The horses attacked in this way, as well as the suicidal attackers, all shuddered as if in tragic despair.
Most of the wolves who brought down horses at the cost of their own lives were female. They were lighter than the males, making it more difficult for them to rip open the horses’ abdomens simply by hanging on, so they had to rely on the might of the horse itself. They offered up their lives, obsessed with vengeance, staring death calmly in the face, devoted to the cause, merging blood and milk. They faced the danger of fatal wounds to belly, chest, organs, and teats with a willingness to die alongside the horses they killed.
Horses whose bellies had been ripped open by wolves had just filled their stomachs with the first grass shoots of the year, mixed with some that remained from the previous autumn, and their abdomens were taut and low-slung; when the thin hide covers were torn away by wolf fangs, the stomachs and supple intestines spilled out onto the snow.
The final maniacal assault by the wolves crushed the herd’s resistance. The grassland was transformed into an abattoir. Horse after horse, gutted by its own hooves, lay writhing in the snow, wracked by spasms. In seconds, chests in which hot blood had flowed only moments before were now filled with ice. Surging horse blood stained the swirling snow.
The wolves’ suicidal war of vengeance paralyzed Batu with fear; cold sweat froze on his body. He knew that all was lost. His only wish now was to salvage a few of the horses. After pulling back hard on the bit to slow his horse momentarily, he abruptly dug his heels into its sides, released his hold on the bit, and flew past the line of wolves between him and the remnants of the herd, heading for the horse leader. The herd had already been scattered by the wolf attack, an army in full flight, running with the wind, so panic-stricken the horses had forgotten that the lake lay straight ahead to the south.
A downhill slope that led to the lake increased their speed, and the blizzard, with its mounting force, pushed them even faster, until their hooves barely touched the ground, their momentum like an avalanche crashing down a mountainside and into a morass. The thin layer of ice shattered under their hooves, and the viscous mud flew; the bog was about to claim the remaining horses, whinnying forlornly and struggling to keep moving, their fear and loathing of the wolf pack at its peak. Now hopelessly mired in the bog, they hesitated briefly before mustering the strength to plow into the deepest part, choosing self-inflicted death and burial in the bog over letting the wolves feed on their flesh and prevail in their quest for vengeance. These horses, castrated by humans, their virility lost to a knife, would end their lives with one final act of resistance: they would respond to the wolves’ attack by committing suicide en masse. At this moment they represented the most intrepid life force on the ancient grassland.
But the cruel grassland scorns the weak, refusing to bestow on them even the slightest measure of pity. As night fell, the plummeting temperature turned the muddy surface into a thin layer of brown ice. The edges of the lake were frozen solid, but the ice over the boggy center was not thick enough to withstand the weight of the horses; their hooves cracked the ice as they moved into deeper water and into thicker mud, made stickier than usual by the swirling snow and bitter cold air. They were trapped, though they kept struggling, each torturous step bringing more snow and cold air into the spaces that opened up between hoof and mud. Their struggles turned the bog into a frozen morass. Finally, inevitably, their strength ran out and they could no longer move. Denied the quick death they had sought, the herd voiced their desperate agony; their breaths created a mist of steam, and their hides were coated in hoarfrost. Every member knew that salvation was impossible, that nothing and no one could prevent the coming butchery.
Batu carefully reined in his horse at the edge of the lake, yet the moment the big black’s hooves touched the water, it snorted fearfully, lowered its head, and nervously eyed the muddy scene ahead, not daring to approach any closer. Batu shone his light on the surface of the lake and saw the hazy outlines of trapped horses where the flying snow of the blizzard weakened here and there. The heads of a few swayed weakly, a plea for help to the man responsible for their survival. He dug the heels of his boots into the sides of his horse to get it to move closer. But before it had gone more than five or six steps, its hooves broke through the ice and sank into mud, an alarm that sent it back to solid ground. This time Batu hit his mount on the flank with his herding club, but it refused to move. He thought of getting down, crawling out onto the ice, and standing guard over his horses with his rifle. But he knew that once he was off his horse and in the midst of the wolf pack, he would lose the commanding position from which he could use his club and the iron shoes of his horse as weapons; as soon as the wolves no longer feared him, man and horse would be torn apart. Besides, he only had ten bullets, and even with perfect marksmanship, killing a wolf with each shot would leave many standing. Icy tears covered his cheeks as he looked to the east, turning his head to the sky. Tengger, Tengger, eternal Tengger, give me the wisdom and power to save this herd! To which Tengger responded by puffing out its cheeks and blowing harder, dissolving the sound of Batu’s voice in the roar of the white-hair blizzard.
Batu wiped the tears from his cheeks with the sleeve of his deel, looped the herding club around his wrist again, armed his rifle, and cradled it and his flashlight in his left hand to await the arrival of the wolves. A single thought ran through his mind: Kill as many as possible.
Time passed, and Batu sat nearly frozen in his saddle. Without warning, the wolves slipped by him, low and quiet as a spectral wind, and moved out onto the ice. They stopped at the eastern edge, where they were hidden by a snowy fog bank. A moment later, a thin wolf emerged from the fog and approached his horse, one cautious step after another, testing the ice. Batu held his fire. The wolf was too small. After a dozen or more steps, it raised its head and ran toward the trapped horses. But it had barely started when a white whirlwind rose on the edge of the lake and sped in the direction of the herd; when it reached the horses, it swirled around them, raising clouds of snow and mist, blotting out heaven and earth.
Batu, blinded by the snow, shivered from the immobilizing cold. His horse, with its keen sense of smell, was wrapped in swirling snow, shuddering from the cold; lowering its head, it voiced its torment. In the heavy darkness of night, the boundless white-hair blizzard once more covered a slaughterhouse, where flowing blood froze on the ice.
Batu, nearly frozen stiff, listlessly turned off his flashlight so that he could vanish in the darkness. He lowered his head, aimed his rifle in the direction of the lake, but then abruptly raised the barrel skyward and fired slowly-once, twice, three times…
6
Sunlight shone weakly through the thin dark clouds, and drifting snow powder fell on the vast Olonbulag. After the two murder-ous days and nights of the white-hair blizzard, the sky had lost its power to send any more snow; no pellets, no flakes. A pair of eagles glided leisurely below the clouds. Warm early-spring air floated above the landscape, turning to mist carried off by the wind. A covey of red and brown sand grouse flew out of a copse of bushes that resembled white coral, rustling the branches, shaking off velvety snow like dandelion down, and exposing the deep red color of the grassland willows. To the observer, it was like red coral in a bed of white-colorful, eye-catching. The mountain range to the north pierced a clear sky, where blue clouds rose and fell atop the dazzling white of the snowcaps. Peace had returned to the ancient Olonbulag.