general. The bets dwindled to a trickle and then nothing. The man he held was so battered and exhausted that he only tugged feebly at Baabgai’s square fingertips.
Khasar had found the wrestler among his Chin recruits, marking him apart immediately for his size and strength. He looked forward to having the massive idiot challenge one of the champions at home. If he judged the wagers well, he could beggar a few men in one match, his brother Temuge among them.
Baabgai waited impassively with his squirming burden, waiting for Khasar’s order. Few others could have supported a grown warrior for so long, and Baabgai’s face was pink and shiny with sweat.
Khasar stared through the big wrestler, his thoughts returning to the message from Genghis. The scout his brother had sent still stood where Khasar had placed him hours before. Flies were sucking at the salt on the scout’s skin, but the young man dared not move.
Khasar’s good mood vanished and he gestured irritably to his wrestling champion.
“Break him,” he snapped. The crowd took a sharp breath as Baabgai dropped suddenly to one knee, bringing his opponent down on the outstretched thigh. The crack of a broken spine sounded across the clearing, and all the men roared and exchanged betting tokens. Baabgai beamed toothlessly at them. Khasar looked away as the crippled man’s throat was cut. It was a kindness not to leave him alive for dogs and rats.
Sensing his thoughts turning darker, Khasar signaled for the next bout and a skin of black airag: anything to distract him from his gloom. If he’d known Genghis would be recalling the armies, he’d have made better time heading into Chin lands. With Ho Sa and Genghis’s son Ogedai, he’d spent leisurely years burning cities and executing their populations, all the time moving closer to where the boy emperor had taken refuge. It had been a very happy time for him.
He was not a man given to thinking too hard about himself, but Khasar had come to enjoy being in command. For men like Genghis, it came naturally. Khasar could not imagine Genghis allowing anyone to lead him to a toilet pit, never mind a battle. For Khasar, it had come slowly, the need growing like moss. For three years, he had not spoken to any of his brothers, Genghis, Kachiun, or Temuge. His warriors had expected him to know where to ride and what to do once they arrived. Khasar had found it exhausting at first, just as a lead dog will last only so long at the head of a pack. He knew that well, but he discovered another truth, that leading was as exciting as it was exhausting. His mistakes were his own, but his triumphs were also his own. As the seasons passed, Khasar had changed subtly, and he did not want to go home. Waiting for Kaifeng to fall, he was father to ten thousand sons.
He looked around at the men he had brought so far from home. His second in command, Samuka, was sober as always, watching the wrestling with detached amusement. Ogedai was yelling and sweating with drink, looking small at the shoulder of warriors. Khasar let his gaze drift over the boy, wondering how he would take the news of their return. At Ogedai’s age, everything was new and exciting, and Khasar thought he would be pleased. His mood soured further as he studied his men. Every one of them had proved his worth. They had taken women by the thousand, horses, coins, and weapons, too much to spend a lifetime cataloging. Khasar let out a long sigh. Yet Genghis was the Great Khan and Khasar could no more imagine rebelling against his older brother than he could sprout wings and fly across the walls of Kaifeng.
Ho Sa seemed to sense the general’s mood and raised a skin of black airag to him, the noise of the wrestling bout swelling around them both. Khasar smiled tightly, without pleasure. With Samuka, Ho Sa had heard the scout’s message. The day had been ruined and both men knew it.
The Xi Xia officer would once have shuddered at the thought of drinking with lice-ridden tribesmen. Before the Mongols had come, Ho Sa had lived a life of simple austerity, proud of his place in his king’s army. He had woken each dawn for an hour of exercise before bathing, then begun the day with black tea and bread dipped in honey. Ho Sa’s life had been almost perfect and he sometimes longed for it, while dreading its dullness at the same time.
On very dark nights, when all the pretenses of men are laid bare, Ho Sa knew he had found a place and a life he would never have enjoyed in the Xi Xia. He had risen to third in command of a Mongol army, and men like Khasar trusted him with their lives. The bites
of fleas and lice were a small price to pay in return. Following Khasar’s black gaze, Ho Sa too glowered drunkenly at Kaifeng. If all an emperor could do was cower behind high walls, he was no emperor as far as Ho Sa could see. He took another gulp of the clear airag and winced as it stung a cut on his gums.
Ho Sa did sometimes miss the peace and routines of his old life, but somewhere, he knew, they continued. That thought brought him comfort when he was tired or wounded. It also helped that he had a fortune in gold and silver. If he ever did return home, he would have wives, slaves, and wealth.
The second match finished with a broken arm and both men bowed to Khasar before he gave them leave to have their wounds treated. The day’s events would cost him perhaps a dozen injured and a few killed, but it was worth it to inspire the others. They were not delicate young girls, after all.
Khasar glared at the scout. It had been Khasar himself who had taken the lonely forts the Mongols now used as way stations for their messengers. They stretched in an unbroken line all the way back to the charred remains of Yenking in the north. If Khasar had realized the new trade road would enable Genghis to send a recall order only eighteen days before, he might not have done it. Would his brother understand if he waited another year for the fortress city to fall? Khasar kicked at a stone, startling the scout as he stood there. He knew the answer. Genghis would expect him to drop everything and return, bringing the khan’s son Ogedai with him. It was galling and Khasar stared at Kaifeng as if he could bring the walls down with anger alone. He hardly saw the third bout of wrestling, though the hard-drinking crowd appreciated it.
“Recite the orders again,” Khasar said suddenly. Over the yelling warriors, he had to repeat himself twice to be heard. The scout bowed his head, at a loss to understand the mood his message had created.
“ ‘Come home and drink black airag with our people, my brother. In the spring, we will drink milk and blood.’ ”
“That is all?” Khasar snapped. “Tell me how he looked when he sent you out.”
The scout shifted uncomfortably. “The Great Khan was discussing plans, lord, with his senior men. They had maps weighted with stones of lead, but I did not hear what they said before I was summoned.”
Ho Sa raised his head at that, his eyes glassy with drink. “ ‘Milk and blood’ will mean he plans a new war,” he called. The noise of the crowd dropped suddenly at his words. Ogedai had frozen to listen. Even the wrestlers paused, unsure whether they should go on. Khasar blinked and then shrugged. He didn’t care who heard.
“If my brother had his precious maps out, that must be it.” He sighed to himself. If Genghis knew he stood before the walls of Kaifeng, surely he would wait. The boy emperor had escaped them at Yenking. The thought of the Imperial Chin court watching the Mongols leave was almost unbearable.
“Has my brother summoned Tsubodai and Jelme?” Khasar said.
The messenger swallowed nervously under the eyes of so many. “I did not carry the messages, lord.”
“You know though. Scouts always know. Tell me, or I will have your tongue.”
The young messenger swallowed his doubts and spoke quickly. “Two other men rode out to bring the generals back to the khan, lord. This I heard.”
“And the armies at home? Are they drilling and making ready, or just waiting?”
“They are under orders to train the winter fat off them, lord.”
Khasar saw Samuka grin and he cursed under his breath.
“Then it is war. Go back along the path I made and tell my brother ‘I am coming.’ It is enough.”
“Shall I say you will be there before the end of summer, lord?” the scout asked.
“Yes,” Khasar replied. He spat on the ground as the scout raced away. He had taken every city for a hundred miles around Kaifeng, surrounding the emperor with destruction and cutting his supplies. Yet he would leave, just when victory was assured. He saw Ogedai’s eyes were wide with excitement and Khasar looked away.
It would be good to see his brothers again, he realized. He wondered idly if Jelme or Tsubodai could match the wealth he had taken from the Chin cities. Whole forests had been cut to provide carts enough to carry it all. He had even recruited from among the Chin, so that he returned with two thousand more men than he had taken with him. He sighed to himself. What he had wanted was to bring Genghis the bones of an emperor. He cared nothing for the other spoils of war.
CHAPTER THREE
GENGHIS LET HIS MARE have her head on the open plain, hitting full gallop so that the warm air rushed by him and sent his long black hair streaming in the wind. He wore only a light tunic that left his arms bare, revealing a dense web of white scars. The trousers that gripped the mare’s flanks were old and dark with mutton fat, as were the soft boots in the stirrups. He carried no sword, though a leather bowcase rested behind his thigh and a small hunting quiver bounced on his shoulders, its leather strap running across his chest.
The air was black with birds overhead, the noise of their wings clattering as hawks tore through them, bringing prey back to their masters. In the distance, three thousand warriors had formed an unbroken ring that dawn, riding slowly and driving every living thing before them. It would not be long before the center was filled with marmots, deer, foxes, rats, wild dogs, and a thousand other small animals. Genghis could see the ground was dark with them, and he grinned in anticipation of the killing ahead. A deer ran bucking and snorting in panic through the circle, and Genghis took it easily, sending a shaft into its chest behind the foreleg. The buck collapsed, kicking, and he turned to see if his brother Kachiun had witnessed the shot.
There was little true sport in the circle hunt, though it helped to feed the tribes when meat was running low. Nevertheless, Genghis enjoyed it and awarded places at the center to men he wished to honor. As well as Kachiun, Arslan was there, the first man to take an oath to him. The old swordsman was sixty years of age and knife thin. He rode well, if stiffly, and Genghis saw him take a pigeon from the air as the bird flew overhead.
The wrestler Tolui galloped across his vision, leaning low on the saddle to drop a fat marmot as it streaked across the grass in panic. A wolf came from a patch of long grass and made Tolui’s pony shy, almost unseating him. Genghis laughed as the massive warrior struggled upright. It was a good day and the circle was almost upon them. A hundred of his most valued officers raced here and there as the ground darkened into a solid stream of animals. They swarmed so thickly that more were crushed by hooves than spitted on killing shafts. The circle of riders closed until they stood shoulder to shoulder and the men in the middle emptied their quivers, enjoying themselves.
Genghis spotted a mountain cat in the press and kicked his heels in after it. He saw Kachiun on the same run and was pleased when his brother wheeled away to leave him the shot. Both men were in their late thirties, strong and supremely fit. With the armies returning, they would take the nation into new lands, and Genghis was glad of it.
He had come back from the Chin capital worn out and racked by illness. It had taken almost a year for him to regain his health, but the weakness was now only a memory. As the end of summer approached, he felt his old strength and with it the desire to crush those who had dared to kill his men. He wanted his enemies proud and strong, so that he could cast them further down in his vengeance.
Genghis reached for another arrow and his fingers closed on nothing, making him sigh. The boys and girls of the camps would now run in with hammers and knives to finish the slaughter and begin preparing the carcasses for a great feast.
The scouts for the khan had reported that the armies of Khasar and Tsubodai were only a few days’ ride away. His generals would be honored with rice wine and black airag when they returned. Genghis wondered how his sons would have grown in the years apart. It was exciting to think of riding to war with Chagatai and Ogedai, taking new lands so that they too could be khans. He knew that Jochi was returning, but that was an old wound and he did not dwell on it. He was done with pea
ceful years with his wives and the young children. If the sky father had a purpose for him, it was not to spend his time quietly while the world slept.
Genghis rode to Kachiun as his brother clapped Arslan on the shoulders. Between them, the ground was red with blood and fur, and boys darted almost under the hooves as they yelled and called to each other in excitement.
“Did you see the great cat I brought down?” Genghis said to the two men. “It took two arrows just to slow it.”
“It was a fine kill,” Kachiun shouted, his face glowing with sweat. One scrawny boy came too close to Kachiun’s stirrups as he spoke, and he reached down to cuff the lad, knocking him sprawling to the amusement of his companions.
Arslan smiled as the little boy picked himself up and glared at the khan’s brother before racing off.
“They are so young, this new generation,” he said. “I can hardly remember being so small.”
Genghis nodded. The children of the tribes would never know the fear of being hunted as he and his brothers had. Listening to their laughter and high-pitched voices, he could only wonder at what he had achieved. Just a few herdsmen roamed the valleys and mountains of his homeland now. He had gathered the rest and made them a nation under one man and the sky father. Perhaps that was why he yearned to answer the challenge from the desert tribes. A man without enemies grew quickly soft and fat. A nation would fare badly without someone peering into their camps. He smiled at the thought. There was no shortage of enemies in the world, and he thanked the spirits that they teemed in their millions. He could not imagine a better way of spending a life, and he had good years ahead.
Arslan spoke again and the lightness had gone from his voice.
“I have thought for many months, lord, that it is time I gave up my position as general. I am getting too old to stand a campaign in winter and perhaps too cautious. The men need someone younger who can risk it all on a single throw of the bones.”
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