Dark of the Sun (24 page)
Authors: Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
Tags: #Fantasy, #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Horror, #Vampires, #Transylvania (Romania), #Krakatoa (Indonesia), #Volcanic Eruptions
To the most worthy Minister K’an Shao-Shou at the Wen Emperor’s capital of Chang’an, the greetings of Chu Sung-Neong, Undersecretary of the Prefecture of Holin-Gol, on the behest of the Prefect Ting Yu-Huan, with utmost regard for the Wen Emperor and his Minister:
Regretfully, I am charged with the task of informing Your Excellency that we cannot support the company of two hundred soldiers you have dispatched to this city to detain refugees from Chang’an; we are hardly able to provide for our own garrison, which is loyal to the Northern Wei Dynasty, no matter who wields the vermilion Brush in Da-Tong. Our soldiers here will be willing to apprehend those refugees summoned by your courts to answer criminal charges, but not to keep them as prisoners.
Unfortunately, your soldiers have taken certain matters into their own hands, and that has led to most unwelcome incidents in this town. Five of the suspects seized, including two women, were pulled apart by four oxen, three were subjected to the execution of the bell, and the rest were mutilated and beheaded. None of this is acceptable to the Prefecture, and the new Magistrate, Ngo Hai-Ming, has dispatched his own condemnation of this flouting of law and social order, and his request that the troops be withdrawn at once.
It is my sad duty to inform you that Holin-Gol is very low on civic provisions. We are halving difficulty feeding our own people, and the addition of your two hundred soldiers is imposing an intolerable burden on us. Dreadful acts of theft and other outrages have been perpetrated, and the new Magistrate has ordered our local militia to remove your soldiers from the town and not to admit them again, upon pain of death.
Here in our town there has been a very cold summer, and now that the year its closing in to the dark, we are already seeing snow two days out of three. The snow its yellow and it bears an odor that is most offensive. This would be hard enough, but in a time when there have been almost no crops harvested, our Merchants’ Council has declared that many businesses in Holin-Gol will not survive the winter without some relief granted them by the Prefecture, which arrangement we are even now attempting to arrange. Another hard year lies ahead, and if we are not to collapse into anarchy, you must exercise prudence and call your soldiers back to Chang’an before something truly disastrous occurs.
Sent this day by courier, the sixth day of the Fortnight of the Dying-Autumn Lanterns, at the order of the Prefecture of Holin-Gol.
Chu Sung-Neong
Undersecretary of the Prefecture of Holin-Gol
(his chop)
Undersecretary of the Prefecture of Holin-Gol
(his chop)
Nine of the Desert Cats and Zangi-Ragozh rode after the furious sounder of boar; seven of the large, wild pigs ran squealing from the galloping ponies and the armed men who straddled them. Baru Ksoka stood in his metal foot-loops and took careful aim with his powerful bow, loosing his arrow as the leader of the boar swung around to rush at him, his tusks foaming. The boar staggered and his furious attack turned to a limping retreat as the Kaigan sent a second arrow into the boar’s flank; the animal tottered, then fell heavily onto his side, his blood spreading through the dusting of yellow snow. The rest of the sounder scattered, the boars keening in fury and dread.
Imgalas rode up, his arrow notched to the string. “Shall we go after the others?” He sank onto his saddle and pulled his pony to a trot.
“Try for at least two more,” Baru Ksoka said, and swung around in his saddle to look at Zangi-Ragozh. “Do you want to go with them?”
“I’ll chase a boar for you,” said Zangi-Ragozh, who carried a Roman boar spear. “I want to see how much better your iron foot-loops let me aim.”
Baru Ksoka laughed aloud. “You will be surprised,” he promised, and stepped down from his saddle, drawing his curve-bladed Nepalese chilanum to begin the task of gutting and skinning the dying boar. “Bring back a prize.”
“I will,” Zangi-Ragozh promised as he hastened after Imgalas and the rest. He gathered the cinder-brown pony’s reins in his left hand and raised the spear with his right as he caught up with the other hunters.
“See you don’t hurt anyone with that … that poker of yours,” Imgalas shouted to him.
“I would not do such a thing,” Zangi-Ragozh called back.
“That is a reckless sort of weapon,” Imgalas remarked.
“No doubt it seems that way to one who does not know how to use it,” Zangi-Ragozh said, trying to maintain a genial demeanor; he spoke the Jou’an-Jou’an language much better now than he had even a fortnight ago. “If you like, I can show you.”
“A spear against a boar when an arrow is possible? What do you take me for? Foreigners!” Imgalas scoffed, then allowed, “swell, why not? Perhaps you can use it well enough.” He pointed with his arrow, indicating one of the largest of the wild pigs. “You try to bring down that big one with the tattered ear. You can make a good kill; he’ll provide some meat, and enough leather for two saddles.” Waving Zangi-Ragozh away, he ordered the other men to follow him, whooping as they hurtled after a pair of boars.
Zangi-Ragozh wheeled his pony and hurried after the boar Imgalas had indicated. He did not feel the harsh wind nor the bite of the cold in the scattered snowflakes. All his attention was on the boar, and on getting his pony close enough to throw the spear. Up ahead the ground rose into a low knoll, and the boar headed directly for it, Zangi-Ragozh and his pony steadily closing the distance between them and the wild pig. As he approached the fleeing animal, Zangi-Ragozh rose in the iron foot-loops and steadied himself for casting his boar spear, a risky and crucial preparation for the plunge. He maneuvered his pony close to the boar, held him there at a steady gallop while he prepared to thrust down with the long spear. His downward thrust rocked him, but his aim was true: the boar shrieked and kicked as he fell, and Zangi-Ragozh pulled in his cinder-brown pony to a walk, then guided him back to the boar, where the black-clad foreigner stepped down from the saddle—another benefit of the iron foot-loops—and approached the twitching boar, a long Darjeeling dao held ready for the final, fatal chop at the boar’s neck; the blood that gouted from the wound steamed in the frosty air. Bending down, he drove the blade into the pig’s belly as he drank the fountaining blood, wincing in spite of himself as he recalled the disemboweling knives that had killed him twenty-five hundred years ago.
“So you brought him down,” exclaimed Imgalas as he rode up, his shearling shuba spattered with new blood.
Zangi-Ragozh straightened up and pulled the spear out of the dead animal. “Do you save the guts?”
“Of course,” said Imgalas. “Why should we throw away something so useful?”
“Some others do not,” said Zangi-Ragozh, putting the offal in a pile. “Do you have a sack for this?”
“Joksu Guadas has them. I’ll send him over as soon as we have dressed the others,” Imgalas shouted as he started his pony running back toward the rest of the hunters.
Zangi-Ragozh continued with his chore, setting the boar’s organs beside the carcass. As he worked, he became aware of a distant sound of growling, and an instant later, he heard a pony whinny in distress. Straightening up, Zangi-Ragozh looked around and saw that Baru Ksoka, who was in the process of securing his kill to the back of his saddle, had attracted a pack of wolves. The Kaigan had reached for his chilanum, but the knife was beyond his grasp on the ground. He had unstrung his bow and could not brace himself to string it again, for the wolves were closing in around him, and his pony was panicking, rearing and trying to pull away from the powerful hand on the reins, and although Baru Ksoka kept the animal from bolting, he could not quiet him enough to mount. From his vantage point on a slight rise, Zangi-Ragozh realized that the Kaigan was in dreadful danger. Imgalas and the others were a greater distance away than he, making it clear that if he did nothing, Baru Ksoka would be savaged or killed.
Leaving the boar where it lay, Zangi-Ragozh vaulted into the saddle and set his pony galloping down the incline toward the wolves and Baru Ksoka. “Kaigan! Kaigan!” he shouted, hoping to be heard over the wolves and the pony.
One of the wolves rushed in and bit the on-side rear leg of the pony, drawing blood and giving the pony the final jolt of terror; the pony broke free of Baru Ksoka and bolted, the slaughtered pig bouncing on his croup as he fled. Most of the wolves took off after the pony, but five remained to circle the Kaigan, who had no weapons to fight them.
Zangi-Ragozh came pelting the last lengths between the Kaigan and the wolves and him. He had grabbed his boar spear and now began to swing it like a club, knocking one of the wolves with such force that he heard the animal’s ribs crack as the flat of the spear-blade struck. As soon as he was sure that the wolf would not be able to continue the fight, he wheeled his pony and drove off another of the pack.
Baru Ksoka dove for his chilanum, shoving it deep into the nearest wolf, shouting as blood spurted over his hand; he pulled out the blade and prepared to stab again just as another wolf fastened on his arm, once, twice, teeth sinking into his flesh; the Kaigan’s pony screamed as the wolves pulled him down, falling upon him in a frenzy. Hearing this, Baru Ksoka swore viciously and began to poke at the wolf that held him; his chilanum finally penetrated the wolf’s shoulder, making him howl, and giving Baru Ksoka the chance to pull his arm free.
Zangi-Ragozh could see that the Kaigan was bleeding heavily from four serious wounds—three in his legs and one on his arm—and he paused in his attack on the remaining wolves to shout, “Can you stand?”
“For a while,” Baru Ksoka said, reeling as he glanced at the damage that had been done.
From some distance away, Imgalas and the rest could be heard rushing toward them.
“Guard the boars!” Baru Ksoka shouted. “We need the meat!”
Zangi-Ragozh drove his boar-spear into the last wolf, then swung out of the saddle, leading his pony and going purposefully toward the Kaigan, who was jabbing at the bodies of the wolves lying around him, some still twitching.
Imgalas and the rest of the hunters appeared around the curve of the rise; they all stood in the foot-loops and had bows raised and arrows notched, ready to bring down the wolves. “Joksu Guadas!” Imgalas brayed. “Save the boars! Stop the wolves!”
Joksu Guadas pulled away from Imgalas, heading toward the surging knot of wolves as they descended on the pony and the slaughtered boar. He began to fire arrows into the mass of hungry wolves, shouting to Demen Ksai to work the other side. “Don’t damage the hides any more than you must. They’ll fetch a good trade!”
Demen Ksai shouted back his understanding and raised his bow, an arrow notched to the string, as he closed in on the other side of the churning pack. He quickly dispatched three wolves, and then sent an arrow into the pony’s skull to end its suffering. Satisfied he had followed orders, he shouted to Joksu Guadas, “The pack is breaking up.”
“Kill as many as you can.” Joksu Guadas shot another wolf as an example. “They’ll trail the clan now that they’ve found us, and we’ll have to keep watch against them. Besides, we can use the skins, though theirs look a little mangy.”
“That we can,” Demen Ksai agreed, and shot another arrow into the pack.
The wolves roiled around the pony, snapping and growling; they were thin—not even their heavy winter ruffs could disguise how scrawny the bodies beneath the fur had become. As the men bore down on them, more and more fell to the arrow, and those few who broke away did not flee unscathed.
Watching this, Baru Ksoka hobbled a few steps in their direction. He staggered and would have fallen if Zangi-Ragozh had not come to his side and slipped his shoulder under Baru Ksola’s arm to support him. “I … I don’t know what …” A film of cool sweat made his face shine in the sere sunlight, and he had to clamp his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering.
Zangi-Ragozh had seen this rush of cold many times in his long life, and he knew it was more dangerous than the bleeding wounds. “Here. Put my shuba over yours,” he offered, pulling off the heavy, sleeveless garment. “Then lie down and—”
“No! No Kaigan of the Desert Cats lies down in hunting, or in war!” His voice was shrill and he tried to break away from Zangi-Ragozh’s support.
“You will fall down, then,” said Zangi-Ragozh calmly, not giving up his bolstering. “If you stand, the blood will more quickly run from your legs. If you recline, you will save more blood.”
“How bad are the bites?” His voice lowered as he looked away from Joksu Guadas and Demen Ksai as they finished off as many of the pack as could not flee, yipping and howling.
“They will need to be tended, and quickly.” Zangi-Ragozh pulled on the reins of his pony, forcing the reluctant animal to walk through the wolves. “If you will not lie down, will you at least mount? Shorten the foot-loops so that your knees are higher than the pommel? You will not bleed so much.”
Baru Ksoka nodded. “I am Kaigan. I should ride.”
“Truly, you should.” Zangi-Ragozh held the pony still as he assisted Baru Ksoka into the saddle, and then shortened the strap of the iron foot-loop.
Imgalas came cantering up on his lathered pony. “Eleven got away. The rest are dead, Kaigan.”
“Then make the boars and pony ready to carry, and start skinning the wolves. Leave the bodies. Let them be food for scavengers.” Baru Ksoka swayed a little in the saddle.
“That we will. There are four boars, counting the foreigner’s,” Imgalas reported.
“Jekan Madassi will be glad of that,” said Baru Ksoka, his voice becoming thready.
Zangi-Ragozh spoke up. “Kaigan, your wounds need to be cleaned and closed.”
Imgalas finally noticed the blood that was dropping from Baru Ksoka’s foot, starting to puddle on the ground. “Our Kaigan is strong.”
“Yes, he is, he would be unconscious now if he were not,” said Zangi-Ragozh.
“Hardly that,” muttered Baru Ksoka.
“If you force him to remain, he will have a more difficult recovery,” Zangi-Ragozh warned.
“Foreigners are all so cautious,” said Imgalas, his mouth turning with contempt.
“Be glad of it,” said Zangi-Ragozh, and vaulted up behind the Kaigan, onto the croup of the pony; he nudged the flanks and set off at a jog-trot. After a short distance, Baru Ksoka slumped back against him, his breath labored. By the time they reached the Desert Cats’ camp, Zangi-Ragozh was holding Baru Ksoka to keep him from falling. He turned his pony toward the wagon where Dukkai lay, and the pony slowed to a walk as if relieved that their journey was over. “Ro-shei!” he shouted as he jumped down from the pony.
From all around the camp came shouts and pointing as the Desert Cats saw Zangi-Ragozh ease Baru Ksoka out of the saddle and carry him toward the wagon; Neitis, Baru Ksoka’s young nephew, was the first to come running up, shouting, “What happened?” He reached the pony’s off-side and took hold of the iron foot-loop, his young face showing intense worry as well as curiosity.
“There were wolves after boar, and there was a fight.” Zangi-Ragozh had reached the narrow rear platform and put Baru Ksoka down on it, making sure his shuba, as well as the Kaigan’s own, was wrapped securely around him. “Baru Ksoka held off the pack.”
“A valiant thing,” Neitis approved, but his praise was short-lived as he stared at the deep bite gashes in the legs. “He is badly hurt.”
“Yes, he is, which is why I must begin to treat him at once. Tell the others that the Kaigan cannot be disturbed just now.” He was about to climb into the wagon, but added, “Dukkai will watch all that I do.”
As if in response to her name, Dukkai called out, “Is that you, Zangi-Ragozh?”
“Yes. I am going to bring Baru Ksoka into the wagon, to clean and treat his injuries. Will you guard him while I work?”
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