Lords of Grass and Thunder (11 page)

“And which fool girl would that be?” she prodded, knowing very well but wanting him to say it. Sechule wasn’t the only woman among the clans who had borne him a child.

“Eluneke.” He had thought that fostering the girl with a distant family of small holdings and few political aspirations would protect him from those wishing to reach Chimbai-Khan through Mergen’s offspring. He hadn’t anticipated this.

“Ah. That one.” Lady Bortu twitched a shoulder in a gesture that someone watching from the floor might take as adjusting the embroidered cuffs of her blue silk coat. Mergen knew better. “She was a pretty little thing,” Bortu mused. “But her mother was nothing special, as I recall, and her people haven’t been heard from since disease took their horses. How long has that been? Long enough to have come to our attention if they had any grit at all. I thought you had abandoned her.”

“So I wanted it to seem, if anyone discovered her parentage. Her foster family knew better than to allow a poor boy to court her. I gave her no dowry or presents to make certain she would have no suitors from among the better-placed clans. Why they gave her to a shaman escapes my understanding completely.”

“It would seem your ruse worked too well. If I’d known you still had an interest, I would have kept my eye open for a likely match. And her foster family might have been more inclined to keep her when her mother died.” Which all sounded perfectly innocent, except that Bortu seemed to know an awful lot about a girl in whom she claimed no interest.

Servants were approaching with heavily laden trays. The delicious smells reminded him of how ravenous he was, but he motioned them away. More important to finish this, now, with his mother.

“Did you know about the shaman business?” he asked her. “Was it your doing?”

“I thought you were the clever son. Don’t be a fool if you can help it.” Lady Bortu sniffed with a flair of nostrils to show her disdain for his questions. She didn’t deny his charge, however.

“But you knew.”

“It didn’t seem to matter.” Gnarled old hands still moved gracefully in a dismissive gesture, just her fingertips showing beneath her deep silk cuffs. “If you do have your eye on her, tell me and I will see what kind of match I can make for her.”

“I thought perhaps the Emperor of Shan.”

“The Shan Empire is very far away.” The Lady Bortu made a sour face. The capital city, she meant, at the heart of the empire: a distance his daughter would cross but once in her lifetime. “And the emperor’s affection is fixed elsewhere, or so the whispers say in camp.”

Mergen had seen with his own eyes the Emperor Shou’s infatuation. Lady SienMa, mortal goddess of war in a foreign religion, held Shou’s heart between her sharp red fingernails.

“Not as first wife, of course,” he conceded, “but more than a concubine. Maybe even second wife.” In the great capital of the Shan Empire, a daughter of the khan might take no slight at being second to a goddess. For the emperor’s part, if anyone might find happiness with a woman of shamanistic tendencies it would be one who courted war in a woman’s form.

Other options remained to them, of course. “We owe Tinglut a sign of good faith,” he reminded his mother. “He’s lost a daughter in his dealings with the clans; it seems only fitting to give him a Qubal daughter as wife.”

“Ah, yes, I meant to tell you. A messenger from the Tinglut-Khan arrived while you were hunting. Old Tinglut has one of his sons on the march to negotiate a match to bind the continued peace between us. I think they will be unwilling to send us a second princess.”

Somewhere on the grassy plain between the Tinglut and the Qubal clans, a bamboo snake-demon had taken the place of the Tinglut princess meant to be Chimbai-Khan’s second wife. The princess doubtless lay in some rocky hollow, dead of the fanged tooth of the demon. Tinglut-Khan had come to accept that the snake-demon, and not her Qubal husband, had done away with his daughter. With Chimbai’s death at the same poisoned tooth and demons pressing them in the recent war, Tinglut had thrown his troops in with Mergen’s, but their truce remained uneasy.

“I sent the messenger to find food and rest in the city, with an invitation for his prince to come at his pleasure.” Lady Bortu watched him with a keen eye for how he would react to the news. He was surprised only by the speed with which Tinglut-Khan had moved, however.

“A daughter of the Qubal given as a wife to the Tinglut-Khan might ease those last suspicions,” he mused.

“The Tinglut are rich enough,” Lady Bortu agreed with a frown that meant she was turning over all the possibilities in her cunning old mind, “but the old khan’s looks are lacking and his temper is not sweeter. Eluneke is not so different from other girls that she will thank you for such a match, however many furs and jewels he showers on her. We must ask ourselves, how grateful will the old khan be for an unhappy wife?”

Mergen agreed for reasons of his own. He wasn’t ready to throw away Eluneke on a lesser power like the Tinglut. Yesugei had a daughter of marriageable age who might trade a husband’s less-than-perfect looks for a rise in rank, however, and Prince Tayy had a sister of seven summers or so fostered among the clans. They might betroth her to the old khan as a promise they might never need to keep.

Lady Bortu had continued down her own track, however. “A son, then,” she suggested. “Old Tinglut has sons. The girl is pretty enough, when she bothers to put on decent clothes. We might do well with a handsome Tinglut prince if not the emperor of Shan.”

Mergen had no intention of letting her go to the Tinglut, but he was determined on one thing: “She can’t be allowed to complete training as a shaman, of course. No sane man wants a shamaness in his bed.” Which was another reason Tayy’s interest had him worried.

A commotion at the door told him that the younger hunters had returned. His time to speak privately with his mother was running out and he hadn’t yet mentioned the most troubling intelligence of the day—Prince Tayyichiut’s fascination with a bootless shamaness from a lowly clan. Tayy couldn’t know who she was, so what had drawn the boy’s attention? And how were they going to put a stop to it? He would have to have a quiet word with Qutula and Bekter. They would join in his loving conspiracy to separate the heir from this inconvenient attraction.

“Have you thought about a match for your brother’s heir?” Lady Bortu nodded in the direction of the doorway. Prince Tayyichiut, accompanied by Mergen’s own sons, had just entered. His dogs, trying to follow their master, were repelled by the guardsmen at the door, adding to the commotion of the party assembling there with much whispering and jostling of elbows. “If you don’t need her for the Tinglut, Yesugei’s girl might do,” she added. “I can talk to her grandmother.”

But Mergen had other plans for Prince Tayy. “The Bithynian Apadisha has a daughter. She’s a warrior, so they should get along very well together.”

Bortu crossed her hands over the knee tucked under her chin and frowned, not so much displeased, Mergen guessed, as calculating the consequences of such a match. “The clans are so beset by enemies these days that we must have not only a warrior khan, but the same in his khaness?”

She might have planned the conversation to that point, but Mergen thought he’d surprised her with the Bithynian princess. Until recently he would have answered “no” to his mother’s question and found Tayy a nice young daughter of a neighboring khan, or even of a chieftain among the Qubal as his mother suggested. The death of his brother and the war for the Cloud Country, however, had taught him otherwise. “Times have changed,” he answered. “A prince of the Qubal people must marry for larger politics now.”

“And there are no warrior princesses nearer?”

He had added up to something new in her estimation, he thought.

“Find me one,” he challenged her. “But not in Yesugei’s tent.” Mergen didn’t want to test the general’s loyalty or his friendship too far while Sechule stood between them. “And stop this shaman madness while you’re at it. Many moves remain to the game if we are to stay abreast of our neighbors, and we have few enough stones on the board to make them.”

“More than you seem willing to use.” She gave a pointed look at the young men ordering themselves at the foot of the ger-tent palace, his own blanket-sons among them.

“Later, when my brother’s heir has the khanate, I’ll advise him, as I expect will you, on how best to use these loyal stones to serve his interests in the world.” It should have been obvious to her—“Until that day, I want no accusations of dynastic aspirations.”

The Lady Bortu frowned again. He had no time to pursue her displeasure, however. The horde of young warriors descended upon him with much noise and, always a bad sign, a bit too much laughter. He wondered which one of them had nearly gotten himself killed and how they had managed it so near to home.

Ah. Qutula. His companions nudged him forward. The sudden feeling surprised Mergen, like a stubborn horse had just kicked him in the chest. On the long trek back from the high country he’d gotten out of the habit of holding his breath, waiting for the news that battle had taken the bright light of his sons from his life. It wasn’t fair, this sneak attack on his unguarded flank. Looked like Qutula had made it home again in one piece, though. He lacked the cocky swagger that surviving a close call usually gave a young man but led the way with his head held firmly erect, his mouth set in a grim line. Perhaps it had been too close a call this time. Or, given it was Qutula, he doubtless hated being rescued even more than he disliked needing the rescue in the first place.

The prince followed behind, trying to look modest, though the excited grin that kept breaking out on his lips ruined the effect. Then Bekter, bursting to tell the story, and two of their companions. One dropped back at the door, but the other trailed his betters with a bundle heavy in his arms. When they reached the foot of the dais, they stopped and made low formal bows.

“Uncle.”

When the prince rose from his bow, Qutula was free to do likewise. He considered addressing Mergen as father, but hadn’t decided what his next step would be if the khan repudiated him. So, “My lord khan,” he said in greeting while in his thoughts he urged his father,
Say it now. Call me your son
. His eyes remained downcast in a respectful manner, showing nothing of the bitterness he felt when the words did not come.

“A trophy in honor of the hunt,” Tayy announced with a flourishing wave of his hand.

It was not clear if the prince meant the bear’s liver or Qutula himself, returned alive to suffer embarrassment in front of his father’s entire court.
I could not love a patricide,
his lady had cautioned him. He would rather have Mergen’s blessing anyway; would rather win acknowledgment as a reward for some heroic act of his own. But not like this, cast up at the foot of the dais like a child swept out of danger by a more alert guardian.

Jumal came forward, however, and placed the doeskin bundle in the prince’s hands, which in turn he extended to his uncle. “A gift to the khan from his heir and the guardsman Qutula, who killed the beast between them,” Tayy explained as Mergen-Khan unwrapped the dripping liver. He was very careful, Qutula noted, to say nothing that would imply any interest that the khan might have in his own son. “It was a very small bear.”

It was clear from the great size of the liver that the bear had been huge, at least seven feet tall on its hind legs, which was how Qutula remembered it.

“Here is a tale for the telling.” Mergen beamed in pride, though his teeth seemed clenched around some less pleasant emotion that remained unspoken. The khan drew his knife and cut off a sliver of the dripping, raw liver.

“A fine gift,” he said, and popped the sliver into his mouth, swallowing it without chewing so that the life of the bear might enter his vitals whole and potent. Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth. With the back of his hand he wiped the smear from his lips and licked away the juices with his tongue. Then he raised his red-stained knife over his head.

“To the cook pots!” he declared, “A portion to all who would be warriors as daring as these young hunters, and a tale of the chase while we eat our weaker porridge in anticipation of that finer fare to come!”

With that he invited his blanket-sons to join him on the dais as Prince Tayy’s courtiers. Bekter wasted no time in grabbing a pie from a passing tray, but Qutula accepted no dinner for himself when he claimed his place at the prince’s side. As Mergen had done for Chimbai-Khan, he sampled Tayy’s dishes before he would allow the prince to eat. His brother fed himself heartily to withstand the exertions of a night of singing, but Qutula took his own nourishment from those bites and fragments he tasted off his prince’s plate.

Their own cadre would guess that he served his lord in gratitude for his life. After a time, who would suspect him of dosing the very food he tasted for his prince? A servant filled the kumiss bowls and handed Tayy’s to Qutula, who took the first sip before passing it on. The tattoo on his breast warmed under his clothes as his resolve hardened.

“Your guardsman serves you well, Prince.” Mergen gave a nod over his own bowl of strong kumiss. He smacked his lips in appreciation for the pungent sour taste of the fermented mare’s milk. Unless one knew him very well, he wouldn’t notice the tension in the line of his jaw.

“Yes, he does,” Tayy agreed around another bite of his pie. They were all too polite—and too superstitious—to mention that Mergen’s solicitude hadn’t saved Chimbai.

They talked in casual nothings as they ate, but presently Bekter pushed his empty dish away, a signal that he was ready to sing.

“Have you made up a song for us yet about the wondrous bear and the great battle to defeat it?” Mergen asked, half mockingly.

“Not in its finished form,” Bekter protested, “But I can play a bit of it for your pleasure, my lord khan.”

“Then do so.” Mergen gave permission with a nod and a rueful smile. “I suppose I’ll never know the real events of this afternoon’s adventure, but we’ll have the poet’s version to entertain us, at least.”