The presence of one warrior—or of one warlord and the warriors whom he led—should not have made her feel so much safer as this Hsiung-nu prince’s sudden appearance did. Yet she might now have a shield lifted between her and her enemies, or a warm cloak laid over her shoulders during the howling climax of a winter storm.
After that first, relieved glance, however, she kept her gaze relentlessly down, allowing the shan-yu some privacy to speak with his son, though how private such speech could be before a tentful of keen-eared Hsiung-nu was highly questionable.
“How fare Modun’s former children, my son?” Khujanga asked.
“They follow us,” he told the shan-yu , “as the lamb follows the ewe. Do you but command, and they shall obey.”
“That is well,” said the old man, his eyes brighter than they had been for many a day. Some of that had to be due to Vughturoi’s triumphant return, without the loss of a single man. However, much was also due to the care that Silver Snow and Willow took of him. The fevers that swept over the camp at the thaw, frequently taking with them the spirits of those who were eldest, youngest, or most sickly, had swept around him. He scarcely coughed, even at dawn, his slaves told Willow, and each day he rode out with great zest.
All around a cheer went up, a cheer rapidly silenced as the robust secondary wives of the shan-yu , wielding heavy copper meathooks, drew mutton from the great cauldrons, then passed around the skins of mare’s milk. The Hsiung-nu ate rapidly and hugely, as if they never knew from whence their next meal might come or whether someone might attack them while they feasted. Gradually, however, as the edge wore off their hunger, and the mare’s milk was passed again and again, men lay back, belching and groaning in satisfaction. Now that the all-important business of eating was done, gradually they began again to speak.
“So, brother said Tadiqan, “the Yueh-chih follow like lambs. Does this seem right for kin of ours, to obey thus, following like sheep when Ch’in commands?”
Vughturoi leaned back, but his eyes were wary. “I had not heard, Elder Brother, that the Yueh-chih obeyed the Middle Kingdom or anyone but the beloved of Heaven, our father the shan-yu who defeated them in honest battle. So long as they obey us, that seems well to me. I have heard, however, that there are others, who do not obey the royal clan of the shan-yu, whose will is—is it not, my father?—that there shall be peace with Ch’in. The Fu Yu and the Jo-Chiang, it is said, speak of raids against the Middle Kingdom, despite our father’s ban. Most Heavenly ...”
At Khujanga’s gesture of impatience with his elaborate title, Vughturoi grinned. Silver Snow was surprised at how much younger and less formidable he looked. “. . . my father, come spring, permit me to ride with my warriors and teach them proper obedience!”
His enthusiasm was contagious. All around the tent, warriors grinned and shouted, pledging support.
Silver Snow suppressed a frown. Impressed with the Middle Kingdom Vughturoi might be, but in some things, he was all Hsiung-nu. She could but hope that he would fight only when attempts to subdue the Fu Yu by argument or show of strength had failed. Not so the others, however.
“Nay, brother,” cried Tadiqan. “You have had your mission to the other clans. Let me and mine go against the Fu Yu, at least, now! I swear that we shall return before the time comes to break camp and move to the summer pastures.”
A flicker of the light drew Silver Snow’s attention to Strong Tongue. Though the woman set her face almost instantly in a grin of triumph, Silver Snow would have taken oath that, for at least a moment, the shaman had been shocked and displeased by her son’s impulsive demand. He had been caught up in the excitement for a good fight, more than in any struggle for power over the royal clan.
A faint pounding rang through the tent, then died away, as if Strong Tongue tapped restively upon that damnable spirit drum of hers, then laid it aside and was quiet. She bent over her son’s shoulder then and muttered urgently, raising a hand when he hissed back. Finally, however, she smiled, showing strong white teeth, and sank back in her place, nodding. The look of satisfaction returned, and she sat serenely, like a beast that has fed well and now will sleep until it wakes to feast again.
Not so the rest of the Hsiung-nu, however. Khujanga’s delighted acquiescence set off cheers and demands for more and more drink until, finally, the noise and heat became intolerable and Silver Snow sought leave to withdraw. She was aware of Strong Tongue’s now-scornful gaze as she left. Probably the elder woman thought her too weak to endure a Hsiung-nu celebration; that is, if she did not resent the fastidiousness that made her draw her skirts aside from the warriors who sprawled, unconscious from drink, on the rich, grease-stained rugs.
Stout and gleaming with oil and with every bit of copper and gold that she owned, Strong Tongue would probably try to usurp Silver Snow’s seat by the shan-yu, too. But, were Silver Snow’s suspicions true, if Tadiqan were gone from the camp, she would try no other evil. That fact that she was required to restrain herself from some of her intrigues might well have accounted for her displeasure.
That was not, Silver Snow learned later, to be quite the case. True it was, the next day, all went round the camp quietly, for Hsiung-nu, as if Strong Tongue’s spirit drum banged in their heads. Venturing out for a ride, Silver Snow noted how many men—restive after a winter’s inaction, or chafing, perhaps, that Vughturoi had not selected them to ride with him to spy out the Yueh-chih’s flocks—now followed Tadiqan. Even some of the younger prince’s own retainers trailed after them. Clearly they longed to be chosen to visit the Fu Yu or Jo-Chiang and awe them into submission.
Action. Tadiqan knew one thing, at least, besides whistling arrows and the forces of arms and fear. He knew that his people required constant movement, a constant promise of battle. Unlike the race of the Han, the Hsiung-nu were too young a tribe to relish the fruits of peace.
Silver Snow had a map, however crude, of the grasslands, provided her by Li Ling. She must, she thought, find out where precisely those tribes ranged and somehow get the news back to Ch’ang-an.
Strong Tongue sauntered from her own tenthold to stand, arms akimbo, before the great tent of the shan-yu.
“She acts as if she, not the old man, rules this camp,” Willow muttered. “Make her understand otherwise, Elder Sister.”
So much, Silver Snow thought wryly, for her earlier mus-ings on the love of the people of the Han for peace. She, however, was a warrior’s daughter on a mission for the Son of Heaven; she dared bow to no barbarian, even if that refusal meant war. Besides, the armies of the Middle Kingdom were many and strong; the Middle Kingdom knew that peace might be bought at a greater price than silks or jade.
Thus it was, when Strong Tongue caught Silver Snow’s eye for the customary battle of looks between them, Silver Snow held her gaze. More than that, she greeted the older woman with the salutation that senior wife used to junior, and waited until Strong Tongue responded accordingly and withdrew. To her horror, as she stared at the woman’s broad, retreating back, Silver Snow found herself shaking even from so paltry a test of strength.
All that day and the next, Silver Snow wondered what form Strong Tongue’s vengeance might take. She checked her horse’s legs; she sniffed her food; she waited, in the shan-yu 's feasting tent, for an attack in words. No such attack came. Strong Tongue, without her son, seemed to be only half the fighter that she was when he was present.