“You already have such a token—”
He didn’t understand, or chose not to. “Love marks fade,” he answered with a little nip at her shoulder. “I would remember this night forever.”
After a moment, she softened toward him.
“Of course.”
With that she pressed her lips to his breast, above his heart. He felt the prick of needle-sharp teeth and his heart beat faster in its cage of bone. Death seemed to creep closer, ready to slip inside the low round tent and steal him away, and he didn’t seem to mind when she touched him like that . . .
Sense returned with the rising of Great Sun in the morning. Qutula’s eyes flew open, the events of the night spinning like a fever in his head.
“Bek!” he called, wanting the evidence of his brother’s ears to confirm that it had been no dream. But his brother slept so soundly and so cold upon the ground that he might have died in the night.
“Bekter! Wake up!”
At last his brother did, shaking off the unnatural lethargy with bleary eyes. “My head is killing me,” he said. “How can I be so drunk and remember nothing of the feast?”
While his brother’s state did nothing to assure him that the events of his own night were true, Qutula discovered he was relieved that the secret remained his alone.
“What’s that on your chest?”
The jade he wore on the string; his brother must have seen it. Qutula bristled at the question, but he didn’t want to rouse Bekter’s suspicions. “Just a broken bit of something I picked up on the battlefield. I thought I showed it to you before.” It felt different when he tucked it back into his shirt—the carved spiral that had covered it like a rune had disappeared. Had his night visitor taken the shard he had brought down from the mountains and replaced it with one of her own? It pleased him to think that she had wanted a remembrance of him as he had wanted one from her. But Bekter wasn’t looking at the jade.
“Not that. The mark on your chest.” Bekter’s eyes had begun to focus again, and they had fallen on the very place where the lady had pricked him with her teeth.
“It must have been a spider. A little bite, nothing more.” Qutula shrugged off his brother’s interest, but Bekter persisted.
“No spider, brother, but a coiled serpent green as grass. You must have been drunker than I, to get the wrong tattoo!”
A tattoo. Idly his fingers passed across the mark that tingled in parts of his body distant from his breast. He had asked her for a token and his lady had left him this. His smile brought a like one to his brother’s sickly face.
“A reminder of some lady?” Bekter asked. “Do I know her? Is she pretty? Is she expensive?”
“She’s not that kind of lady.” Qutula answered his brother with a tart pursing of his lips to discourage further questions. “I can’t tell you more.”
He made it sound as though he defended the lady’s honor with his silence, which he did as any young man would. In this case gallantry hid his ignorance, as well as the promise he had made. Not a serious vow, he assured himself, but a lovers’ game for the dark. The tattoo began to burn, however, and did not stop until he admitted to himself that he knew what he must do. Then the gentler warmth returned.
His brother had watched the silent debate cross Qutula’s narrow features with interest. “I think there’s more of a tale here than meets the eye,” Bekter said. “When you’re ready to talk, I’ll be your willing audience.”
“No tale at all for you to turn into a song, but indigestion.” Qutula passed off the pain of the tattoo with the same drunken evening that had answered Bekter’s curiosity about his headache. But he covered the mark well with his shirt and caftan before he left his tent. A lady’s token, like her name, belonged to no one but the man to whom she gave it.
Chapter Three
MUCH LATER, WHEN ASKED what he remembered of that return from war to the great tent city of the Qubal clans, Mergen would say the barking of the dogs as they ran alongside the horses, nipping at the heels of his soldiers. Proud at the head of his army as they rode down the broad avenue, lined on either side by white felt tents of many lattices, he noticed only in passing the flash of Sechule’s dark hair moving through the crowd. He had set his gaze on the great ger-tent palace at the head of the avenue, its silver embroidery glowing like Great Moon herself to welcome his first return from battle as the khan.
How would his mother greet him? he wondered. She loved him as a son, but he had not been her first choice as khan. That son, that brother, had died and Mergen had survived. Surely survival must mean something to the old ones waiting for an accounting of this foreign war. In the silver cap of the khanate and the lavishly embroidered silk robes he wore, his magnificence must amaze his people crowding either side of the avenue. But vanity didn’t urge him to wonder if he cut a splendid figure on his horse. The clans who had elected him could replace him if they found him lacking.
In such an event, of course, there would be war. The riches he displayed on his horse and his person, the very tilt of his head and the way he held himself in the saddle, warned his adversaries that they had a fight on their hands. Or, if his presence failed to issue the proper warning, assured that they might easily remove him. He had neither the breadth of chest nor the regal stature of Chimbai-Khan who had gone before him, but he believed that the wisdom of his thoughts must show in his solemn carriage. The keen eye he set upon the crowd must prove him a dauntless foe.
If his own looks did not inspire confidence, however, the ten thousand Qubal warriors at his back, and the ten thousand of his conquered enemy who followed in chains, must. Cheered by the solid presence of his armies, Mergen was ready to pay attention to his companions.
Prince Tayyichiut, in the embroidered silks and cone-shaped silver cap of the heir, attended him at his right hand as the youth had so often ridden at the side of his father. The boy had become a hero, but he seemed unable to encompass the thought as yet. He scanned with satisfaction the crowd cheering and throwing flowers as they passed. “The wars have made you popular, uncle,” he said as a bluebell tumbled off his cap.
“It’s not my name on the lips of the clans, nephew.” Mergen had keen hearing, and he knew the limits of his popularity. “The Qubal celebrate their hero-prince.”
“No—” Prince Tayyichiut turned in his saddle as if seeking some other prince, some other hero with his name who had captured their love.
“Salute your people,” Mergen instructed, “for they are yours indeed, and only in my keeping until I can return them to you.”
The dogs running at his side increased the din with their barking, as if in agreement with the khan. The prince seemed less convinced than his hounds, but he’d been raised at the khan’s court. When reminded, he squared his jaw and sat straighter in his saddle, raising his hand to greet the crowd as his horse continued its stately walk down the grassy avenue. He would grow into his fame as a hero must, Mergen thought, while those of more subtle skills accepted the burden of rule and the joy of teaching their successor. The crowd already showed that Prince Tayy would make a popular khan. Mergen had to ensure he became a wise one as well.
He turned to share his doubts with General Yesugei, who rode at his left hand, but the general’s thoughts were elsewhere. His eye followed the movement of black hair slipping through the crowd. Yesugei had one wife and was looking for a second. Mergen doubted the wisdom of the direction his affection was leading him in, however.
“She will never settle for the place of second wife in your tent,” he reminded his friend. Sechule had always put ambition above her heart.
Her beauty had drawn Mergen to her tent against his better sense for more seasons than he cared to think about, so he understood the attraction. But her ambitions had followed Sechule under the blankets, making an uneasy third in their bed. He must put himself forward, she had said; his cunning made him more fit to be khan than his brother. Her complaints had tired him long before their affair had ended.
&nb
sp; He could only warn Yesugei, his friend of many battles, what he knew of the woman Sechule. “If the brother of the khan did not satisfy her ambitions, a general who stands a step below the dais can expect to do no better.” One who could offer her only second place in his tent in particular stood no chance against Sechule’s pride.
Yesugei dismissed his concerns with a breezy wave of his hand, as if sweeping pebbles off the board. “I have many herds and flocks,” he reminded the khan. Mergen had served his clan well, but they both knew he had gathered no wealth of his own, increasing his brother’s fortunes instead. “Sechule can have her own house in my camp and rule over it as she wishes. She may even keep her sons with her, though they will be looking around them for wives of their own soon enough.” Mergen’s sons as well, but they would never be called so while they remained unacknowledged.
“She’s a haughty woman,” the khan reminded him. “And cold when she doesn’t get her way.”
“I would never criticize my khan—” Yesugei affected a boastful tone, in jest, “—but some, perhaps, are better at pleasing a woman—her way.”
The khan laughed at the ribald joke as he was meant to do, but still he wondered if his friend had heard any of his warnings.
If General Yesugei heard not enough, Prince Tayy’s wary expression told Mergen that perhaps his nephew had heard too much. He leaned over in his saddle and gave the prince a reassuring slap on the shoulder, a wicked grin held to his lips with determination.
“Matters of the heart,” he said. “You will understand about such things yourself soon enough.”
Tayy returned him an uncertain smile. His eyes roved the crowd, but Sechule had gone.
“Too old for you,” Mergen joked again, though he had no fear for his nephew on that score. Prince Tayyichiut had come back from his journey a great deal braver than when he set out, but no less cautious. He’d lost a father, after all, and a mother at the hands of a monster wearing a fair face and a stolen name. His nephew would not be parted easily from his good sense for a one-sided love.
They had arrived at the door to the white-and-silver ger-tent palace. Mergen alighted, his fist upraised in a salute to the warriors who quickly filled the practice field behind him with their cries and the thunder of horses’ hooves. Prince Tayy and General Yesugei followed amid the recrimination of Tayy’s dogs, who chastised their master with their howling for leaving them behind. After Yesugei came their guardsmen. As he entered the palace, Mergen noted with pleasure how closely his own blanket-sons clung to the prince. Bekter and the prince laughed between them as they held off the dogs from entering with the party of men while Qutula looked on with exaggerated dismay at the noisy beasts.
Already Qutula had gathered some small renown, with followers who pledged to serve the prince in his name. Bekter declared himself ready to immortalize their brave deeds in his songs. Their presence at Tayy’s side assured him that his blanket-sons would bring honor to their family as chosen guardsmen when their cousin took his rightful place as khan. He hoped, with the hope of one who had lost to death the anda of his boyhood, that they would swear themselves friends of the heart to their young khan, binding them in lifelong alliance of friendship and service. He had sworn so to Chimbai, his brother, as Otchigin had sworn himself to Mergen. Both khan and adviser were dead now, murdered, but the ties of anda held fast even in the underworld. Mergen stilled a shiver that traveled up his spine. It would be different for his nephew, who would reign in peace.
Prince Tayyichiut must decide for himself to accept his cousins as anda, but he had confidence in his nephew. A family so united could only grow richer and more powerful. Satisfied that he had done all he could for now to ensure their future, he led the triumphal procession inside.
The ger-tent palace of the khan was much as Mergen remembered it.Where they showed between the rich hangings on the walls, the polished lattices were hung with decorations of bronze and silver and mirrors to frighten away evil spirits. Painted chests scattered here and there displayed their burdens of family heirlooms and clan treasures. Six hundred clansmen could fit at need within the round, felted walls. Less than half that number settled in their places today, but as always the firebox at the center marked the dividing line of rank and station. Above sat the royal family and those of greatest rank, the most powerful of the clan chieftains and the advisers to the khan. Below the firebox, nearest the door, chieftains and retainers of lesser family and lower standing settled themselves by a separate order.
The khan’s guardsmen, and the younger corps who defended the prince, followed only as far as the firebox at the center of the palace. There the greater number split off to take their positions with their backs to the lattices on the perimeter. The chosen few, Qutula and Bekter among them, continued to the dais at a respectful distance. Yesugei at other times had advanced with Mergen’s guard, sitting at the khan’s back to serve him. Their disagreement over the woman Sechule seemed to have made the general sensitive to his other obligations, however. He left Mergen to join the elders and chieftains of the many clans of the Qubal ulus.
This was no time to hesitate, however. As custom dictated, Mergen strode ahead with his heir a proper pace behind him. Each acknowledged the waiting dignitaries with gracious nods to the left and the right until they reached the dais.
Surrounded by those elders most closely tied to them by blood and marriage, the Lady Bortu, his mother, awaited them. She wore a towering headdress of silver horns from which her hair poured forth on either side of her head. Medallions of figured silver hung with many ornaments dangled from her earlobes. Large beads of coral and turquoise and other jewels strung on silver chains spilled like a waterfall to the shoulders of her heavy yellow silk coats, obscuring all but her eyes. Those eyes, however, read to the very heart of her son, offering welcome as she measured the stature he had gained in his position since she had seen him on the eve of battle.
At the dais, he stopped. Prince Tayy stepped up beside him, equals before their Great Mother and neither of them khan in the camp of the Qubal while the Lady Bortu ruled in Mergen’s name. Together they made respectful bows, their elaborate silver caps brushing the soft upturned boots on her feet.
“The sons of the great clans of the Qubal people return to the hearth of the Great Mother,” Mergen recited the formula of return. “We bring you slaves, ten thousand in number, who grovel at your feet—” he meant by that the fallen army of the Uulgar, defeated in the battle for the Cloud Country. “Speak only the word and a ruddy river will spring up to rival the Onga, flowing with the treasure of their spilled blood.”
“Have these slaves sworn an oath to you, my son the khan?” Old Bortu put her hands on his head as she asked the question.
“They have, Great Mother,” he answered. “The evil magician who led them, and the evil demon who held sway over them, have both been destroyed. Their armies have renounced them.”
“That pleases us,” she approved.
From Mergen’s position he could see that she shifted her weight from foot to foot. The right one must hurt where the bunion pinched. She had so formidable a determination he sometimes forgot that age brought with it these small infirmities. Best to finish quickly so that she might sit in comfort among the furs heaped on the dais. She seemed to feel the same, for she stepped back, drawing him with her.
“Assume your rightful place, then, son. The throne is no comfortable seat for an old lady.” Her words put the ulus into Mergen’s hands again.
“And grandson,” she greeted Prince Tayyichiut, “Take your ease with your old grandmother. You will be happy to know that the cooks have watched the dust of your horses drawing nearer since morning!”
As khan, Mergen sat first, one leg tucked up under him and the other with the knee drawn up to his chin in front of him. Prince Tayy followed him and took the heir’s seat at his side. The boy could not help but suffer from the memory of times past when his father sat in Mergen’s place, with his beloved mother to hand as wel
l. Mother and father both lay murdered now, but the ancient Bortu still greeted her grandson with a hug and a kiss for each cheek.
“You must tell me about your adventures,” she said to both her male relatives. “And then we must dispose of these slaves you have brought me. There will be tents in need of men, but not so many. And as you will doubtless soon prove, fighting men require a great deal of feeding.”
As she spoke, she clapped her hands. An army of servants waiting only for her signal marched into the great ger-tent carrying huge trays in their arms. Dish followed dish of the feast prepared for them. Mergen helped himself to sour yogurt made from mare’s milk, and a tangy cheese from the milk of sheep. Tea with butter followed, and Mergen’s favorite kumiss—beer fermented from mare’s milk. When Chimbai was khan, the servants had brought out thick-crusted pies filled with fat from the tail of a sheep first, but on this homecoming his mother had arranged for his own more humble favorites, rich with minced roots and meats, to greet him. Only when he had chosen one to his taste did the servants bring out the others, which Tayy preferred.
Bortu laughed at the hopeful look that the prince was quick to hide. “Can you think the Great Mother of the khan would forget how to welcome a hero?” she asked him.
Mergen was pleased to note that, though he colored like old wine, his heir didn’t hide his face but smiled to accept the teasing of his grandmother. He’d always been a steady boy. Your father would be proud of you, he thought. Your mother would berate me for not protecting you better. But such thoughts were better left for the light of Great Moon Lun, when regrets came home to live in dreams. In the warmth of Great Sun came pies that tasted like all the heavens of Bekter’s tales, and the company of clan and ulus to hold the questions at bay.
As they ate, newcomers arriving from farther down the line of march took their places among the honorable company. Bolghai the shaman scampered down the aisle in the character of his totem animal, the skins of a dozen stoats flying out from around his neck as he danced. Beating a mischievous tattoo on his drum with a stick made from the thighbone of a roebuck, he asked the company a riddle. “A horse with three legs is whole,” he said with a flourish on his drum. The ulus, he meant, crippled without their khan, now healed by his return. Giving Mergen an approving nod, which the khan acknowledged with an answering tilt of his head, the shaman took his place below the dais. There he could enjoy the pies and drink among the second ranks while watching the comings and goings of the court.
Lords of Grass and Thunder Page 3