Neal Stephenson - The Mongoliad - Book One

Perhaps her news would change all that.

Before they reached the tumbledown monastery they were using as their chapter house, Feronantus’s attention was drawn to the skin-clad hunter. He, for no obvious reason, crouched, then performed a clownish flop to the ground, and with eyes closed, pressed his ear against a settled and moss-covered tombstone.

Not his ear, actually, but the heavy skull bone behind it. He was listening for something.

“What comes, Finn?” said Feronantus, or something like that in the rough tongue Finn favored.

Finn held up four fingers. Then he dropped his hand to the ground and made it prance along like a cantering horse.

Many steppe ponies… Finn opened his eyes and shook his head. He held his hands close and then drew them farther apart. One very big , he judged.

“Destrier,” Feronantus said.

All of the men in the compound, save Feronantus and Finn, seemed to have disappeared. Looking around, Cnán was able to see where they had gone to ground. Boys who had been brandishing wooden swords a moment ago were suddenly armed with long steel. Istvan and Rædwulf had their bows out and arrows nocked, and as soon as Finn rolled back to his feet, he did too.

It was an embarrassingly long time before Cnán could hear anything at all. But finally a heavy clop of hooves and jingle of steel penetrated the dense swath of greenery that surrounded the compound, and two riders came up the forest road abreast, each leading a spare horse.

Now here , Cnán thought, was a knight worthy of her mother’s tales. He was tall, with long brown hair swept back from a high forehead, hazel eyes, and the clean-shaven face of an angel. He was armored in a shirt of mail, which she was accustomed to, but over that, guarding his shoulder and his breast, he wore segmented plates of polished steel. Slung over his back was a shield shaped, she sourly guessed, like the teardrops that must have rained from the faces of all the fancy ladies in his castle on the day he had gone prancing off to fight the Mongols. On his hip was a sword made for use in one hand, but straight, double-edged, longer and finer than most such weapons.

The other man was smaller, thick-muscled, and with a head more square than round. At first she assumed he was a squire, but as the pair rode into the compound, she saw he was at least as old as the knight. His clothes, though travel-worn, were more in keeping with courtly life than this forest camp. Something like a hatchet dangled from his waist, and he was festooned with daggers. Across his back was slung a crossbow, drawn and cocked. In his posture and the way he related to the beautiful knight, there was no deference, only equal regard and camaraderie. Coupled with a wry awareness of how people favored his handsome friend.

The knight had eyes only for Feronantus and a courteous greeting seemed ready on his lips, but the courtier with an excess of daggers broke in and was first to speak. He swept his arm ceremonially and announced in a booming voice to the compound: “Christendom is saved! Brother Percival has made a quest of it.”

Laughter from all around, partly at the jest, but partly, Cnán thought, out of relief that these men were on their side.

The knight Percival drew up near Feronantus and dismounted with practiced grace. Finn had been right about his horse. It was a rare, beautiful brute with a white blaze on its forehead and a silky gray mane, barrel-chested, bigger than Istvan’s stallion, and easily twice the size of a Mongol pony.

She had heard tales from her kin-sisters of an altercation between certain brothers of the Teutonic Knights and a party of Mongols who had gone astray and gotten lost in enemy territory. Trapped between river and woods, unable to maneuver as they were wont to, the Mongols had crowded together and the warhorses of the Teutons had slammed their smaller mounts around like bowling pins. Seeing this huge destrier, it was easy to believe. A horse worthy of the man…

Percival bowed low to Feronantus. Cnán was not at all amused at how much pleasure she felt, studying his face. She did her best to make sure it didn’t show.

“Brother Percival, Brother Roger, welcome,” Feronantus said. “It is very good to see you both. Thank God for your safe arrival.”

Percival’s companion, Roger, was only a step behind him. “Truth be told, God was surprisingly unhelpful,” he began. Percival shot him an exasperated look. Side by side, the difference in height between the pair was not as great as she had thought at first; Percival had seemed larger because of his mount.

“We will listen to your stories while we sup,” Feronantus said, holding up a hand to stay further discourse between the two.

“And listen, and listen some more—and listen again!” cracked the big man who had been training Haakon.

Percival turned to look at the source of the jest, and un-feigned delight spread over his face. “Taran! I hoped you’d be here.”

“I heard you might come,” said Taran, “and knew you’d need whipping into shape before the contests begin.”

“Taran you know,” said Feronantus, “and this dark, splendid fellow is Raphael, our physician. There is much we might speak of greetings and tales, but, Roger and Percival, you have interrupted me en route to a meeting, one I’m assured is too important to be delayed.”

Eyes went to Cnán, then back to Feronantus.

“This is our swift-footed guide and messenger,” Feronantus said. “Her name is not important—for now.”

Taran muttered something about Bindings , and then wary interest chased the confusion out of their faces.

“Where did I come from? Places of which you have never heard the names. So there would be little point in my reciting them,” Cnán said, in answer to Feronantus’s first question.

Amusement around the table, only a little strained. She was nervous that the one named Raphael, with the close-cropped black beard and the Syrian look, might call her bluff. A Crusader, she guessed, born and bred in one of the few surviving fortress-cities that the armies of the West still garrisoned in the flyblown hellhole that they styled the Holy Land. But such a man might know the deep parts of Asia better than, say, Taran, who was Irish and probably considered Dublin to be part of the exotic Orient.

Or perhaps she was being unkind. Hunger, and being hunted like an animal, had a way of shortening her temper. She tore into a piece of bread while the three senior knights enjoyed a chuckle.

“But most recently,” she went on, chewing and talking at the same time, “in the last few days, I have traveled from Czeszow. East of here.” She swallowed. “In the forest.” And again. “Where Mongols don’t like to go. There is a man there, a Ruthenian of noble birth, from the city of Volodymyr-Volynskyi—you probably know it as Lodomeria. He says he knows you.”

A serious, pained look came over Feronantus’s face. “Illarion,” he said.

“A member of your Order?”

“No,” said Feronantus, “but he could have been, were it not for…religious controversy.”

“Wrong kind of Christian?” Cnán asked, still chewing.

“Yes. Please go on. Illarion is alive, you say?”

“You seem surprised,” Cnán observed, “which tells me that you must have heard tell of what happened at Lodomeria.”

Feronantus’s silence implied assent. But Taran only looked provoked. “I have not heard,” said the Irishman.

“Briefly, the same as happened to all other cities that stand in the way of the Mongols. Perhaps worse than usual.”