The Mongoliad: Book One

or look away, she swallowed heavily and spoke. Her grasp of the language was rough, her accent clipped, and her words enunciated too clearly as if she had never spoken any of these words more than once or twice before. “You make mistakes. I am not a killer. Your Khagan is alive.”

“I don’t believe you.”

She pursed her lips, defiant, but she didn’t try to convince him. As if it didn’t matter what he thought. The truth would be the same either way.

Gansukh shifted his weight, lowering the tip of the sword so that it rested against her breastbone. Just enough that she didn’t think he was a fool. He didn’t believe her—not entirely—but there were a number of details that were starting to clamor for his attention. If she was an assassin, what had been her tool of choice? Not this sword. It was plain and functional—a horse rider’s sword—and to be used effectively, one had to be bigger and stronger than she appeared to be. Poison? If so, had she discarded the poisoned weapon? There were no visible pockets or pouches on her plain black garments.

“Roll over,” Gansukh said. When she didn’t move, he elaborated. “I want to search you. There must be a knife…”

She shook her head, but complied when that refusal made no impression on Gansukh. Keeping her hands raised, she shifted onto her hips and rolled toward Gansukh, forcing him to pull the blade back or cut her. Silently cursing at himself for not being more explicit, he shuffled a half step in reverse to keep his measure the same. As he moved, he rocked back onto his toes so that he was no longer on his knees. Anticipating her.

She tried to bolt when she got her hands on the ground. Half running/half crawling, she scuttled away from him and nearly got upright before he body-slammed her again and took her to the ground. She gasped as she felt his full weight, and she squirmed until he punched her twice in the lower back with the hilt of the sword. She lay still after that, head turned, cheek pressed against the dirt, glaring at him.

He ran his hands roughly over her body, feeling through the fabric of her clothes. She was thin and angular, more like a bird than a woman, but he felt nothing hard enough to be a knife. And nothing soft enough to be a pouch. He grabbed at her jacket, meaning to pull her over and search her front, but he stopped as his hand encountered something hard. He tried to tug her jacket around without having to roll her over, and she reacted, violently bucking under him. He slammed his elbow against her spine and put the sword blade against the side of her head.

“Lie still,” he hissed when she quieted down.

He continued to yank at her jacket so that he could get his hand inside it, but the angle was all wrong. As he struggled to get the jacket open, he heard the rumbling sound of hooves.

Glancing over his shoulder, he spotted a quartet of lights bouncing across the plain. Torches, held by a search party. His prisoner started to squirm again and he leaned against her body, hissing at her again. Gansukh felt her relax, and together they lay as flat as possible on the open ground, hoping the riders wouldn’t notice them—he, because he wasn’t ready to give up his prize; she, because while she might still escape one captor, more only reduced her chance of success.

There were five of them, riding fast with torches, and they passed on their right, seemingly intent only on what lay directly in their path. Gansukh was about to congratulate himself on remaining undiscovered when one of them suddenly reined in his horse and shouted at the others. Gansukh’s heart sank when he heard the rider’s voice.

Munokhoi.

CHAPTER 16: THE MAN FROM ROME

Dietrich von Gruningen had officiated at a number of tournaments since becoming Heermeister—the military master of the Fratres Militiae Christi Livoniae, the Livonian Brothers of the Sword. He was no stranger to the tedium that surrounded such proceedings. But this gladiatorial spectacle, sponsored by one of the Khans of the invading Mongolian army, was not like the others. It was similar in the sense that crowds did gather to witness feats of arms between single combatants, but unlike other tournaments, which were typically over in one or two days, the duration of this one depended on its host’s willingness to continue watching.

The invitation, which he and the masters of other martial orders had responded to, spoke of a tournament to decide the fate of Europe. Representatives would meet in single combat, but it hadn’t been clear what would be the spoils of victory. The Khan—Onghwe, a son of the Khan of Khans, Ogedei—had suggested he would spare Europe if he lost. But he was only one of several generals—and not even the most powerful—who was threatening the West. What was the real purpose of these games?

Sport, His Most Holy Father had said when Dietrich had asked that question two months earlier, during his audience with the Pope in Rome. It is a distraction they can afford to entertain themselves with. It speaks of how little regard they have for us. After the devastation they visited upon good Christian soldiers at Legnica and Mohi, they do not fear our martial strength.

What is the purpose, then, of participating in this mockery at all? Dietrich had asked.

The Great Khan wishes to extend his dominion, Pope Gregory IX had finally replied. Like all conquerors before him—men of small vision who thought land and tribute were what defined an empire. These are matters that do not concern us.

What does? he had asked.

His answer was not to come from the pontiff himself, who had fallen senseless. His eyes remained open, and his chest still rose and fell, though the motion was difficult to discern beneath the voluminous robes and blankets that covered him. The room faced west, and the windows were wide and tall enough that the sun looked in on the room for most of the day. He had been standing there for but a few minutes, and his back was already warm. The Pope had been there much longer, and still his body shivered slightly.

Dietrich had not been able to shake a sense of foreboding at how frail the Bishop of Rome had become. The weight of the Church was immense, and it slowly crushed every man who took the office, but in the year since his last audience, Gregory IX looked as if the life were being wrung out of him like juice from a grape.

The persistence of the Church, Cardinal Fieschi had said as he led Dietrich back to the main hall of the Lateran Palace. To answer your question, we are concerned with the persistence of the Church, for it is the soul of the people. We are the rock to which they cling when everything around them is swept away.

What am I to do? Dietrich had asked, seeking the answer to why he had been summoned to Rome, an answer the frail Pope had failed to offer during the brief audience.

Make certain of our survival. It would be best if the Mongolian rabble does not encroach any farther into Christendom. Should that be impossible to avoid—and we realize such indolence on the part of this horde is, indeed, most unlikely—how do you reduce an army’s strength before it arrives at your gates?

By making the journey costly, Dietrich had replied. Every league they march is a league farther from their homes, a league farther into territory that they do not control. Ground they must earn.

Redirecting an unstoppable army and whittling away at its host of fighting men until the cost of conquest was too high was a seemingly impossible puzzle, one he pondered daily—nay, hourly—until his arrival at Legnica. The circus itself seemed like nothing more than a passing fancy, an idler’s summertime indolence. In the fall, the Mongol hosts would have finished resupplying and would be looking south for warmer climates to conquer. How was he to turn their attention away from Rome?

And then a solution presented itself. North of the killing fields and the recently erected arena—as well as the