Swords of the Steppes

by Harold Lamb

  "Lest the curse of the wolves be laid upon us, we did her no harm, only asking whither she held her way. It is likewise true that she said she sought the warrior with the two Kabardas. When we released her she went forward upon the trail of the man and the wolves.

  "Now, in the next hour we beheld a fat Persian on a white horse, riding as if a fiend sat on the crupper. We had drawn our arrows to the strings when this son of many fathers cried out thy name!

  "W’allah! He showed us a khalat, a gift from thee. And to one who understood his words he explained that he had been taken captive into the Wolf's Throat. Though he had escaped, his soul was sick from fear. We let him pass.

  "We did no harm to the three remembering the Wolf's Throat where aforetime thousands of thy people went to their graves as to beds under the swords of the Muscovites. We hastened to thee. And this is truth— even as it is true that the spirits of our slain ancestors dwell today in the wolves of that pack.

  "So we salaam before thee, asking leave to go, O Lord of our lives, to draw the sword across the river."

  Chapter XII The Trail Beyond the River

  Snow still lay in the hollows and in the rock nests where the sun did not touch. But the earth was damp, and a soft blur of green was to be seen on the gray bushes that covered the hillocks. Spring had come to the steppe.

  A warm wind rippled the forest of rushes that stretched down from the knolls into the flooded river. And this river, without a boat or sail visible in its dark surface, murmured in satisfaction, like a man full fed. Beyond its edge black pools of water also had their voices—the song of myriad frogs that felt the growing warmth. By the thin smoke of a fire two black horses snorted and tossed their heads as Kirdy parted the last fringe of rushes and strode toward his camp, a dead heron in one hand, a bow in the other.

  With the bow he held an arrow, a light shaft with two tips that had struck down the bird rising in flight from the river mud. The man looked at the sun, sinking to the edge of the plain, and turned aside to a hillock where he knelt, gazing intently in all directions. In the bare plain that was like the bed of the ocean at sunset, nothing, apparently, was to be seen. But the Cossack noticed slender gray forms blending with the blur of the brush-wolves evidently full fed. For a moment he studied them with surprise. They had appeared around his camp at intervals during the weeks since he had left the Volga, and the leader of the pack was surely Karai, the giant borzoi.

  The wolves had not attacked his horses, perhaps because Kirdy had lived for a while with the wolf master of the Wolky Gorlo, perhaps because Karai had once been the Cossack's dog.

  Kirdy did not bother his head about why things happened on the steppe. He was grateful to the wolves because they had frightened off Nogai tribesmen who would otherwise have killed him for his horses.

  If he had met one of the still more to be dreaded riders of the steppe—a spirit that had crept out of a murdered body that had not been buried—he would have reined to one side with a "Luck to you, sir brother!"

  But, as he waited for the plucked heron to cook on the wooden spit over the fire where a handful of barley was already boiling in his one iron pot, he pondered men and their ways and especially the men he was following. He took out of a goatskin sack a worn leather horseshoe with the remnants of wooden cleats. Placing this before him, he added a silver coin with a hole in its center and a length of thin hemp rope.

  These three things he had found by the ashes of a large fire to the north of his camp. Around these ashes at the edge of the river he had seen the tracks of a score of horses and the wheel track of a wagon. Now the men he had been following had with them a sledge with narrow iron runners, and a similar number of ponies. Back on the Volga their trail had revealed no wagon.

  Moreover there was something curious about this trail. He had followed it back a little into the steppe and had spent a day in making wide circles without picking it up again. It ran to the ashes and it did not go away again. He had noticed many of the cleated horseshoes lying around.

  He was certain that the man he sought, Gregory Otrepiev, had camped at that fire for several days. The silver coin was a Muscovite coin, and the hole in it showed that it had been used as an ornament on a horse's rein or a saddle. The rope, too, was native workmanship.

  Otrepiev and his five companions had not turned back toward Muscovy. They had crossed the river and entered the unknown world that lay beyond it.

  Kirdy knew this because the tracks had extended to the fire at the river's edge and had not left it. The six men had waited at their camp until they had hailed a boat, or a raft drifting down the river. The cleated horseshoes they had discarded because the horses no longer had to pass over snow. For the same reason they must have removed the runners from the sledge and fitted on the wheels that had been lashed to the sides.

  So he was glad that he had found the campsite, after a week's careful search of the river's edge for that very thing. Only a tribesman or a steppe-bred Cossack would have discovered it and learned from it that on the other side of the river the trail would be that of a wagon and a score of unshod horses.

  But he had discovered also this thing that troubled him, the worn leather shoe at his feet. A Cossack cares for his own horse, always, and Kirdy had cut out that same piece of leather at the Wolky Gorlo, and had nailed on those cleats. It was a piece of oxhide with the hair still on the inner side.

  The shoe had been on the off forefoot of the bay stallion Kirdy had left at the Wolky Gorlo as a gift for Nada, the daughter of the wolf master. Nada was a wild girl, as apt to ride after him as to follow the trail of Otrepiev of her own accord. Except the great dog Karai, Nada was the only living being that Kirdy cherished in his heart.

  Nada tried to follow him? Had she fallen into the hands of the Otrepiev party? Or—and Kirdy remembered how Otrepiev's daring had stirred the girl—had she sought the false tsar of her own accord?

  A horse like the bay stallion, he knew, was a magnet that might draw every thief along the Volga. The charger might have been stolen. Kirdy— although he had examined every inch of ground in the campsite—had seen no other traces of Nada.

  His eyes gleamed under knotted brows.

  "May the Father and Son grant that I come with them!"

  But, however his spirit burned in him, he did nothing in haste. When he had eaten he threw the bones far enough from the fire to be sure that the wolves that came after them would not approach the horses. Then he led the ponies off to water and picketed them. He piled more brush on the fire and rolled himself up in his fur.

  He slept lightly because he meant to start before dawn and several times the stamping of the horses roused him. He felt rather than heard movement in the black abyss around him, and—because it is not well to sleep when others are astir in the steppe—put on his boots and coat, feeding the fire to new life.

  As he did so he caught the flash of animals' eyes. The gaunt gray form of Karai moved into the circle of light and flung itself down at the Cossack's side. Kirdy put out his hand and rubbed the wolfhound's throat and Karai growled softly, as was his wont.

  "Well, brother," the young warrior smiled, "you have run with the pack, and I'll warrant you've had the pick of the girls. Will you come with me across the river?"

  Again the dog rumbled, the broad head stretched upon the bony paws, the amber eyes intent on the face of his former master. Karai was restless and uneasy, as if anticipating some evil beyond his ken. The other wolves remained without the firelight—gray shadows against the outer blackness.

  When Kirdy saddled one pony and lashed the goatskins on the other a little after daybreak and went to the water's edge, Karai paced beside him. The Cossack had discovered a shallow stretch where the horses were able to keep their feet halfway across. The river1 was in flood but the current sluggish, and the black Kabardas struck out for the far side without hesitation, the Cossack swimming Tartar fashion, holding to the tail of one pony.

  They made the crossing and Kirdy looked back
. Karai was still sitting on the western bank, and the wolfpack had come down to sniff at the tracks.

  "Hi, Karai!" Kirdy called, and waited, hoping that the wolfhound would bark, or run up and down the bank. But the gray beast remained sitting until it threw back its head and howled like the wolf it was. The pack gave tongue, some of the wolves leaping off toward the brush. Karai took his place at the head of the pack. Once he stopped, on a rise, to look back across the river. The long, quavering hunt swelled and dwindled into distance.

  "Eh, gray brother," Kirdy murmured, "you served me well. May you have good hunting!"

  The loss of the wolfhound saddened him for a day. Karai had gone from his side to the steppe. Nada too had vanished as if the earth had swallowed her and the bay stallion. The Cossack quested far to the south, searching for the trail that must show where Otrepiev and his men had landed. Then for a week he rode north without seeing so much the track of a horse. No human being appeared on the skyline.

  For the third time Otrepiev had hidden his trail—first by the body of a dead man, then by fire and sword, then by water. How was a man to be found in that wilderness of lush grass, of thickening brush and flooding watercourses? The Cossack was on the edge of the known world; beyond the river, he could still return to Ayub and wise old Khlit and say truly that he had followed Otrepiev until all signs failed.

  But Otrepiev had once sworn that he would press on, to the Golden Horde. And this would be like the reckless spirit that had prayed to a grinning mask.

  For the Golden Horde was no more than a name, spoken by wanderers. Some said the Horde was to be found beyond the Earth Girdle, others said the Horde was not made up of living men but of spirits, penned eternally behind a rampart far toward the rising sun.

  All these matters Kirdy pondered for a day while he rested the Kabar-das and repaired his arrows. Then, well content with his course, he set out. Lacking a trail, he turned his horse's head toward the rising sun.

  The grass of the steppe grew long and tough, and the wind dried up the dark pools of water in the hollows. Instead of purple, the shadows lay gray on the plain, and haze was in the air, like a veil. The "whirling plant" rolled and tossed before the wind, often on the skyline black smoke appeared.

  For the length of two moons Kirdy pushed steadily toward the rising sun. He passed through where the earth itself was gray, and a white froth spread around the pools of water—salt. Here the only game were antelope herds and wide-winged bustards, and man and horses suffered before he turned north to seek for a river.

  If he was to go on, he must find good grazing for the Kabardas. He had fashioned his goatskins to hold water and made new saddlebags out of antelope hide—though he had little enough to carry. The barley was about gone, and only a few cups of brandy remained in the leather jug.

  The land began to rise as he went on, and instead of finding grass he entered a barren and rocky region. During the two months he had met few human beings, because he avoided the larger clusters of tents, only riding up to the fires of two or three men—thin-faced nomads with long greasy hair, who tried first to bargain with him, then to beg. Their language he did not know, but he had no doubt whatever they were born thieves as well as idol worshipers and filth eaters. More than once he had to draw his sword.

  When he asked where lay Altyn-juz—the Golden Horde—these creatures merely stared or shook their heads. But once or twice he saw them glance understandingly toward the east, and he thought they knew the name of the Golden Horde.

  Although he did not come upon a large river, the nature of the land began to change again. The dry tamarisk growth yielded to thickets of birch and aspen. In the valleys now he met rivers flowing from the east, and since these were full in Midsummer he knew that far beyond sight they were born on the upper tiers of great mountains where the snow melted slowly under the touch of the sun.

  "In the beginning," he said to himself, "the streams ran from the west."

  It was the first sign that he was coming to a different land.

  Kirdy knew cattle country—knew that this was a mellow, ripe land, well suited to cattle—and he began to be puzzled.

  It was a rolling grassland, thinly wooded, with the lines of hills wandering here and there against the sky. Fish were in the streams and some of these he caught while the Kabardas rested and rolled and healed saddle sores. And at times the Cossack saw clouds of sheep near at hand—enormous masses. He heard dogs bark from behind the sheep. The sheep were heavy and fat-tailed—certainly they had not been driven far.

  When he rode on again, he observed horses grazing on the uplands, and though they galloped off before the Kabardas, he made out that they were branded. They were shaggy beasts, swift-footed, evidently at home. Once he saw camels stalking on the skyline.

  But no men were to be seen. Certainly the cattle and sheep were not wild—dogs did not shepherd mountain sheep. In the steppe the beasts of a tribe are always guarded, unless the owner is so feared that enemies dare not take what belongs to him.

  And in the steppe, rich grassland such as this with abundant water in Midsummer is a prize to be fought for and held with bullet and steel until the coming of frost drives herds and men to the southern pastures.

  At night the Cossack could make out no fires, or any smoke by day. The herds seemed masterless. Unless—and this puzzled him sorely—the flame he had noticed one evening had something to do with them.

  It came out of a gully at deep dusk and flitted out of sight before he could do more than stare. It might have been a whirling plant afire and wind-driven, because the flame swung in circles. But there was no wind, and Kirdy thought that it was a man on a swift horse swinging a torch in his hand to keep it alight. He would have saddled and followed, but the Kabardas were spent after a day's run—and Kirdy had heard of the ghils of the steppe that led travelers astray in just this fashion.

  That night he slept lightly and wished heartily that Karai were at his side to growl a warning of enemies.

  Before sunrise he climbed a rise behind his camp and looked to the east. The air was cold, without haze. And the Cossack drew in his breath sharply.

  Under the flood of crimson and the mantling clouds he made out a dark line, jagged and yet symmetrical. A line of mountains at a great distance. And while he watched, the summits of the range began to glow as if fires had been lighted within them. From rose and red, they changed to orange and then to the glitter of sheer gold as the first rays of the sun struck through them.

  "A hundred devils!" Kirdy whispered, frowning.

  There were many of these snow peaks at an unguessed height and distance. Often in the Caucasus and Mazanderan he had seen isolated snow peaks, but never so many that looked like the crenellated towers of a battlement. Below them he could discern the veils of fog.

  Then the golden glow faded, the mist seemed to rise and form a thin haze that shut out the gigantic battlement of the mountains—if indeed it really had been there. Kirdy had seen more than one mirage in the steppe, and he had been told by the older Cossacks that such things were the work of Moslem wizards, to betray wanderers.

  "Herds without masters—a circle of fire—mountains that come and go—Allah, here is either enchantment—or a very strange land!"

  He looked again for the mountains at sunset, but there was no sunset. The air was black, and the cold breath of coming rain swayed the white stems of the birches. Kirdy led the horses into a ravine where he had noticed a shelving cliff on the sheltered slope. He had barely rubbed down and tied the ponies when drops pattered on the outer rocks. Far off, thunder muttered and lightning flickered faintly. Kirdy looked for wood and found under his stone shelf only damp loam. So he moved his almost empty saddlebags and the furs out of the wet and prepared to sleep without food or fire. Pouring a cupful of the precious corn brandy, he lifted it with a muttered:

  "Glory to God!"

  In the act of drinking he stopped to listen. The rain was coming down in gusts, and the thunder was rolling ominou
sly. Yet he thought he had caught the slapping of hoofs up the gully. One of the Kabardas snorted.

  A rending crackle and roar overhead was followed by a moment of comparative quiet, and Kirdy was sure that there was movement in the outer darkness, more than the spatter of rain and soft rush of a freshet near his ledge. Distinctly he heard the creaking of leather and ring of bit chains.

  Then the white glare of lightning lighted up the ravine, the shining drops of rain, the threshing trees.

  On the slope across from Kirdy a horseman stood motionless as a stone figure—a squat man in a towering hat, astride a shaggy pony, peering ahead as if on the edge of a bottomless pit.

  "For the ages of ages!" Kirdy concluded, and tossed down his gorilka.

  This, he reflected, was the hour after sunset, the hour of ghosts. And surely the diminutive figure on the black horse resembled nothing human. The Cossack knew what he must do.

  He touched the cross on the hilt of his saber and thrust his dagger into the ground near his boot. If the apparition of the mounted dwarf were a Christian soul riding the steppe in torment, the cross would give it comfort. If, however, it were a ghil, or evil spirit, it would climb upon the dagger and disappear into the earth—Kirdy jumped suddenly for the Kabardas. He had heard one beginning to whinny. In a second he had grasped both the velvety muzzles. And again came the lightning, revealing this time a score of strange riders. He could see the steam rising from their soaked sheepskins, and the flash of their eyeballs as they looked at him.

  Then the pall of darkness, and sounds drawing nearer—guttural chuckling voices, sibilant whispers, the clatter of hoofs on rocks—and a harsh challenge.

  "Yarou-yarou!"

  Kirdy drew his sword with a sharp grating of steel that he intended them to hear, and then there was real silence for a moment.

  "Kneel!" the harsh voice bade him. "Put down thy weapon."