He kicked at a pillow, and his foot met little resistance against feather stuffing. The action was so unrewarding that he kicked another one, harder. The results were similar, and instead of kicking a third cushion, he scooped it up and tore at it with his hands. The silken fabric resisted his efforts, taunting him with its soft resilience, and growling deep in his throat, he pulled his dagger free of its sheath and stabbed the pillow instead. Cutting and tearing, he released a cloud of goose feathers, an explosion of white snow that filled the tent with yet more reminders of how soft he had become. Whirling, he stabbed and slashed at the floating feathers, striking at invisible enemies—laughing phantoms that darted and hid behind the screen of floating feathers.
Eventually—his arms aching, his chest heaving—he relented. Leaning over, one hand propped against his thigh, he glared at the insolent feather clinging to the shining blade of his dagger. All of his effort amounted to nothing: his blade was clean, and his enemies were still there, floating just out of reach.
?gedei glanced at the two soldiers standing guard, examining their faces for any reaction. Chaagan and Alagh stared at the opposite wall, their expressions blank and stoic; judging by their unblinking fascination with the tent wall, they had seen nothing at all of what had transpired over the last few minutes.
“I am the Khagan,” ?gedei sighed, flicking the feather off the blade and sliding his dagger back into its sheath. He walked over and stood directly in front of Chaagan. “Would you die for me?” he asked.
“Yes, my Khan,” Chaagan answered.
“Would you fall on your sword right now if I asked you to?”
A muscle twitched in the guard’s jaw, and he hesitated briefly before barking out his answer. “Yes, my Khan.”
“Would it be a good death?” ?gedei asked.
Chaagan looked away and did not answer.
?gedei stepped closer to the guard and put his hand on the man’s shoulder. He felt Chaagan twitch under his hand, and a flicker of fear twisted the guard’s lips. “I think,” ?gedei said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, “that if I were to run out of this tent and engage the enemy—an enemy that wants nothing more than for me to present myself in that fashion—that I would be doing something very similar to falling on my own sword.” His grip tightened on Chaagan’s shoulder. “Do you agree?”
Chaagan nodded. “Yes, my Khan.
“That would not be a very good death.”
“No, my Khan.”
“I should let men like you—and Alagh, as well—fight for me, because that is your duty. That is all that you want to do for me—to fight in my name, to fight for the glory of the Empire.”
Chaagan stood up slightly under ?gedei’s hand. “Yes, my Khan.”
“And yet, you are here with me now. Inside this damned tent, watching your Khagan fight with a...pillow. There is little glory in that, is there?” ?gedei chuckled at Chaagan’s bleak expression. He released his grip and patted the man’s shoulder—the way a father absently reassures a confused child. “Let us watch the fight outside this tent,” he said, nodding toward the straps that held the tent flap closed. “I want to witness my fierce warriors in combat. I want to behold the glory of their actions.”
The wine would always fill him with bravado, but without the brittle bluster it provided, all that was left was a squirming nakedness, a raw awareness of the prisoner he had become. He had been a warrior of the steppes once, but now he was the Khagan, and that title was nothing more than a golden chain crushing the life out of him. He could not participate in the glory of the Mongol Empire; he could only bear witness to it.
29
Deus Iudex Iustus
“WHAT ARE YOU doing up there?” the guard demanded, fumbling for his sword.
Ferenc hung halfway to the top of the old Roman wall, frozen with indecision, fingers of one hand clinging to the gap between two blocks of tufa, and the other scrabbling for purchase on a brick-and-mortar facing.
Left behind on the path below the wall, Ocyrhoe backed away from the guard, who was focusing his attention on the one most likely to escape—the youth clinging to the wall.
“Get down!” The guard raised his sword—with little effect, since Ferenc’s feet were at least two yards over his head.
Bits of grout and decaying brick sifted down from Ferenc’s fingers and broke away from his questing toes. Should he keep going? Was Ocyrhoe going to run?
Comically, the guard now began to jump, waving his blade in an attempt to close the distance. Ferenc arched his back and raised his feet. More grout broke free. Some of it sifted into the guard’s face, and he swore, backing off to rub his eyes.
Ferenc and Ocyrhoe hadn’t planned well, that was obvious—run ragged by their mission and the environment of fear that was sweeping Rome. If they were split up, where would they find one another again? Ferenc found it strange that he and this tiny girl had become so inseparable, as if they had been running together, struggling to survive, since they were children.
His mother’s secret language had helped, of course. She had never openly taught it to him, as he was not one of them, the szépasszony who wove the kin-knots, but he had learned it regardless, absorbing the signs and gestures and codes by being attentive in her presence, and by remembering how she had touched and tickled him when he was a baby. The tündér magic all children know when they are born and then forget as they learn to be human.
The guard, frustrated by Ferenc’s inaccessibility, now turned his attention to Ocyrhoe. He extended his blade and lumbered toward her.
With a small yelp, she leaped onto the wall and scrabbled up along the brickwork, grabbing frantically at higher handholds in an effort to climb out of the guard’s reach.
Looking up and to her left, she shouted at Ferenc, “Ascende!”
The guard grunted and stretched up, reaching for her dangling foot. She yelled, jerking and kicking her leg.
The guard got a grip on her ankle and yanked, pulling her off balance. Her legs swung free, and as Ferenc watched, her right hand slipped.
“Ascende!” she cried, oblivious to her precarious hold on the wall.