Authors: Conn Iggulden
The spy caught his breath, whispering a prayer he had not remembered for years, from before he had forgotten his true name. His heart broke for his people and his city.
All along the walls, figures in white had climbed like a line of ghosts. The Mongol warriors saw they were women and called out to them raucously, laughing and jeering at the distant figures. The spy shook his head to shut out the coarse sounds, tears sparkling in his eyes. Many of the girls held hands as they stared down at the enemy who had ridden right to the gates of the emperor’s city.
As the spy watched in frozen grief, they stepped off. The watching warriors fell silent in awe. From a distance, they dropped like white petals and even Kokchu shook his head, astonished. Thousands more took their place on the wall and stepped to their deaths without a cry, their bodies breaking on the hard stones below.
“If there is betrayal, the city and everything in it will be destroyed in fire,” the spy whispered to the shaman, his voice thick with sorrow.
Kokchu no longer doubted it.
CHAPTER 31
A
S THE WINTER DEEPENED,
children were born in the gers, many of them fathered by men away with the generals or one of the diplomatic groups Temuge had sent out. Fresh food was plentiful after the capture of the supply column, and the vast camp enjoyed a period of peace and prosperity they had never known before. Kachiun kept the warriors fit with constant training on the plain around Yenking, but it was a false peace and there were few men there who did not turn their eyes to the city many times each day, waiting.
Genghis suffered in the cold for the first time in his life. He had little appetite, but he had gained a layer of fat by forcing himself to eat beef and rice. Though he lost some of his gauntness, his cough remained, stealing his wind and infuriating him. For a man who had never known sickness, it was immensely frustrating to have his own body betray him. Of all the men in the camp, he stared most often at the city, willing it to fall.
It was in the middle of a night filled with swirling snow that Kokchu came to him. For some reason, the coughing was worse at night, and Genghis had become used to the shaman visiting him before dawn with a hot drink. With the gers as close as they were, his hacking grunts could be heard by all those around him.
Genghis sat up when he heard Kokchu challenged by his guards. There would be no repeat of the assassination attempt, with six good men around the great ger in shifts each night. He stared into the gloom as Kokchu entered and lit a lamp swinging from the roof. Genghis could not speak to him for a moment. Spasms racked his chest until he was red in the face. It passed, as always, leaving him gasping for breath.
“You are welcome in my home, Kokchu,” he whispered hoarsely. “What new herbs will you try tonight?”
It may have been his imagination, but the shaman seemed strangely nervous. Kokchu’s forehead glistened with sweat and Genghis wondered if he too was falling ill.
“Nothing I have will make you better, lord. I have tried everything I know,” he said. “I have wondered if there is something else that prevents you from becoming well again.”
“Something else?” Genghis asked. His throat tickled infuriatingly and he swallowed hard against it, the action now part of his usual manner, so that he gulped constantly.
“The emperor has sent assassins, lord. Perhaps he has other ways to attack you, ways that cannot be seen and killed.”
Genghis considered this, interested. “You think he has magic workers in his city? If the best they can do is a cough, I will not fear them.”
Kokchu shook his head. “A curse can kill you, lord. I should have considered it before this.”
Genghis sat back on his bed wearily. “What do you have in mind?”
Kokchu gestured for his khan to stand and looked away rather than see Genghis struggle up.
“If you will come to my ger, lord, I will summon the spirits and see if you are marked by some dark work of the city.”
Genghis narrowed his eyes, but he nodded. “Very well. Send one of my guards for Temuge to join us.”
“That is not necessary, lord. Your brother is not as accomplished in these matters. . . .”
Genghis coughed, a sound which he turned into a furious growl of anger at his failing body.
“Do as I tell you, shaman, or get out,” he said.
Kokchu tightened his mouth and bowed briefly.
Genghis followed Kokchu to the tiny ger, waiting in the snow and wind as Kokchu ducked inside. Temuge was not long in coming, accompanied by the warrior who had fetched him from his sleep. Genghis drew his brother aside where Kokchu could not hear.
“It seems I must endure his smoke and rituals, Temuge. Do you trust the man?”
“No,” Temuge snapped, still irritable at being woken.
Genghis grinned at his brother’s waspish expression in the moonlight. “I thought you might not, which is why you are here. You will accompany me, brother, and watch him all the while I am in his ger.” He gestured to the warrior standing nearby and the man came quickly.
“You will guard this ger, Kuyuk, against anyone who might disturb us.”
“Your will, lord,” the warrior replied, bowing his head.
“And if Temuge or I do not walk out, your task is to kill the shaman,” Genghis said. He felt Temuge’s gaze on him and he shrugged. “I am not a trusting man, brother.”
Taking a deep breath of the freezing air, Genghis stifled his twitching throat and entered the ger of the shaman, Temuge behind him. There was barely room for three in that tiny space, but they sat on the silk floor with their knees touching, waiting to see what Kokchu could do.
Kokchu lit cones of powder in gold dishes on the floor. They sparked and spat, producing a thick cloud of narcotic smoke. As the first wisps reached Genghis he doubled over in a fit of coughing. Every gasp made it worse and Kokchu grew visibly nervous that the khan would collapse. At last Genghis took a clean breath and felt coolness in his tortured throat, like stream water on a hot day. He took another breath and another, rejoicing at the numbness that flowed in him.
“That is better,” he admitted, staring at the shaman with bloodshot eyes.
Kokchu was in his element, despite Temuge’s hard gaze on him. He produced a pot of the black paste and reached out to Genghis’s mouth. He jerked as a hand snapped around his wrist.
“What is that?” Genghis said, suspiciously.
Kokchu swallowed. He had not seen him move. “It will help you to break the bonds of flesh, lord. Without it, I cannot bring you onto the paths.”
“I have had it,” Temuge said suddenly, his eyes brighter than before. “It does no harm.”
“You will not, tonight,” Genghis replied, ignoring his brother’s disappointment. “I want you to observe, Temuge, that is all.”
Genghis opened his mouth and endured the shaman’s black-nailed fingers rubbing the paste into his gums. At first there was no effect, but as Genghis began to mention this, he noticed the dim light of the shaman’s lamp had become brighter. He stared at it in wonderment and the light swelled to fill the little ger, bathing them all in gold.
“Take my hand,” Kokchu whispered, “and walk with me.”
Temuge watched mistrustfully as his brother’s eyes rolled up in his head and he slumped. Kokchu had closed his own so that Temuge felt oddly alone. He winced as Genghis’s mouth flopped open, made black by the paste. The silence stretched and Temuge lost some of his tension as he remembered his own visions in that small ger. His gaze drifted to the pot of black paste, and with the two men deep in a trance, he replaced the lid and made it disappear inside his deel. His servant Ma Tsin had secured a regular supply for a time before the man vanished. Temuge had long ceased to wonder where he had gone, though he suspected Kokchu had some hand in it. There were other servants to be found among the Chin soldiers Genghis had taken in, though none were as adept.
Temuge had no way to judge the passage of time. He sat for an age in perfect stillness, then was jerked out of his reverie by Kokchu’s voice, hoarse and distant. The words filled the ger and Temuge inched back from the rush of nonsense syllables. Genghis too stirred at the sound, opening glassy eyes as Kokchu began to talk louder and faster.
Without warning, the shaman collapsed, breaking his hold on Genghis’s hand. Genghis felt the fingers slip away and blinked slowly, still deep in the grip of the opiate.
Kokchu lay on his side, spittle dribbling from his mouth. Temuge stared at him in distaste. Without warning, the babble of alien sounds ceased and Kokchu spoke without opening his eyes in a firm, low voice.
“I see a white tent raised before the walls. I see the emperor talking to his soldiers. Men pointing and pleading with him. He is a little boy and there are tears on his face.”
The shaman fell silent and Temuge leaned close to him, worried that his stillness meant the man’s heart had given way. He touched the shaman’s shoulder lightly, and as he did so, Kokchu jerked, writhing, producing sounds that had no meaning. Once more he fell silent and the low voice spoke again.
“I see treasures, a tribute.
Thousands
of carts and slaves. Silk, weapons, ivory. Jade in mountains, enough to fill the sky. Enough to build an empire. It gleams so!”
Temuge waited for more, but no more came. His brother had slumped against the wicker-braced wall of the ger and was snoring softly. Kokchu’s breathing relaxed and his clenched fists fell loose as he too slept. Once more Temuge was alone and in awe of what he had heard. Would either of the men remember the words? His own recollection of visions was patchy at best, but he recalled that Kokchu had not taken the black paste into his own mouth. No doubt he would tell the khan everything he had seen.
Temuge knew he could not shake his brother awake. He would sleep for many hours, long after the camp had risen around him. Temuge shook his head wearily. Genghis was sick of the siege as the end of the second year approached. He might well grasp at any chance. Temuge grimaced to himself. If Kokchu’s vision was true, Genghis would turn to him in future, in all things.
Temuge considered cutting Kokchu’s throat as he lay in sleep. For a man who dabbled in dark magics, it would not be too hard to explain away. Temuge imagined telling Genghis how a red line appeared on Kokchu’s throat while he watched in horror. It would be Temuge who told Genghis what the shaman had seen.
Temuge drew his knife slowly, making no sound. His hand shook slightly, even as he told himself to act. He leaned over the shaman, and at that moment, Kokchu’s eyes snapped open, warned by some sense. He jerked his arm to knock the blade aside, trapping it in the folds of his robe.
Temuge spoke quickly. “You live then, Kokchu? I thought for a moment that you had been possessed. I was ready to kill whatever spirit had taken you from your body.”
Kokchu sat up, his eyes sharp and alert. A sneer touched his face. “You fear too much, Temuge. There is no spirit that can harm me.” Both men knew the truth of the moment, but for their own reasons, neither was willing to force it into the open. They stared at each other as enemies, and at last, Temuge nodded.
“I will have the guard carry my brother back to his ger,” he said. “Will his cough ease, do you think?”
Kokchu shook his head. “There is no curse that I could find. Take him, as you wish. I must think about what the spirits revealed to me.”
Temuge wanted to prick the man’s vanity with a barbed comment, but he couldn’t think of one and crawled out of the door to fetch the guard for his brother. Snow whirled around him as the burly warrior hefted Genghis onto his shoulders, and Temuge’s expression was bitter. No good could come of Kokchu’s rise, he was certain.
Zhi Zhong woke abruptly at the clatter of sandals on a hard floor. He shook his head to clear it of sleep and ignored the spasm of hunger that remained with him at all hours. Even the emperor’s court was suffering in the famine. The day before, Zhi Zhong had eaten only a single, watery bowl of soup. He had told himself the floating slivers of flesh were the last of the emperor’s horses, slaughtered months before. He hoped it was true. As a soldier he had learned never to refuse a meal, even if the meat was rotten.
He stood, throwing aside his blankets and reaching for his sword as a servant entered.
“Who are you to disturb me at this hour?” Zhi Zhong demanded. It was still dark outside and he was drugged with exhausted sleep. He lowered his blade as the servant threw himself down, touching his head to the stones.
“My lord regent, you are summoned to the presence of the Son of Heaven,” the man said without looking up. Zhi Zhong frowned in surprise. The boy emperor, Xuan, had never dared to summon him before. He repressed the twitch of anger he felt until he knew more, calling for his slaves to dress and bathe him.
The servant quivered visibly as he heard the call. “My lord, the emperor said to come at once.”
“Xuan will wait on my pleasure!” Zhi Zhong snapped, terrifying the man further. “Wait outside for me.” The servant scrambled to his feet and Zhi Zhong considered starting him on his way with a kick.
His own slaves entered, and despite his response, Zhi Zhong had them hurry. He chose not to bathe and merely had his long hair tied behind with a bronze clasp so that it hung down his back over his armor. He could smell his own sweat and his mood soured even further as he wondered if the emperor’s ministers were behind this summons.
When he left his rooms, with the servant trotting ahead of him, he could see the grayness of dawn from every open window. It was his favorite time of day, though again, his stomach clenched.
He found the emperor in the audience chamber where Zhi Zhong had killed his father. As the lord regent passed through the guards, he wondered if anyone had told the boy he sat on the same chair.
The ministers were in attendance like a flock of brightly colored birds. Ruin Chu, first among them, was standing at Xuan’s right hand while the boy sat on the throne, which dwarfed his tiny frame. The first minister looked nervous and defiant at the same time, and Zhi Zhong was curious as he approached and went down on one knee.
“The Son of Heaven summoned me and I have come,” he said clearly into the silence. He saw Xuan’s eyes fasten on the sword at his hip, and he guessed the boy knew very well what had happened to his father. If so, it made the choice of room a statement, and Zhi Zhong mastered his impatience until he knew what had given the emperor’s birds their new confidence.
To his surprise, it was Xuan himself who spoke.
“My city is starving, lord regent,” he said. His voice trembled slightly, but firmed as he went on. “With the lottery, perhaps as many as a fifth have died, including those who threw themselves from the walls.”
Zhi almost snapped an answer at the reminder of that shameful incident, but he knew there had to be more for Xuan to have dared to call him to his presence.
“The dead are not buried, with so many mouths to feed,” the emperor continued. “Instead we must endure the shame of eating our own, or joining them.”
“Why have I been summoned here?” Zhi Zhong said suddenly, tired of the boy’s airs. Ruin Chu gasped at his effrontery in interrupting the emperor. Zhi Zhong cast a lazy glance in the man’s direction, hardly caring.