The corner of Ögedei’s left eye began to twitch, and he forcefully shoved Gansukh away, pushing him against the table. “Give me the cup,” he snarled. “I will be the judge of whether it is worthy.”
Gansukh dropped to his knees, lowering his gaze to look down at the Khagan’s feet. “Yes, my Khan,” he murmured. His vision blurred, and he swayed, gasping for air. He heard the sound of hooves rattling against wood, and after a moment he realized it was only the echo of his own pounding heart.
Someone pressed the cup into his hands—too fearful, clearly, to give it to the Khagan himself. With shaking legs, Gansukh got to his feet and offered the vessel.
Ögedei snatched it from him. “Wine!” he shouted. “Why is there no wine in this cup?” A dozen bodies sprang forward, offering to fill the Khagan’s chalice with their own half-filled cups.
With a grunt, Ögedei turned and smashed the cup across Gansukh’s face.
Gansukh’s eyes filled with tears, and the room became a blur as he spun and fell to his hands and knees. There was blood in his mouth, and it felt like a hot coal had been ground into his cheek.
Something heavy fell against his body, and he stiffened, trying to keep from collapsing entirely to the floor. Planks. His hands clenched with panic. But it was only a man, leaning on him, clutching at his shoulders, his hot, stinking breath washing over his bloody cheek. He tried to focus on a glittering object that floated in his field of vision, and blinking through the tears, he realized it was the cup—his gift to Ögedei.
It had fared better than his cheek.
“It is a good cup,” the Khagan hissed in his ear. “Get out of my sight, young pony, before I change my mind.”
CHAPTER 28:
ILL-MET IN KIEV
When they passed around the foot of the hill, they felt the wind on their faces, and while its touch was both light and refreshing, its breath was filled with an unwholesome stink. At first Cnán thought it was the sort of putrescence that was not uncommon in fetid swampland, but the river flowed too freely to allow decaying matter to build up. Glancing at the others, she saw they too were affected by the smell, but unlike her, they appeared more familiar with it.
“Corpse rot,” Yasper explained. He rooted around in one of his many satchels until he found a small vial. Carefully unstopping it, he poured a small dollop of the thick liquid onto two fingers, and then he pressed the fingers to both nostrils. Keeping his mouth closed, he inhaled deeply, the sides of his nose indenting. “Ah,” he sighed. When he lowered his fingers, he appeared to be no longer in distress from the lingering smell that permeated the air. With a grin, he offered the vial to Cnán.
She stared at him as if he had been taken with a pox fever, and when he waggled the vial at her, she finally took it from his outstretched hand. Somewhat dubiously, she poured a tiny bead onto one of her fingers and sniffed at it cautiously. The smell of mint was overpowering and she jerked her head back in surprise. “What is this?” she asked.
“A tincture of mint oil,” he smiled. “My own recipe.” He waved his hand about his face as if he were directing more of the revolting stench toward his nostrils.
She put a bead on another finger and, somewhat clumsily, aped his method of applying the oil to her nose. Her eyes watered as she inhaled and the mint vapors speared deep into her head, like tiny icicles. But, she had to admit, it was a pleasant sensation in its own way, and much preferable to the stink of decaying flesh.
Rædwulf chuckled at her expression as he reached over with a long arm and plucked the vial from her fingers. Unlike Yasper, he put drops of the oil in the wide webbing between his thumb and index finger and shoved his hand against his face to smother his nostrils completely.
He passed the vial to Feronantus, who partook before offering it to Istvan. The Hungarian glowered and busied himself with stroking his mustache as if the idea of mint in his beard were too distasteful to contemplate. Finn only sniffed at the vial before shrugging and returning it to Yasper. As if he wasn’t quite sure what all the fuss was about or why one would want to mask one’s ability to smell.
A little lightheaded from the mint oil, Cnán focused on the tiny shantytown nestled between the hill and the river. Several wooden docks sprawled along the water’s edge, and boats were moored to its length by any available means. Makeshift hovels and stalls were arranged in no clear order, seemingly erected wherever two pieces of wood could be leaned together to make the semblance of a wall. The tiny hamlet along the river appeared haphazard and carefree, as if the residents built and crafted what they needed from their surroundings without much worry about permanence or protection from marauders. An attitude, she realized, that wasn’t entirely unexpected in the wake of what the residents had survived. What else could the Mongols do that they had not already done? Killing them might even be a blessing.
Without intending to, Cnán fell into a despondency of memory, and her head filled with the scents and sounds of the burning village where, so long ago, she had lost everything. Somewhat dazed, she swayed in her saddle and would have fallen off her horse had someone not placed a hand on her arm. She turned her head, opening her eyes, and flinched when she saw Yasper’s concerned expression.
Mistaking her reaction, Yasper let go. “Breathe through your mouth,” he said gently. “The scent can be too strong at first. Breathe slowly—not through your nose—until the dizziness passes.” He demonstrated.
“I’m fine,” she said, more curtly than she had intended, and then, “I am sorry, Yasper. You are only trying to help, and I have spoken rudely.”
“It is of no consequence,” he grinned. “These are rude times, and the only true incivility is that which is not recognized as such.”
“Speaking of which…” Rædwulf interrupted, drawing their attention toward a trio of scruffy natives who were approaching their party. To say the three men were dressed would be to call the scraps of cloth and twine and bits of fur that partially covered their gaunt bodies clothing. They shuffled slowly, bent at the waist, their grimy hands raised in supplication. The foremost one, pressed by the other two to be their spokesperson, babbled at them in Ruthenian.
“Cnán,” Feronantus called, “do you ken his words?”
She let her horse wander closer, her head cocked to the side as she tried to follow the man’s discourse. There was a repetition to his cadence that made it a little easier for her to pick out words she knew. “He’s saying the same thing over and over,” she reported. “Something about gifts, I believe. No, tribute.” She interrupted him with a few words of Tartaric.
One of the other two men shrieked and fell to his knees, groveling in the dirt. The spokesperson’s mouth hung open, but words no longer spilled from his blubbering lips.
“Well now,” Yasper opined as he joined Feronantus and Cnán, “that is a mighty invocation. Mayhap you could teach it to the rest of us…”
“I just asked him if he understood what I was saying,” Cnán pointed out.
“In the Mongolian tongue,” Feronantus reckoned. When Cnán nodded, he squinted at the shantytown, looking for movement among the hovels and detritus. “They’re terrified of us,” he said. “But we are clearly not Mongols…”
Off to their right, Istvan snorted noisily, and the attention of the three men darted to the Hungarian. His scowling visage only engendered more fear, and the kneeling one tried to press himself even lower against the ground.