The mamluks murmured excitedly, then quieted as Aidan pushed his way into the center of their circle. "True," he said. "You can. Any of you can escape. But I believe Kai. I have known him half my life, and he is an honorable man. This is my only chance to free my wife, my child." He paused. "And perhaps even find my sister, whom I pledged to free. Any of the rest of you who want to flee, do it. I stand here."
The men grumbled, but to his relief only two or three of them stood.
"Good," Aidan said. "Fine. And, Mouse—you're the youngest. Get the hell out of here."
Mouse and three others were heading as nonchalantly as possible toward the back storeroom when they encountered a Moorish foot soldier. "Hey, ghost." The Moor's face was strained, as if offended that he had to share air with them. "Where do you think you're going?"
"Just stretching our legs, sir."
The Moor grunted, mollified, and went his way.
"Should we tell him about the tunnel?" asked an older mamluk.
Mouse considered. All his life, the arrogant blacks had told him what to do. Had worked his father into an early grave, had violated his sister's chastity. He hated them, and hated the fact that he had never been free to tell them. "Fock 'im," he said, and imagined the soldier dead, heart ripped out by Aztecs. Served them right, all of them.
But what of him? He would be free, but where would he go, what would he do? He wanted to be free, but he had no trade except fence mending, could not read or write, and would be hard-pressed even to prove he was a free man.
There was no joy in that future, he was smart enough to know that. But was there another way? Any other way . . . ?
Then another thought occurred to him, and its possibilities were so exciting that again he almost wet himself.
In the holy sanctum beneath the golden dome and the Naqsh Kabir, Kai curled, asleep. Dreaming.
He dreamed of his boyhood, racing on horseback with Ali. Learning to read and write at his father's knee. Playing with Aidan.
Of Sophia, and their first night together.
Lamiya, her eyes glowing in the darkness, whispering: "Find that flame, that existence, that wonderful man—"
The sweetness of her soft and parted lips against his mouth.
Uncle Malik, drilling him along the triangle and the square. And Babatunde, tutoring him in the secret lines of the Naqsh Kabir. Babatunde, teaching him in his lab. Babatunde, teaching him the philosophies of men living or long dead.
Then, in the dream, Babatunde seemed to speak to him directly. "The world is not its symbols, Kai. The form is not the essence . . ."
"Kai—" he heard a voice call, and the dream receded. Kai sat up suddenly, his eyes bright.
"Kai?" Kebwe called to him again from the mosque's doorway.
"I asked that I not be disturbed," he said, irritated.
"It is your slave, Aidan. He said that, on his life, he must be heard."
A strong oath. Kai prayed the message was worthy of it. "Send him in," he said.
Aidan entered, dressed in battle garb. Two steps behind him was the little one that the slaves called Mouse.
Aidan stopped a respectful distance away as Kai rose.
"Yes? What is it?"
"I believe," said Aidan, "that you should hear what this boy has to say, and hear it now."
There was steel in Aidan's voice. Steel and something else: excitement. Kai could not repress a grin. He knew that expression, that tilted, off-center curl of Aidan's lips. There was pure hell in it, and Kai felt his heart's load lighten. Aidan had learned something, discovered something, that could make a difference.
"Then let him speak his piece," Kai said.
Chapter Sixty-nine
When Kai exited the shrine it was only three hours after midnight, but the men had been hustled awake. They grumbled and yawned and stretched, but there was an undeniable thread of curiosity about them.
"Men! Together!" he called. "The new day has begun, and today is our day!"
The men clustered about, and Kai felt his heart swell. "Warriors!" he said. "Those of you still among us this morning have chosen the company of men to the solitary pleasures of the forest."
There was a scattering of grim, tired laughter among them. Kai continued. "This is not a time for sleep, but for arms. It is not the end, but the beginning. The beginning of a legend that will last a thousand years. It will be told, I promise you, that once upon a time there was a band of brothers—white, black, rich, poor—who stood together for the land they loved, for freedom, for Ar-Rahman, the Merciful, and pledged their lives and their souls for something greater than themselves."
He had their attention. The hundred of them were gathered now, and armed. They were a ragtag lot, wearing mismatched armor from Egypt, Abyssinia, and Azteca. Armed with spears and swords, staves and rifles. Born to battle or captured from Frankish homes. These were the men who had placed their lives in his hands. These were his men. And they would die, or triumph, together.
"I offer you no pretty promises," he said. "Only that in the coming bloody dawn I will be at your side, my flesh with yours, my sword with yours, and that we will stand or fall together. We. Today, we noble few. I say that every man here has the soul of a free man, of a landed man, that every man here is, today, my brother. And those who did not come with us, or who crept out in the night with their tails between their legs, when they hear the songs and stories of the deeds we shall do this day, they will hold their manhood cheap, and weep that their blood was not shed with ours upon this hallowed ground." He paused. He had them, by Allah. By their shining, uplifted faces, he had them! This was what it was to lead men, to hold their hearts and lives in his hands. They were no longer half asleep. Their trusting eyes believed his words, and something within Kai blossomed. This was the moment for which he had been born, for which his honored father and uncle had prepared him, for which Babatunde had cultivated him. "This is manhood. This is the cost of freedom."
The words were barely out of his mouth before the men began to cheer, and he held up his hand for silence. "No sound," he said. "So many voices together would pass beyond these walls, to the ears of those we would deliver unto hell. Hold your voices closely, let them reverberate within your chests, let them drown doubt, and fear, and confusion." They fell silent, but their faces were alive with the words they did not speak.
"Follow me, my brothers." His whisper carried to every ear. "With the dawn we hold—or we die." He knotted his hand into a fist and raised it high, spread the fingers and clenched them again. "And I say: Hold!"
They did not cheer, but a hundred hands covered a hundred hearts, and pounded against their chests rhythmically. "Kai," they muttered. "Kai. Kai. Kai." Every eye upon him, every mouth speaking his name, as if the only thing giving them hope and life was their belief in him. And the weight and power of that belief made him strong.
He would not prove them wrong.
He would not fail them.
He would not fail.
He would not.
Chapter Seventy
The moon hung low and pale on the horizon as the night prepared to surrender to the day.
The brush concealing the secret tunnel quivered and then was pushed aside, and a black, shaven head appeared. The man's name was Kzami, and once upon a time he had been a farmer and trapper on the edge of the Aztec frontier. Kzami was a sharpshooter, a quiet man of lethal skills whose wife and children had been brutally murdered during the Aztec assault on Khartum. When Kai asked for volunteers of skill and courage, Kzami had stood, and no one had challenged his right to lead.
When Kzami picked the men to go with him, to Aidan's surprise, he had asked for hunters, black or white. "I never had a slave," Kzami said. "And any man who fights to avenge my family is a brother."
Aidan O'Dere, Donough, Mouse, two other mamluks, and two more blacks were the final choice, and it was these seven who emerged from the secret tunnel after Kzami. They were scraped, scratched, and dusty, but ready for anything. The wh
ites had Aztec swords and muskets. The blacks, who toted breech-loaders, were two of the best sharpshooters under Kai's command.
Desperately, Aidan wished he was a better shot, that he had had more time, more powder to practice that craft. Easy to understand why the blacks had denied their slaves such skills. But if they wanted mamluks to fight their wars, they would have to change that policy. And if that policy changed, if they were forced to recognize and rely upon the courage and ability of whites, mightn't that one day lead to an end to slavery?
Head feeling like a bottle filled with bees, Aidan crept west along the dried bed of the wadi, choosing stealth over speed.
The Aztecs were camped west of the mosque, just out of rifle range, although it was inconceivable that they had failed to post spies on all sides of the mosque. In intervals, teams of mamluks and blacks exited through the tunnel, positioned themselves, and waited for Kzami's signal.
The trapper was using some kind of internal clock or measurement, and at one point he turned and scrambled silently up the rough, steep side of the wadi, leaving the others behind him. Aidan watched him disappear like a lizard up a tree, astonishingly agile.
After about three minutes the farmer came halfway back down and gestured for the others to follow.
When Aidan reached the top, he saw what Kzami had seen: The Aztec camp was right in front of them. In fact, they had passed it slightly, and would therefore be approaching from the rear. It appeared to be home to between three to five hundred men. Fewer than the thousand Kai had feared, but enough to do the job. They were arrayed in bedrolls and beneath tents, the camp laid out in a rough circle, with a makeshift corral for the horses. Plumed, club-armed guards walked the perimeter in soberly vigilant pairs. He counted up to twenty in the interval between their cycles.
Not long, but perhaps long enough.
Kzami gave silent hand signs to the men behind him, and they began the crawl, following Aidan's lead. The grass between the wadi and the camp was high enough to conceal a man on all fours. Slowly, taking absolutely nothing for granted, they worked their way close.
Brush and grass poked Aidan in the face, and little forest creatures seemed to be crawling up into his armpits. He hoped they were leaf-eaters.
It took the better part of an hour to cover two hundred cubits of grass, waiting until the gap between patrols to traverse any bare patches.
Using hand signals only, Kzami positioned the men. The sharpshooters had their rifles trained on the largest tent.
Willing himself to silence, Aidan crawled into the shadow of a tree, held his breath until the giant Donough appeared beside him. They were committed now. The shadow would hide them from the guard's approach, but as soon as the guards passed them, a single glance back over a shoulder would reveal them and raise the alarm.
Despite the two battles he had already fought, Aidan felt his nerves burning, looked at his childhood friend's placid face and wondered how Donough could be so calm, wondered if they would live long enough for him to ask the question.
Before his next thought had the opportunity to fully form, the guards appeared, walking toward them, speaking quietly to each other. The long night hours had stolen some of their energy and focus. Aidan ducked behind the tree and drew his knife.
The instant the two men passed them, Aidan sprang, trusting that Donough would not hesitate either. There was no need to fear. Aidan's knife was in the man's neck, as Kzami had taught him, at the same moment that Donough landed on his own victim, driving him to the earth with a knee in his back.
His own prey's death cries drowned in blood as Donough's man's spine cracked with a sound like a rotten branch. They dragged the bodies back into shadow.
Step one complete. Two of the men behind him worked their way around to the Aztec horses. A squat, burley mamluk carried a cask of gunpowder as if it were a baby boy.
The men were arrayed very, very carefully, and the mamluk set the cask at the edge of the horse corral—the side away from the Aztecs. He applied a daub of fire-paste from each end of the tube, then reached safety just as Kzami signaled that the next set of guards was heading their way.
The fire-paste combined, sparked to flame, and the fuse caught. Then, perversely, the fuse smoked, sputtered, and died.
Behind Aidan, Mouse cursed, then scampered forward. Aidan wanted to scream at him: There's no time! But it was too late. Now he could only pray. Mouse hovered over the fuse, probably putting another twist of fire-paste into play. If he could do so quickly enough, he might disappear around the other side of the corral. There was no longer time to cross the clearing into shadow. Just a moment. . .
He was backing away now, making it, when one of the guards saw the flare of light and bounded toward it.
Aidan would never know what went through Mouse's mind at that moment. No one ever would. He could have run, or perhaps remained hidden.
Instead, as the guard headed to look at the flame, Mouse launched himself like a frenzied cat, throwing a rock at the same time. The rock struck one guard in the forehead and sent him reeling back before he could shout an alarm. Mouse hit the second guard on the chest, stabbing with a little knife, the blows deflected by the Aztec's armor.
The guard shucked Mouse off, raised his axe—
The second guard came to his feet, and yelled an alarm—
Mouse raised his arm in a useless defensive motion—
And the powder detonated, and it seemed that Allah Himself had shouted in anger. In an instant, white and brown, Frank and Aztec, friend and foe were obliterated in a thunderclap of light. Chunks of flesh hurtled through the air to litter the grass in smoking heaps, and only the angels could have distinguished man from horse.
Instantly the camp was in an uproar. The surviving horses stampeded in all directions, trampling several of the Aztecs.
Aidan watched as the enemy stumbled out of their tents, seizing weapons as if they had been born with axe in hand.
Two of the mamluks broke and ran toward the west. Howling, Aztecs chased them down and hammered them into red ruin in the grass.
Aidan and Donough stayed flat, knowing that in another moment the soldiers would find them. There was no time to slink back to the wadi. Running west would avail nothing. And the partial safety of the mosque lay on the other side of the awakening army.
This was death, approaching nearer and nearer every moment.
Then the flap of the largest tent opened, and the Aztec chief appeared. Aidan recognized the man from Addis Ababa, and from his conference with Kai the previous day. Even without his ceremonial feathers he was half a head taller than the average Aztec soldier. In the firelight, his skin shone like gold.
Aidan had only a moment to admire the man, who had begun snapping orders in a staccato singsong instantly, as if he had been awake for hours.
Then he staggered back, and then caught his balance again. He looked down at his chest at the same instant that Aidan heard a second shot, and realized that he had heard a first one, but somehow hadn't registered it.
Cuahutomec's head snapped back, his right eye a crimson hole.
A howl of anguish went up from the Aztecs, a cry of mourning and anger arose. For a moment they were disoriented, a thousand-headed beast without a single cogent mind.
"Now!" Aidan screamed, and Donough rose up and ran, probably faster than he had ever run in his life, Aidan close behind him.
On the horizon ahead, dawn's first blush had appeared.
Chapter Seventy-one
Astride his mount, flanked by his five surviving officers, Kai watched the remnants of his sneak attack fleeing toward him, back toward the imagined safety of the mosque.
His riflemen had exited the mosque only half an hour earlier, creeping carefully through the tunnel, circling around into position. Aztec lockouts had been identified and avoided until the explosion, when the mosque's front door flew open and the horsemen emerged. Confused by the chaos in their camp, taking fire from both horsemen and riflemen, the lookouts
had wilted and fled.
Now the riflemen were arranged in three standing rows of fifteen, one behind the other, widely spaced and staggered so that each had a clear shot.
It would take a few moments now. There was a gap between arranging his men and giving them their orders and the time, only a few breaths away, that hell itself would be unleashed.
Despite the yelling and frenzied running, the galloping mad horses and the stench of flaming flesh, Kai felt at peace. This, then, was an ending. From the moment of contact with the enemy until this all ended, there would be no more time for thought. His desperate stratagem would succeed, or they would all be dead. And it was all in the hands of Allah, where such things belonged.
As the surviving mamluks passed them, Kai straightened and raised his voice. "On my mark. Fire!"
The first line fired their rifles at the nearest Aztecs, now only ten paces away. Eight axe-wielding foes fell, but those behind them continued on, a few dropping to one knee and preparing hastily seized rifles of their own.
"Second line, fire!" The first line had fallen back behind the second and were reloading: either with premeasured loads of black powder and ball or with manufactured bullets. Less than half his men had seen combat before the current campaign, and considering, their nerves were holding well.
The officers watched, and every time they saw an Aztec take a position to aim carefully, they fired their own weapons. Their fire was lethal, far better aimed than that of either the mamluks, the common black soldiers, or their sleep-deprived, half-dressed Aztec foes.
"Third line, fire!" At his command, fifteen rifles exploded at once, directly into the oncoming Aztecs. The second line had fallen back behind the first and were reloading feverishly.
Still the Aztecs advanced. The officers couldn't spot and hit every enemy sniper. Their rifle line was being smashed, one man after another falling from enemy bullets or war clubs hurled with devilish accuracy. The third line fell back, and now the first was in position again.
Lion's Blood Page 50
