Eric Flint: Much Fall Of Blood

The knights rode in the rear of the column. There was a disturbance up ahead and Bortai rode on to see what it was.

David lay on the ground and fitted epileptically. The Khesig had formed a defensive circle around him. The shaman Kaltegg had already made a circle in the snow and was beating his drum, chanting.

As Bortai pushed her way through, David sat up. By the time she got there he was being helped onto his horse.

"Are you all right?" she demanded.

"No," he said, crossly. "I feel like I have just run fifty miles, and been pounded with rocks."

"Magical attack," said the shaman. "I have the flavor of the attacker now."

"Oh, good," said David, clinging to the saddle."That makes me feel better. Why didn't you stop them?"

"I did not know who it was, or what form it would take," said Kaltegg. "I do now, boy from Jerusalem. And if you had been Kildai, the attack would have killed him. Now, it will rebound."

Bortai rode back and evaded Erik, to make sure that Ritter Von Stael's "squire" in peaked helmet and high-collared cloak was all right. And to reassure Kildai that David too was fine. They managed a swap around later in the Hawk camp, and a little later Kildai, looking as fit as a young colt, rode off to the first session of the kurultai.

"You will be called," Bortai explained to Erik. "A little after me, I think."

"What happened earlier?"

"The horseboy transferred his debt to you, to us," said Bortai with a twinkle. "He will be all right. And he is a brave boy."

"Better than he was, anyway," said Erik.

A messenger came looking for Bortai, and she went to face the clan-heads.

"There was some consternation at seeing Kildai there," said her escort, grinning.

"You have noted carefully who did not expect him to be?"

"Of course. But we already knew."

Bortai stood and spoke to the crowd. She had a good, strong carrying voice. She told her story well. She had been taught to do so, since story-telling was a skill of great value. The audience responded appreciatively, with suitable laughter, and appropriate gasps of horror in the right places. Pointed looks were cast at the orkhan.

Afterward one of Gatu's pets got up. "It's a good story," he said, "if hard to believe."

The audience hissed. They wanted to believe. "But tell me," he went on. "The effects of a fall onto one's head, as we all know, can weaken the souls of the body causing fits. Is it not true that the young khan of the Hawk has had such fits since then? Making this tissue of silly lies a necessity? The clans cannot have a leader who will fall from his horse."

Bortai drew herself up for her reply-and Nogay, he who had been Tarkhan to the north-suddenly began gibbering and shrieking, and then, with foam on his lips, began to spasm and jerk uncontrollably. He rolled down the slope, his back arched with a peculiar choking, gurgling and screaming as he thrashed about, fighting unseen demons. Eventually he lay still, his head at an odd angle.

"No," said Bortai, smiling sweetly. "You must have confused Kildai with General Nogay," she pointed. "That was no fit, though. That was a curse. A spell cast by Nogay-which has come echoing back on him." She sniffed disdainfully. "His souls do not have the strength of my brother Khan Kildai. His ancestors do not watch over him. They have turned away from him in shame. Some people will do anything for gold. But it does not go well with the spirits if they do so."

The lifeless corpse of Nogay bore mute witness to what she'd said. That and the fact that Nogay had indeed come from relative obscurity to become very rich. The advisor who had raised what he had hoped would be a clinching point, supported by a fit from Kildai which never came… shrank down again, close to his master.

"It has been said, though, that the clan Hawk gave shelter to truce breakers and, worse, those who take hostage an honorable Tarkhan of the Ilkhan of the Red Horde."

"Many things have been said. Not all of them are true," said Bortai calmly, although she raged at the implications. "We say that the clans were deceived into truce breaking, into attacking those who came honorably acting within the writ of safe conduct they had been given. If there is dishonor, it is to those who told such lies." She walked over and kicked the corpse of Nogay. "Here is one. The other traitor to both the Red Horde of Ilkhan and those whom he was supposed to be the emissary to… is the tarkhan Borshar." There was a gasp of horror at this. A Tarkhan was immune to any form of punishment. It made things complicated. "I have here," she held up the documents, "bearing the great seal of the Ilkhan Hotai, a writ of safe conduct to the Khan Manfred of Brittany and his retinue of Knights of the order that is called 'the Holy Trinity' as escorts of the tarkhan Borshar. I call the warrior Tulkun of the bear clan of the Red Horde to be our next witness to this."

Tulkun had been fetched. As he strode in the escorts left to fetch Erik. They had decided to let it be Erik, because he spoke-badly, it was true-the tongue of the people.

Tulkun was a good fighter. He was not a particularly good speaker.

The tarkhan himself rose, lazily. "What you have here is a case of double-tongued speaking. A traitor himself, accusing me of treachery. Yes, they had a safe conduct, but planned treachery and used me as a hostage. This Tulkun is a traitor and without honor, who has sold his clan and his people to the foreigners. I say the honor of the Golden Horde demands his head."

There was a growl of assent from a lot of throats.

Bortai held up another piece of paper. "There is one more thing. A document that has come to our hands. It was given to Captain Feldu for the late General Nogay. Written by the tarkhan."

Bortai read it out.

And was aware of a group of armed men who had entered the central area of the natural arena.

"A forgery," said the tarkhan, waving a dismissive hand.

Bortai was aware of the fact that the nine men who had accompanied Tulkun and the tarkhan Borshar were closing on them.

"You know that this is the kurultai. That the spilling of blood is forbidden," said Bortai, turning toward them.

They bowed. "We know that. We have not come to spill blood," said the leader of the small group, Matu. "We escorted the tarkhan from Jerusalem. We have come to bear witness that the warrior Tulkun speaks the truth. He is an honorable man."

"I carried the message to the Captain from the tarkhan Borshar," said another.

There was an audible hiss of indrawn breath from the watching crowd. You could see the red rage-lights in their eyes.

The tarkhan shrugged. "Politics. There is nothing you can do about it. I am a tarkhan of the Ilkhan, with all the rights granted between the fellow people of the Hordes. Send me home, if you can."

"There is something I can do about it."

Bortai turned to see that Erik had entered the amphitheater.

"Who are you, foreigner, that you dare to raise your voice at the kurultai," said Gatu Orkhan. "There is no limit on the spilling of blood of non-Mongol."

"He is protected by the same writ of safe conduct. He is a Knight of the Holy Trinity," said Bortai.

"None-the-less. Borshar Tarkhan may be unwelcome in the lands of the Golden Horde, but no one can raise a hand against him," said the orkhan.

There was an outcry at this. "He has shamed us. He has brought us to the brink of war with the Ilkhan." The crowd seethed like angry bees.

Erik held up his hand. Someone in the watching crowd said "He is the tortoise Orkhan!"

There was ripple of interest and amusement through the crowd.

"Let him speak!" called several voices.

Erik bowed. "My thanks and my respect to the Clan heads of the Golden Horde." He pointed to Borshar. "There is a man who has tried to engineer war between the Golden Horde and his supposed master the Ilkhan. He has tried to engineer war between the Holy Roman Empire and Golden Horde-for, and he knew this well, had his plot succeeded, and had my Khan, Manfred of Brittany, been treacherously murdered, it would have meant war. Probably war with the Ilkhan too. He does not serve the Ilkhan. He serves the Khan Jagiellon. The source of much gold."