Swords From the East (17 page)

Thereafter no men of Cathay ventured in the ravine where the dead bodies lay under the tree, and the Taidjuts made a new road around the place. Only Chung-hi, struggling against his deep superstition, passed that way to make sure that his messenger and his hired slayers, the Taidjuts, were beyond all doubt powerless to reveal his plot.

He was well content: those who could have betrayed him were dead, Mingan was powerless, even though living, and the prestige of Chung-hi was greater than ever. Only one thing troubled him.

In the heavens Mingan's birth star glowed in a favorable constellation, and the northern warriors whispered among themselves that the time would come when the Prince of Liao-tung would return to dwell among them again, and take his place as leader. Chun, hi shifted uneasily when he thought of it.

III

The Master of the Horde

For several days Temujin and his two companions passed swiftly over wide prairies where the dry grass rose high as the horses' noses.

Here were no villages, but only clusters of gray, Tatar tents visible at times on the horizon, and scattered herds of ponies and cattle. Temujin avoided these and pressed on without halting, except to rest the horses. He and Burta slept in the saddle, and Mingan from very weariness learned to do likewise.

The son of Yesukai touched no food for four days, and Mingan would have fared badly if the Mongol boy had not ordered Burta to share her dried mutton and raisins-with which her saddle bags were filled-with him. This, seeing that the prisoner was suffering, she did willingly enough, and even prevailed on Temujin to take off his bonds on the morning of the second day.

Mingan was too tired to think of trying to escape from the Mongol that night even if he could have stolen away from the keen eyes of the children of the plains.

The third day, Mingan judged that they covered four hundred li"
by the late afternoon. Temujin's will to go on would suffer no hindrance; his eyes were smoldering, as if he were faced by a visible foeman. It was a hard race, that ride over the plateau of the northern Gobi; to Mingan it was torment. But Temujin was racing against time, and the hand of death.

"Look toward the sun," said Burta to Mingan.

The chief's son already had seen what she noticed-a long line of dust ahead of them. They were on a small knoll in the prairie, and the wind from the west whipped at the girl's dark tresses, and dried the sweat on Temujin's hollow cheeks. Mingan watched the dust draw nearer, revealing dark specks that proved to be horsemen, riding along a front of a half-mile.

As the gap between the strangers and Temujin closed, Mingan saw that there were other lines, evenly spaced, behind the first-several thousand riders in all. In the center of the moving square above the film of dust that rose from the dry soil appeared a long pole, topped by the antlers of a wapiti-a rude enough standard.

"Tatars," said Burta briefly.

They rode not close together with the slow pace of the chargers of the mailed Cathayan cavalry but in squadrons of a hundred, each with its leader in front. They were thick-set men, brown of skin and clad in black, rawhide armor, coated with dust, and Min.-an looked in vain for supply train or pack-animals. The Tatars had goatskin saddle bags tied to the peaks of the high saddles, and two bows slung at their shoulders, with a sword or ax in their belts, and every warrior had a spare pony.

As if the three wanderers on the knoll had been an islet and the riders a succession of swells, the Tatars dashed up and divided to pass them. Mingan caught glimpses of scarred faces, and occasionally steel ring mail gleaming under flying fur cloaks.

"Hai, ahatou! Koke Mongku, hai! (Ho brothers, warrior Mongols, ho!)"

The lines took up the shout as they came abreast, and echoed the war
cry of the Horde. Mingan stared at them, aware of power in the steady gait of the ordered ranks, in the deep voices of the riders. It was his first glimpse of the fighting men of the Horde that was made up of Tatars, Mongols, Merkets, and even the strong Keraits*
of the west, the desert tribes of the south, and the reindeer folk of the white regions in the north-but of which the Khan of the Mongols had always been the leader.

As the standard passed close to them, a burly rider, hatless and whitehaired, galloped up, and reined in sharply by Temujin.

"Are you hale and well?" asked the boy quietly, raising his hand in greeting. "0 Mukuli, Khan of the Tatars, are your cattle fat, and your herds numerous? Have your sheep fat tails, and is the grazing good in your land?"

"Hale and well," growled the old chieftain, responding to the customary salutation, while his black eyes scanned the three keenly, thereafter shifting to the mist on the horizon through which the sun flamed dully. "Why are you in my land, far from the Three Rivers?"

"I have slain the Taidjut khan who put poison in Yesukai's

Mukuli considered this, with approval.

"Good! A snake has been trodden down." He pulled at his mustache thoughtfully. "It is well that you did this. You are a slender arrow, but you are Khan of the Mongols and Master of the Horde. Yesukai died last night. The women are wailing in the death tent."

The corners of Temujin's lips drew down, and his shoulders stiffened. Beyond this he displayed no emotion. Mukuli, squinting at the setting sun, fingered his reins.

"Do not stop to pull thorns from your feet, or stones from the hoofs of your ponies. Go swiftly to your ordu, your encampment."

When Temujin made no response the Tatar explained that the orkhons, the chieftains, who had assembled at Yesukai's side on learning of his illness, were talking now of dispersing to their various tribes. They had acknowledged the leadership of Temujin's father, not without some discontent-for Yesukai had been more of a leader in the field than a chief of a confederacy.

Now that the mastery of the Horde had fallen to Temujin, most of the khans declared that they would not be ruled by a boy.

"What said you, Mukuli?"

"When Yesukai sat on the white mare's skin at the head of the kurultai, the council, I was his sworn brother, as was Wang Khan, master of the Keraits."

"He who is called by some Prester John of Asia," nodded Temujin. "And now?"

"Can a nursling carry the yak-tail standard?" asked the Tatar dryly. "Nay, it is heavy. It was for this talk that I left the kurultai to seek you, hearing that you had crossed the Tatar grazing lands to follow the path of vengeance into Cathay. It is one thing to slay a thieving Taidjut; it is another to lead a million warriors."

"What is your mind?" observed the boy again, quietly.

"True, the Tatars are knitted to Mongols as flesh is to bone. As a friend, the tents of my people are open to you-we will give horses and food without stint. But if you seek to be verily Master of the Horde, and my overlord, then first you must prove your worth, as good metal is tested. Then will I place my standard behind yours. That is my word, and by the white horse Kotwan I will not unsay it."

"Am I a dog, to come to your heel?" Temujin's lips drew back a little from his teeth.

Mukuli nodded, as if he had expected such an answer, and watched with interest the sun disappear behind a pall of gray.

"Yesukai, who was my comrade, gave me a message for your hearing. 'Go,' he said, 'to Wang Khan, in the south and west of the Horde, who holds the castle above the sands. He is the king called Prester John and he will aid you, being wise in all things, and my friend."'

Temujin shook his head.

"Was Prester John at the council?"

"Nay, for he goes not beyond the walls of his castle, wherein you must seek him."

Mukuli gathered up his reins. "The wild goose, Temujin, takes flight in the face of the storm, but the snow pigeon seeks safety in the earth, when the winter is hard, among its kind. Turn not aside from Prester John, who is shrewder even than Jamuka, our Master of Plotting. You and he and I could conquer the world."

"I have heard your word. May the rain make your pastures green; may the way be open before you."

He lifted his hand to his head and dropped it to his lips, in farewell. Mukuli, ill-pleased at this sign of authority, glanced at him briefly, hesi- rated as if he would urge him further to make the alliance he suggested, and then wheeled his horse away.

"May you come in peace to the end of your journey," he growled over his shoulder.

The standard-bearer and the group of officers who had awaited him at a little distance put their horses in motion. The last line of the horsemen, which had halted behind their khan, swept past with a shout.

"Hai, ahatou! Koke Mongku hail "

A drumming of hoofs on the baked earth, a taste of dust in the air, and the array of the Tatars left them.

Mingan had thought of the Gobi as a waste of sand. In the last day's ride they galloped over a level sward, sparkling with daisies, where the rarefied air was like wine. They crossed a river near a range of blue mountains, and in the early afternoon came to the ordu of the dead Yesukai-a city of tents in a shallow valley, where large herds of horses were grazing under guard of boys little younger than Temujin.

At the crest of the valley Burta dismounted and picked out her pony from the small group that had survived the journey.

"It is better that I should depart to Podu's lands," she said to the Mongol. "My father would be angry, if he has been drinking kumiss and sees me come to the kurultai at your side. Are you-" she lowered her eyes-"pleased with me, or angry?"

Temujin had been silent all day, and now he frowned. "Kai, so you fear to be seen at my side!"

Burta flushed and tossed her head, the silver earrings jingling.

"I go where I will and now, because I am weary, seek the path to my home."

As Temujin watched her without comment, her flush deepened.

"Because you are Master of the Horde you cannot summon or dismiss me at pleasure. You can be angry, if you like-it is all one to me!"

The boy suddenly drew his horse close to her and placed his hand under her chin so that he could see into her eyes.

"Little Burta, I am pleased with you."

"Verily! The king is kind!"

She tried to free herself, and, failing, fell to whimpering. Temujin released her.

"I will come to your father's tents before another summer has passed."

Burta glanced at him fleetingly, and turned away. Yet Mingan noticed that she rode slowly, and presently she called over her shoulder softly-"I will pray that the spirit of Yesukai finds peace in the sky-world."

Nearing the tent village, Temujin waited until the girl was lost to sight and then turned his ponies loose into a herd belonging to the Mongols. Mingan noticed that his hands trembled a little and the pulse in his brown throat beat furiously as they rode in among the tents, prepared to face the council that sat by the death tent of Yesukai.

Word of their coming had preceded them, for men lined the path they took-squat warriors, bow-legged but massive of shoulder, with the skin of their faces wrinkled like dried grapes. They wore high boots and walked with the short, clumsy step of those more at home in the saddle than on foot. They were armed with bows, javelins, and short iron maces. As Temujin passed, paying no attention to them, they grunted in pleasure and tried to touch his horse or stirrup. These, Mingan learned later, were the warriors of Yesukai's clan, the backbone of the Mongols.

But as the young chief neared the largest tent, a cavalcade of riders, hemmed in by the assembled throngs, barred his way.

The leader of the horsemen, an old desert man brilliantly clad in a crimson Turkish khalat and a purple, plush cap, seemed ill at ease at seeing the pair.

"Greetings, Podu," observed Temujin. "Has the fire of the council died out, and is the cask of liquor empty that you mount to leave the ordu before the new khan comes to take his seat?"

Podu's fine brown eyes were moist with the warmth of wine, and his white teeth bared in a smile.

"Nay. Temujin, I have paid honor to the dead hero Yesukai, your sire. I have left a fine white horse to be slain on his grave, so that he can ride fittingly in his journey through the sky-world to the banquet hall of the dead palladins. As for the kurultai-" he fingered his gold earrings slyly- "that is quite broken up, quite."

"How, Khan of the Gipsies?" Temujin's eyes narrowed.

"Why, like a raven's nest when the black sandstorm sweeps it away. Kai, it is so! Mukuli has turned his back, and the khan of the spear-bearing Merkets, and the chief of the reindeer folk have ridden off on their horned beasts. They bayed like dogs-" old Podu swayed in his saddle and his words were twisted-"and slunk off like foxes. May their heads be cut off and salted down-"

"But the ten Mongol khans abide my coming?"

Podu shook his head mysteriously.

"The half of them have gone back to their clans saying that they will not follow in battle a nursling yet smeared with milk."

The veins in the boy's forehead stood out, and the muscles of his arms tightened. Podu started and, eyeing the motionless throng of warriors, sobered visibly.

"Nay, Temujin. It is only that your khans grumble like camels when the load is bound on. I would not leave your side, but I must assemble my trade caravans before the autumn storms."

Temujin's fingers caught at the arrows in the quiver at his saddle-peak, and his men surged forward, waiting for his word. But his glance went to the valley's side where Burta had said farewell, and he sat silent a moment, thinking.

"Pass, Podu, and seek your tents. Yet give up to me the gold tablet that marks you for an orkhon, a palladin of Yesukai. When you have left this camp you will be no longer a khan of the Horde."

Slowly Podu obeyed, his eyes watchful. With a sigh he handed over a small square of gold, inscribed with writing, hefting it reluctantly as he did so. Temujin put it into his girdle and waited until the nomads had ridden off before he sought the council tent, and dismounted.

A tall chieftain, clad in rich nankeen, with a sapphire-studded scabbard and a sable hat, came out of the tent and held his horse, smiling a welcome.