The problems of a vast khanate were nothing like those he had known as an officer. The Great Trek west with Tsubodai had been a simpler life, with more basic obstacles to overcome. He could not have dreamed back then that he would be trying to settle a complicated dispute between the Taoists and Buddhists, or that silver coins would become such an important part of his life. The yam lines kept him informed in a flood of information that almost overwhelmed him, despite the cadre of Mongol scribes who worked in the city. Mongke would deal with a hundred small problems each morning and read as many reports, making decisions that would affect the lives of men he would never see or know. In the sheaf he had thrown down was a request from Arik-Boke for funds, a few million silver coins that had to be dug out and smelted from the mines. Mongke might envy his youngest brother the simple life in the homeland, but the truth he had discovered about himself was that he loved the work. It was satisfying to solve problems for other men, to be the one they came to with their questions and catastrophes. As far away as Syria and Korea, they looked to Karakorum, as Ogedai Khan had once hoped they would. Bankers could cash drafts for silver in different countries because of the peace Mongke had fostered. If there were bandits or thieves, he had a wide net to catch them, thousands of families devoted to running the khan’s lands, in his name, with his authority backing them. He patted his stomach ruefully. As with all things, peace had its price.
His knees cracked as he stood up. He groaned softly as his chief adviser, Urigh, came trotting in with more papers.
“It is almost noon. I will see those when I have eaten,” Mongke said. He would enjoy an hour with his children when they had run home from their school in the city. They would speak Mandarin and Persian as well as their own language. He would see his sons as khans when they were grown, just as his mother had worked to raise her eldest over the rest.
Urigh put down most of the papers he carried, a bundle of scrolls bound in twine. He held just one and Mongke sighed, knowing the man too well.
“All right, tell me, but be quick.”
“It is a report from your brother Kublai’s domain in Chin lands,” Urigh said. “The costs of his new city have become immense. I have the figures here.” He handed over the scroll and Mongke sat down again to read it, frowning to himself.
“When he runs out of money, he will have to stop,” he said with a shrug.
Urigh looked uncomfortable discussing the brother of the khan. Mongke’s feelings for Hulegu, Arik-Boke, and Kublai were complex and no man wanted to come between them, no matter how Mongke complained.
“You can see he has spent almost all you gave him for the campaign, my lord. I have reports that he has been seeking out silver mines on Sung land. Could he have found one and not declared it to you?”
“I would know,” Mongke said. “I have men close to him who report every movement. The last message was a week ago on the yam lines and he had not found a mine yet. It cannot be that. What about these new farms of his? He leased thousands of plots two years ago. They will have been plowed and planted twice by now, more if they are growing rice in the floodplains. In Chin markets, that will have brought in enough silver to keep building his palaces.” Mongke frowned as he considered his own words, checking through the details of the accounting in Xanadu. Huge stocks of marble had been ordered, enough to build a palace to equal his own in Karakorum. He felt a seed of distrust grow in him.
“I have not interfered with his campaign, or Hulegu’s.”
“Hulegu has sent back vast revenues, my lord. Baghdad alone has brought in gold and silver to keep Karakorum for a century.”
“And how much have we had from Kublai?” Mongke asked.
Urigh bit his lip. “Nothing so far, my lord. I assumed it was with your permission that he put the funds into his new city.”
“I did not forbid it,” Mongke conceded. “But the Sung lands are wealthy. Perhaps he has forgotten he acts for the khan.”
“I am sure that is not true, my lord,” Urigh said, trying to walk a careful line. He could not criticize the khan’s brother, but the lack of proper accounting from Sung lands had troubled him for months.
“Perhaps I should see this Xanadu myself, Urigh. I have grown fat in peace and it may be my brothers have grown too sure of themselves without feeling my eye on them. Kublai has done enough, I think.” He fell silent and thought for a time. “No, that is unfair. He has done well with what I gave him, better than I dared to hope. By now, he will have discovered he needs me to finish the Sung. He may even have learned a little humility, a little of what it takes to lead tumans into battle. I have been patient, Urigh, but perhaps it is time for the khan to take the field.” He patted his belly with a rueful smile. “Send your men to me when they come back with their report. It will do me good to ride again.”
TWENTY-TWO
KUBLAI WATCHED AS THE CHIN REGIMENTS RAN FROM THEIR tents, forming up into well-disciplined lines. He could still hardly believe how close his tumans had gotten to the mine before the alarm horns sounded. At less than two miles, a distant blare of brass had begun to wail, muffled by the fall of the land. The Sung officer should have had more scouts further out, regularly relieved by men from the main camp. Kublai prayed silently for it to be the first of many mistakes they would make.
Kublai took strength from the long line of horsemen on either side of him as they trotted forward. Bayar’s minghaan had cut the Sung supply lines four days before, then waited to ambush whoever they sent. Not a single man of a hundred had made it back to the Sung camp. Kublai hoped they were getting hungry. He needed every edge he could find.
The bowl of land that led down to the mine ended on a flat field some miles across. Kublai tried to put himself in the place of the Sung general. The site was not a good one for a defensive battle. No leader would choose a spot where he could not command the closest heights. Yet it was exactly the sort of battle that came when an emperor thousands of miles away ordered one of his senior men to hold a position, no matter who came against it or how strong they were. There would be no retreat, Kublai was certain. He raised his fist and the Mongol ranks halted, curving slightly as they met the line of the valley ridge. The sun was high above them and the day was warm. He could see a long way, beyond the mine itself to the shantytown that fed it with workers each morning. The air itself shimmered over part of the sprawling site, revealing the location of the smelting furnaces. Kublai took heart from the fact that they were still working. Perhaps there would be silver in the warehouses after all. He could see a stream of workers leaving the site and as he waited for his cannons to come up, the distant shimmering ceased. The mine shut down and the air was very still.
Behind him, the cannon teams whipped horses dragging the heavy cannon, straining for the last burst of speed up the ridge. Kublai and Bayar had experimented with oxen and horses, even camels, trying to find the best combination of speed and stamina. Oxen were painfully slow, so he had left them in camp with the families and used teams of four horses. Once the guns were rolling, they could triple the speed to the front, though the cost in horses was enormous. Hundreds of them would be lame or have had their wind broken pulling the guns, as well as the carts full of shot and gunpowder.
Kublai readied his orders in his head. The Sung had formed quickly on the valley plain and he saw the dark shapes of their own cannons dragged to the front, ready with braziers to light the black powder. To charge that camp would be to ride through a hail of shot, and Kublai felt his gut tighten in fear at the thought. He scowled as he saw that the Sung regiments were holding their ground, certain that he had to come to them.
Kublai sent single warriors out ahead of the tumans. Thousands of eyes on both sides watched them walk their mounts down the gentle slope. The Mongol warriors waited to see if they found hidden trenches or spikes in the grass, while the Sung regiments tensed at what could have been the first outriders of a suicidal charge. The braziers by the Sung cannon smoked furiously as their tenders fed in fresh coal, ke
eping them hot. Kublai could feel his heart thumping as he waited for one of the riders to fall. His emotions were mixed when they reached the bottom safely and rode on to the edge of arrow range. They were young men and he was not surprised when they stopped to jeer at the enemy. It was more worrying that the Sung commander had not set traps. The man wanted them to ride in fast and hard, where he could destroy them. It was either justified confidence or complete foolishness and Kublai sweated without knowing which. His riders returned to the ranks amidst shouts and laughter from those that knew them. The tension had been unbearable, but with a glance Kublai saw four of his own cannon were ready, their braziers lit and smoking, well clear of the piles of powder bags and shot balls. The rest were still hitched to the teams that dragged them, poised to move closer once they saw the range. He told himself the Sung could not have expected so many of the heavy weapons.
He still hoped to surprise them. The Persian chemists working in Karakorum had produced a finer powder, with more saltpeter than the Chin mixture. Kublai understood little of the science, but smaller grains burned faster and threw the ball with more force. The concept was clear enough to anyone who had ever fried a slab of meat, or seen it cut into small pieces for cooking. He watched anxiously as the four cannon were hammered loose from their mountings and fresh wooden blocks put in to raise the black muzzles to the maximum elevation. The blocks often shattered on firing and the teams drew them from sacks of spares, each one hand-cut from birch. Powder bags were shoved down the iron tubes and on each team a powerfully built man lifted a stone ball, straddling it as if he were giving birth. With a massive heave, the balls were raised to the lip and another of the team made sure it did not fall back. For an instant, Kublai had almost ordered a second powder bag, but he dared not risk the guns exploding as they fired. He would need every one.
Three quarters of a mile below and across the valley floor, the Sung regiments waited in perfect, shining ranks. They could see what was happening on the ridge, but they stood like statues, their flags and banners flapping. Kublai heard his gun teams shout instructions, using those same flags to judge the wind. They began to chant, with an emphasis on the fourth beat. Almost as one, the iron weapons were heaved around, lifted by main force and groaning men. The shots would fire straight until the wind changed.
Kublai raised his hand and four tapers were lit and shielded from the breeze as the officers readied themselves to touch the reed filled with the same black powder, the spark that pierced the bag within and slammed the balls out into the air.
Kublai dropped his arm, almost flinching in anticipation. The sound that followed had no comparisons. Even thunder seemed less terrible. Smoke and flame spurted from each of the iron holes and blurs vanished upward. Kublai could see the curving lines and his heart raced faster as he saw they would surely reach the Sung. His mouth fell open as the cannonballs soared over the regiments, striking too far back for their damage to be seen.
There was a moment of stillness, then every man who could see suddenly roared and the rest of the cannon teams lashed their horses with fresh urgency, bringing them up. They could hit the enemy. Either the Sung had misjudged the benefit of the ridge, or the Mongol gunpowder was much better than their own.
Kublai shouted fresh orders, overcome with a sense of urgency to use his sudden advantage. He watched the painfully slow adjustment as the teams grabbed up heavy hammers and began to bang out the blocks while others lifted the iron barrels to make a space.
On the valley floor, horns wailed and conflicting orders were given in sudden confusion. Kublai could see that some of the Sung officers thought they merely had to pull back closer to the mine. Others who had seen the balls pass right overhead were shouting angrily and pointing up at the ridge. There was no safe spot for them to stand. They would either have to attack or abandon the mine and move out of range, in which case Kublai decided he would take the tumans in quickly and capture their guns. He tensed as his gun teams readied all the cannon for a massive volley.
When it came, the balls of polished stone skipped and bounced their way through the Sung ranks. Horses and men crumpled as if a point of hot iron had been laid onto them. Two of the Sung cannon were struck, flipping over and crushing men underneath. Kublai exulted and his teams worked on, pouring with sweat.
The shots came faster, rippling along the line as they sought to outdo each other. Kublai looked around in shock when one of the iron weapons burst its barrel, killing the men at the muzzle. Another man was killed when his companion failed to cool the barrel quickly enough with the long rammer and sponge. The powder bag went up while he was still pushing it down, tearing it open in his enthusiasm. The rush of flame could only find a path past him and he burned in an instant. The mad pace slackened slightly after that, the lesson not lost on the other teams.
Kublai was too far away to see Bayar’s expression, though he could imagine it. He had weapons designed to pulverize a city wall and the chance to use them against standing enemy ranks. The warriors around him were still stunned by the damage the cannons could inflict and Kublai wondered if they would be as fast to ride against the Sung weapons, now that they had seen in daylight what cannons could do.
The Sung lines re-formed over their dead, but Kublai did not think they would stand for long in the face of such murderous fire. He did not envy the Sung commander, whoever he was. He waited for the Sung to pull back, but they stood their ground while red claws sank into their ranks. Kublai glanced at the pile of stone balls nearest to him and bit his lip as he saw it was down to barely a dozen. Sheer weight made it as difficult to move the shot as the guns themselves and some of the carts had broken on the trip. He watched almost mesmerized as the pile dwindled until the final ball lay on its own. The barrel was sponged out for the last time. A billow of steam hissed and crackled over the men around them, part of a greater cloud that hid the entire ridge. It irritated Kublai by drifting across his sight, making him blind for long moments until the air cleared. He heard the cannon team fire the last shot, and by then most of the thundering guns had fallen silent, their teams standing proudly to attention. A few more shots sounded from slower teams and they were done at last, suddenly useless after the carnage and destruction.
Kublai felt the wrench to his emotions as his power to reach out and strike suddenly vanished. The air was thick with sulfur and steam and he had to wait while the breeze tore it into wisps and he could see again.
When they were revealed, the Sung regiments had taken a vicious battering. Thousands of men were clearing the dead and the officers rode up and down the lines, exhorting them, pointing up to the ridge and no doubt shouting that the worst was already over. Kublai swallowed dryly. They had not broken. As he stared into the distance, he saw their own cannon teams swarm around their weapons. Time slowed down for him and he could hear every beat of his heart as he raised his hand. His men had to cross half a mile of land, one hundred and twenty to one hundred and eighty heartbeats. He would feel every one of them. He roared the orders and his tumans came over the ridge, kicking their mounts into a gallop. Kublai remained still as they flowed past him, knowing he had to be the calm center, the eye above them that could read the battle and react to it, as the men below could not.
They poured down toward the Sung lines and a great shout of anger and challenge went up from those who had been forced to stand through the most terrifying moments of their lives. Kublai barked at his bannermen and they raised the flags that would send Uriang-Khadai and Bayar out wide against the flanks.
He could not trust his heartbeat to judge the time. When he held a finger to his neck, he could not find it at first, then felt such a rapid pulse that he gave up. The tumans hit full gallop on the short plain below the bowl and he could see the black needles of arrows fly before them, a different kind of terror for those Sung who still stood and dared them to come in close.
He winced as the first Sung cannons fired. Below, he could see the paths of the balls, chopping through the gallop
ing ranks. The tumans covered the ground at reckless speed and as the Sung teams reloaded, his men sent arrow shafts whining in among them, so that the Sung gunners fell faster than they could be replaced. On the wings, Uriang-Khadai and Bayar had ridden in close, then halted at two hundred paces. From each ten thousand, arrows soared, punched out from bows too strong for other men to draw. There were no cannons on the wings, but most of Kublai’s archers could hit an egg at fifty paces. They could hit a man at two hundred and the very best of them could pick the spot.
On the ridge, thousands of warriors still poured past him. An entire tuman was pressing on, desperate not to be left out of the battle. The resting gun teams shouted encouragement, knowing they could play no further part. Kublai found himself trembling as the last warrior rode over the ridge. He had a mere twenty men left as a personal guard and a drummer boy on a camel to give signals. Every officer below could see him and he was the only one able to judge the entire battlefield. He wrestled with the urge to give new orders, but at that point it would have been more likely to hamper his officers.
For a time, he raised himself up, standing on his saddle so that he could see exactly what was happening. His mind still ticked away with ideas and plans and he knew he would have to set forges to make iron balls for the cannons. It was difficult work to make a true sphere with no imperfections that might snag on a barrel and burst it or send the ball slicing off in the wrong direction. Iron had to be heated until it ran like water, and the temperatures were far beyond the portable forges he had. Lead balls were a possibility, but the soft metal was too prone to becoming misshapen. Kublai wondered for a moment if the smelter of the mine could be used. It was far easier to polish stone, but the labor took weeks and, as he had seen, he could lose the best part of a year’s supplies in a morning.
The Khan Series 5-Book Bundle: Genghis: Birth of an Empire, Genghis: Bones of the Hills, Genghis: Lords of the Bow, Khan: Empire of Silver, Conqueror Page 193