When the beating began, Genghis Khan himself led the imperial procession to a low ridge, which would serve as a good viewpoint. All the Golden Family were required to be present, along with Genghiss wives and concubines, chamberlains and servants. Yeh-l traveled with the royal party, and brought Kolya, Sable and their interpreters with him.
The scale of the exercise was startling. When he took his place at the summit of the ridge Kolya could see only a couple of military units, drawn up in formation, standards flying, horses restless, on the plain below; the rest were somewhere over the horizon. And he was stunned by the opulence of the food, drink and other hospitality laid on for the royal party.
While they waited for the beating to be completed the Golden Family were kept amused by falconry displays. One man brought forward a mighty eagle, perched on a massive hawking glove. When the bird stretched its wings, their span was wider than the keeper was tall. A lamb was released, and the bird lunged with a ferocity that dragged the keeper off his feet, to the hilarity of the royal party.
The falconry was followed by horse races. Mongol races were conducted over kilometers, and only the finishing stages were visible from Kolyas position. The child jockeys, surely no older than seven or eight, rode their full-sized mounts bareback and barefoot. The riding was ferocious, and the finishes, masked by a billowing cloud of dust, were close. The Golden Family threw gold and jewels at the victors.
As far as Kolya was concerned, all this was another example of the Mongols mixture of barbarity and vulgar ostentationor, as Sable put it, These people really dont have any taste. But Kolya could not deny the calm aura of Genghis Khan himself.
Militarily disciplined, politically astute, single-minded and incorruptible, Genghis Khan had been born the son of a clan chief. He was called Tem, which meant smith; his adopted name meant universal ruler. It took a decade of fratricidal conflict for Tem to unite the Mongols into a single nation for the first time in generations, and he became the ruler of all tribes who live in felt tents.
Mongol armies consisted almost entirely of cavalry, highly mobile, disciplined and fast-moving. Their fighting style had been honed over generations in hunting and warring across the plains. For the sedentary nations of farms and cities around the fringe of the steppe, the Mongols were difficult neighbors, but they werent exceptional. For centuries the great land-ocean of Asia had spawned armies of marauding horsemen; the Mongols were just the latest in that long and bloody tradition. But under Genghis Khan they became a fury.
Genghis Khan began his campaigns against the three nations of China. Rapidly growing rich on plunder, the Mongols next turned west, assailing Khwa-rezm, a rich and ancient Islamic state that stretched from Iran to the Caspian Sea. After that the Mongols pushed on through the Caucasus into the Ukraine and Crimea, and struck north in an outrageous raid on Russia. By the time of Genghis Khans death, his empire, built in a single generation, was already four times as extensive as Alexanders, and twice as large as Romes ever became.
But Genghis Khan remained a barbarian, his only purpose the empowerment and enrichment of his Golden Family. And the Mongols were killers. Their ruthlessness derived from their own traditions: illiterate nomads, they saw no purpose in agriculture, no value in cities save as mines of plunderand they placed no value on human life. This was the creed applied to each conquest.
Now Kolya had been magically transported to the heart of the Mongol empire itself. Here, the benefits of the empire were more apparent than in history books written by descendants of the vanquished. For the first time in history Asia had been united, from the boundaries of Europe to the South China Sea: the tapestries that adorned Genghiss tents combined Chinese dragon designs with Iranian phoenixes. Though contact would be lost after the Mongols empire decayed, myths of eastern nations were replaced by memorya memory that would one day inspire Christopher Columbus to strike out across the Atlantic Ocean, seeking a new route to Cathay.
But in the overrun lands the suffering was vast. Ancient cities were erased, whole populations slaughtered. Compared to the human misery Kolya was able to perceive, even in the pavilion of Genghis Khan himself, the benefits of the empire seemed of little worth indeed.
But Sable, he saw clearly, was drawn to the Mongols rapacious glamour.
At last the beating troops appeared over the horizon, yelling and crying, and converged on the hunting ground. Runners stretched ropes between the army groups, making a cordon. Cornered animals lumbered or raced to and fro, dimly visible in the great cloud of dust they raised.
Kolya peered into the dust clouds. I wonder what theyve caught. I see horsesasses maybewolves, hyenas, foxes, camels, haresthey are all terrified.
Sable pointed. Look over there.
A larger shape loomed through the dust. It was like a great boulder, Kolya thought at first, a thing of the earth, much taller than a human being. But it moved massively, immense shoulders working, and curtains of rust-brown hair shimmered. When it raised its head, he saw a curling trunk, spiral tusks, and he heard a peal like a Bach trumpet.
A mammoth, he breathed. Genghiss hunters, crossing the time slips, have trapped more than they bargained forit is the dream of ages to witness this. If only we had a camera!
But Sable was indifferent.
A little stiffly, Genghis Khan mounted his horse. He rode forward, with a couple of guards to either side. It was his privilege to make the first kill. He took position not twenty meters below Kolya, and waited for the prey to be shepherded to him.
Suddenly there were screams. Some of Genghis guards broke ranks and fled, despite the howls of their commanders. Through the billowing dust before Genghis, Kolya saw a red rag flung through the airno, not a rag, it was a human being, a Mongol warrior, his chest ripped open, entrails dangling.
Genghis Khan held his ground, holding his horse steady, his lance and scimitar raised.
Kolya saw the beast coming, emerging from the dust. It was like a lion in its stealthy advance, but it was massively muscled, its shoulders more like a bears. And when it opened its mouth it revealed teeth that curved like Genghis Khans scimitar. In a moment of deadly stillness emperor and saber-toothed cat faced each other.
Then a single shot rang out, as unexpected as a clap of thunder from a clear sky. It was so close to Kolya his ears rang, and he heard the hiss of the bullet as it flew. Around Kolya the royal party and their attendants screamed and quailed. Suddenly the cat lay in the dirt, its hind legs twitching, its head exploded to a bloody mass. Genghiss horse was shying, but the Emperor had not flinched.
It had been Sable, of course. But she had already hidden the pistol.
Sable spread her arms. Tengri! I am the emissary of Heaven, sent to save you, great one, for you are intended to live forever, and to rule all the world! She turned to a whimpering Basil. In broken French she hissed, Translate, you dog, or it will be your head I take off next.
Genghis Khan stared up at her.
The slaughter of the animals inside the cordon took days. It was customary for some of the animals to be let loose, but on this occasion, as Genghiss life had been threatened, none was allowed to live.
Kolya inspected the remains curiously. The heads and tusks of several mammoths were presented to Genghis, along with a pride of lions of a size nobody had seen before, and foxes with coats of a beautiful snowy whiteness.
And there were a strange kind of people, too, caught up in the Mongols net. Naked, fast-running but unable to escape, they were a small family, a man, woman and boy. The man was dispatched immediately, and the woman and child brought in chains to the royal household. The creatures were naked and filthy, and seemed to have no speech. The woman was given to the soldiers for their sport, and the child was kept in a cage for a few days. Without his parents, the child would not eat, and rapidly weakened.