Flame Winds (2 page)

The wicket snapped shut and, an instant later, the door itself swung wide. The Chinese bowed low, hands clasped comfortably across his padded belly. He led the way around the screen built to keep out the devils of the Yellow Kingdom; the devils that could move only through doors and windows and then only in straight lines. He shuffled on to a room hung in the rich carpets of Sarouk and Bokhara, motioned courteously to Wan Tengri to be seated.

“Art no Mongol,” Tsien Hui muttered with his ever-smiling lips, while his fat-lidded eyes took careful survey of the giant who sat cross-legged before him. “Art Barbarian out of the West.”

Wan Tengri started, but controlled his muscles with an effort. He should be used to the knowledge of these yellow-skinned devils by now. He grumbled an assent. “It matters not to you, yellow thief,” he said shortly. “I have need of money.” He scooped out a pair of ruby earrings from the bag of stolen loot he had offered to Kassar, tossed them carelessly on the rug before him. He grinned slightly behind the cover of his red beard. That wizard’s ears would be sore for a while. Mournfully, Wan Tengri shook his head.

“Balass rubies,” he said sorrowfully. “From my own dead mother’s ears I took them not two moons ago. Aye, she was a wonderful woman, but she would not want my mother’s son to starve.”

“So,” Tsien Hui stirred the blood-red drops with a long-nailed forefinger. “So… Balass rubies.” He picked them up and weighed them in a yellow palm. “From thy dead mother’s ears, sayest thou.”

Wan Tengri’s hand closed about the hilt of his sword. “Aye,” he said softly. “From her small, sweet ears, heathen.”

The drops of jewel blood fascinated Tengri’s eyes. They would grace the ears of any princess, such a princess as he would take unto himself when, filled with honors and wealth, he sent his own galley back to the West again. He smiled—and then his eyes widened fearfully. There was suddenly nothing in the yellow palm of the Chinese, nothing where an instant before those exquisite jewels had glistened! Tsien Hui smiled and bobbed his head amicably.

“It is as I thought, O Barbarian,” he said. “The jewels were stolen from some wizard.”

Like an uncoiling snake, Wan Tengri leaped across the space that separated them. His left hand clamped about the fat-padded yellow throat, and there was red rage, bright as Balass rubies, in his eyes.

“Thief!” he roared. “Liar! Give me those jewels. Do you think to rob me? Me, Prester John?”

He shook the Chinese like a monkey, and fear deadened the man’s eyes. He trembled in that savage grip. “Nay, Barbarian, I do not lie to thee. In this wondrous city, strange things pass. No man may steal, for if he steal, when the owner wakes to find his belonging gone, it ceases to be. The magicians, who rule this place, have said that things are only because we believe them to exist, and that which no man believes does not exist. See, is there sound if a great tree fall where no ear is to hear? So, it is only by thinking of things that they are at all. If a magician misses his substance, he thinks it out, and it ceases to be!”

Wan Tengri grinned wolfishly. “Lies, pretty lies, fat thief! If this be true, then surely I may find no hidden things about your clothes, eh?” Deliberately he stripped Tsien Hui of his garments. Afterward, he combed the rug with his fingers and stood, staring like a caged thing about the walls. There was nowhere else the jewels could have been secreted, and yet—

“You see, Barbarian,” whined the naked Tsien Hui, hugging his yellow shanks, “ it is as I told thee. Nothing is unless men think of it, and the owner of that bauble—”

Wan Tengri roared in anger. “Stupidity and lies! Why cower there, fat thief, unless it be in memory of my thoughts of that jewel?” Suddenly Wan Tengri bethought him of the jewels at his waist. He snatched the leathern bag from his belt and upended it over his empty palm. No jewels came out. No single gem of the small fortune he had stolen from the wizard—but a wicked, flattened triangular head thrust out! A snake’s fangs darted toward Wan Tengri’s open and waiting palm!

II

ONLY battle-trained muscles could move a man more swiftly than the strike of a snake, the skill of a man whom the fickle Alexandria mob had named for the hurricane. Wan Tengri acted without thought, with the incredible swiftness of those who have lived by the speed of hand and eye. Both hands moved together. Writhing snake and leather bag kited toward the silk-draped ceiling. Wan Tengri’s sword sang hissing from its scabbard—and the snake divided into two harmless fragments in the air.

Wan Tengri’s lips were curved in a contemptuous smile. His deftness meant nothing to his pride. Had he not sliced arrows in mid-flight? Used the swift flail of his sword as a shield against their biting sting? He flipped his scimitar into the air and caught it neatly by the hilt.

“It is in my mind, yellow turtle,” he said gently, “that thou art a wizard! This fuddlement of what men think makes things be I have no understanding of. But in the Hind, I have seen such befuddlement of mind that I saw tigers where no tiger was, and it comes to me that thou art such as those tricksters of the Hind—a wizard. I think it is thee that has charmed these bits of colored crystal from my pouch. Now, I have an unfailing test for a wizard. Everyone knows, of course, that only enchanted steel can harm a wizard. Consequently, if you do not survive when I slice your too-fat throat, I shall know that I have wronged thee, Tsien Hui, and I shall revere your memory as that of an honest man.”

Tsien Hui’s smile was a ghastly thing. “It is a sorry jest, Barbarian, yet I feel that my honor is touched. The jewels in truth vanished from my own hands. Therefore”—his voice grew heavy with sorrow—“therefore, you must let me make thee a gift.”

Before Wan Tengri could more than smile, there came a heavy thunder of sword hilts upon the wicket door. “Open, Tsien Hui!” a man’s voice thundered. “Open, and surrender the slave of the All-High!”

Wan Tengri’s smile did not waver. “Now this is three times,” he said slowly, “that I have been called a slave this night. It is not a name I care for.” His eyes quested over the room and, with a quick stride, he reached the edge of the screen that sheltered the door. “Go to your treasure house, Tsien Hui, and prepare this little gift you so graciously offer. I will attend to this small matter.”

He whipped a single glance over his shoulder toward the Chinese, and the man had vanished. There was no quiver of a wall-hung rug to show where he had gone, and Wan Tengri cursed softly. So he must fight with treachery at his back? He threw back his head and his deep laughter boomed out.

“Come, fools,” he cried. “Come and take a—slave.”

With a flip of his sword point, he threw aside the bar which secured the door, and a wedge of men drove in through the opening. Their weapons were out, and the flickering yellow glow of the great Chinese lantern from the ceiling touched golden fire on their brass breast plates and embossed helmets. Wan Tengri laughed again and his sword flicked out like a caress of a snake’s tongue. A dragging touch of the tip across a throat, then it whipped high to sever an outthrust sword arm. It was only after that second blow had fallen that a great shout of anger and dismay sprang from Wan Tengri’s lips.

He had struck true. He needed no reassurance on that point, for, through the years, his life had hinged on the lightning swiftness of eye and sword arm. There should be two men on the floor, one with his head almost severed from his shoulders and the other minus an arm. There should be—but there weren’t! There was no blur on the shining steel of Wan Tengri’s sword, and no bright, glad rush of crimson heralded victory!

Instead, the captain’s point reached out to hover against Wan Tengri’s chest. “You cannot harm the enchanted guards of Turgohl, fool,” the captain said contemptuously. “Throw down your sword!”

Wan Tengri sprang back a full pace from the threat of that sword point. His breath was quick and dry in his throat and fury was rising hotly behind his eyes. Enchantments! Everywhere he moved, he met the machinations of these accursed wizards. So his sword, his fine Damascus steel, could not harm them. And yet—they wore armor! If they wore armor, they could be harmed!

Men were milling out from behind the other side of the screen, circling toward him warily—a captain and ten. With a swift movement, Wan Tengri shoved his sword home into its scabbard. He bulked huge against the bright crimsons and blues and golden yellows of the carpeted walls. The coned hat had fallen to the floor and the fiery locks were a halo for the fierceness of his face. His knotted, hairy fists were sledges at his sides.

“You have called me slave,” he said, his voice rumbling deep in his barrel chest. “Surely, fighting men who cannot be harmed need not stand back from a slave?”

The captain had the smiling, sly face of a cat. “Give up your sword, slave,” he ordered. He made a small gesture with his hand and his men moved out on his flanks, their swords poised like ready spears.

Wan Tengri appeared to ponder while, under his frowning heavy brows, his eyes canvassed every possibility. He muttered his thought aloud: “Surrender my sword, is it? Now, that is a thing I have never done, even when I faced a double score of the stout warriors of the Emperor of Chin. It is true they were not enchanted, but they had a cause they thought was just. Look you now, captain.” Wan Tengri took a half pace backward and felt the silken brush of a carpet against his swinging fists. “Look you, it was no small matter for which they fought, since I had stolen away the favorite concubine of the Emperor Han himself, and—”

It was a titan’s feat he performed. Bokhara rugs are silken and soft and they may be drawn through the circuit of a small woman’s bracelet, but they are heavy and their very size and the resistance of the air made the thing Wan Tengri intended seem incredible. With a single wrench of his two hands, he tore the carpet from its hangings and, before those swords, no more than a yard away, could reach him, he had swung the entire heavy fabric over the heads of the guards as deftly as a
retarius
in the arena casts his net over a rival gladiator. Wan Tengri might have fled then, but his anger—the anger of Hurricane John—was aroused.

“So I’m a slave!” he whispered.

He stooped while the men slashed at the carpet net and, reaching under its verge, he seized the ankles of the captain of the ten. If they wore armor, they could be harmed—and no man should dub Prester John a slave and live! Wan Tengri’s huge shoulders arched and his thighs corded. He straightened, and snapped the captain’s head against the floor as a boy might crack a snake’s head on a rock! The helmet bounced and at last Wan Tengri saw the blood flow.

It was like red wine in the rage-dried throat of Wan Tengri. He threw back his head in bellowing laughter, and his grip on the ankles of the captain did not loosen. He lifted the man’s broken head clear of the floor and set the body swinging against the pivot of his arms, once, twice, a third time while keen steel slashed through the carpet and one man, then another stumbled through to leap forward with swords lifted for the kill! Three times, Wan Tengri swung the body, and the third time, he whirled it in a great circle around his head. His shout was a roar like a beast’s. His human war club caught a guard across shoulder and chest. It picked him off his feet like a toy and hurled him against his fellow. The human war club was sheathed in brass. The men did not stir.

Twice more the mighty flail of Wan Tengri swung, and those men who still could stand fled screaming into the streets. After them, Wan Tengri tossed the broken corpse of the captain. The carpet he had torn down revealed a doorway and, snatching up his felt cap, Wan Tengri strode through it. His feet were light and there was a singing in his blood. He hummed through his nose. The frightened squeals of women came to his ears now. A door resisted his hand, and he bowed his shoulders to wrench it from the hinges, and then lurched through.

“Come out, Tsien Hui, thou mangy sewer rat,” he bellowed. “Come out before I take thy hovel to pieces.”

He was in a room where a perfumed fountain played softly, and there was the languorous odor of incense, of musk in his nostrils. Here the lights were soft—women’s quarters. He snorted. Tsien Hui was the sort who would hide among his women. He took three ranging strides across the room and, against the farther wall, a gossamer veil parted and a woman stepped unhurriedly through. Her breasts were cupped in jewel-studded plates of gold, and a jeweled girdle held a translucent skirt of silk that swirled with her slow dancing steps. Her hair was night-black and twisted close about a finely modeled skull, and there was pride in the carriage of her chin.

“So now Tsien Hui tries more human enchantments,” Wan Tengri said lightly. “Still, it is a gift a man can accept.”

He towered over the girl and she looked up into his face, dark eyes unafraid. “You’re no more than a child,” Wan Tengri rumbled. “That old dog should be ashamed of himself. Still, I can admire his choice.” With a quick gesture, Wan Tengri tore off the jeweled breast plates. He swung on his heel with a short laugh. “I have more need of wealth than women, child,” he said. “And these will help. Yes, these will help. Tell that fat fool, Tsien Hui, that if he wants his throat whole, it will be wise not to use it to call these jewels back.”

The girl stood where he had left her, near the sheer curtains, where the perfumed fountain splashed. Her slender arms were crossed over her breasts, and there was a look of wonder in her eyes. For an instant, Wan Tengri hesitated in the doorway, then he strode heavily along the way he had come. His vengeance was incomplete, but perhaps it was better that Tsien Hui should live. He couldn’t trust the Chinese, but the man could be governed by fear. Wan Tengri strode out into the street and stood with his head tipped back, his eyes questing the black sky. It was a rich town, and a man could fight enchantments with a man’s weapons. He looked at the shattered corpse of the captain of the guard, face down in the mud. He rumbled a curse in his throat. A soldier deserved better than that, even a soldier of cowardly wizards. He caught the man up and carried him to lie on Tsien Hui’s choicest silks; then, with a wry grin, Wan Tengri strode off along the twisting narrow streets of Turgohl—and he walked in the middle of the way. Let cowardly dogs skulk in the shadows; let the guards clank through the mud and over cobbled ways. A warrior could hold his own!

Now and again, he caught the tinkle of a lute or the whine of a troubadour’s one-string fiddle from behind forbidding walls; now and again the warmth of incense or spices curled his nostrils while he drove his booted feet through the slime of the alleys. There was a muted, constant sound that drifted down from the high air. It rose and fell with a throaty moaning. Now and again, there was a thin and rising shriek like a demon’s laugh. The flame wind—the flame wind of Turgohl was blowing? Yet here in the streets, it was cool.

There was a restlessness in Wan Tengri’s soul. It had something to do with the thought that he was locked into this city. For a free man, any restraint was irksome. Trapped—Yes, once those gates closed and the flame wind began to mourn across the black sands, no animal thing could survive within two arrow flights of the walls. A wind that would burn out a man’s guts and suffocate him; a wind that would leave his body a well-roasted pig upon the plains. Wan Tengri lifted his challenging, proud head and turned his eyes toward the high central tower of Turgohl. Under the lash of the flame wind, it glowed like a many-colored jewel, terrifyingly beautiful—ominous with enchantment.

For a slow moment, doubts shook Wan Tengri, then he brushed them aside. He began once more to hum through his nose. He had jewels in his pouch that Tsien Hui would not dare to call back. He must hunt up a new money lender and market them. There must be ways that a strong man could rise. Who knows? Perhaps he was destined to carve himself an empire out of this mysterious East? Give him a foothold and a chance to raise a stout following; and he would sweep these wizards into the crystal blue waters of Baikul. There would be slaves to do his bidding, and concubines like that soft girl creature whose jewels he carried in his pouch. Enchantments
—phagh!

Wan Tengri stood with his fists on his hips and glowered up at that mystical tower. By Ahriman, since he was a follower of Christos, and with a bit of the True Cross about his neck, too, it was almost his duty to fight these wizards and enlighten these poor fools. He could do that best if he himself was the ruler; then they would accept Christos or he would slit their throats, and a deal of wealth should trickle into the chests of the ruler of Turgohl. Wan Tengri nodded in satisfaction to himself. Well, then it was settled. He would gather a force of stout men. They would have to be city dwellers, not the superstitious Mongols. They would be thieves—

In sheer exuberance, Wan Tengri tossed his scimitar glittering into the air. First, he must find his thieves, and he thought he knew where to look. If the wizards could call their property back, then the thieves would devote themselves to stealing weapons and foodstuffs from the major supply houses. For thieves would steal. It was in the blood. Wan Tengri grinned wolfishly. Who should know better than he? He stalked through the streets until he heard again the clank of marching men, then he followed in their wake. Eventually, they would lead him to the guardhouse, and there he would find the source of their supplies. He needed a few weapons himself, a dagger to replace that he had given to Kassar and a war club, less burdensome than the captain’s body, since the guards apparently were impervious to his steel of Damascus. The guard filed presently into a low building against the north walls of Turgohl. The smell of the salt sea came strongly to Wan Tengri’s nostrils here, and he leaned his shoulder into a dark corner to wait.

Against the blueness of the sky, he could make out the sturdy silhouette of a pacing guard on the city wall. He could even make out the slow pacing of sandaled feet through the undying mournfulness of the flame wind. Wan Tengri waited until the sentry was at the far end of his post, then he reached the shadow of the guardhouse with a half dozen long, silent strides. The only openings that emitted lights were long arrow slits, too narrow for any man of his girth—but the wall was made of sun-baked mud. And the roof? Tengri waited his chance, then, with a short run, he leaped up and caught the low edge of the building’s flat top, swung himself easily to the roof. He grunted with satisfaction, squatted close against the marble of the city’s wall and began to slice the hard-packed earth with his sword point.