Bortai had been among the first to work out what the mingghan of Hawk warriors that came to their aid was doing. They surely realized that Gatu had at least three or four thousand men to thus venture into Hawk territory. They-from what the the two Jahguns had said, knew that they were outnumbered, mustering barely a full Mingghan-a thousand men. Yet they could not desert her and Kildai. So they had sent a few men and horses to use General Subatai's trick. Harnessing horses to logs to make dust. Sounding horns and drums where they were not. That was what gave it away to her. No Mongol general would betray an attack until it was too late. Creating the impression that they were a far larger host and coming from exactly where they had not seemed to be. It was a masterful stroke. She'd told Tulkun. And one of the knights. He'd looked puzzled and steered her toward Erik.
It did separate her from her brother. She was less worried than she had been. A handful of the the Jahgun had been determined to become the part of the young Khan's Khesig, his imperial guard. And what better way than to surround him and fight bravely? He had a guard of at least twenty. He would just have to cope without her. And she'd told them that if they ran off after Gatu's men, they would wish they were dead.
She saw Erik. And then saw that some of the Gatu Orkhan's men were making a last effort to leave the field with some honor. Or at least with her.
It was a mess, thought Erik. And this was always when things went wrong, when people got killed. When they thought it was all over. He was keeping close to Manfred for that reason. And then he saw Bortai riding toward them, alone, and straight into trouble.
There were four of Gatu's men, and there was at least seventy yards between her and the knights. Erik put his spurs to his horse, and Manfred was right beside him. Von Gherens was just behind them. But Erik knew they could never get there in time. His heart knew the agony of remembering the same situation with Svanhild's death.
Only… this was Bortai, not Svan. She was not going to wait to be rescued. The first of the four got an arrow through his chest. The second barely missed being slashed out of the saddle with her knife stroke. She'd dropped the bow, and had a blade into her hand. She didn't kill him, but his right arm was gashed to the bone. And the third, taking no chances, and using his lance, got the thrown knife through his throat.
That left one man, who suddenly realized this fact. He swung his sword in a vicious arc that would have-with the pace of his pony-probably have decapitated her… If she'd been in the way. She wasn't. She'd dropped over the side of her horse, and the blade scythed above her. The fellow suddenly realized that three knights' lance points were heading straight for him, and attempted to turn, to flee… to find Bortai had beaten him to the turn and was just behind him. She used her momentum and his weight to cartwheel him out of the saddle, under the galloping hooves of the advancing horses. The knights lifted their lances. And she smiled sweetly at them and waved. Dismounted to recover her knife and bow.
"This is why I disapprove of women in combat, " said Von Gherens.
Manfred guffawed. "Ten more like her and there wouldn't be any combat. No wonder she laughs at you, Erik."
A little while later-the knights massed again-they rode across to the cart and wagon encampment. The duke of Valahia came out to meet them.
"So, your Highness, what brings you out here on to the lands of the Golden horde?" said Manfred, conversationally, after formal introductions had been made.
"Well, I am at war with King Emeric of Hungary," explained the tall, pale-skinned man. "I have raised a small army, mostly of Valahian peasantry. I came to buy horses for my army."
There was a rather stunned silence. "Er. Don't you have a quartermaster-general to do that?" asked Eberhart, probably the most skilled at filling in gaps
The duke of Valahia smiled diffidently. "I probably ought to have one. Making war is a new profession for me."
Manfred looked at the killing field. Men were out dealing with the wounded, and looting. Putting down horses that were too injured. "God help king Emeric if this is what you do while you're still new to it. Shall we find a place away from this carnage to have a stoup of wine, and talk? Emeric of Hungary is no friend of ours."
Vlad nodded. "I too would like to know what the knights of the Holy Trinity are doing here in the lands of the Golden Horde?"
Manfred laughed. "It's a long story. And a dry one, like all long stories."
Vlad was torn between suspicion of people who wished to befuddle him with drink, and a desire to get to know these knights, and their Prince. The signs of piety and yet skill in warfare appealed to him. Well, he had found that alcohol had little or no effect on him. If they hoped to dull his senses with it they were in for a shock. "Come into the enclosure," he said. "We have had very few losses in there. It was much more effective than I had hoped. The cannon too were very much more deadly than we expected. As I said, I am still learning…" his voice trailed off. "Although such death must grieve any Christian's soul."
Several of the knights nodded.
Vlad found that encouraging, despite his own strange, suppressed desire to walk among the dead and dying. He was morbidly fascinated by it.
They sat and talked. Vlad's quartermaster had only some beer to offer, but the knights provided a small cask of wine. Feeling he needed some support, Vlad asked the Szekely Primore to join him. "I speak very little Frankish, Drac. Just what I learned from the whores in the tail of Emeric's army when I served on the western border. Not suitable for high company."
"I need you. Even if you say nothing." He wondered, again, for the thousandth time, just where Rosa had got to.
The Szekeler shook his head and smiled. "No, Drac. We need you. I think you can count on the support not just of me and the people of Ghimes, but the Szekely. You have what we need. Honor, courage and fairness. Those are rare attributes in princes, and the Szekely will follow one that has all of them. But if you want me, I will be there. Besides, I like a goblet or two of wine."
After a while, Vlad had lost his earlier caution and merely enjoyed talking to people whose world was wider than his, and who, it would seem, knew much of what he needed to learn. And they felt… wholesome.
The talk went on deep into the night, only interrupted by a respectful Hawk clan officer who came to ask if the envoys and traders needed anything. "I think we need to clarify your status a bit," said Manfred.
Vlad smiled. "We will need to trade with them, if we are to fight Hungary. It will make trading easier."
That brought laughter. "It'll put them off raiding other traders, that's for sure."
That night, after the talking had finally broken into yawning, and the men had retreated to bed, Vlad pondered what he had learned. The world was a bigger and more complex place than he'd known. And there were, he decided, forces of good and evil in it. He liked to think he was part of the good. But he still wondered. Here, on the edge of Hungary, dependent in many ways on it, he was in a poor position to ally with the Holy Roman Empire. Yet… they seemed-to judge by this small sample, a people he would want to ally with.
"He's a lost cause," said Manfred, cheerfully. "No allies, no money, no officers, no powerful friends, except this Countess.. I think I should conclude an alliance the fellow on my Uncle's behalf. Besides the fact I like him, it'll infuriate Eberhart."
"When it comes to fighting your way up from nothing with nothing… he has proved he's far from a lost cause. But he really does have huge holes in his knowledge of the world. Being confined and isolated like that for all those years has shaped him in some odd and unpredictable ways," said Erik.
"And kept him from learning a lot of things which he'd just have to unlearn. Look, we're trapped, for now, in this part of the Golden Horde territory. Let's take him in hand, Erik. He can, at the very least, be a thorn in Emeric of Hungary's side, and keep the man busy rather than interfering with our affairs."
Erik nodded. "Those are good troops he has, especially when you consider they were peasant volunteers six months ago. Well disciplined, and willing to die for him, I reckon. And the light cavalry, the Szekelers, are not bad either. Not as good as the Mongol, but on a par with the Croats."
"And like any elite, they resent the fact that Emeric has passed them over for his Croats. I gather the Croats will take pay in money, and the Szekely want it in less tangible things. They're hardened with constant attrition by the Mongol clans."
"The Mongol are better, though. And they outnumber them. How come they haven't pushed into Hungary?"
"From what I can gather two reasons. One, the terrain. They don't like mountains, they don't like forests, they like open plains, and their way of life is shaped to that. There are also a lot of fortified buildings up there, things it would be hard for them to take. And secondly, since the time of their 'Great Khan' Ulaghchi… they've been through a number of periods of civil war, with no strong leadership. Ulaghchi pushed east and north, recapturing lost territory, pushing further. Much of that land was lost again to Lithuania and Jagiellon."
"And Eberhart ferreted out something else about this Khan Ulaghchi. Apparently he was a rabid traditionalist-you remember that hamlet next to the river being literally the only settlement we'd seen? He issued an edict against settled dwellings. Said they made people corrupt and soft. Didn't approve of gunpowder much either."
"He could be right," said Erik, with a chuckle. "No inns and no wine-think how tough you'd be."
"Yeah. And how miserable. But as the old windbag pointed out, it means that they have no real manufacturing base either. If you can't make it from a sheep or a horse, you have to take it from your foes."
"Or buy it. People in towns buy sheep. And I need some sleep before morning. I have a feeling that tomorrow is going to be even more complicated."
Nothing, thought Bortai, was ever completely simple. Yes, they had managed to get home to the Clan. Yes they had handed the forces of Gatu Orkhan a lesson, and a defeat that would have other clans steer clear of Hawk lands, and conflict with the Hawk Clan, for many years. It was a defeat that had been inflicted, largely, by a force a quarter of the size of Gatu Orkhan's. Moreover, they had taken very few casualties, and inflicted vast numbers of deaths and maiming among the enemy.
And now some of the Hawk Clan were saying that they should seize the cannon from the trader who had aided them. They were pressing her, as they could not press Kildai. He had ridden off with his 'Khesig' to 'do things he had to do'.
She was not sure quite where Kildai had got to.
But it had been somewhere in the direction of the wagon-cart fortress.
David could have told her. At least, once he had got over the disorientation of being woken up after very little sleep after one of the most exhausting days of his life, he could have. The guards on the rough encampment of the knights had recognized and admitted Kildai. They'd had been polite but firm about Kildai's escorts. Kildai had been relieved. He did not want them listening in. Nor was he too keen on them seeing David. He had a feeling that it might be useful if the two of them wanted to get away…
Before the kurultai… before his Uncle's death, Kildai had been happy. He had had no real responsibilities. He'd been the nephew of the orkhan, and the great grandson of the Great Khan. He did not remember clearly, as Bortai did, when their father had been Orkhan. In the months leading up to kurultai… well he'd been aware that he was being pushed forward as the Hawk clan's claim to rule the horde. But he had not really believed in any of it. It wasn't actually going to happen.
Then had come the accident… If it was an accident. He suspected sorcery still, even if no-one but David seemed to believe him. That had suddenly made him aware of a whole lot of the realities he had not known about before. Now… it seemed that the clan itself thought that somehow… He was the Khan. To them anyway.
And they were asking him to decide on things he'd never even thought about. He could ask Bortai… but… but… he had spent the last few years rebelling against that. And it would be, in terms of his authority, a mistake. He knew that much.
So instead he turned to someone he could trust. Someone who knew a little more of politics and the world than he did. Someone brave enough to not carry a sword into combat so that he could keep Kildai upright.
David blinked. "How would I know?"
Kildai hoped his face did not betray his disappointment. But of course it did. David laughed. "You wake me up and ask me what to do about the trader. What trader, you idiot?"
David knew, by now, just what high company he'd been mixing with. But the habits of the last few weeks of near constant contact and amicable bickering, when he hadn't knownit, died hard. And his brain was still fuzzy with sleep. The idiot part had come naturally. What he didn't expect was Kildai to grab him… not to wrestle him or cut his throat for such disrespect, but to hug him. "They expect me to know everything," said Kildai, in a distinctly watery voice.
"Ach, so what do they know?" said David roughly. "So tell me. Who is this trader?"
"The man with the cannons. He is with some Szekeler guards. The Clan do not like the Szekely. The commander of the Mingghan says we must take the cannons."
David covered his eyes. "Is one war not enough? That's not a trader, Kildai. No trader has a whole lot of cannons. That is the Khan of Valahia. He said so to the knights. I heard him. And they believe him. Wait. I'll ask Ritter Von Stael…"
"No," Kildai said, warily.
"He's a good sort, Kildai. He made me his squire." David was still incredulous about this.
"I need… No one must know. But I need to ask you. So: he is a Khan, really? And the Szekely? The Officer of the Mingghan has something against them. But some of my Khesig say that he tried to raid one of their forts… I don't know. They say he said he came to buy horses."
So David spent the next half an hour solving the problems of the young Khan. Mostly he solved them the best way he knew, by the logic of the back streets of Jerusalem, and with a bit of common sense. Often Kildai seemed to have that too. He just needed a bit of reassurance.
"If you're worried, just tell them that you need to think about it. And that only a fool makes big decisions in a hurry. Von Stael said that to me today. Then you can ask me." David did not add, "and then I'll ask your sister," although he thought it, and wondered just how he could manage to do that.
Kildai nodded. "Yes. Now I will go back. The Khesig will be worried. And I need to step in and stop anything more happening tonight. You are right."
Bortai was a worried woman. She'd already quietly asked three men to go and find Kildai and get him here. She felt, in her core, that the trader should be left alone. They'd fought together, as brothers of necessity, against Gatu's troops. She had some support from the commanders of the Jaghuns that had accompanied them over the Iret-although they too were tempted. The Mingghan that had arrived later… well, they felt that it would be a rich booty, and too valuable in the war that was coming. Yes, the traders had aided the young Khan, and they deserved some mercy. Well, most of them felt that way. The commander of one of the Jaghuns felt they should leave them alone. That he was mad, and should be avoided in case it a sickness that spread. But his and Bortai's voices were the only openly dissenting ones, and it was only the respect that she commanded, and that her father had commanded that had held matters in check for this long.
Then Kildai entered, accompanied by a close guard of those who had elected themselves his Khesig.
The question was respectfully put to him. Bortai's heart sank. Protocol demanded that she could not speak to him first. And he was a boy of fourteen. A good rider, but what did he know, really, of such things? He would let the officers lead him.
Kildai took his time in answering. Sat down. Looked thoughtful. She knew him. He was play-acting the part. She'd seen him do it…
"Only a fool," he said calmly, "starts a second war, before he has won the first."
That was accepted as wisdom, which, indeed, Bortai thought it was, from him. It made sense, and was an argument she might have used. It just didn't sound like something he'd have come up with on his own.
Kildai continued. "And only a fool does not scout his enemy's position and know whom he is attacking, before he presses the attack."
"What do you mean, young Khan," said the commander of the Mingghan, a little patronizingly.
That was a mistake with Kildai. He pointed at the the commander. "I mean your counsel nearly led us into another war. He is not a trader. Those of us who saw him in war, know that. Those who arrived later, did not."
It was a cutting comment, a little unfair. But…
"But he had trade flags. He said he wished to buy horses," said the officer who had been insistent that he was mad.
"I say again," said Kildai. "He is no trader. Your scouting is not good enough."
"Who is he then, Young Khan? A spy. A conqueror with two hundred men?" That was said a little sarcastically by the commander of the Mingghan.
Kildai shook his head. "He is the Khan from over the mountains. He told us so. And I have been making sure. My scouting is careful."
The trader, well, not a trader, according to Kildai, had spoken in Frankish when he had ridden up to them. But she'd only understood part of it. The part about an alliance of convenience. But how had Kildai understood more? And then it came to her, and she understood just where he had been. The horseboy. Well. So far the little devil's advice had been good. She must talk to the orkhan Erik about this. She would need to say a few things that boy, and also to have an eye kept on him.
"But then… what does he want here? He said he wanted to buy horses."
"Probably exactly what he says. Horses."
"But we do not sell our horses… some old ones, bad animals maybe. But a Khan would want the finest…"
"We don't know. Maybe he wants to give them to the Szekelers," said Bortai, which provoked a fair amount of laughter.
"Anyway," said Kildai. "Who said anything about selling him OUR horses?"
The entire audience was stilled. "We'll sell him our enemies horses. We may even give him some for free."
That provoked uproar. Horses were the measure of wealth. Kildai held up his hand for silence and it came, reluctantly. "Gatu Orkhan has gold. And wars cost that. We will need gold, which we can't take from Gatu, easily. But this day we have taken at least two thousand horses. Let us exchange them for gold, if this Khan has it. We'll keep the best ones, of course."
Bortai was sure now that David had fed him this. She'd listened to him talking to Kildai. He seemed to know a great deal about the value of horses. But she found herself in agreement with him on one thing. There was no point in starting a second war. Instead they must use him to win this one.
Vlad was greeted the next morning by a respectful messenger from 'the young Khan'. Could they meet?
He took the Primore Peter with him. They were escorted to a small encampment away from the field of battle. He was surprised to see that they really meant 'the young khan'. The boy looked as if he was in his teens. They were introduced, also to several of the other Mongol, some of whom were definitely the military commanders. The introduction seemed to provide the young boy with a fair amount of satisfaction. "My people told me that you were a trader. Wishing to buy horses. Not a prince." Translated one of the men.
"I am a Prince fighting a war. I need horses." This too was translated.
"So you were scouting to raid," said one of the older men, sardonically. At least, if the translation was faithful it was darkly said.
Vlad stared him down. "It is beneath my honor to steal. I told your men. I wish to buy horses."
Vlad did not allow his gaze to waver, as this too was translated. The officer did not seem pleased. But it made an impact. Vlad was not to sure it was a positive one. But the boy nodded. Said something to one of the men. The Szekely Primore gaped. "He is giving you horses."
The translator explained. "The young Khan has ordered that you be given your share of the battle-spoils. Fifty horses. The young Khan wants to know: for what do you want the horses?"
Vlad explained. The translator guffawed. Slapped his knees. And translated with difficulty. The other Mongol found it equally funny.
Eventually the question was asked "So, you do not want our fastest and best then, for the earth diggers, the eaters of vegetables?"
"No. Good sound placid animals. Not warhorses. And I wouldn't mind buying some sheep too." Vlad was a little prickly. True, his men were mostly peasants or poor freemen. But their cannon and arquebuses had brought down enough horse riding Mongol light cavalry yesterday. More than the Hawk clan Mongol had. But if they wanted to deceive themselves, well, maybe it was best that they did. As long as they sold him horses. And some sheep. It appeared they were willing to do that. Selling 'good' horses… spirited war horses, or parting with them in any other way but by brute force, was sheer foolishness. They could be used against them. But to sell the slow, solid slugs to men who could not ride… well if the Khan from mountains was stupid enough… And sheep. Sheep were plentiful and cheap. The Mongol were chortling with glee, when he started talking gold. And then they were eager to discuss future business.
They parted with mutual goodwill, each, it appeared, having got what they wanted. It was rather pleasant.
Outside, Vlad was surprised to see the officer who had told him they did not sell horses. The man bowed, warily. It appeared that at least one of Mongol had decided that he did not wish to fight Vlad. "Khan. My brother was with the Jahgun that escorted the Lady Bortai and the young Khan. He says you are terrible in battle. You saved some of their lives. I spoke foolishly before. But I spoke for you last night."
Vlad could honestly not remember much of the the sortie that had turned ugly. He hoped the man did not mean 'terrible' as in 'not good'. "We all say things we don't mean. I promise this. I do not harm women and children. In fact, if they need it, we will provide shelter and protection during the war.
The fellow seemed even more taken aback.