“Unthinkable,” Cnán said. “They have a superstitious reverence for certain magic places in their homeland. Only there could a kuriltai be convened.”
“So you are telling me,” Feronantus said, now staring at her intently in a way that made her not altogether comfortable, “that if ?gedei, the Khan of Khans, were to die, then all of the other Khans—Onghwe, here in Legnica, and Batu, down in Hungary, and all of the others wherever they are—they would all have to drop what they were doing immediately and travel back to Mongolia?”
“That is correct,” said Cnán, uncertain why Feronantus seemed to be so fascinated by this hypothetical punctilio of Mongol tribal law. “If they wished to become the Khagan. And they all do.”
Feronantus seemed enormously relieved all of a sudden. A piercing glint came into his eyes, and he clasped his hands in front of his knees. He looked around the room at his smartest tacticians: Raphael, Finn, R?dwulf, Taran. “Well, our path is perfectly obvious, then!” he announced. “We will no longer become one, but two. We will split our group, and our efforts, and teach these Devil’s horsemen to respect the butt as well as the blade.”
The silence in the room, and the expressions of all who stared at him, made it clear that she was not the only one who failed to see his plan. He threw up his hands, exasperated by their inability to see what, to him, was so obvious.
“Some will fight in the circus. That will give us cover and diversion.”
Cnán gaped, but turned her gaze immediately to Haakon, who seemed oblivious. She felt ill again, as if looking at Raphael’s bloody pincers—or smelling the rot around Legnica.
Feronantus, she knew, had just sealed the young Viking’s doom—Haakon would die first, along with his younger and least experienced brethren.
The Order was about to throw their children from the walls.
The Kinyen was still silent, waiting for Feronantus to explain the other half of his plan.
“And the rest,” Feronantus said, “shall ride into the East, passing over the Land of Skulls and into the sacred heartland of the Mongols, and find the Khagan. And kill him.”
CHAPTER 6:
IN THE GARDEN
“On the field of battle, who has the power?”
Lian’s tone implied she knew the answer to the question. Gansukh found this habit of hers irritating, but knew if he didn’t answer, she would only repeat the question. She would phrase it differently or seem to ignore his lack of answer for a short time before suddenly returning to the question. She was like a horsefly: always out of reach, buzzing and biting endlessly, and never landing on the same patch of flesh twice.
“The general,” he replied, mentally swatting her away. “He makes the battle plans and gives the order to execute them.”
Lian nodded. She was framed by the midmorning sun, and the light tinged her hair red. This was their third time meeting in the eastern gardens. Gansukh liked it much better here, outside, than in his tomb of a room. He could see the sky.
It was only when he couldn’t see the endless expanse of blue that he realized how much he missed it. Not like a sword or a horse, or even one of the other tribesmen who had survived the siege at Kozelsk. Those were all parts of a Mongol’s life that changed: swords would be broken or lost, horses would fall in battle or grow too old to carry a warrior, friends and comrades would die too. This was all part of the cycle of life under the Endless Blue Heaven, and throughout that cycle, the sky never changed. It was always there.
Until it wasn’t.
He hated sleeping in a bed. He was always sore in the morning. Muscles in his lower back and shoulders were knotted in a way that made no sense to him. He had once spent a week in the saddle—riding, sleeping, fighting, pissing, eating—and at the end of the week, he hadn’t been as stiff as he felt after a single night in that bed.
“And here, in Karakorum…” Lian paused until she was sure she had his attention. “Who has the power?”
“The Khagan, of course,” Gansukh muttered.
The east garden had become Gansukh’s refuge, and after the way the first few lessons had left him feeling even more confused and frustrated, he had insisted they take place outside. The grounds were nothing like the open steppe, but there was some room to wander, enough that he didn’t feel quite as caged.