Wanderer of Steppe and Sand

  When morning rose over the Kangar plains, the day was cold and bleak. The ashes had ceased to fall, but the sun’s face remained hidden from the world behind thick gray clouds.

  Yesugei was dragged out into chill morning air by two of B?ri-khan’s keshiks, one for each arm. The girl shaman Tuyaara led the way as they marched through the camp to the jeers of the gathered tribesmen. A small procession grew around them, but none among the shouting mob dared to lay a finger upon their khan’s Qarakesek captive.

  His sleep had been fitful and absent of any dreams, but Yesugei was surprised at his own strength as he walked without stumbling towards his doom - his bandage-wrapped leg felt light and strong, and each step no longer came with the dread of buckling to his knees for the crowd’s mockery. For all that had happened the night before, Tuyaara and Aysen’s healing had worked - but Yesugei saw no trace of the father as he glanced about the ulus.

  “Where is your father?” he asked Tuyaara as they drew nearer to the khan’s tent. The girl remained silent.

  “Aysen can’t save you now, Qarakesek scum,” laughed the keshik to his right. “It’s the spirits you face, not their caller.”

  The grass outside the khan’s yurt had been hurriedly cleared since last night’s revelry. In place of the feasting tables stood a ring of braziers casting light and warmth as the great crowd pressed in, eager to see their captive bleed.

  When the crowd parted, Yesugei saw the Kangar khan seated on a stool, his fiery orange robe a splash of color against the leather and iron armor of his noyans. Aysen’s daughter sliced his bonds free, and the keshiks shoved him forward. He stumbled into the ring, laughter and spiteful howling all around, but then it came to a hushed stop. B?ri stood, hand to the pommel of his saber.

  “I take all gathered here as witnesses,” boomed the khan’s voice, “that I have challenged Yesugei, son of Aqtai, prince of the Qarakesek horde, to a duel for his freedom.”

  Yesugei must have looked a sight compared to the Kangar khan, standing tall and proud, while he himself shivered from the chill breeze - clad in rags and worn boots. The crowd whispered, but there was no doubt - for the tribe, this was a spectacle, a way to mark the beginning of the war to come with the blood of their most ancient foe.

  B?ri continued, “If the spirits judge him kindly and grant him life, I have promised the princeling I will let him leave as his father allowed us - with horse and supplies enough to leave our lands, and unmolested by any of you lot!”

  “Now, all of you, swear by the gods!” The khan raised his sheathed sword. The warriors gathered within the ring unsheathed their blades and axes, saluting them to the sky. The khan led his warriors in a strange oath, one before the Eternal Sky and the tengri, but also before the Lightning Lord, and the justice of the Klyazmite gods.

  The Eternal Sky is silent and hidden from us all today, Yesugei thought bitterly as the weapons lowered. And the Lightning Lord…if his justice were real, then why do he let his followers’ lands burn?

  “Come forth, son of the Qarakesek,” B?ri said. A keshik handed Yesugei a blade. He tested its weight with a slash, then scoffed at the Baskord khan, swallowing his fear. But terror’s grip did not ease around his silent heart - it only tightened as he stepped forward.

  One of the noyans gestured to three bowmen. “If he tries to cut his way free, fill him with arrows like the wretched dog he is.”

  “The only dogs here are the ones that stand around me,” huffed Yesugei. “Look at you all, hungering for blood and flesh.”

  Look at you all, clamoring for more blood to be spilt on this earth while the Apostles sleep.

  He remembered the slaughter he had seen in the Devil Woods - and the terrible silence that had reigned there. The more they fought, the more the smell of death and suffering would rise to the heavens, and the more they would be roused from their sleep. Would princely blood rouse Aysen’s Dreamers more than that of a commoner’s?

  No, he thought to himself as he raised his sword. The Kangar khan drew his own sword, and threw the scabbard to the side. We are all just meat. So much meat.

  B?ri launched himself forward with a cry, his sword flashing silver as it arced through the air. Yesugei parried, but no sooner had he turned away the first blow a second, a third, a fourth came raining down on him from above and below in an iron dance.

  He took one step back, then another, and another. Their swords never stopped in their dance, leaping high and low to meet at each turn. The Kangar khan's attack was relentless and blindingly fast, never giving him the centre, striking from every which way, each cut powerful enough to cleave him in two.

  Soon Yesugei’s wrist was ringing from the jarring strikes that ran through the spine of his blade - and the khan looked nowhere near tired.

  B?ri pressed on with a mighty roar as though he could kill him with noise and fury alone. He swung for a mighty blow that would have sliced him from hip to shoulder - Yesugei dodged just as his back seared with heat. The khan had pushed him back all the way to the edge of the dueling ground, and his missed strike clanged against the brazier at Yesugei’s back.

  Yesugei fell onto his side. Before B?ri could strike again, he kicked the base of the brazier with all his fading strength. A cascade of burning coals spilled over the khan, and his orange silks erupted into flame.

  The khan gave a hoarse shout of surprise that turned to agony as he thrashed, his sleeves trailing long, orange tongues through the air. B?ri swung wildly, but as he ripped free of his burning silks and hurled them at Yesugei the princeling darted forward - and his blade cut a silver blur into the khan’s side. Blood sprayed onto the grass, sending a cry through the crowd.

  B?ri staggered upright, his right side dripping red. A terrible fear smothered the crowd’s joy. Fate had granted first blood to the Kangars’ enemy - and before B?ri could regain his footing proper, Yesugei took his turn to rush forward in their steel dance. He struck blow after blow, sending the khan staggering back, and hammering into the crowd with every ring of steel.

  Yet fortune’s smile did not last long. Even injured, B?ri regained his footing, and his defense hardened. Soon the sword in his hand felt as though it were turning to lead, and Yesugei’s lungs burned from the effort and the frigid morning air.

  Then B?ri struck again. Yesugei barely turned his head in time, but the blade raked his temple with an explosion of pain. Blood ran bright and crimson across his eyes, and the crowd roared their joy once more. Dazed, he staggered back, hearing their chant—Death, death, death! B?ri raised his sword for the kill - and his own wretchedly-heavy sword refused to rise, damn it all!

  Yesugei let his ponderously heavy sword fall from his hands - then lunged. His shoulder slammed into B?ri’s gut, and the bigger man grunted like an ox as the blow took the wind from his chest, swaying him off balance. Yesugei swept the khan’s legs out from under him, and together they toppled to the ground in a tangle. The Kangar cried out in pain as he landed on his wounded side, and his sword fell free from his grip.

  Yesugei scrambled for the sword, but B?ri seized his ankle and yanked him down.

  He landed hard, but gripped the hilt - and that was all that mattered. As B?ri climbed atop him, Yesugei thrust the blade upward, pressing it against the khan’s throat.

  Yield, he would say. The real enemy grows stronger the more we shed each others’ blood. Yield, and let us both live.

  He pushed the sword to the khan’s throat - then froze. B?ri’s fingers wrapped around the honed steel, grasping it firmly from his neck. The harder Yesugei pushed, the more crimson droplets welled between B?ri’s fingers. His blood dripped onto Yesugei’s face, blinding him even more.

  No…no…no…

  The steel blade flexed. With a loud hiss, B?ri wrenched the blade free and threw it far across the grounds, hopelessly out of reach. Before Yesugei could react, a punch sent his world spinning and shook his teeth loose in his skull.

  “Kill him!” The crowd’s cheering was exhausted, desperate, even. “Finish him!”

  The second punch filled Yesugei's mouth with blood. Through blurred vision, he saw the khan raising his fist again.

  No…no…I swore an oath…I cannot die…

  “Kill him, my khan!” the crowd roared, and B?ri brought both hands high in the air to finish it.

  Yesugei's own hand darted in a final, spiteful strike. He drove his thumb deep the khan’s open wound, and pressed hard. B?ri howled, his weight shifting just enough for Yesugei to roll free. As he scrambled upright he reached for the khan’s sword, and saw B?ri picking up his own.

  Both men staggered to their feet, circling like injured wolves. Yesugei's arms trembled just trying to keep the sword aloft and pointed at the khan. Every muscle in his tired, beaten body screamed for rest, and the pounding in his head threatened to drop him to the ground all on its own.

  The khan, bloodied and tired, eyed him with fury - and something else. Surprise.

  The crowd fell deathly quiet. The only sounds to be heard were crackling of the fires, the whispers of the grasses, and the creak of a bow being drawn tight.

  B?ri’s eyes widened as they flicked behind Yesugei. “No, no-”

  “Stop!” another familiar voice cried.

  The bowstring twanged. A brightly-feathered arrow hissed past Yesugei, embedding itself between him and the khan. The crowd roared in outrage. The archer who shot the offending arrow collapsed, clutching his head—Aysen’s daughter stood over him, horsewhip in hand.

  “Idiot!” B?ri roared as he pulled the arrow from the ground. “Have you lost all respect for our ways? Is this what my warriors have become?!!”

  The khan snapped the arrow in two, and cast it aside in disgust. The warriors, the noyans, and the gathered crowd stood in sheepish silence. The silence hung heavy until, with a sight, the khan planted the tip of his sword into the ashen ground.

  It was over. For better or worse, it was over.

  “Who am I to speak of honor, when my own men resort to shooting our prisoners in the back?” B?ri laughed, then gritted his teeth as his bleeding side gushed anew. Yesugei saw the effort it took for him to remain standing, but the khan’s voice did not waver. “The spirits must look kindly upon you to give me such a fight, Yesugei-mirza. And for that, you may leave our lands, as I have promised.”

  Hushed whispers abounded around them. The longbeard noyan pushed his way through the circle, his face beet-red. “My khan, you had said-”

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  “-that Yesugei-mirza may leave if the spirits grant him life, not victory,” shot back B?ri. “Surely our people know the difference, Toktar-noyan. We who lost, but still live to fight and suffer for another day.”

  He gave Yesugei a grim nod. “Such was your father's mercy, Yesugei-mirza. One which I will only extend once.”

  To the girl-shaman who stood over the groaning archer, B?ri commanded, “Tuyaara, escort our Qarakesek guest to the spring pastures and let him fly. See that he has a horse, arms, and food enough for the High Road, but no more.”

  Tuyaara bristled at the task but nodded, sticking her horse whip back into her belt.

  B?ri faced the sullen crowd. “The spirits have shown our war will be hard, and our war will be bloody. But I promise - I will bleed for you all first, and set my sword down last should you follow me!”

  He pulled his sword from the ground and raised it to the dark sky. “These ashes that have sullied our lands blow from the east, where the dogs that have stolen our homes now fight among themselves! Aysen-guai’s Sight has shown it! The spirit-caller follows the Black Heavens, and I will lead our ulus in his wake. United, the Qarakesek were unstoppable. But torn apart…they are nothing but starving dogs once more.”

  From the east…? The khan’s words rang with a terrible dread in Yesugei’s mind. A terrible fear.

  Black for the east…the Khurvan…the kurultai…

  Had it come too late? Had the end already begun?

  The thought twisted in his gut like a knife. But the signs had been there long before Aysen’s visions. The ruin of Tosont, the omens of his own Sight, the disappearance of spirits from the land.

  Yesugei exhaled and sank to his knees in exhaustion. He pressed a hand to his chest, where his heart should have pounded with fear, with urgency. But there was nothing. Only silence.

  The end had begun long ago. And he was already dead.

  ***

  The Kangar tribesman patted Yesugei’s horse as he fixed the saddle with a final tug. “She’s too fine a beast for the likes of you, Qarakesek, but it’s done.”

  More than the dun mare—a gift from B?ri’s own herd—the khan had outfitted his prisoner better than expected. Yesugei’s saddlebags were packed with food and fodder, and once his new wounds were bound, his rags were replaced with a sheepskin robe. The khan had also seen fit to arm him with a hunting bow and arrows, and a wide-bladed hunting knife with an ivory handle. Yesugei kept the knife tucked into his boot, alongside a thin pouch of silver coins.

  Once B?ri retired to deal with the tribe’s move to the east, some of the younger tribesmen eyed his supplies - why did a Qarakesek, their enemy, deserve such weapons and silver? Only Tuyaara’s horse whip kept their hostility to heckling. Even now, as Yesugei prepared to leave, the shaman lingered, ensuring B?ri’s promise was kept when others sought to break them.

  Her look was baleful, but instead of cursing him, she pointed west to a small creek. “That is the Nanly, where summer herders water their sheep. Follow it for twenty miles. It will lead you to the Charcoal-Burners’ Trail and guide you north.”

  It seemed Aysen had informed his daughter of their plans before his departure in the night - she guided him to the northwest as though she knew where he was to go. However, her father’s faith was clearly absent from the shaman’s own heart.

  “My father sends you only because he fears for me, his lone daughter,” Tuyaara had said after tending his wounds from the duel. “But I know the Klyazmite lands better than anyone in this tribe—if you betray his trust, I will find you.”

  With her grim warning, she gave his mare a light whip. The horse started off, and Yesugei took the reins—free at last.

  At fifty paces, he turned back. Most of the tribesmen who gathered to see him off were already mounting their steeds to rejoin the ulus, vanishing eastward below the horizon of the plains. Only Tuyaara lingered, watching him a little while longer until she too rode off. Soon, he was alone beneath the gray sky.

  The high grasses opened reluctantly before his ride as Yesugei followed after the steady summer creek. The Nanly wound serpentine through the land, occasionally running through deep ditches and grooves. In the plains, tall grasses all round concealed the ditches until a lesser horseman was to trip and break his neck in the fall.

  As he rode on over rolling hills and scattered trees, Yesugei quickly realized he was still being watched. Steppe mice scurried through the grasses and birds occasionally flew overhead, but none lingered long - nor did they appear a second time.

  The steppe falcon appeared in the mid-afternoon, its dark silhouette barely visible against sky. When he saw it again beyond a stony ridge, flying at the same distance—perhaps closer—suspicion took root.

  He had half a mind to shoot an arrow at the bird as it continued to follow him, but the falcon remained just beyond the reach of his hunting bow. Almost as if it were trained.

  Kangar, as all Khormchaks, excelled in falconry; a skilled tracker could remain hidden well beyond the horizon while their bird shadowed its prey. No matter how he rode or concealed himself, the falcon followed. Only nightfall brought its disappearance.

  As the darkness loomed, Yesugei made camp and struck flint to kindling. The fire crackled, sending embers into a sky now bright with stars and a high, full moon. He had made good time and rode well for the day, but the falcon and its master who doubtlessly followed made sleep hard to find, even tired and sore as he was.

  He ate salted meat and stale flatbread, sipping mare’s milk sparingly. Fatigue pressed heavy, yet sleep was slow to come. The falcon - and its master who doubtlessly followed - lurked in the dark corners of his mind.

  Just as he began to doze, an unnatural weight settled over him. The crisp steppe air thickened like a mire, and distant voices called a name that was not his. Before he could listen, sleep fell upon him.

  ***

  The swirling darkness consumed him entirely, but then it parted, and Yesugei felt himself drifting, wandering, walking. He was walking uncertainly, and the ground at his feet was not the hard, dry earth of the plains, but sinking, grasping sand.

  But though his eyes were closed, he knew where he was. He knew the place well. It had dogged him for years, creeping when he least expected it.

  The White Pinch.

  He opened his eyes, and found himself in that dreadful plain once more. A vast, yawning expanse of dry earth and stinging squalls of sand, dotted with few standing stones and pebbles.

  But something did not seem right. He took another step forward, and he realized he was shivering with cold. The entire desert was freezing, for the high pale sun above his head that should have cast the land in sweltering heat as in his memories instead seemed to suck away all warmth.

  The cold was somehow worse than the drowning heat and sweat of that day, and the memories flooded to him in fragments as he walked. The pounding hooves, blaring horns, the whistling of arrows...so many arrows, as many as the sands, blanketing the steppe in darkness with every volley. He took another step, and then another - he was walking up along a low dune, trudging to where - he did not know. But he knew that if he stopped, he would not be able to bring himself to walk again, and the terrible, cold sun would bear down upon him like a circling vulture and eat him.

  When he reached the top of the dune, he saw the White Pinch stretching ever on before him, lifeless, barren, and cold…so cold. Why? Down below arrow shafts jutted out from the ground, so many that they seemed like grasses sprouting from the barren waste. But nothing could grow in the White Pinch - that he knew. As he looked on, he saw the bodies that lay beneath the arrows and drifting snads.

  Thousands of men and horses lay strewn about the White Pinch, lying just as they had fallen so many years ago. Colorful robes and tribal sigils were bleached pale by the looming sun so that he could not tell who among the dead were of his tribe and who were of the Quanli. Together, Khormchak lay upon Khormchak, kin slain by kin for the follies of khans and spurned blood-brothers.

  As Yesugei made his careful descent from the dune, he spied a winding path that seemed clear of rotting dead, bordered on either side by broken arrow shafts like stones along a road.

  Seeing no way forward or back, he strode beneath the chilling sun, which grew colder with every step. As the path descended a rocky slope, a sudden cloud of dust rose from below. Tiny grains slashed his exposed hands and face like a thousand knives. He yanked his collar up, but the storm clawed at him, and any cry of pain would only fill his mouth with sand.

  Blinded and staggering, he lost his footing. The ground crumbled beneath his boots, and he tumbled down the ridge. He did not know how long he fell, only that when he finally landed on a patch of sand, his body was battered, and his mouth tasted of blood.

  This was the end, he thought. The cold sands beneath him leached away his last warmth—and with it, the strength to rise again.

  “Back on your feet, Yesugei,” growled a voice. Nariman? No - Nariman was a thousand miles away. The voice in his ear was a ghost, and the desert did not lack for those. Hundreds, no, thousands had died at the White Pinch - his first and last command in battle. They died all around him beneath the stinging arrows and in the clash of lances, and more had died after, screaming and howling beneath the open sun.

  That same sun hung above him now, cold yet just as unforgiving. But someone was shaking his shoulder, not letting him die.

  “Get up,” the voice said, but this one was different, and tight with urgency. “Yesugei, get up. You can’t sleep here. Get up. The war is not over. Get up.”

  No, I am not sleeping. I am remembering.

  He turned, searching for the voice, but saw no one. Yet the echoes remained. When he pushed himself onto his hands and knees, he saw them—footprints in the sand, too many to count, vanishing into the swirling storm.

  He crawled after them. The sand obscured his vision, but just ahead, the prints lingered, fading fast. The voices trailed ever further, dancing just out of reach.

  "Leave him," said the first voice. Now he was sure it was Nariman. His eldest brother, cold and unfeeling - the one who was destined to inherit it all. "If he can't stand on his own, he's finished. Leave him. We can go home."

  Home…home…where was home? Home had been his yurt, his ulus, his tribe. But that had belonged to the man he once was—not the corpse he had become.

  The cold crept into his mind, numbing thought, blurring sight. If this was a dream, why did it feel so real? So exhausting?

  “He’ll get up,” spoke another, gentler voice. Kaveh, the only brother who ever felt like one. “You’ll get up, won’t you, Yesugei?”

  Other voices swirled with the storm - too many, too hushed to discern. Some were harsh, others were gentle, but as Yesugei felt himself slowing down, their voices grew louder. They were calling his name. No, not calling. Cheering.

  Yesugei, they called. Get up. The Great Design is not over. Remember your oath! Remember our oath!

  It was his father he heard. It was his brothers and his sisters, it was his keshiks and sworn men. It was their footprints he was crawling after. But as the storm howled, they faded, vanishing one by one until only a single, uneven trail remained.

  And then he was walking - stumbling, really, but on his feet. He staggered to his feet, head bowed against the wind, the sand biting his skin. The ground sucked at his boots, so he let them go, pressing on barefoot.

  Through the swirling storm, a figure emerged—hunched, sitting cross-legged in the freezing sand. As Yesugei drew closer, he saw the man clad in tarnished lamellar, bleeding from a dozen wounds. The man traced a symbol into the barren earth with a finger daubed in his own gore: cross, topped with a triangle. As it was completed, the Apostle’s symbol shimmered with a strange, terrible power. The whole desert began to shake, and the earth itself roared beneath the sands.

  The Quanli noyan, Murat, whispered an incantation. But he had died long ago - and Yesugei had claimed his treasure and tent for his own. This, he knew.

  He didn’t know where and when the sword appeared, only that its silver shamshir was freezing in his grip. As the dead man’s prayer continued, Yesugei staggered forward, half-blind, and thrust the blade before him. A terrible howl rang out. The Quanli noyan’s armor warped into stone and black, greasy muscle. The shamshir was no longer steel but dark, hungry crystal—blacker than night.

  The thing before him flickered between Murat-noyan and the Apostle. Then, with a final impact, both noyan and monster burst into ash, shrouding Yesugei in darkness once more.

  But still, there was the cold. And the voices.

  They poured into his silent heart—strength, dreams, oaths old and new. A fire kindled in his chest, sinking into the crystal that kept him walking, breathing, fighting.

  What does a dead man have to fear? He thought to himself. Nothing. Nothing ever again.

  When he opened his eyes, gray clouds loomed above. Morning had come, the sun had risen, and he was still alive. The chill no longer bit as sharply—warmth buzzed from the crystal in his chest, filling him with a life he hadn't felt in ages.

  In the half-light of the hidden sun, the horizon finally broke, revealing deep, verdant woodlands miles away. No paved roads crossed the Kangar plains, but beyond a rocky precipice marked by a squat tribal stone, Yesugei spotted wagon ruts winding through the dirt. The path followed a roaring stream where the Nanly flowed, twisting through scattered trees and standing stones before vanishing into the waiting woods.

  A strange feeling seized him. He knelt by the creek, dipping his hands into the cool, clear Nanly, letting it lap against his scarred skin. As he cupped the water to drink, his mind drifted to the Jigai River at the Devil Woods’ border—a memory from another life, long past, long ended.

  He cupped more water, peering into his wobbly reflection. Faint ashen marks streaked his face, making him seem like a ghoul from the steppes. He splashed the chill water onto his skin, a jolt running through him, then wiped the ash away, letting the memories and whispers of the east drift down the Nanly and dissolve. He lingered, watching the ashes vanish. Somewhere, he knew, the Nanly would flow into the Cherech, and where the Cherech ran, the city of the west would lie—with its tolling bell, and perhaps...Vasilisa. There, oaths sworn beneath the sullen sky and amidst steppe grasses would be fulfilled, and madness would yield to answers.

  “Well then, you’d better get started.”

  A voice sounded behind him. He turned, but saw only the vast Kangar plains. For a moment, he saw a flicker—a green robe, and red hair like fire dancing among the high, swaying grasses.

  Kav...?

  Then, silence.