Bones of the Hills (24 page)

The minghaans re-formed in a landscape of broken men, littered armor and weapons. Some of them dismounted to yank precious arrows out of flesh, but only a few were good enough to be used again. Tsubodai felt his heartbeat settle and took in the battlefield, judging where he was needed. The Shah’s army was out of the passes and he could see the tumans of Jebe and Jochi cutting them bloody in the rear. The sun was deep in the west and he thought Genghis would hardly have time to attack before the light faded.

Tsubodai nodded to himself. He could see the last of the Shah’s infantry were back on the flank, staring out balefully at the Mongol warriors milling amongst the bodies. Most of the elephants had vanished,
though some lay kicking where they had been hit with more arrows from the Shah’s own ranks, rather than letting them smash through. Tsubodai was tired and he ached in a dozen places, but the battle was far from over.

“Form on me!” he shouted, and those who heard responded. As the Shah’s ranks marched past, fresh foot soldiers came under Tsubodai’s cold gaze. He could hardly believe it, but the Shah’s soldiers were so determined to reach Otrar that they pressed on regardless of the attacking forces.

Tsubodai shook his head. The generals had shown the strength of mobile forces, with the officers acting on their own. Yet the Shah’s army lumbered on, holding to a single command no matter what faced them. Tsubodai thought the Shah as ruthless as Genghis himself in the way he spent his men.

As Jelme’s men formed with his into columns, Tsubodai saw frightened faces turn toward him in the Shah’s army. They knew what was coming, even as he made the decision. He watched them bend their bows and make ready.

Tsubodai reached for the scout’s horn at his neck, only to find it in two pieces, cut by a blow he could not remember. He swore to himself, blind to the grins his words produced in those close by.

“With me!” he bellowed. To his left, Jelme’s men dug in their heels and rode.

Genghis had pushed hard for twenty miles to be in that place, changing to fresh mounts when the battle was in sight. He saw the Shah had come clear of the hills, but there was no help for that. He looked along the lines to where his son Chagatai galloped and further to Khasar. Fully fifty thousand men rode at his back, with a great tail of spare horses riding behind them. Yet they faced an army that stretched further than he could see. Tsubodai’s flags were barely visible on his left, attacking the flanks. Behind the Arab host, dust clouds roiled and raged. Genghis thought Samuka and Ho Sa would be dead by then, but Otrar was far away and its garrison could not reach the battle that day. He had done all he could, but this was the final fling of the bones. It came to this and he had no other plan except to hit the Shah’s column and envelop it in horns.

Genghis snapped an order to a bannerman and heard the fluttering as a gold flag went up. All along the line, thousands of bows creaked.
The Shah’s army tried to brace for the impact, though their officers urged them on. No one wanted to face these grim warriors again, but there was nowhere to go. They screamed defiance as the gold flag dipped and the air blackened.

The Mongol lines struck at full speed, roaring, the sheer pace as dangerous as the weapons they carried. The wide Mongol horns spilled around the head of the Shah’s army, racing along the flanks and cutting in. The light was already gray as the armies met, the sun sinking over the west. The evening was clear and perfect as the Mongols flung themselves at the host of their enemy.

Shah Ala-ud-Din Mohammed cried out in shock as a line of Mongols cut right through to him. His mounted guard slaughtered them to a man, but he was surrounded on all sides and half his army could not bring their weapons to bear. The Shah was close to panic as he looked in every direction. It would be dark very soon and yet the Mongols still fought like madmen. They did not make a sound, even when life was ripped from them. The Shah could only shake his head at such a display. Did they not feel pain? His son Jelaudin believed they were more like dumb animals than men, and he could have been right.

Still, the Shah’s army moved, staggering as they fought the desire to run from this enemy. Ala-ud-Din saw bright columns of his men being smashed to pieces on the flanks, and always the rumble of the Mongols in the rear drove them on.

More and more of the khan’s warriors died as they tried to fight their way to the center. The Shah’s soldiers held formation and cut them to pieces as they came galloping through. They could not match the Mongol speed, but their shields stopped many of the arrows and those who came in were hacked and slashed as they went, sent reeling back time and again. As the light faded, Ala-ud-Din exulted in the enemy dead as his elephant passed over them.

Darkness came and for a time it was a vision of hell. Men cried out as they struggled in a heaving mass of shadows and knives. The Shah’s army seemed to be surrounded by a growling djinn, the thunder of hooves in their ears. Marching soldiers jerked around as they struggled on, terrified that the noise of riders was coming straight at them. Above their heads, the stars were clear and bright as the crescent moon rose slowly.

The Shah thought that the Mongol khan might continue right to
dawn, and he prayed constantly as he gave his orders, hoping that he would survive the dark hours. Once again his guards had to fight off a stray column of raiding warriors, killing eighty or so men and sending the rest galloping away to be cut down by others. The sons of the ancient houses were enjoying themselves, Ala-ud-Din could see. Their teeth flashed as they mimed good cuts to their friends. The army around them was being battered to pieces, but such noble sons would not count those losses. Allah gave and took away as he pleased, after all.

Ala-ud-Din thought dawn would reveal a bloody tatter of the host he had commanded. Only the thought of his enemy suffering as much kept him resolute.

He did not notice the sound dwindle at first. It felt like he had lived with the thump of hooves in all directions forever. When it began to fade, he was still calling for his sons, for fresh reports. The army marched on and Otrar would surely be somewhere close before dawn.

At last one of the Shah’s senior men shouted that the khan had withdrawn. Ala-ud-Din gave thanks for his deliverance. He had known horsemen could not attack at night. With hardly any light from the moon, they could not coordinate their blows without crashing into one another. He listened to news as his scouts came in, estimating their distance from Otrar and passing on every detail they had seen of the khan’s position.

Ala-ud-Din prepared to make camp. Dawn would bring an end to it and the cursed Mongols would have left their arrows behind in the bodies of his men. With Otrar in sight, he would widen his lines and bring more swords to bear on their stinging attacks. In the last hour, they had lost as many men as he had, he was certain. Before that, they had gutted his host. He looked around at the marching lines, wondering how many had survived the fight through the mountains. He had once seen a hunting party follow a wounded lion as it dragged itself away from their spears. The animal had left a trail of blood as wide as itself as it crawled on its torn belly. He could not escape the vision of his own army in just such a state, the red smear bright behind them. He gave the order to halt at last, and he could hear the massed sigh of thousands of men allowed to rest. The Shah began to dismount, but as he did so, he saw lights begin to spring up to the east. He knew the pinpoints of an army’s fires well, and he stayed on the back of the elephant as more and more sprang into existence until they looked like distant stars. There was his enemy, resting and waiting for the dawn.

Around Ala-ud-Din, his own men began to make fires with wood
and dried dung from the camel backs. The morning would see an end to it. The Shah heard voices calling the faithful to prayer and nodded fiercely to himself. Allah was with them still and the Mongol khan was bleeding too.

As the moon crossed the black sky, Genghis gathered his generals around a fire. The mood was not jubilant as they waited for him to speak. Their tumans had slaughtered many of the Shah’s men, but their own losses were appalling. In the last hour before darkness, four thousand veteran warriors had been killed. They had cut their way almost to the Shah himself, but then the Arab swords had gathered against them and dug them out.

Jebe and Jochi had come into the camp together, greeted by Kachiun and Khasar while Genghis merely stared. Tsubodai and Jelme rose to congratulate the two young men, having heard the story of the long ride as it spread through the camp.

Chagatai too had heard the news and his expression was surly as he watched Jelme clap his older brother on the back. He could not understand why they seemed so pleased. He too had fought, following his father’s orders rather than disappearing for days at a time. He, at least, had been where Genghis needed him. Chagatai had hoped to see Jebe and Jochi humiliated for their absence, but even their late arrival at the Shah’s rear ranks was being treated as a stroke of genius. He sucked his front teeth, looking to his father.

Genghis sat cross-legged, with a skin of airag on his hip and a bowl of sour cheese curds on his lap. The back of his left hand was caked in blood, and his right shin was bound tightly but still seeped. As Chagatai turned his face from the foolish praise of his brother, Genghis cleaned the bowl with a finger and chewed the last of it. Silence fell as he put the bowl aside and sat perfectly still.

“Samuka and Ho Sa must be dead by now,” Genghis said at last. “The garrison at Otrar cannot be far away, and I do not know how many survived the fire and arrows.”

“They won’t stop for darkness,” Kachiun said. “Perhaps they will walk their horses, but they’ll still reach the Shah before dawn.” As he spoke, Kachiun stared out into the night, to where they could expect the garrison to arrive. Further still, he could see the fires of the Shah’s camp, and even after so much death, there were still hundreds of the pinpoints of light, just a few miles away. No doubt Arab scouts were
already riding back to join with the Otrar garrison and lead them in. The darkness would hide them well enough.

“I have scouts out in a ring around us,” Genghis said. “If they attack tonight, there will be no surprises.”

“Who attacks at night?” Khasar said. His thoughts were with Samuka and Ho Sa and he barely looked up from the dry goat meat he forced between his lips.

In the light of the flames, Genghis turned a cold gaze on his brother.

“We do,” he said.

Khasar swallowed the meat faster than he had intended, but Genghis went on before he could reply.

“What choice do we have? We know where they are and the arrows are all gone anyway. If we strike from all sides, we will not foul each other’s lines.”

Khasar cleared his throat and spoke thickly. “The moon is weak tonight, brother. How could we see flags or know how the battle is going?”

Genghis raised his head. “You will know when they break, or when you are killed. It is the only choice left to us. Would you have me wait until a garrison of twenty thousand men joins them at dawn—fresh men who have not fought as we have?” In the firelight, he looked around at his generals. Many of them moved stiffly and Jelme’s right arm was wrapped in bloody cloth, still wet.

“If I know Samuka, there won’t be half that number,” Khasar muttered, but Genghis did not reply.

Tsubodai cleared his throat and Genghis’s eyes slid over to the young general.

“My lord khan, the flying columns worked well when we had arrows. In the night, each attack would be met by men with shields in solid ranks. We could lose them all.”

Genghis snorted, but Tsubodai went on, his quiet voice calming the others.

“One column could cut its way in, but we saw that today. They do not run from us, these Arabs, not easily. Every step brings more and more men onto the flank of the charge until it is overwhelmed.”

“You have an alternative?” Genghis snapped. Though his voice was hard, he was listening. He knew Tsubodai’s sharp mind and respected it.

“We need to confuse them, lord. We can do that with a false second
attack, circling around. They will send men to hold and we will roll them up from our side.”

Genghis shook his head, considering. Tsubodai pressed on.

“What if we had a small number of men drive horses at the Shah’s left wing, lord? Have them take all the spare mounts and make as much noise as they can. When the Shah commits his soldiers there, we attack the right with everything we have. It might make a difference.”

He waited as Genghis thought it through, unaware that he was holding his breath.

“It is a good plan,” he began. All the men at the fire stiffened as they heard a scout’s horn sound in the night. Almost in response, a roar sounded in the distance, coming toward them. While they talked and ate, the Shah had attacked their fires.

As one, the generals surged to their feet, keen to get back to their men.

“This is simpler, though, Tsubodai,” Khasar said as he passed.

Tsubodai grinned at the insolent tone. He had already planned for such an attack, and the warriors were ready.

AS HE TROTTED THROUGH THE DARKNESS
, Jelaudin stared at the fires ahead of him. The men running at his stirrups were exhausted, but he had pressed his father for one more massed charge, knowing that their best chance lay in catching the Mongols asleep. He seethed at the thought of his father’s precious guard still barely blooded. The Shah had refused his demands to have them accompany him, just when they would have justified their existence. Jelaudin cursed his father and Khalifa too, for losing the cavalry, then pressed away his anger to concentrate. Just one sweep through the enemy camp could be enough to break them at last. The moon was hidden by clouds and Jelaudin rode slowly over broken ground, waiting for the uproar that would follow.

It came sooner than he expected, as enemy scouts blew warning notes before they were cut down. Jelaudin drew his sword and risked his neck with a faster pace. The running men fell behind as he aimed his mount at the Mongol fires.