Bones of the Hills

CHAPTER FIVE

As dawn came, Tsubodai’s poet was in the middle of telling the tale of the Badger’s Mouth, where Arslan had fought the largest army ever seen by any of the people. With Genghis and the generals watching, the poet was more honest than usual as he told Arslan’s exploits. They had all done well in that mountain pass before Yenking. Each man recalled those bloody days, with pride and awe mingling with the wine in their blood. No one else would ever understand what it had meant to stand together there against the Chin empire — and see it humbled. The Badger’s Mouth had been the womb that shoved them out into a new world: stronger and more dangerous. They had gone east and Yenking had burned.

The rising sun brought sight of thousands of riders streaming across the land from the camp by the Orkhon river, many with women and children on the saddles. Genghis was the khan and could ride where he wished, but they all wanted to hear the stories of Arslan. As the morning sun rose in the sky, poems and tales were declaimed from a hundred throats, over and over until the poets and shamans were hoarse.

Even Genghis had not realised so many would want to hear of the early days, but his people sat rapt for the performances, including those who were drinking heavily and stuffing their faces with greasy mutton and goat meat. He heard again how Arslan had rescued him from a pit and he blinked in painful memory at names he had not recalled for years. Arslan had been the first man to take an oath to him, to promise horses, gers, salt and blood, when Genghis had nothing but his mother and sister, a few wild brothers and starvation as his companions. It had been an immense act of trust and Genghis found himself reminded and moved once more by the changes Arslan had wrought and witnessed. That was the purpose of the truth-telling of a man’s life, that all those who heard would remember what he had meant to them and what he had accomplished as he flung the years.

The recitals broke off for the storytellers to rest their throats in preparation for the evening performances. By then it was clear that the entire Mongol nation would drift into that place.

It was not where Genghis had intended to honour his first general. The river was too far away, the grazing was sparse and the ground itself was rocky and dry. Yet it was that lack of permanence that made him grunt in satisfaction as he peed into the earth. His people should not become used to comfort, he told himself blearily. Their hard lives kept them stronger than those who lived in cities.

His thoughts were interrupted by shouts and cheers nearby. Warriors seemed to be clustering around one spot like a swarm of bees. As Genghis blinked, he saw Chagatai climb a cart to address them. Genghis frowned as another sound stilled the crowd, a yowling, coughing roar that made the hairs on his neck bristle. Genghis dropped his hand to his sword hilt as he strode through his people, letting them fall back before him rather than touch the khan and lose a hand or a head.

His generals had gathered around an iron cage on the cart, but Genghis did not look at them, nor at Chagatai, who stood like a proud owner. The animal behind the bars was larger than any great cat he had ever seen. Genghis could only shake his head in amazement, closing one eye against the ache from his broken tooth and a throbbing headache. To numb the pain, he gestured for more airag and scored his throat with a line of it. Even then, his eyes did not leave the beast that prowled back and forth, showing its curved white teeth in a display of anger. He had heard of the orange and black striped tiger, but to see its jaws and hear the thump of its tail as it padded back and forth in the cage set his own heart beating quickly. There was a challenge in its yellow eyes that raked the awed crowd.

‘Is it not a gift for a khan?’ Chagatai said.

Genghis merely glanced at him, but Chagatai lost some of his cockiness in that warning. The crowd around them had fallen silent as they waited for the khan’s reaction. Jelme was visibly uncomfortable and Genghis nodded to him in appreciation.

‘I have never seen such an animal, general. How did you capture him?’

‘The tiger is a gift to you, lord, from the king of Koryo. It was raised from a cub, but they cannot be tamed. I am told it will run down even a man on a horse and kill both the mount and the rider.’

Genghis stood very close to the bars, staring into the tiger’s eyes. As they met his, the animal moved without warning, its weight rocking the cage as it hit the bars. Genghis was too drunk to dodge and felt a tearing impact on his arm as a paw lunged at him. He looked in dim surprise at the blood on his torn sleeve. A single claw had caught him and gashed his flesh deeply.

‘So fast …’ he said in wonder. ‘I have seen slower snakes. And at such a size! I can believe the tale of it killing a man and his horse. Those jaws could break a skull.’ He swayed slightly as he spoke, but no one there mentioned the wound in case it shamed the khan.

‘In Koryo, there are warriors who hunt the tigers,’ Chagatai said more humbly, ‘though they work in groups and use bows, spears and nets.’ Chagatai’s gaze fell on Jochi as he spoke and his expression became thoughtful. His older brother was as fascinated by the beast as Genghis himself and stood too close to the bars.

‘Be careful, Jochi,’ Chagatai warned him loudly. ‘He will strike you too.’

Jochi glared. He wanted to contradict him, but he could not boast of his speed while his father stood and bled.

‘Have you hunted one of these tigers, in Koryon land?’ Jochi asked.

Chagatai shrugged.

‘They are not common around the king’s palaces.’ Under Jochi’s flat stare, he could not help going on. ‘I would have taken part, if one had been found.’

‘Perhaps,’ Jochi said, frowning. ‘Though I doubt Jelme would have risked the life of a young boy against such a monster.’

Chagatai’s whole face flushed as some of the men chuckled. Moments before, he had been the master of the crowd. Somehow, his father and Jochi had stolen his moment from him, so that he had to defend his pride. At fifteen years old, he had only spite and he lashed out without a thought at the only one he dared challenge.

‘You think you could face a tiger, Jochi? I would wager a fortune to see that.’

Jelme opened his mouth, but Jochi’s anger leapt and he spoke rashly.

‘Name your terms, brother,’ he said. ‘I will consider teaching your cat a little respect. He has shed my father’s blood, after all.’

‘This is drunken foolishness,’ Jelme snapped.

‘No, let him try,’ Chagatai replied as fast. ‘I will wager a hundred cartloads of my share of the Koryon tribute. Ivory, metal, gold and lumber.’ He waved a hand as if it mattered nothing. ‘If you kill the tiger, it will be yours.’

‘And you will kneel to me, in front of all the tribes,’ Jochi said. Anger consumed him, making him reckless. His eyes glittered as he stared up at Chagatai, but the younger man still sneered.

‘For that, you will have to do more than kill a tiger, brother. For that you will have to be khan. Perhaps not even that will be enough.’

Jochi’s hand dropped to his sword hilt and he would have drawn if Jelme had not laid a hand on his wrist.

‘Will you fight like children in front of the camp? On the night my father is honoured? The tiger is a king’s gift to the khan. No one else may decide what is to be done with him.’ His eyes were furious and Chagatai dipped his gaze, instantly meek. During his training, he had endured harsh punishments and scathing lectures from the general. The habit of obedience ran deep.

Genghis spoke at last, having watched the entire exchange.

‘I accept the gift,’ he said. His yellow eyes seemed the same colour as those of the big cat yowling at their backs. Jochi and Chagatai bowed their heads low rather than have the khan’s temper erupt. When he was drunk, Genghis was likely to knock a man down for staring.

‘We could pack a circle with armed warriors,’ Genghis said thoughtfully, ‘pointing swords and lances to the centre. One man could face the beast then, if he wanted.’

‘These animals are more dangerous than anything else I have seen,’ Jelme said, his voice strained. ‘With women and children all around…’ He was caught between the need to obey his khan and the madness of what Genghis seemed to be considering.

‘Move the women and children back, general,’ Genghis replied with a shrug.

Jelme’s training was too ingrained to argue and he bowed his head to the inevitable. Chagatai did not dare look at him.

‘Very well, lord. I could have my men tie heavy planks together all the way around. We could use the catapults to form the structure.’

Genghis nodded, not caring how the problems were solved. He turned to Jochi as the young man stood stunned at where his bickering and pride had led. Even Chagatai seemed awed, but Genghis was making all the decisions and they could only look on.

‘Kill this beast and perhaps your brother will bend a knee to you,’ Genghis said softly. ‘The tribes will be watching, boy. Will they see a khan in you?’

‘Or a corpse, or both,’ Jochi said without hesitation. He could not back down, not with his father and Chagatai waiting for it. He looked up at the tiger in its cage and knew it would kill him, but somehow he could not care. He had ridden with death before, in Tsubodai’s charges. At seventeen, he could gamble with his life and think nothing of it. He took a deep breath and shrugged.

‘I am ready,’ Jochi said.

‘Then form the circle, and place the cage within it,’ Genghis said.

As Jelme began to send his men for wood and ropes, Jochi beckoned to Chagatai. Still stunned, the younger brother leapt lightly down, rocking the cart and bringing a snarl from the tiger that scraped along the nerves.

‘I will need a good sword if I am to face that animal,’ Jochi said. ‘Yours.’

Chagatai narrowed his eyes, fighting to hide his triumph. Jochi could not survive against a tiger. He knew the Koryons would not hunt one without at least eight men and those well trained. He was staring into the eyes of a dead man and he could not believe his luck. On a sudden impulse, he unstrapped the sword Genghis had given him three years before. He felt the loss as its weight left him, but still his heart was full.

‘I will have it back when that beast has torn your head off,’ he murmured. No one else could hear.

‘Perhaps,’ Jochi said. He could not resist a glance at the animal in the cage. Chagatai saw the look and chuckled aloud.

‘It is only fitting, Jochi. I could never have accepted a rape-born bastard as khan.’ He walked away, leaving Jochi staring at his back in rage.

As the sun set, the circle took shape on the plains grass. Under Jelme’s watchful eye, it was a solid construction of oak and beech brought from Koryo, bound with heavy ropes and buttressed at all points by catapult platforms. Forty paces across, there was no entrance and no escape from the ring. Jochi would have to climb over the barricades and open the cage himself.

As Jelme ordered torches lit all round the circle, the entire nation pressed as close as they could. At first, it looked as if only those who could climb the walls would have a view, but Genghis wanted the people to see, so Jelme had used carts as platforms in an outer ring, raising men on pyramids of pine ladders, nailed roughly together. They swarmed over the towers like ants and more than one drunken fool fell onto the heads of those below, packed so tightly that the ground was hidden from sight.

Genghis and his generals had the best places on the ring and the khan had led them in drinking themselves almost blind as the third day wore on. Arslan had been toasted and honoured, but by then the whole camp knew a khan’s son would fight a foreign beast and they were excited at the closeness of death. Temuge had come with the last of the carts from the camp by the Orkhon river. He took most of the bets from the warriors, though only on the length of the fight to come. No one gambled on Jochi to win against the striped horror that lashed its tail and padded back and forth, staring out at them.

As night fell, the only light on the plains was that circle, a golden eye surrounded by the heaving mass of the Mongol nation. Without being asked, the drummer boys had begun to beat the rhythms of war. Jochi had retired to Jelme’s own ger to rest that afternoon and they waited on him, eyes turning constantly to catch the first glimpse of the khan’s son coming out.

Jelme stood and looked down on the young man seated on a low bed, his father’s sword across his knees. Jochi wore the heavy armour Tsubodai had given him, layered in finger-width scales of iron over thick cloth, from his neck to his knees. The smell of sour sweat was strong in the ger.

‘They’re calling for you,’ Jelme said.

‘I hear,’ Jochi replied, his mouth tightening.

‘I can’t say you don’t have to go. You do.’ Jelme began to reach out with his hand, intending to place it on the younger man’s shoulder. Instead, he let it fall and sighed. ‘I can say that this is a stupid thing to be doing. If I’d known how it would turn out, I’d have turned the cat loose in the Koryon forests.’

‘It’s done,’ Jochi murmured. He looked up at his father’s general with a bitter twist to his mouth. ‘I’ll just have to kill that great cat now, won’t I?’

Jelme smiled tightly. Outside, the noise of the crowd had grown in volume and now he could hear Jochi’s name being chanted. It would be a glorious moment, but Jelme knew the boy could not survive it. As the circle was being constructed and the cage lifted down from the cart, he had studied the animal and seen the smooth power of its muscles. Faster than a man and four times as heavy, it would be impossible to stop. He was silent with foreboding as Jochi came to his feet and flexed his shoulders. The khan’s first son had inherited his father’s blinding speed, but it would not be enough. The general saw sweat dripping down Jochi’s face in a fat bead. Genghis had not allowed him room to interpret his orders, but he still struggled against ingrained obedience. Jelme had brought the tiger to the khan. He could not simply send a boy to his death. When he spoke at last, his voice was barely a murmur.

‘I will be on the walls with a good bow. If you fall, try to hang on and I’ll kill it.’ He saw a flicker of hope in the young man’s eyes at that. Jelme recalled the only hunt he had seen in Koryo, when a tiger had taken a shaft in the heart and still disembowelled an experienced net man.

‘You cannot show fear,’ Jelme said softly. ‘No matter what happens. If you are to die tonight, die well. For your father’s honour.’

In response, Jochi turned a furious gaze on the general.

‘If he depends on me for his honour, he is weaker than I realised,’ Jochi snapped.

‘Nevertheless, all men die,’ Jelme went on, ignoring the outburst. ‘It could be tonight, next year or in forty years, when you are toothless and weak. All you can do is choose how you stand when it comes.’

For an instant, Jochi’s face cracked into a smile.

‘You are not building my confidence, general. I would value those forty years.’

Jelme shrugged, touched at the way Jochi showed courage.

‘Then I should say this: kill it and your brother will kneel to you in front of the tribes. Your name will be known and, when you wear its skin, all men will look on you with awe. Is that better?’

‘Yes, it is,’ Jochi replied. ‘If I am killed, be ready with your bow. I do not want to be eaten.’ With a deep breath, he showed his teeth for an instant, then ducked under the low doorway and out into the night. His people roared to see him, the sound filling the plains and drowning the growls of the waiting tiger.

The crowd parted to let him through and Jochi did not see their staring, cheering faces as he approached the walls of the ring. The light from torches fluttered and spat as he climbed lithely to the top, then leapt to the grass below. The tiger watched him with a terrifying focus and he did not want to open the cage. Jochi looked up at the faces of his people. His mother was the only woman he could see and he could barely meet her eyes in case it unmanned him. As his gaze drifted over her, he saw Borte’s hands twitch on the wood, as if she wanted to reach out to her first-born son.

His father’s face was set and unreadable, but his uncle Kachiun nodded to him as their eyes met. Tsubodai wore the cold face and, in doing so, hid the pain Jochi knew he would be feeling. The general could do nothing to thwart the khan’s will, but Jochi knew he at least would not relish the fight. On instinct, Jochi bowed his head to the general and Tsubodai returned the gesture. The tiger roared and opened his great mouth to gnaw at a bar in frustration, angered by the ring of baying men. The animal was a young male, Jochi saw, unscarred and inexperienced. He felt his hands shake and the familiar dry mouth before battle. His bladder made itself felt and he took a strong grip on the wolf’s-head sword of his father. It was a fine blade and he had wanted it for a long time. He had not known his grandfather Yesugei and only hoped the old man’s spirit would give him strength. He stood tall and another deep breath brought calm.