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  She put her hand on heart and bowed. "Respect to the hearth and the Fox clan."

  They still drank kumiss and set up guest fires, so they probably still held to tradition. Tradition would require a greeting and an offer of sustenance before any form of business could be discussed. The delay irked her, but it could be used to her advantage.

  The Fox Clan elders would assume she was avoiding being stolen by her intended groom. That was a game they would revel in. Being hard to capture was still honorable. Chinggis Khan had declared an end to wife-stealing, and while he lived that had been strictly observed. But he was centuries dead and, like drinking, wife-stealing was a much beloved Mongol custom.

  Eventually, the niceties having been observed, they got down to negotiation. Bortai was terrified that her brother might wake, alone and in the dark and as confused as people were, after a blow to the head. But she kept a steely calm. "I need three fine horses, such horses as the great Fox clan ride."

  The clan elder shook his head sorrowfully. "Alas. Horses . . . We could offer you a pony. For twenty dirhan in silver."

  She shook her head equally sorrowfully. "A prince's ransom. I am a poor woman. What of a gelding and mare?"

  The bargaining went on. She dropped some comments about the leader of the Jaghun her father wanted her to marry. She was afraid that even the small piece of jewelry she offered might be too much, or a piece they might recognize. But at length she got what she wanted—which was anything but three horses—and they got a good price on a covered cart that had seen better days, with an ox. The cart would be in bad repair, and it was most likely the ox was young and still balky and undertrained, or close to its deathbed. But they expected her to be caught in fairly short order, so there was no point in parting with the best. There was a fair chance that the ox would either be left on the plain or become part of her new husband's property.

  Now she had to deal with the delicate matter of getting Kildai into the cart, unseen. She really had no idea how to manage that. But fortune favored her. No sooner had the beast—young and balky, as she'd predicted—been poled up, than a loud fight broke out. Her Fox clan helpers hurried off to watch. They were fairly drunk by now and entertainment at night in the kurultai was scanty. She went back to find Kildai and found that he had moved. Rolled over, or been rolled over.

  Her heart was in her mouth as she felt for her fur muff that she'd left the rest of her jewelry in. It wasn't there!

  Anger blossomed like fire in her. What had they come to, the great Golden Horde? She assumed that someone had thought the boy drunk, maybe a thief himself, and had robbed him. She cursed furiously. Kicked something. It was the muff . . . but there was no jewelry in it.

  Feeling around she found a solitary bangle that the thief must have dropped. Maybe there was more, but time conspired against her. She slipped the bracelet onto her wrist, carried Kildai to the cart, loaded him into it, and led it off. There would still be sentries to pass. But discipline was fairly lax. She'd planned to bribe a night-watch sentry. Now . . . she might have to kill one.

  She made her way to the edge of the vast encampment. Once outside those limits, the rules of conduct for the kurultai would no longer apply. She could see a sentry on horseback, silhouetted against the night sky. There might be foot patrols, as well. It had not occurred to her to find out before the kurultai. Like the problem of how to deal with a mounted guard, that had not been something she had ever given any thought to.

  The sentry was mounted, and had a lance, a bow, a sword. She had a knife and a bullock-cart.

  And he was not going away.

  She led the cart forward. Sometimes boldness was the only approach.

  The guard rode over. "Where are you going, woman?"

  She bowed. "Greetings."

  "I asked you a question." He leaned over and grabbed her by the hair.

  She grabbed his wrist and jumped, and then hung. "Hellcat!" he swore, struggling to keep his balance. But he was a Mongol horseman, not easily dislodged from the saddle. She kicked off two footed from the pony he was riding. It whinnied in protest, and he lost his grip on her hair—well, mostly; some stayed in his hand—as she fell free. She rolled under the cart.

  Then the fool committed the cardinal sin of any cavalryman in combat. He dismounted. And fortune, or the tengeri, favored her. He dived under the cart too, to try and catch her, startling the ill-trained young bullock. She rolled out of under the far side of the cart while the heavy wheel rode over his arm. He screamed, but she already had her foot in the stirrup, and swung up onto the pony. She had the advantage now, as he staggered to his feet, clutching his arm.

  Mongols train their horses to be weapons too. And the guard had much that she and her brother would need to survive. She rode him down. Then she used his own lance, which had been strapped to the saddle, to make sure that he was dead. Only when she was certain did she dismount, tie a rope to him and drag him to the cart. That took nearly all of her strength to get him onto it, to lie next to her stentorianly breathing little brother.

  She tied the pony to the tail of the cart, and then led the bullock off into the darkness, following the heavily worn and rutted track to the southwest, away from the lands of the White Horde and the Hawk clan. In short, away from the direction of safety—but that was also where Gatu's men would search first. By mingling her tracks with those of the other clans who had come from the southwest she would make it harder for them to track her.

  A bullock cart could not move very fast or very far. And they only had one pony. A family needed at least ten, and a hundred sheep, just to survive. They would have to eat plants. The thought was enough to make her blench, despite all she had been through that night. The shame and disgust would simply have to be borne.

  It was a long night. When she stopped to rest and water the bullock and the pony at a copse next to a small stream, she had time to check on her brother, and to examine the dead man.

  He carried the typical gear of an ordinary horseman. Knife, sword, a small hatchet and a leather surcoat, varnished and sewed with iron bosses. His captargac had some boiled horsemeat, a small bag of millet, a small clay pignate and grut—four or five days food for them before she would have to resort to roots, berries and leaves, and whatever game she could kill.

  She left the body in the copse, covered with leaf litter. She would have given him a better burial, but time pressed. A bullock-cart does not move very fast and distance was her only friend, tonight. In the morning—or sooner—the body of the shaman Parki would be discovered. Then there would be a hue and cry. Gatu's men too would be out looking for both her and Kildai.

  Thinking about it now, she was sure it had been Gatu's intention to present the murdered bodies of both her and Kildai and a couple of dead scapegoat killers, to the clan. With no leadership the Hawks and their adherents, would have fallen in behind Gatu. Now . . . his plans too were awry. The death of shaman Parki added to that. Many had fallen from the old religion, but shamans were still revered and respected.

  It was possible that the great kurultai might break up, with no decision on the khanship reached, and with clan fighting clan. She could only hope the Hawk clan survived. The clan was in a very poor position—without leadership, the subclans might desert to join others. There were some cousins with a claim to the clan-head, but, thought Bortai, none whom would do more than to enable the Hawk clan to survive, at best.

  In the pale light of dawn, Bortai found a small fold in the landscape and hid the cart in among the scrub oak. She tethered the ox and pony where they could graze and reach the stream. Then, too exhausted to do more, she lay down next to her younger brother. His face was pale, but he was still breathing. She put an arm around him, and she slept.

  She woke briefly as a party of horsemen rode past on the lip of the hill. She could hear their voices carried on the breeze. They were angry voices, but the words were indistinct. She held the hatchet, and waited. One whicker from the pony and they were lost.

&nb
sp; But the riders rode on, and lady sun shone down from father blue sky.

  Chapter 7

  David was saddle-sore, tired and a long way from Jerusalem. Too far for him to run in one night. And that dark-haired son of Baal that had hired him still wanted work from him!

  "You want me to do what?"

  Kari cuffed him. "Every night. It gets done, see. If I have to chase you to it again, I'll beat you. Do you know anything about the care of horses? You ride like a bag of corn. You barely know which end bites and which end makes manure."

  David decided right then that running off, with or without something for his trouble, could barely wait until everyone was asleep. Only they didn't seem tired.

  It was a cold and grey dawn when Kari shook him awake. "Get up, lazy boy. There is work to do." Kari seemed cheerful to be up before the sun. David was not. He must have fallen asleep, and he was so stiff he could hardly move.

  Kari looked at him trying to stand up and began to laugh. "You're not really a horseboy, are you?"

  David stared poisonously at him. "No, Lord."

  "Then why did that big fool of a stable-master tell me you were?"

  David did not point out that his father was no stable-master, although right now he would agree that he had been a fool to have done this to his youngest son. "Can I go? I will even give you the money back." He never thought he'd say that. But it would be worth it.

  Kari laughed. "No."

  "What . . .?" David gaped.

  "Ha!" Kari shook his head. "And make me have to tell Erik that I messed up? Are you crazier than me? No, you are going to become a great horseboy. Now get moving. The more you move, the less stiff you will be."

  The only direction David wanted to move in was straight down back into sleep. But with Kari standing there he could hardly do anything except to stagger towards his chores.

  A few minutes later the Frank, Erik, came in to the stable, still in a quilted jacket and carrying a thin-bladed sword. "No training this morning, Kari?" he asked, setting aside the blade and taking off the jacket.

  Kari poured oats into a nosebag. "No. New horseboy to train instead."

  Erik laughed. "I hope he makes your life a bloody misery."

  "Then he'll be a short-lived horseboy."

  Other Frankish knights began arriving. They had all plainly been hard at some form of exercise, and were sweating freely despite the cool of the morning. David soon realized that he was there merely to care for the spare remounts. The knights had each come to see to their own horses. What kind of Frankish lords were these?

  Later he asked Kari. He got a cuff around the ear for his question—but also some answers. "Firstly, I am not a Frank. I am from Vinland. And secondly, these are the knights of the Holy Trinity. The knights are a militant order, brat. They may be Frankish lords, but right now they are monks in armor. They also believe a knight must have a close bond with his horse. It is his first and greatest weapon in battle."

  David had heard of the knights. Who had not? It just hadn't occurred to him that these men with the three crosses on their surcoats were part of that order. They fought up in wild northern parts, which in his limited knowledge of the world, must be at least three days ride from Jerusalem.

  Vinland . . . he wasn't too sure where that was. A wild land somewhere to the west, full of monsters and barbarians. He took a long look at Kari. Well, that fitted.

  "Why are they here?" he asked. "Are the ogres and trolls of the north coming to attack our master the Ilkhan?"

  Kari shrugged. "I am just Erik's blood-retainer, now. Or so he has told me. It is some affair of state, brat. Of no interest to you or me."

  David had heard of affairs of state. Just quite what they were he was less sure. But he suspected high-paid whores. He found the idea very interesting indeed. The Mongol escort's slaves and servants began trickling into to the stable-area to see to the horses. One had a steaming piece of new bread. David was suddenly aware of a pressing need for food. He'd fallen asleep before anyone had eaten the night before. "Do we get to eat?"

  Kari looked at him critically. "When you've finished with the horses, yes."

  "Chartering vessels for this lot is going to be less easy than it was in Venice," said Manfred thoughtfully. "I don't have Francesca to smile at Petro Dorma, and the Venetians are going to look askance at fifty armed Mongols and their horses."

  Eberhart shook his head. "Only nine will be going on with us. This is something of an honor guard. But yes," he said, his old eyes twinkling, "even I miss Francesca. Although it is her wit and her knowledge of statecraft that I miss."

  Manfred grinned. "Old man, I saw you look at her statecraft, if that is what she kept on her chest. And I'll bet we miss her more than she misses us. She'll be breast deep in intrigue already, mark my words."

  "Breast deep . . ."

  "She never got neck deep. Always liked to be able to see above the common herd of players. I'd like her here to watch this emissary." Manfred began to chuckle. "Mind you, just think what she will drag Eneko Lopez and his friends into."

  "The priest and the courtesan. An unusual pairing," said Eberhart, smiling.

  "That depends on the priest," said Erik. "But those two are well matched, I would say. She'll add some worldly wisdom to his saintliness and he will add some his piety to her . . . uh . . . breasts."

  Eberhart nodded. "It's as well that those two are numbered among the Empire's friends."

  Manfred rubbed his jaw. "I wouldn't put it that way, exactly. Eneko Lopez is a friend of God. As long as the Empire is on God's side—at least in his eyes—he will stand by us through thick and thin. But only God will save us if we become like Aquitaine. I've heard him on the subject. As for Francesca . . . she is a wonderful woman. A very, very clever woman. I wonder if I ever saw what really motivated her. It wasn't just money. She could have become very rich, at least in the short term, by betraying the Empire. She knew who would pay—I know, because she pointed enough of them out to my uncle. She sees, or at least saw, that her interests aligned to the Empire—when it might have been of short term benefit to see profit elsewhere. Now . . ." he shrugged. "I know she will be in contact with my uncle's agent in Alexandria."

  "You're very dispassionate about it," said Eberhart, impressed despite himself. His brief had been to teach Manfred something of diplomacy and statecraft on this journey to the Holy Land. At first he'd thought it hopeless . . .

  Manfred shrugged again. "She said princes need to be."

  Erik said nothing, but he knew Manfred well enough to know that his charge was still a little hurt by Francesca's departure. Manfred was deeper than he let people guess. And his armor was more complex too. Perhaps Francesca and Manfred had not been soul-mates, as he and Svan had been, and God knew how it still burned him even now to think of her, but Manfred had stuck almost faithfully to Francesca for longer than Erik would have thought possible. In a way he was comforted that Manfred was a little wounded. Dispassionate might be what princes had to be, but it was not what a man must be. And a prince needed to be a man, first, or he might become a monster like Jagiellon. Maybe errors in love were a small price to pay to avoid that.

  But all he said was: "Time to ride before it gets too hot again."

  "To think I longed for warmth in Ireland," said Eberhart, looking out at the cloudless sky.

  "Too much of anything is a bad idea." Manfred speared another piece of meat from the wooden platter on the table.

  "Tell your stomach that also applies to breakfast," said Erik. "The sooner we go, the sooner we'll get there."

  The sea was near to mirror flat when they came in sight of Ascalon, gleaming as if some knight's poor squire had just polished it, with reddish tints from the setting sun. Erik saw how the new horseboy—who had possibly the worst seat of any rider Erik had ever seen, bar Benito—gaped at it, his mouth wide open. For once, the scrawny foxy-eyed boy didn't look like a thief looking for a target. He just looked stunned and very young.

  "What i
s it?" asked the horseboy.

  "The Mediterranean. They call it a sea," said Kari, sneering, "but it's hardly worth it."

  "But . . . what is it?"

  "Salty water. The tear of the giantess Ran."

  "Can't be." The boy swallowed. "It's even bigger than Jerusalem."

  "And has more fish too. Some big enough to eat a man whole."

  The foxy expression returned to the boy's eyes. "I'm not some stupid Frank."

  Kari grinned. "You just thought you were a horseboy. Really, we're keeping you for bait."

  "Kari," said Erik.

  "Well, he's not much good as a horseboy," said Kari with a shrug.

  "And too scrawny for good bait," said Erik. "Now, someone who hasn't come to drill for the last few days is more likely to have a bit of fat on him for the sharks."

  David decided that they were all crazy. He ignored them. But he wanted to get to that "sea." It called to him. He wanted to touch it. Tears . . . ha. There was not that much salt in the whole world. But to see it and touch it! The stories he would tell his older brothers.

  The world was a bigger place than he'd realized. Bigger even than Jerusalem, although he would never admit that in public. Ascalon itself was barely worth calling a town, though, he thought, with a lofty sniff. They rode on into the gathering dusk, towards the port. The air smelled very strange. He recognized the garbage and horse-dung scent of Jerusalem. But it was overlaid with fish, tar, and a smell that he'd never come across before.

  It smelled salty.

  "The bad news is that going on to the Black Sea, let alone chartering a vessel to take Borshar there is simply not feasible," said Eberhart. "The Mongols are not welcome in Byzantium—with good reason, to be fair—and word is out that the Venetian traders on the Golden Horn are virtually under siege again. Alexius is not going to allow Venetian vessels to pass through the Bosphorus to the Black Sea. He may let the eastern trade convoy that has gone to Trebizond back out because to try and trap them again would mean war, but it's going to take a fleet bombarding his palace to get the Byzantines to let Venetian vessels sail up the Bosphorus."