Munokhoi rolled away too, using the motion to propel himself into a crouch and from there to an upright position. He favored his left leg, and there was a bright wash of blood running down the side of his pants. Munokhoi’s gaze was charged with feral rage, his mouth contorted into a savage grimace. He stood ready to fight, oblivious to the wounds he had received.
Gansukh had seen this blindness to injury before. Men who refused to lie down and die, no matter how many arrows stuck out of their bodies or how many times they had been stabbed or cut. He had even heard of a man who continued to fight with a severed arm until his heart had pumped nearly all of the blood out of his body.
He wasn’t surprised that Munokhoi would be filled with this invincible bloodlust. In fact, he was prepared to call upon it himself. After everything, Munokhoi was not going to walk out of the forest. Gansukh was going to be the survivor of this fight. “You are nothing,” he hissed. “I will leave your corpse for the scavengers.”
Munokhoi’s response was a snarl of raw hatred and a lightning-fast lunge. Gansukh darted to the side, staying away from Munokhoi’s knife and keeping to the other man’s wounded side, but Munokhoi grabbed his left arm and tried to pull him close. He slashed at Munokhoi’s neck with his knife, and Munokhoi tumbled forward, shoving his shoulder. He stepped back, stumbling slightly, and Munokhoi slipped behind him, making ready to slit his throat like a sheep.
Gansukh contorted his body, trapping Munokhoi’s arm with his own. They were locked together now, each straining to overpower the other. Whoever lost control first would lose his life. Their faces reddened with anger and effort as they twisted in a macabre dance, trying to break each other’s hold. Trying to drive their knives deep into flesh. They were evenly matched, unable to gain the advantage while keeping the other’s knife at bay. Munokhoi slipped his arm over Gansukh’s wrist, attempting an arm lock, and Gansukh wriggled free and nearly managed to throw Munokhoi in return.
Munokhoi recovered and stabbed at Gansukh’s side, but there wasn’t enough speed or force to his blow, and Gansukh was able to stop the blow by grabbing Munokhoi’s wrist and pushing his hand away. Growling with frustration, Munokhoi hurled himself forward, thrusting with his chest. He snapped at Gansukh’s cheek with his teeth. Gansukh pulled his head back, and Munokhoi lurched farther up his chest, still straining to bite. He latched onto Gansukh’s ear, grinding his jaws together. He shook his head back and forth, like a dog worrying a piece of raw meat.
Gansukh felt blood flowing down his neck. He wanted to jerk his head away, but he knew if he did it would only increase Munokhoi’s blood rage. But letting Munokhoi gnaw on his flesh wasn’t helping either. He twisted his body, trying to slip his shoulder against Munokhoi’s chest, and he felt Munokhoi’s grip loosen on his right wrist.
The hand holding the knife.
Gansukh jerked his hand up, wrenching his wrist free of Munokhoi’s grasp, and he drove his blade swift and deep into Munokhoi’s neck.
Munokhoi shivered and jerked his head back. His jaw had locked, and he tore a piece of Gansukh’s earlobe free. Gansukh retaliated by yanking his blade forward and then pulling it back, tearing a deep slash across Munokhoi’s throat. Munokhoi started to choke, and when he spat the piece of Gansukh’s ear out, blood spattered from his mouth.
Gansukh tried to shove him away, but Munokhoi, eyes bright with spite, clung to him like a leech as he staggered and fell. Munokhoi coughed up a gout of blood when Gansukh landed on top of him, and he weakly tried to fend off Gansukh’s blade. Gansukh stabbed Munokhoi again and again—in the chest, in the neck. Blood flowed freely from the copious wounds, and Munokhoi’s motions became more and more feeble. His skin paled, his mouth went slack, and finally his eyes lost their mad gleam. Only when he no longer showed any reaction to being stabbed did Gansukh finally stop. Leaving his knife imbedded in Munokhoi’s chest, Gansukh slid off the dead body and crawled a short distance away. Bent over, he threw up again and again until the bloodlust was purged from his being.
At last the bloody work was done.
Late in the afternoon, the hunting party rested by a stream that gurgled happily along a rock-strewn course. The horses drank their fill and quietly nosed around, cropping the tender grasses that grew along the bank. ?gedei had been only too happy to get out of his saddle, and he moved a little stiffly as he walked back and forth along the river’s track.
Namkhai took the opportunity of this rest to check on his men, and he walked among them, making small talk and inquiring of what they had seen (or hadn’t, in the case of bear sign). Of all the host, only the old rider—Alchiq—didn’t dismount. He stayed in his saddle, quietly chewing on a piece of salted meat.
“Where’s Gansukh?” Namkhai asked.
Alchiq nodded past Namkhai’s shoulder, his expression unchanging, his mouth moving slowly around the jerky.