The Khagan slumped in an ornate chair behind a fourth table, and seated around him on low benches were his advisors and special guests. Gansukh spotted Master Chucai on the Khagan’s right side. He was listening to something the Khagan was telling him, his fingers idly picking at the breast meat of a cooked duck.
Not wanting to be seen by either man, Gansukh wandered along the row of torches, looking at the other guests scattered on the carpets. He found Lian sitting by herself, and as soon as he spotted her, she noticed him. For a second, he reconsidered his decision. It was not too late to approach the main table and present himself to the Khagan and Chucai, but the weight of the bag in his hands made his mind up for him. Why had he brought his lessons with him? He did not have a good answer.
He walked over to Lian and sat down. He set the bag down between them and gently pushed it toward her.
“I missed you last night,” she said, glancing down at the bag. Her voice was almost too soft to be heard over the noisy gathering.
“I was busy,” he said awkwardly.
Her hands crept toward the bag and gently pulled it into her lap. “Did you look inside?”
“I did.” Gansukh tapped the knife stuck in his sash.
She remained still, clutching the bag tightly to her stomach. “What are you going to do?”
There was no sign of the fiery woman who had accosted him in the alley. She was resigned to some fate she had already decided upon in her head, some judgment she assumed he was going to pass.
What was he to do? The contents of the bag suggested she was going to escape, and he should tell Chucai what he knew. It would reflect poorly on him if she ran, as rumors of their relationship would surface. Munokhoi, the ambitious and vindictive Torguud captain, would especially relish the opportunity to turn the Khagan against him. Would the bond he had with ?gedei be enough to convince them that he had nothing to do with Lian’s flight?
But he had not expected her to be so complacent, to give up so readily. He had thought her mind was made up—she would be free or she would die trying. “I don’t know,” he replied honestly.
She started to stand, and he grabbed her arm, holding her back. “Listen to me...” She tried to pull free, and he tightened his grip. “Listen,” he said. He glanced around, checking to see if their conversation had caught anyone’s attention. Too much arkhi had been drunk already; no one showed any interest in their conversation. “This is the worst time to escape,” he said. “There are too many patrols, and they’re all still eager to prove themselves. You’ll never make it.”
While he spoke, she had been staring at his hand, but she raised her head now and looked up at him. “The worst time...” she said. “Is there a better time, Gansukh?”
He let go. “That’s not what I meant.
“What did you mean?”
“Lian, you can’t—”
“I have to, Gansukh. I cannot spend the rest of my life as a prisoner.” It was her turn to grab him. “Help me.”
Her words paralyzed him. His tongue would not move, nor could he pull away from her. Help her? It wasn’t the question that had struck him senseless but the sudden realization that he wanted to. But at the same time, he was confounded by the realization that doing so would mean either never seeing her again or going with her—two choices that had been swimming in the back of his mind for the last few days but that he had studiously avoided thinking about. Until this very moment, when she spoke those two words.
“The Mongol Empire is on the brink of disaster, Gansukh,” Lian whispered. “?gedei Khan will drink himself to death—despite everything—and what happens then? The Empire will fall apart as his wives and his brothers fight amongst themselves over who will be the next Khagan. What happens to me during that time? To us?”
Gansukh found his voice. “?gedei Khan knows what he must do,” he said. He removed her hand from his arm. “I know what my duty is.” Something fluttered in his chest, like a tiny bird caught in a bramble, and he exhaled slowly, letting his chest collapse. Whatever he felt became more frantic, fighting the crushing weight of his denial, and then it went limp. He was very tired all of a sudden, and all his appetite was gone. All he wanted to do was go back to his tent and sleep. He didn’t want to have to make this choice.
“Please give me the knife back,” Lian asked softly.
He shook his head. “If you are caught with it, you will be punished,” he said dully.
“If I’m caught with any of this, I’ll be punished.” Lian pounded her fist against the bag. Some of her fiery independence was returning, and Gansukh felt a brief spasm in his chest, one final flutter of affection.
“Lian—” he started.
She shook her head, refusing to listen to him, and leaped up. Clutching the bag, she rushed out of the ring of torches. Gansukh got to his feet, meaning to follow her. To what end? The thought made him indecisive, and he staggered slightly as he tried to sit back down and go after Lian at the same time.
“The horse rider has had too much to drink already.”
Munokhoi and a pair of Torguud guards had come up behind him. He hadn’t seen them coming, and he held his tongue, unsure how much of the conversation with Lian they had seen. Munokhoi came too close to Gansukh, a leer stretching his face. “Your pretty bird has flown,” he chuckled. His breath stank of arkhi, and his eyes were black holes that seemed to suck the torchlight into them. “If she flies too far away, the giant bear won’t be the only thing we hunt.” He glanced at his companions and laughed with them. “What soft skin she has...”
Gansukh stood firm on the sandy ground. Before he had come to court, his reaction to Munokhoi’s words would have been physical. He would have drawn his knife and demanded the other man do the same. But after all the lessons with Lian, he knew that was the reaction of a wild animal—one wolf responding to another. Munokhoi had come looking for a fight; why give him that satisfaction? Did he not have better weapons at his disposal now?