The horse gave out an awful scream and lost its gait, staggered for a couple of paces, tried to return to the gallop, but staggered again and fell into an off-rhythm, off-balance diagonal stride that felt like a slow descent. The saddle stopped pounding her belly. Rubble flashed beneath her, a plunging hoof cracked down on a big rock, and then the ground came up fast.
Sky and rubble and rye vied for her attention as she and Percival skidded and tumbled over each other. Ending up on top, she rolled to unsteady feet, sucked back the wind that had been knocked out of her, and turned to face the enemy, wondering how many more times she would fall off a dying horse today.
Four Mongols abreast rode toward them, with many more negotiating the turn behind. One archer had drawn his bow and nocked an arrow. He pushed the bow forward, loosed the arrow. Another was in the act. Both arrows found their target.
With the apparent strength of a Hercules, Percival hefted body, mail, and armor from a crouch and swung his shield off his shoulder. Three arrows stuck out of it. Another shaft flew his way—no, for Cnán—and he extended the shield just in time to catch that one as well. Another whanged off his steel helmet.
The knight staggered sideways, turned, crouched, and hurled the bristling shield into the pounding legs of the nearest Mongol horse. It fell in a heap, its shriek cut off as its muzzle plowed into green grass and dirt. The rider somersaulted out of control and slid across the grass like a child on a sled. Percival abruptly halted the Mongol’s glide with a downward, double-handed thrust of his sword, pinning him to the ground.
The other three Mongols hurtled past. Cnán knew that their next move would be to pivot in their saddles and loose Parthian shots. So she turned to face them just in time to see them go down—one, two, three—as arrows from sides and front pierced their leather armor.
Istvan was the only archer she could actually see; the other shots had come out of concealment. The Hungarian now galloped to the fore, leaning in his saddle, and shot a second arrow through the neck guard of a wounded Mongol lurching to his feet. The Mongol dropped again to his knees, hands reaching, unable to cry out—the arrow had pierced his wind-pipe and come out the other side, almost clean through.
“Run, my lady,” said Percival as calmly as if he were inviting her to dance—and Cnán ran. He was right behind her. Naked, he might have outpaced her; in full armor, even he lagged.
They were being chased up into the field, and as Cnán’s lightly shod feet pounded through rye and weeds, from the corners of her eyes, she became aware of men lying flat in shallow trenches under piles of uprooted grass. She also saw more long cords beneath her feet—cords run out over the ground and left there, straight, but slack.
Istvan rode past going the other way. She turned to watch as the Hungarian shot an arrow into the foremost of the next wave of riders. He wheeled his destrier and returned the other way, twisting in his saddle to shoot his own Parthian shot. As he passed, the cords jerked off the ground—three ranks of them, pulled taut by knights working in pairs, one at each end, levering them around hefty sticks jammed into the earth.
Percival burst forward and in a few strides caught up with Cnán, grabbed her already aching arm, steered her toward the hedge, and tossed her into it. Vines and thistles welcomed her. Rocks bruised her face and shoulder—light wounds and a fair trade. More arrows buried themselves in the ground just a couple of yards away.
Cnán nestled into the hedge, delicately plucking thistles and draping tendrils to hide herself. But curiosity won out over caution. Parting the vines, she saw that disaster was about to fall upon the Mongol horsemen. Two arban—twenty riders—were galloping at speed—right into the rope traps.
All but two of the riders and their ponies tripped over the stretched cords and tumbled headlong, kicking and squealing, in a cloud of dust. The two that made it through were brought down by arrows from Rædwulf and another reverse shot from Istvan. The Hungarian grinned like a demon, his huge bristling mustache still caked with black blood from the massacre at the farmstead.
In a patter of heavy, thumping footsteps, a man ran right by her hiding place in the hedge, panting with exertion and trailing a long, stretched-out cloud of smoke. It was the alchemist, Yasper—and he seemed to be on fire. Every couple of paces, he stopped to hurl a smoking object plucked from a satchel slung over his shoulder. He tossed them in the direction of the entrance to the abandoned field, where the two squadrons of Mongols were staggering to their feet, drawing swords, or still trying to drag themselves from under thrashing horses.
The burning objects tumbled along the ground and jetted smoke—not the translucent white smoke that came from fires, but a yellow-brown vapor, thick as river mud. And it kept coming. One fell from Yasper’s bag and lay on the ground not far from Cnán. It was a gourd, about the size of a fist, with a vent hole cut into one side. She was fascinated by the sheer volume of smoke hissing and belching from the tiny object; it was like watching a hundred men leap out of a single wine barrel.
In a few moments, the jets and clouds of smoke combined to form a dense wall around the fallen riders, like a low storm cloud. The day was calm, the field was sheltered by woods, and the pungent yellow vapor was in no hurry to blow away.
From the shallow trenches sprang Taran and Feronantus, then Roger and Illarion, drawing swords with a strange, ululating, hooting cry:
“Alalazu! Alalazu! ”
The war cry, she guessed, of the Ordo Militum Vindicis Intactae.
Running straight down the center of the field came Eleázar, drawing and poising the colossal sword that he had used to such effect yesterday evening. Trotting after him came Raphael, bow out, arrow nocked, scanning for more distant foes.
But the blinding power of Yasper’s smoke cloud was absolute, and so the remainder of the Mongol force, still finding its way around and through the hedge, dared not use their bows for fear of striking comrades.
The cloud expanded. Terrible sounds came out of it now. A Mongol hopped through the billowing yellow wall on one leg, coughing and waving his free hand, smoke trailing from his hair and clothes. A hatchet whirled out of the cloud and split the back of his skull. Eyes suddenly red and bulging, he threw out his arms and sprawled flat on his face.
Roger, arms covered in blood, backed out of the cloud, reached down, and pulled the hatchet loose. Another Mongol charged out after him. Roger backhanded the weapon with a casual flick, making it skim whirling across the ground at knee level. It did not cut the Mongol but destroyed his gait and staggered him. He raised a short sword, not so much to deliver a blow now as to protect himself from what might come next; Roger ran forward, caught the man’s elbow, and with all his might, shoved it back so that it grazed the Mongol’s ear, spinning him round and leaving his neck an easy target for the dagger in Roger’s other hand. The dagger found its mark.
Streaked and dripping all over now with fresh blood, Roger wrenched away the dying Mongol’s sword and stalked back into the cloud, his face contorted with battle rage, crying, “Alalazu! ”
Raphael turned toward the hedge to look directly at Cnán—no, just above her—and loosed an arrow. There were loud rustling noises and a Mongol fell from the top of the hedge, striking a heavy blow on her shoulder. He and she—and a great deal of torn vegetation—all fell in a heap. Cnán scrabbled out from under and tried to leap back, a groan of fear and disgust rumbling from deep in her gut. The Mongol had an arrow in his right lung. Still he lashed out and grabbed Cnán’s ankle. With his other hand, he pawed at his belt, trying to reach the hilt of a dagger that had been knocked askew in the fall.
Cnán dropped to her knee, making sure that knee came down hard on the Mongol’s nose. She then grabbed the wayward dagger and buried it in his stomach. Leaves rattled from above and she jumped off the loudly dying man just in time to avoid being bowled over by another Mongol, this one sporting two deep-shot arrows.
She’d had the bad luck to hide at a banked spot on the hedge wall, easily scaled from the oth
er side. Probably it was a good thing to be disabused of the foolish notion that there was any safe place in this melee, and so she ran to the middle of the field.
The smoke cloud slowly drifted her way, or perhaps it was just growing—and the battle came with it.
She glimpsed Illarion whirling a ten-foot spear, stopping only to jab one end or the other into a foe. Feronantus cruised with grim ease round the fight’s perimeter, wielding short sword and shield, striking down those who tried to escape.
Smoke peeled back to show Taran engaged in single combat with an impressive Mongol wearing good, thick armor, clearly a commander of an arban, if not the whole group. The two matched each other stroke for stroke, but the Mongol looked exhausted and unsure, while Taran was calm, implacable, and—for lack of a better word—curious. Taran used the opportunity of a raised sword to step off line and drive his own blade up the commander’s unprotected armpit.
Yasper seemed to have used up all of his alchemical supplies and was now walking about alertly, sword in hand, but showing no interest in going into the battle cloud. This struck Cnán as exceedingly prudent—an eye on the periphery of the battlefield meant they would not be surprised—and in fact, as she watched, Yasper pointed his sword up at the other end of the field. He shouted to the others, sharp words that Cnán did not quite catch but were clearly an alarm.
Raphael and Rædwulf and Istvan, preoccupied with picking off stray Mongols trying to climb the hedge, had been paying no attention to the end of the field by the forest salient and the old farm hovels. Another squadron of Mongols had found their way through by that route. They were slicing furiously at the neck-high ropes that had been strung from tree to tree. Four riders had passed through and gathered at the head of the field, waiting for several more comrades to join them.
But when they heard Yasper’s shout and saw the archers turn and aim their way, they mounted a direct charge rather than wait to be picked off.
Istvan loosed a single shaft and then spurred his stallion right at them, slinging his bow over his shoulder and drawing his curved sword; he and the foremost of the charging Mongols clashed in the center of the field, blade on blade. The Mongol rode away, upright, but with a dismayed, fading look, missing half of his sword arm.
Two others went down with arrows in neck and chest, but the fourth somehow managed to thread his way through Istvan, the archers, Yasper, and Cnán. He galloped straight for Taran, who had his back turned. In the Mongol’s wake followed half a dozen more who had found their way over the same path as the first four.
The fighters in the smoke cloud had heard the commotion and become aware of the danger. Illarion and Feronantus came running, leaving Percival and Roger to guard what had now become the battle’s rear.
Cnán was captivated for some moments by the sight of Feronantus, on foot, entering into single combat with a charging Mongol knight on a horse. Feronantus tossed his sword into the air as if playing with it, letting it spin lazily end over end, and caught it by the flat of its blade, which he pinched between the balls of his fingers and the heel of his hand. Stepping aside so that the Mongol’s blow whistled past his chin, close enough to sever whiskers, he brought his sword’s hilt up, swinging it like a pickax so that the sharp end of the crossguard jammed upward into the rider’s armpit and caught there, jerking him backward off his horse.
Pinning the downed man with a foot on his neck, Feronantus reversed the sword again and drove it up beneath his helmet.
That was the last of the Mongols to die. But it was not the last of the Mongols.
One remained at the head of the field, near the old hovel. He half squatted on his saddle, bent over, one foot out of its stirrup and raised behind the pommel, elbow on that knee, fist supporting his chin—defiantly casual, confident. Watching. A stocky man, even by Mongol standards, attired in armor that was good but not flashy. He rode an excellent horse but wore no helmet, and his gray hair hung loose beneath the shaved tonsure that all of the Mongol warriors affected.
When Cnán first noticed him, Rædwulf was in the act of shooting an arrow at him, but the gray-haired Mongol leaned back, deftly raised his shield, and caught the shaft just short of his face. He peered over the shield, eyes glinting, and seeing there was not another arrow coming, he held his curved sword high and shook it in what might have been anger, or a salute. Communicating with his horse with guttural shouts and knee-and-heel work, he spun it around and galloped into the woods.
Istvan wheeled as if to give chase, but Feronantus, standing nearby, reached over and grabbed the horse’s rein. “Stop,” he said. “You will never catch him. Your mount is half dead. And besides, for now your rage has accomplished more than enough.”
Istvan seemed proud to have received this compliment, until, noting a grim look on Feronantus’s face, he followed the older man’s gaze to a place about ten strides away, where Taran lay on the ground, facedown, motionless.
CHAPTER 15:
A NOCTURNAL PURSUIT
Gansukh dozed, the rhythmic motion of his horse and the distant sound of the Orkhun River lulling him into a somnambulant state. His lower back and left shoulder still ached—the former having been bruised when he had leaped from the wall and used a ger to break his fall. The structure had collapsed under his weight, preventing him from serious injury, but he had sprawled into a bulky object inside the ger as everything had come tumbling down.
The jump had been the last in a litany of foolish actions undertaken in the last few hours, a list he had had ample time to relive in his mind as he tracked the assassin.
The assassin had fled Karakorum, as Gansukh had suspected he would, via the western gate, though he had opted for a much less traveled route—over the wall instead of through the market gate. A pile of timber and stone—building materials awaiting a location in which to be assembled—had afforded the assassin and Gansukh a shortcut to the outer wall. The assassin had—much more deftly—leaped from the pile of timbers to the crenellations of the wall, clambered up, and leaped again over the far side. When Gansukh—slamming himself against the battlement as if he were a boulder from a catapult—had managed to climb atop the wall, he had seen that the assassin had used a ger to break his fall.
There were many ger to choose from; the population of Karakorum always swelled to a density greater than the walls could hold when the Khagan was in residence. Many a clan pitched their tents in tiny villages along the outside of the walls. What had given Gansukh pause was the height.
He had stared down from a bird’s-eye view as tribespeople began to stir from their tents at the disturbance caused by the assassin landing on—and collapsing—a ger. His muscles had refused to move beyond the wall’s edge, his brain telling him it would be insane to follow, that the chase had to end here.
But he had forced his body to jump, and the rushing air had been exhilarating, so much so that he hadn’t noticed the ache in his back for several hours. Not until the excitement of the chase had given way to the endless drudgery of night tracking. And then his body had threatened to collapse from exhaustion.
The terrain around Karakorum was flat, mostly scrub and pasture; to the west lay the Orkhun River, a broad ribbon of water that bisected the valley. Typically the Khagan stayed at Karakorum for a few weeks during his transition from his summer to his winter residence, and during that time, the population of the city increased a hundredfold. Dozens and dozens of small clans made pilgrimages to the city to pay tribute to the Khagan; long caravans, weighted down with all manner of exotic goods, spilled into the trade district; priests, representing more religious sects than a man could reasonably count, erected shrines—some grandiose, some very austere—as physical manifestations of their spiritual inclinations; princes, courtiers, and displaced nobility sought to curry favor from the Khagan. They all arrived at Karakorum on hooved animals—horses, asses, oxen—and the ground around the city was trampled again and again.
But it had rained a few days ago, driving away the dust and softenin
g the ground, and Gansukh had been able to find a few hoofprints—sharp indentations in the ground pointing away from the city. The river was a natural barrier; the assassin wouldn’t try to ford it at night unless he knew exactly where to cross, and Gansukh doubted the man had that information. The tracks indicated the assassin’s intent: keep the river on his left, the city behind him. Hanging low in the night sky directly ahead were the Seven Gods. A simple route. Gansukh could track the man all night.
He kept his stolen horse pointed at the brightest of the Seven Gods and let it pick its own pace. Even though the ground was very flat, there was no reason to push the animal. It might step in a hole and injure itself, and an exhausted horse would be of no use to him. When he caught up with the assassin, a fresher horse might make all the difference in the final chase.
He would have to answer for taking the mount when he returned. There hadn’t been time to negotiate a loan—not that any true steppe warrior would loan his horse to a complete stranger who had just come running up to him. In some clans, horse thievery was punishable by death. He could only hope that catching the assassin might provide some extenuating circumstances by which the Khagan might grant him amnesty.
Gansukh sat up a little straighter as his horse’s gait changed. He peered ahead, straining to see anything in the near darkness. The sky was clear, and the moon was still in the sky, but he couldn’t see anything distinct on the plain around him. The river called to him and he tried to block out its noise; then the smell hit him and he realized what had spooked his horse.
Tightening his legs, he forced the horse closer until he was sure the large shape on the ground was just a horse and not a horse and rider, and then he let his horse shy away from the dead animal—its blood still wet and fresh on the ground. He kept his horse’s head canted to the left as he made a large circle around the corpse, trying to ascertain which direction the assassin had fled after killing his downed mount.