Dragonwall (30 page)

A black streak flashed past Batu’s head, then something slapped the leather armor over his collarbone. He gasped in alarm, but felt no pain. Instinctively, he transferred his reins to his sword arm and felt for a wound with his free hand. He found a deep cut in the leather where an arrow had grazed his hauberk. As he realized how close he had come to perishing, the general’s chest tightened.

In the next instant, he left the deadly shower of arrows and entered the melee in front of the gate. A rider leveled a saber at his head. The general dropped his reins and raised his tao in a desperate block. As the two swords met, a terrific jolt ran along his arm. The barbarian found himself holding the hilt of a broken sword. Batu countered with a slash and felt his blade cut through the man’s leather armor.

Screaming, the Tuigan slid out of his saddle.

Batu grasped at his loose reins, but lost them. He was unsettled by the thought of having no control over his beast during the melee, but another barbarian slashed at him and the general gave up any hope of recovering the reins.

Batu turned the enemy blow aside, then slipped his blade along the Tuigan’s shoulder and opened a wound in the enemy’s throat. The barbarian gurgled and dropped his weapon, then kicked his horse onward. The melee became a whirl of flashing blades and dying men. Time after time, Batu blocked and countered, more often than not barely aware of whom he was fighting. Once, he barely ducked a blow from a soldier he had thought to be Shou until the man’s curved blade sailed past his head. Twice, only the glimpse of a double-edged chien stopped him from slaying one of his own men.

As the general lifted his aching arm for what felt like the thousandth time, the deep reverberating rumble of Tuigan signal drums rolled from the city. Batu’s opponent sliced at him with a wild cross-body swing, then wheeled his horse around and sprang away. The man was out of reach before the general could react.

To all sides, the Tuigan were following the lead of Batu’s adversary and turning away from the battle. A few pengs reacted quickly, downing the fleeing horsewarriors with vicious hacks or beheading them with efficient slashes. More often, however, the stunned Shou found themselves swinging at empty air while their foes galloped toward the city gates.

An instant later, a spontaneous shout of triumph rose from the Shou pengs. Though Batu suspected otherwise, to his soldiers the sudden withdrawal seemed as though the enemy had been routed. Screaming their war cries, the Shou tried to pursue.

When they set their heels to their horses, however, the result was pandemonium. Like Batu, most of them had dropped their reins during the battle, so they had little control over the excited beasts. The horses bolted in all directions, crashing into each other or sprinting away from the throng altogether.

Anxious to avoid being carried away by the anarchy plaguing his ranks, Batu quickly recovered his own horse’s reins. Once he felt in control of his mount, he turned his attention to Shou Kuan. The last of the Tuigan were slipping between the closing gates. There was no sign of Yamun Khahan or his bodyguard, and Batu realized that the enemy commander had reached the relative safety of the city.

The battle, for now, was over. Dead and wounded soldiers, both Tuigan and Shou, blanketed the ground between the knoll and the gate. Already, over a hundred pengs had dismounted and were efficiently dispatching the Tuigan wounded. It did not even cross their minds to take prisoners, save for the few officers who would prove useful for interrogation.

Atop the walls of Shou Kuan, thousands of Tuigan had gathered on the ramparts to watch the slaughter of their wounded comrades. Their faces betrayed no anger or shock, only cool detachment. Batu had no doubt that if the horsewarriors had been the ones outside the city, they would have done the same thing to the Shou survivors.

As the general scanned Shou Kuan’s rampart, however, he was interested in more than Tuigan faces. He was searching the brick-lined walls for a weakness that he could use to bring a quick end to the coming siege.

As Batu studied the fortifications, the Tuigan on the ramparts raised their bows. An instant later, a rain of black-shafted arrows brought an end to his inspection. Amidst a chorus of anguished wails and cries, he wheeled his horse about and galloped away from the city gate.

The morning sun touched the exterior of the tent, kindling an orange light inside. In his ire last night, Batu had driven away the engineers before they could stake the pavilion, so now its unsecured flaps slapped wildly in the late summer wind. The general’s silk shirt was soaked with sweat, but he barely noticed. As he had been doing since before dawn, he stood motionless, staring out the tent’s door.

The pavilion rested on a ridge overlooking Shou Kuan, giving Batu a clear view of the city’s walls and towers. The general was trying to think of a way to bypass those fortifications, but he kept losing his thoughts. Over sixty thousand dead and wounded soldiers, both Shou and Tuigan, lay in front of the city. They had fallen in a triangular pattern that reminded Batu of an arrow pointing at the main gate.

A cloud of vultures and other carrion birds were already savoring the feast, Tuigan archers stood atop the bell tower, using tethered arrows to pick off the fattest birds. They were meeting with uncanny success, but the horsewarriors’ accuracy did not surprise Batu. Yesterday, after the gate had closed on his unsuccessful bid to take the battle into the city, the enemy archers had killed ten thousand of his men in less than a minute. Given the precision of the barbarian bows, Batu counted himself lucky to be alive. He had dropped his sword as he fled, but that seemed a small price to pay for his life.

The other generals who had also ridden in the charge had not been so fortunate, however. Wang Kuo’s general lay outside, awaiting a proper cremation. Kao Shan’s fate remained unknown, though it was hardly a mystery. If the general had still been alive, someone would have brought him to the pavilion by now. The commanders of the Armies of Wak’an and Hai Yuan had both survived, for they had not been involved in the charge. They were seated on the far side of the tent, waiting for their new orders.

Kei Bot was not present, but Batu doubted that his second-in-command had fallen in battle, for the general should have been nowhere near the heavy fighting. Batu suspected Kei Bot was intentionally avoiding him, fearing retribution for his part in yesterday’s setback. The tactic irritated Batu almost as much as the failure itself, so the general from Chukei had sent his adjutant to find the missing commander.

The same suspicion kept returning to Batu’s mind: Kei Bot had deliberately neglected to give Wak’an the new orders. If so, the stocky general from Hungtze had committed a terrible military crime. Worse, he had lost the fight for Shou Lung and robbed Batu of his illustrious battle.

The General of the Northern Marches turned away from the door. Across the room, both of his subordinate generals rose to their feet expectantly.

Addressing the commander from Wak’an, Batu asked, “What did Kei Bot tell you yesterday?”

The two first degree generals cast uneasy glances at each other. Wak’an asked, “When, my commander?”

“Before the battle!” Batu snapped, pointing at Shou Kuan. “When do you think?” Despite his lack of patience, the general understood the man’s caution. When a plan went awry, Shou commanders often selected subordinates to serve as scapegoats, as Kwan had selected Batu himself after the battle of the sorghum field.

To reassure his subcommanders, Batu said, “Have no fear. The blame for this disaster rests on my shoulders alone, but I must know what went wrong.”

Wak’an relaxed. “He said you were going to charge the city.”

“And?” Batu prompted.

“He was to assume command until you returned.”

Batu’s stomach churned at the thought of Kei Bot commanding his armies. “Anything else?”

Wak’an shook his head.

As Batu started to ask his next question, he heard a small force of riders approach the pavilion and stop outside. A moment later, Pe entered the tent and bowed.

“General Kei,” the adjutant announced.

The general from Hungtze bustled into the pavilion behind Pe. Kei Bot’s bow was very shallow, and Batu did not bother to acknowledge it.

Instead, he turned back to the general from Wak’an. “Did General Kei tell you to follow me into the city?”

Before the man could answer, Kei Bot stepped forward and interrupted. “I did not.”

When Batu turned toward him, the stocky general met his commander’s gaze with a defiant stare. “I thought it best to hold both Wak’an and Hai Yuan in reserve,” Kei Bot continued, sneering at Batu. “Your plan was foolhardy and suicidal.”

“You cost us the battle,” Batu countered. “If Wak’an had been behind the Army of Wang Kuo, we would have overwhelmed the barbarians and taken the gate.”

Kei Bot ignored his commander and shifted his gaze to the other two generals. “When the barbarians massed for the attack, General Batu ignored my advice and refused to strike. Instead, he delayed until the city had all but fallen. Hoping to correct his mistake, our commander ordered a desperate charge. It was my duty to save what I could of our armies. At least the enemy is now trapped within Shou Kuan’s walls.”

“Until he chooses to leave,” Pe retorted.

“Mind your place, young fellow!” Kei Bot snapped, barely sparing the adjutant a sidelong glance.

Batu did not immediately leap to Pe’s defense, for he was pondering his subordinate’s strategy. He had expected Kei Bot to make excuses or lie about his failure yesterday. Instead, the stocky commander seemed proud of his disobedience.

Without speaking, Batu stepped forward and stood face-to-face with his mutinous subordinate. In a quick, fluid motion, the General of the Northern Marches pulled Kei Bot’s sword from its scabbard.

Staring at his sword’s bejewelled hilt, Kei Bot gasped, “What is the meaning of this?”

“You have deliberately disobeyed my orders, and now you’re fostering rebellion,” Batu said, his voice cold and even. “That is treason.”

“The emperor himself gave me command of the Army of Hungtze!” Kei Bot retorted, reaching for his weapon. “You wouldn’t dare suspend my commission!”

Batu sidestepped the clumsy lunge, then brought the blade up and drew it across the stocky general’s throat. “The penalty for treason is death,” he said.

Kei Bot clasped a hand over the wound, his mouth open in astonishment. The surprised mutineer dropped to his knees, blood oozing from between his fingers. Finally, he collapsed and pitched forward onto the dirt floor.

“What have you done?” gasped Wak’an.

“Kei Bot disobeyed a direct order,” Batu replied, nonchalantly cleaning the sword on the fallen man’s k’ai. “He cost us the victory.”

“Perhaps,” countered Hai Yuan, “but to execute a general without a formal inquiry….”

Batu shrugged, then sheathed Kei Bot’s ornate sword in his own empty scabbard. “He admitted his crimes,” the general said wearily. “I have chosen his punishment.”

Killing Kei Bot had cleared Batu’s mind, and he finally felt as if he could concentrate. “Pe, get me some brushes and paper,” he said, walking over to an empty table. “From what the prisoners say, there are over a hundred thousand Tuigan inside the city. We’d better do some planning.”

Batu’s two subordinates simply stared at him, astounded by his indifference to the man he had just executed. When they did not follow their superior to the table, the general from Chukei said, “Gentlemen, your thoughts may prove valuable.”

Both men shook their heads as if to clear them, then joined Batu. While Pe supervised the removal of Kei Bot’s body, the three surviving generals fell into a discussion of logistics, debating the best type of shelters to build for the months ahead, where they could secure a steady food supply, how their soldiers would fuel cooking and, eventually, heating fires, and a hundred other details.

By the end of the week, the Shou were making considerable progress toward establishing a siege camp. A group of scouts found a bank of clay on the shore of a nearby river, so the Chief of Works built kilns to fire bricks. Without straw or something similar to add to the mix, the bricks would not hold together very long. That did not trouble Batu, for he needed them to last only a few months. Win or lose, the siege would be over by winter.

Just outside arrow range, under the guidance of the engineers, the Army of Hai Yuan was encircling the city with a trench that would eventually become a defensive fortification. The Master of Ample Supplies solved the fuel problem by developing a program to collect dried horse dung, reserving the small supply of wood within riding of distance of camp for firing the kilns.

Still, the Shou could not solve all their problems easily. Batu sent a messenger to the summer palace asking for artillery and reinforcements, but he knew it would be at least six weeks before any substantial aid arrived. Food was especially scarce, for the barbarians had been camped outside Shou Kuan for nearly a month. To procure even small amounts of provisions, the Shou foraging parties had to travel over one hundred miles. When the riders did find a village that might have some grain, the lookouts mistook the filthy pengs for barbarians and burned the communal food-stores.

Batu and his subordinates were in his tent discussing these problems when Pe entered. “Excuse me, General,” the adjutant said, bowing low. “The Tuigan have dispatched a messenger and ten escorts under a flag of truce.”

The two first degree generals raised their eyebrows. “One thing is for certain,” said Wak’an. “The enemy isn’t surrendering this soon.”

“Not ever,” Batu replied. From the stories of his greatgrandfather, he knew that the Tuigan did not ask or grant mercy. That knowledge only made him more curious about what the envoy had to say. “Bring the messenger to my pavilion.”

Pe bowed, then turned to execute the order.

While he waited for the messenger, Batu supervised the rearrangement of the pavilion. The barbarians, he knew, were careful observers, and he wanted the messenger to return to Yamun Khahan properly impressed. The General of the Northern Marches had his chair placed in the center of the room. His subordinates’ chairs were placed to either side and slightly to the rear of his own. Finally, he had fifty senior officers summoned to the tent. After arranging them in a standing circle, he explained that no matter what he said or did, they were to remain solemn and perfectly quiet.