Bones of the Hills (11 page)

“I was there at the beginning, lord,” Arslan said. “If I were younger, I would ride with you to the end.”

“I know it, General,” Genghis replied. He gestured to the vast camp on the banks of the river. “Without you, none of this would be here. I will honor your name always.”

Arslan had never been a man who enjoyed physical contact, but he took Genghis’s hand in the warrior’s grip and then mounted. His young wife looked up at her husband, proud to see great men honor him with their presence.

“Goodbye, old friend,” Genghis called as Arslan clicked his tongue and the ponies moved away. The herd boys used their sticks to move the animals with their master.

In the distance, they could hear the khan’s son crying out, a mournful wail that seemed to go on and on.

Moving such a vast host of people and animals was no small task. As well as a hundred thousand warriors, a quarter of a million ponies had to be herded, with as many again of sheep, goats, yaks, camels, and oxen. The need for grazing land had grown to the point that the nation could remain in one place for only a month at a time.

On a frozen dawn, with the sun barely touching the east, Genghis rode through the busy camp, noting every detail of the cart lines with the huddled figures of women and young children on them. The column stretched for miles, always surrounded by the herds. He had lived with the sounds of animals all his life and hardly noticed the constant bleating of goats and sheep. His generals were ready; his sons were. It remained to be seen whether the Arab nations were ready to meet them in war. In their arrogance, they had invited annihilation.

Jochi had survived having his wounds burned. As Genghis had promoted Chagatai to lead a tuman of ten thousand warriors, he could hardly do less for an older son, especially one who had triumphed against a savage beast. The people talked of it still. Yet it would be months before Jochi was able to take his place at their head. Until then, he would travel with the women and children, tended by servants while he healed.

In the middle of the host, Genghis trotted past the ger of his second wife, Chakahai, who had once been a princess of the Xi Xia kingdom. Her father had remained a loyal vassal for almost a decade, and the tribute kept the Mongols in silk and valuable timber. Genghis cursed softly to himself as he realized he had not arranged a way for the tribute to follow him into the west. He could not trust the king to hold it for him. It was one more thing to tell Temuge before the tribes moved. Genghis passed the cart where Chakahai sat in furs with the
three children she had borne. His oldest daughter bowed her head and smiled to see her father.

He did not leave the path to find the carts of Borte and his mother, Hoelun. The two women had become inseparable over the years and would be together somewhere. Genghis grimaced at the thought.

He passed two men boiling goat meat on a small fire while they waited. They had a stack of unleavened bread pouches ready to pack with meat for the trip. Seeing the khan himself, one of the men offered up a wooden platter with the head on it, touching the white eyes with a finger to make sure Genghis saw them. Genghis shook his head and the man bowed deeply. As the khan moved on, the warrior threw one of the eyes into the air for the sky father before popping the other in his mouth and chewing lustily. Genghis smiled at the sight. His people had not yet forgotten the old ways or been spoiled by looted riches. He thought of the new way stations that stretched in lines into the east and south, manned by crippled warriors and the elderly. A scout could change horses at a dozen of those places, covering land faster than Genghis would once have believed possible. They had come a long way from the hungry, quarreling tribes he had known as a boy, but they were still the same.

In a mass of carts and animals, Genghis dismounted at last, having ridden more than a mile from the head of the column. His sister Temulun was there, she who had been a babe in arms when his own tribe had abandoned him years before. She had grown into a fine young woman and married a warrior from the Olkhun’ut. Genghis had met the man only once, at the wedding, but he had seemed healthy and Temulun was pleased with the match.

As he adjusted the belly strap on his pony, she was ordering Chin servants to collect the last of her belongings. Her ger had been stored before dawn, leaving a black circle on the grass. As she saw Genghis, Temulun smiled and went to him, taking his reins.

“Don’t worry, brother, we are ready, though I cannot find my best iron pot. No doubt it is at the bottom of the packs, under everything else.” She spoke lightly, but her eyes were questioning. The khan had not visited her even once since she had been properly married. For him to come as they rode to war made her uneasy.

“It will not be long now,” Genghis told her, losing some of his stiffness. He liked Temulun, though she would always be a child to him in some ways. She could not remember the first winters alone, when the brothers and their mother were hunted and starving.

“Is my husband well?” she asked. “I have not seen Palchuk in three days now.”

“I don’t know,” Genghis admitted. “He is with Jebe. I have decided to have Palchuk command a thousand and carry the gold paitze.”

Temulun clapped her hands with pleasure. “You are a good brother, Genghis. He will be pleased.” A slight frown crossed her face as she considered giving her husband the good news. “Is it for him you have done this, or for me?”

Genghis blinked at her changing moods. “For you, sister. Should I not raise my own family? Can I have my only sister’s husband in the ranks?” He saw her expression remained troubled. This sort of thing was beyond him, though he struggled to understand.

“He will not refuse, Temulun,” Genghis said.

“I know
that!”
she replied. “But he will worry that the promotion comes from you.”

“It does,” Genghis replied.

Temulun raised her eyes at her brother’s failings for an instant. “I mean it will matter to him that he did not earn the new rank.”

“Let him prove he is worthy of it then,” Genghis said with a shrug. “I can always take the paitze back.”

Temulun glared at her brother. “You wouldn’t dare. Better not to raise him at all, than lift and drop him as you please.”

Genghis sighed to himself. “I will have Jebe tell him. He is still reordering Arslan’s tuman. It will not be so strange, unless your precious husband is an idiot.”

“You are a good man, Genghis,” Temulun replied.

Genghis looked around to see who was close enough to hear.

“Keep it quiet, woman!” He chuckled to himself, remounting and taking back the reins.

“Leave the pot behind if you cannot find it, Temulun. It is time to go.”

The restless urge that had made him tour the carts faded away as he rode back to the front. He nodded to his generals and saw that they too felt the same simple pleasure. Their people were on the move again and every day would bring a new horizon. There was nothing like the sense of freedom it brought, with all the world before them. As he reached his brothers and his generals, Genghis blew a long note on a scout horn and urged his pony to a trot. Slowly, the nation moved behind him.

IT WAS SNOWING
in the high passes. The Altai mountains were further west than most of the families had ever traveled. Only the Turkic tribes, the Uighurs and the Uriankhai, knew them well and then as a place to avoid, a place of poor hunting and death in the winter.

Though the mounted warriors could have crossed the range in a single day, the heavily laden carts were ponderous, built for grassy plains and ill suited to deep snowdrifts and goat paths. Tsubodai’s new spoked wheels did better than the solid discs that broke too easily, but only a few carts had been converted and progress was slow. Every day there seemed to be some new obstacle, and there were times when the slopes were so steep that the carts had to be lowered on ropes, held by teams of straining warriors. When the air was at its thinnest and men and animals grew exhausted, they were lucky to make five miles in a day. Every peak was followed by a twisting valley and another dogged climb to the best way through. The range seemed to go on endlessly and the families huddled miserably in their furs, exposed to the wind. When they halted, the rush to raise gers before sunset was hampered by frozen fingers. Almost all the people slept under the carts each night, covered in blankets and surrounded by the warm bodies of goats and sheep tethered to the wheels. Goats had to be killed to feed them, and the vast herds dwindled visibly as they traveled.

Thirty days out from the river Orkhon, Genghis called a halt early in the day. The clouds had come down so low that they touched the peaks around them. Snow had begun to fall as the tribes made a temporary camp in the lee of a vast cliff, soaring into whiteness above their heads. There was at least some protection from the biting wind in that place, and Genghis gave the order rather than take them over an exposed ridge that would see them still traveling as the light faded. He had riders out for a hundred miles and more ahead of them, a stream of young warriors who scouted the best path through and reported on anything they found. The mountains marked the end of the world Genghis knew, and as he watched his servants kill a young goat, he wondered how Arab cities would look. Would they resemble Chin fortresses of stone? Further than the scouts, he had sent spies to learn what they could of the markets and defenses. Anything could be useful in the campaign to come. The first ones out were beginning to return to him, exhausted and hungry. He had the beginnings of a picture in his head, but it was still in fragments.

His brothers sat with him in the khan’s ger on its cart, above the heads of all the others. Looking out into the whiteness, Genghis could see gers like a host of pale shells, thin trails of smoke rising from them to the skies. It was a cold and hostile place, but he was not discouraged. His nation had no use for cities, and the life of the tribes went on all around him, from feuds and friendship to family celebrations and weddings. They did not have to stop to live: life went on regardless.

Genghis rubbed his hands together, blowing into them as he watched his Chin servants make a cut in the kid goat’s chest before reaching in and squeezing the main vein around the heart. The goat stopped kicking and they began to skin it expertly. Every piece would be used and the skin would wrap one of his young children against the winter cold. Genghis watched as the servants emptied the stomach onto the ground, shoving out a mulch of half-digested grass. Roasting the flesh inside the flaccid white bag was faster than the slow boil the tribes preferred. The meat would be tough and hard on the teeth, but in such cold, it was important to eat quickly and take strength. At the thought, Genghis tested the stump he had broken in his drunken ride to Jelme and winced. It hurt constantly and he thought he might have to get Kokchu to pull the root out. His mood grew sour at the prospect.

“They’ll have it on the fire in a little while,” Genghis said to his brothers.

“Not soon enough for me,” Khasar replied. “I haven’t eaten since dawn.” Around them in the pass, thousands of hot meals were being prepared. The animals themselves would get barely a handful of dry grass, but there was no help for it. Over the constant bleating, they could all hear the sounds and chatter of their people, and despite the cold, there was contentment in it. They rode to war and the mood was light in the camp.

In the distance, the generals heard a thin cheering, and they looked at Kachiun, who usually knew everything that went on in the gers. Under the stares of his brothers, he shrugged.

“Yao Shu is training the young warriors,” he said. Temuge tutted under his breath, but Kachiun ignored him. It was no secret that Temuge disliked the Buddhist monk he and Khasar had brought back from Chin lands. Though Yao Shu was ever courteous, he had fallen out with the shaman, Kokchu, when Temuge had been Kokchu’s most willing disciple. Perhaps because of those memories, Temuge regarded him with irritation, especially when he preached his weak Buddhist faith to fighting men. Genghis had ignored Temuge’s protests, seeing only jealousy for a holy man who could fight better with his hands and feet than most men with swords.

They listened as another cheer went up, louder this time as if more men had gathered to watch. The women would be preparing food in the camp, but it was common enough for the men to wrestle or train when the gers were up. In the high passes, it was often the only way to stay warm.

Khasar stood and dipped his head to Genghis.

“If that goat won’t be ready for a while, I’ll go and watch, brother. Yao Shu makes our wrestlers look slow and clumsy.”

Genghis nodded, seeing how Temuge grimaced. He looked outside at the bloated goat stomach and sniffed the air hungrily.

Kachiun saw Genghis wanted an excuse to watch the training and smiled to himself.

“It could be Chagatai, brother. He and Ogedai spend a great deal of time with Yao Shu.”

It was enough.

“We’ll all go,” Genghis said, his face lighting up. Before Temuge could protest, the khan stepped out into the cold wind. The rest followed, though Temuge looked back at the roasting goat, his mouth watering.