The Mongoliad: Book One

younger man’s interruption. He spoke in calm, measured tones. “Regrettable as it may be, an application of intense force can be used to reveal threats to the Khagan and to the stability of his rule.”

“Was she a threat?” Gansukh demanded.

Chucai’s gaze focused on Gansukh, his eyes narrowing. “An enemy is an enemy,” he said, his voice even more flat than before.

“That isn’t what I asked you,” Gansukh replied. “On the steppe, my clan always treated our enemies with respect, even those who came at us with swords and bows. She was unarmed. This…this was butchery.”

“She had no weapon,” Chucai agreed. “But you are being naive to think that she could not wield one.”

“Was that what she was doing here?” Gansukh asked. “Did she tell you she sought to assassinate the Khagan?”

Chucai looked at him quizzically. “Is that what she told you?”

“She didn’t tell me anything,” Gansukh replied quickly.

“You are a bad liar, Gansukh,” Chucai said, his gaze intensifying. “Has Lian taught you so little?”

“This isn’t about…” Gansukh started, a flush rising in his cheeks.

“What were your instructions from Chagatai Khan?” Chucai asked. “Were you supposed to go chasing after thieves? To interrogate foreign spies? Or were you just supposed to keep an eye on the Khagan’s drinking habits?”

Gansukh kept his mouth shut, biting back the torrent of words in his throat. He knew Chucai wasn’t interested in hearing them.

“What this woman wanted—what she sought to accomplish—is none of your concern,” Chucai said, dismissing Gansukh with a wave of his hand. “I have placed Lian at your disposal so that you may learn the ways of court—simply so that you may more readily accomplish your mission. Chasing after an intruder like you did last night is the hotheaded behavior of an uncivilized nomad from the steppes.”

“Uncivilized?” Gansukh snorted. “I wouldn’t have tortured her.” And he spun away from Master Chucai, leaving the Khagan’s throne room and its blood-tainted floor behind.

He didn’t like running away, but he had learned something from Lian: to know when he had lost the advantage. Master Chucai had twisted their conversation around to focus more on Gansukh than on what the woman had wanted. He didn’t dare push back. Chucai would see that he did know more than he was letting on.

Though did he know more?

He slipped a hand inside his deel and touched the lacquered box.

CHAPTER 18: THE PARTING OF THE VEIL

Later, after he had killed this giant steel cockroach, Zug would worry about the humiliation of being down on the ground. Of having been sent there with his own weapon! But he had not fought hundreds of combats in this and other such arenas without having acquired certain skills. One of which being that he could draw power from the energy of the crowd when it suited him, but ignore them altogether when they were only honking like excited geese.

Chevalier—as the crowd appeared to name this big Frank—had some experience with pole-arms, and while he wasn’t exceptionally proficient with the naginata, he was good enough. Zug knew he had been lucky—twice!—and such fortune was more than a dead man could hope to receive. He would not be afforded any more such chances.

Lying on the ground, he could not use his legs or his body to put force behind his blocks. He had to get in close, like the Frank had done.

Though unlike the Frank, he was flat on his back.

Zug curled like a prawn, contracting his chest and knees toward each other. As he arched his back to move across the ground, he flicked the blade of the Frank’s sword toward the closest target—the Frank’s right ankle.

Unlike the rest of his body, the Frank’s ankle wasn’t armored. The strike would either take his foot clean off or break bones and cripple him.

The Frank lifted his foot adroitly, just high enough to let the blade hurtle through underneath. But he was off balance and would have to plant the foot again before he could formulate his own attack. He had lost the initiative.

Zug kept the enormous sword moving. He whirled it all the way around as he shrimped across the ground again and brought it back for a second pass—the same strike, but with even greater power.

The point of the naginata drove into the ground in front of him and brought the sword’s movement to an abrupt stop. It was almost an exact mirror of how Zug had stopped the Frank’s second naginata strike a moment ago.

Levering himself up on his right elbow, Zug reached up with his left and grabbed the naginata’s wooden shaft, his hand only about a foot away from the Frank’s. The weapon was neutralized, and Zug had something to lean on.

The Frank’s left knee was exposed, at about the altitude of Zug’s head, in a perfect position to be kicked. Zug pulled his knees up almost to his chin and then lashed out at his opponent’s knee. The Frank, seeing an opportunity of his own to kick Zug in the head, had started to pivot on his left leg, but Zug was faster and drove the other’s knee sideways at the precise moment when all of his weight—and that of his massive coating of armor—was firmly supported by that leg.

The Frank collapsed to the ground, nearly landing on top of Zug. His right elbow was now on top of Zug’s left, immobilizing that arm, and his stinking armpit was almost in Zug’s face. Zug’s right arm, however, was shielded by his body and free to move.

Zug discarded the Frank’s sword, and in a well-practiced motion, he reached to the small of his back and drew out the tanto sheathed there. He brought it around the front of his body in a small, quick movement that the Frank could not even see and jammed it with all his strength upward into the Frank’s armpit. As he did so, he had to control an instinct to flinch away, since he expected a fountain of blood to erupt from the big artery that was pumping life into the Frank’s arm.

But nothing happened.

Haakon had been struck in some painful ways during his training, and Taran had made a point of teaching them to poke each other in certain spots, such as behind the point of the jaw, where it was especially unpleasant. But he had never felt anything quite as bad as what Zug did to his armpit.

He was no longer holding the shaft of the glaive; the impact of the thing in his armpit had made his hand go slack. He raised his arm, more to see whether it still worked than as a martial tactic, and was horrified to see a silver steel blade projecting from Zug’s right fist, going straight up to where it hurt.

Haakon’s mail had stopped a perfectly aimed thrust.

Then, much later than it should have, Haakon’s training came back to him; he grabbed Zug’s wrist with his left hand, palmed the blade with his right, and pushed in different directions. The hilt peeled up out of Zug’s fingers, pinky first, followed by the rest, and then the dagger was in his hand. Forearm-to-forearm pressure kept Zug’s right arm buckled and pinned against his chest. With no real planning or effort, Haakon found that he had brought the dagger into a position where its tip was only inches away from his opponent’s throat. A small movement of his hand and it would be over.

But he could not bring himself to kill this man. From a distance, swinging the huge glaive—that was one thing. But he was so close now that he could see, through the narrow eye slits of the demon mask, the bloodshot veins in the whites of Zug’s eyes.