Until the Sun Falls

by Cecelia Holland

  Heavy Russian voices called out, and Mongols answered, high and yelping. Metal screeched on metal. A horse reared straight up, a stump where one foreleg had been, and crashed down on its side. Tshant dodged around it and into the main fighting. With only a dagger he had to get close. He rammed into a Russian on foot and put the dagger in between his ribs, and the Russian looked down at him, eyes round with surprise, and fell.

  He whirled to face another. This one carried a lance, and the lance jabbed at him, nuzzling at his cloak. He knocked it aside and jumped in. The Russian struck him in the face with his fist. Tshant sat down abruptly, lunged to one side, and slashed at the Russian’s hamstring. The hide boot parted under the dagger blade, and the Russian grunted and collapsed. A charging horse rushed them. Tshant dove aside, but the Russian only flung up his hands, and a great forehoof smashed the hand and the face beneath it.

  Tshant jumped up and looked for the Russian’s lance. The surging lines of men around him caught him like a river current and carried him in a rush toward the gate. The timbre of the Mongol shouting had changed, it was fiercer now, triumphant, and he knew that they were winning. He gasped for breath and yelled along with the rest. The moonlight made it almost as bright as day.

  They rushed up against the wall, as if by their weight alone they would smash it down, and the rough wood seemed to tremble before them. On the wall over their heads, women shrieked and sobbed. Tshant paused, his hands flat on the wall, and looked up. The wall could not be manned only by women—

  “Climb,” someone behind him screamed. “Quickly—climb the wall.”

  That was Quyuk. Tshant flashed a look over his shoulder and saw him on a Russian horse galloping down toward them. The stirrups banged against the horse’s sides, far below Quyuk’s feet. Tshant swung toward the men around him.

  “Bend your backs, now. Come on, climb.”

  The first row of men bent over, their hands on their knees. Tshant pushed away from them, not meaning to be a pack animal. The next line backed up a step, ran lightly forward, and leapt up onto the backs before them and bent in the same way. The third line climbed up onto their backs, and the fourth onto theirs. Tshant pulled himself up over the crouching men, using belts and shoulders for handholds, his dagger in his sleeve. The top of the wall swayed above him, painted in moonlight. He stopped just long enough to take his dagger in his hand and vaulted over.

  The rampart was deserted. All along the wall, Mongols were running. Torches bloomed. Tshant ran for the main gate. His breath burnt in his throat. He stumbled over a catapult’s lashings, almost fell from the rampart, and saw briefly a clot of women and children huddled underneath, their faces white as the ice. He raced to the gate.

  Three or four men were already there, struggling futilely with the enormous bar across it. He paused, wiped his dagger on his sleeve, and sheathed it. The engine on the ground beside the wall was a winch. But the bar could not be worked by winch.

  He yipped, calling up the Mongols within earshot, and jumped down to the gate. The Mongols followed him, leaping down from the wall. They caught the bar in their hands and with a single shout heaved it out of the cleats and flung it down. With their bare hands they tore the gate off its hinges.

  Only a few Mongols came in by the gate. Tshant, watching them go off contentedly to plunder, frowned and climbed back up onto the wall.

  What had happened he saw at once. Here on this stretch of wall the Mongols had beaten the Russians, but everywhere else the fighting still blazed on. Probably every Russian able to fight was outside the wall. The Mongols streaming in through the tunnels were slowly overpowering the Russian defense, but they still fought, and in some places they were forcing the Mongols back toward the main gate. In the moonlight the Russian armor glinted, and there was no color, only black and white, even where there was blood.

  He saw Quyuk on his huge Russian horse lead a charge straight into a mass of mounted Russians. The fighting surged up all around him. A horse screamed and reared up, and the swords hacked and jabbed at the massed bodies between the two walls. Quyuk’s horse burst riderless out the back of the Russian line and galloped away. Tshant swore under his breath.

  Abruptly he realized that someone was attacking him. He swung around. A dozen women with pitchforks and axes lumbered along the rampart toward him. Their faces, slobbered and stained with tears, were like the bloated faces of drowned men. He took a step backward. They screeched and rushed toward him. They could come only two abreast, because of the narrow rampart, but the ones behind shoved at the ones in front in their eagerness to get at him.

  He bent his shoulders and launched himself at them, grabbed the pitchfork in the hands of the nearest, and whipped her off the rampart. She thudded on the ground. The others shrieked at him. Their eyes gleamed. Their hair flew around their heads. He jabbed the fork at them, and one woman spread her arms and smiling ran herself onto the triple tines, gasping only a little. He leapt back, jerking the fork loose, and his stomach churned.

  The women came on. He could not frighten them back. He swung the fork in great sweeps, knocking them in pairs and threes off the rampart. They hardly seemed to use their weapons, only fell and smashed on the cobblestones below. From under the rampart rose the wailing of children. The last pair of women faltered, whirled, and ran away screaming.

  He followed them. They began to cry out for help, ahead of him. One plunged down onto the rampart and lay still. He caught up with her and kicked her over onto her back. She stared at him, white-faced, and her mouth jerked open. She raised her hands to hold him away.

  His blood hammered in his ears, and he caught his breath. All the while the woman lay still, her great eyes pleading with him, her hair tangled on the wood of the rampart. The thought of monsters dimmed, and he knelt, one knee on each side of her waist, and dragged her skirts up.

  Quyuk’s breath sobbed through his teeth. Psin glanced quickly down, saw that his eyes were still closed, and whirled to drive off the Russians beating down on them. His arm ached from holding the sword so high, and whenever another sword smashed into his he felt the jar clean to his shoulderblades. The Russians spilled back, away from him, uncertain. The angle of the wall at Psin’s back and the fighting all around them kept the Russians from attacking effectively. Across the little space between them and Psin they stared, their eyes shadowed under their helmets, their mouths working nervously.

  “Come on,” Psin said, in Russian. “Come take me, Christers.” He switched the sword to his left hand and flexed the other arm; one of the Russians cocked his lance and charged in.

  Psin chopped awkwardly at the lance, knocked it aside, and struck for the horse. A hoof grazed his side. The horse’s head swung across his shoulder. The Russians behind the horse bored in grimly. He hoisted the sword and fended off their strikes, his legs widespread so that he could dodge from side to side without moving his feet. Somewhere far away something crashed down hard enough to shake the earth. The Russians shied back.

  “Leave this one,” one said. “Get a bow. Nicholas—”

  Arrows came, but they were Mongol. One of the mounted Russians screamed and pitched off his horse. The others whirled and raced away. Psin looked up and saw Mongols running down the wall above his head. More Russians thundered down the space between the city wall and the snowbank, but they were fleeing and they didn’t pause to attack Psin. He knelt beside Quyuk.

  “I’m all right,” Quyuk said. “It’s my shoulder.”

  “Hunh.” Psin helped him straighten himself out. He’d thought, when he saw Quyuk weave in his saddle, that Quyuk had another headache. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “Are we winning?” Quyuk’s face was strained, dead white around the mouth.

  “I don’t know. Stand up.”

  “Help me.”

  Psin took hold of Quyuk’s good hand. Quyuk braced himself against it and gathered his feet under him. His right arm hung limp and his right shoulder bent at the wrong place. He rose unsteadily and lea
ned hard on Psin. He swayed, his eyes squeezed shut. Psin jerked off his belt and lashed Quyuk’s bad arm to his side. When he picked him up, Quyuk gasped.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Hurts. Yes. Do it.”

  Psin carried him as gently as he could, but he felt each stride jarring the broken shoulder. Quyuk’s hand was fisted in Psin’s collar. At the nearest tunnel, Psin paused and called, “Is anybody in there?”

  “Three of us,” a Mongol voice said. “Nobody but wounded out here.”

  “I have the Kha-Khan’s son; get a litter.”

  Horses were coming. Psin looked up and saw a band of whooping Russians hurtle around the corner and down this wide stretch. Their swords cut arcs through the empty air.

  “Sleds,” the Mongol in the tunnel said. “They won’t fit—”

  “Get out here and defend me.”

  “Who—”

  “Psin Khan. Get out here.”

  The Russians, seeing them, were veering to attack. Three Mongols squirted out of the tunnel mouth. They had bows; they knelt and shot. Two Russian horses pitched forward and slid across the ice toward them, kicking. The others whirled and fled back the way they had come. Arrows hummed after them. Rounding the corner, one Russian flung up his arms and fell backward over his horse’s rump. Psin sat down with his back to the tunnel, Quyuk still in his arms, and dug his heels into the ice.

  “How goes it?” one of the other Mongols asked.

  Psin shrugged. “Ask tomorrow.” He shoved himself backward into the tunnel. Quyuk’s head lay against his neck. He pushed his feet against the sides of the tunnel to keep himself moving. Someone took him by the belt and dragged him out the other side.

  “Sleds here, Khan.”

  “How—”

  “We’ve widened two tunnels.” This was a Kipchak. He spread a cloak on a sled and thrust it over. Psin laid Quyuk on it and folded the cloak around him.

  “Be careful. He’s broken his shoulder.”

  “Are we winning?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Across the wall, in or near the city, Mongols were cheering. The moon was setting and the light failed steadily. The Kipchak said, grinning, “I think so. You look tired.”

  Psin pried Quyuk’s fingers loose from his collar. “Take care of him.”

  Quyuk’s hand tightened abruptly, to pull Psin around to face him. “Why is it I’m only helpless around you, Merkit?”

  “Because you can afford to be.” Psin jerked loose and dove into the tunnel and crawled to the other side.

  The city was burning. Smoke eddied in the air above him, and embers rained down. The sounds of fighting had died for a moment. He could hear the solitary howl of a baby, inside the wall. He had dropped his sword when he picked up Quyuk, and he couldn’t find it again. He had only the dagger in his belt. He jogged along the wall, looking for another weapon.

  This section was almost empty. The blood shone in lakes and dead men and horses covered the ice. Many of the dead were Mongols. Most of them. He stopped and counted, surprised. Of the thirty-four corpses he could see twenty-two were Mongol. That was wrong. Something was wrong here.

  From the wall across from him, a Mongol yelled, and Psin ran around the corner to the sounds of fresh fighting. The battle filled the space from wall to wall. Most of the Mongols were on foot, most of the Russians mounted; Psin saw two Mongols darting in and out of the packed horses to slit girths and bellies. The Mongols stood shoulder to shoulder in a breech in the city wall. The gate. Psin took a deep breath and jumped in among the surging horses.

  Russian axes and swords smashed down at him. He drew his dagger and plunged it to the hilt in a horse’s chest. When the horse reared he ducked beneath it and slashed at a mailed leg that swung at eye level before him. The rider attached to the leg clubbed at him with an axe. Psin grabbed the horse’s bridle and forced it back, dodging the wild swings of the axe. The Russian screamed a curse, lifted the axe in both hands over his head, and swung hard at Psin. Psin dragged the horse around so that the axe clove into its neck just behind the ears. The horse screamed and plunged to its knees.

  “Mongols, down—watch your heads—”

  That was Tshant’s voice. Psin went to his hands and knees beside a dead horse. Above him, the arched necks, the swinging arms and swords shut out the night sky. He saw a face, solemn, almost detached, above a long sword with jewels in its hilt. He flattened himself against the dead horse.

  Stones pelted all around him. He squirmed, trying to get as much of himself as possible under the horse. Something—a stone, a hoof —smacked the ground beside his head. The dead body beside him quivered. A horse bugled. Something landed hard across his back. He smelled blood, horse, sweat, dead things. Metal clanked hollowly.

  The noise rolled away, and he lay still, waiting. Finally he lifted his head. Stones lay all around, and dead horses and men. A Russian in armor sprawled across him, a stone buried in his skull just behind the ear. Psin kicked, and the corpse rolled sluggishly away.

  “Hurry up,” Tshant said. “There’s fighting just down the way.”

  Psin got to his feet. The smoke was heavier now, and flames crackled just inside the gate. “Who set fire to the city?”

  “We did. We thought if they saw it burning they might lose heart.”

  “They lose heart, we lose plunder. How is it going?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  A sword lay among the stones near a dead horse, and Psin went over and picked it up. The weight dragged at his arm. Tshant was watching him, and he forced himself strong and started down the wall. His shoulders ached, and he couldn’t keep his knees from sagging. The light was strange, and looking up at the sky he saw the first streaks of the false dawn reaching through the stars.

  “We lost a huge number of men, and we took almost no plunder.” Sabotai pulled up his belt and rammed his hands inside it, over his belly. “It was a hard fight, granted, but I think we should have done better.”

  Psin nodded. He brushed his hair back off his forehead. The dead weariness hauled at him. He had fought until noon and it was only dusk now.

  “What happened?” Sabotai said.

  Psin shut his eyes. He heard Sabotai move quickly around behind him, and Sabotai’s hand shook him roughly by the nape of the neck. “Come along. We have to hold a council tonight. If we two can’t decide what happened, how can the pack of them?”

  “I’m tired.”

  “I told you not to go into the city. You said you weren’t certain the Altun would do what we wished if you did not. You went in, and they still did not do what we wished. They were burning the city long before we had cleaned up the Russians. Why?”

  “Nobody knew what was happening. Nobody could see anything. Quyuk ordered them to climb the wall, and they did, and threw the gate open. But there were no Russians inside but women and children, and they started to plunder and rape the women and burn—”

  “So. First, Quyuk should not have told them to take the city wall.”

  “We made out better because we held the wall. Once they got organized on top of it.”

  “They got inside without a commander, then.”

  Psin opened his eyes. Sabotai was in front of him, his stare urgent.

  “They had a commander. Tshant was inside.”

  “Tshant couldn’t keep them organized?”

  “Apparently ... he didn’t see the reason to.”

  Sabotai murmured. “All right. There’s the crux. Quyuk was wounded too early to do much damage—”

  “Quyuk did well. He kept every man he could outside the wall and moving.”

  “Kadan? Mongke?”

  “Mongke I did not see.”

  Sabotai settled back, frowning. “Do yon think he fled?”

  “No. I’d stake a lot on that.”

  “Baidar?”

  “I didn’t see, Sabotai. I know them all. I suppose they did what was there to do.”

  “But you know that Tshant… didn’
t.”

  “Yes.” Psin shut his eyes again.

  “In fact, on the basis of partial evidence, the whole disaster seems to have been Tshant’s fault.”

  Psin whispered, “Yes.”

  “You shouldn’t have gone in.”

  “Sabotai, he’s never held an independent command before this war, and he’s—”

  “Neither has Quyuk. Quyuk so far has proven himself something of a general. You have more faith in Tshant than he deserves, apparently.”

  Psin bit his lip. “Sabotai, I won’t—”

  “Be quiet. He’s made an error, and he has to be punished. I mean to take him to pieces in the council.”

  “I could punish him.”

  “You could, but I will. Go to sleep.”

  “O God. I’m so tired.”

  Sabotai pushed him gently down. “Sleep.”

  Psin sank down on the couch. In the last of his consciousness he heard Sabotai say, “You’re tired. I would be dead. Go to sleep. Go to sleep.”

  Sabotai summoned the council in his yurt; the Altun, the tuman commanders, and half a dozen of the thousand-commanders gathered there when the moon rose. They woke Psin up, and he shouldered his way through the growing mob, found Mongke, and sank down next to him.

  “Where were you in the fighting?”

  Mongke looked over at him. He was sitting on a couch next to Quyuk with his bound shoulder. “I was with Kadan, down by the river.”

  Psin nodded. “I thought so. I didn’t see you.”

  Quyuk glanced over, cold-eyed. Mongke was watching Psin thoughtfully.

  “What’s wrong?” Psin said.

  “I’m waiting for you to go ask Kadan if I was there.”

  Psin laughed. “Why should I?”

  Baidar came over and sat on his heels beside Psin’s knee. “It was terrible, wasn’t it.”

  Mongke said lightly, “Oh, well, we only lost a tuman and a half, that’s all.”

  “And no plunder,” Baidar said. “I’m just glad I got out whole. We all did. Quyuk, how are you?”

  “I,” Quyuk said, “am in excruciating pain, useless on a horse, powerless to carry a bow or a sword, and dying of thirst.”