He frowned to himself as the column of soldiers reached the river gate and Lujan passed under the shadow of the deserted archer platforms. Everything depended on the honor of the two Mongol brothers he had aided. He wished he could know for certain whether Khasar and Temuge could be trusted, or whether he would see his precious city torn apart. The crowd at the barracks watched the retreating soldiers in eerie silence, and Chen Yi offered up prayers to the spirits of his ancestors. Remembering his Mongol servant, Quishan, he mouthed a final prayer to the sky father of those strange people, asking for his help in the coming days.
Leaning on the wooden bar of a goat pen, Genghis smiled at the sight of his son Chagatai, hearing the boy's whoops across the encampment. He had given the ten-year-old a set of armor that morning, specially made for his small frame. Chagatai was too young to join the warriors in battle, but he had been delighted with the armor, riding around and around the camp on a new pony to show the older men. There were many smiles as they saw him brandishing his bow and alternating between war cries and laughter.
Genghis stretched his back, running a hand along the thick cloth of the white tent he had raised before the walls of Baotou. It differed from the gers of his people, so that those in the cities would know it and beg their leaders to surrender. Twice as high as even his own great ger, it was not so solidly built and shivered in the wind, its sides snapping in and out like breath. White horse-tail standards stood on tall pikes on either side of it and whipped around as if alive.
Baotou stood closed to them and Genghis wondered if his brothers were correct in their judgment of this Chen Yi. The scouts had brought news of a column of soldiers marching from the city just the day before. Some of the young warriors had ridden close enough to score distant kills with their bows before being driven off. If they had estimated the numbers correctly, the city had no soldiers to defend it, and Genghis found himself in a mellow mood. One way or another, the city would fall like the others.
He had spoken to the Baotou mason and been reassured that Chen Yi would not have forgotten his agreement. Lian's family remained inside the walls he had helped to build, and he had many reasons for wanting a peaceful submission. Genghis looked up at the white tent. They had until sunset to surrender, or they would see the red tent the following day. No agreement would save them then.
Genghis felt eyes on him and turned to see his oldest son, Jochi, on the opposite side of the milling goats. The boy was watching him in silence, and despite what he had promised to Borte, Genghis felt himself respond as if to a challenge. He held the boy's eyes coldly until Jochi was forced to look away. Only then did Genghis speak to him.
"It is your birthday in a month. I will have another set of armor made for you then."
Jochi wrinkled his lip into a sneer. "I will be twelve. It will not be long before I can ride with the warriors. There is no point in playing children's games until then."
Genghis's temper prickled. The offer had been generous. He would have spoken again, but they were both distracted by Chagatai's return. The boy thundered up on his pony and leaped to the ground, barely stumbling as he steadied himself on the wooden pen and whipped the reins around a post in a quick knot. The goats in the pen bleated in panic and pressed away from him to the other side. Genghis could not help but smile at Chagatai's uncomplicated joy, though he felt Jochi's gaze settle on him again, always watching.
Chagatai gestured toward the silent city of Baotou, less than a mile away. "Why are we not attacking that place, father?" he said, glancing toward Jochi.
"Because your uncles made a promise to a man inside it," Genghis replied patiently. "In return for the mason who helped us win all the others, this one will be allowed to stand." He paused for a moment. "If they surrender today."
"And tomorrow?" Jochi said suddenly. "Another city, and another after that?" As Genghis turned to him, Jochi straightened. "Will we spend all our lives taking these places one by one?"
Genghis felt blood rush into his face at the boy's tone, then he recalled his promise to Borte that he would treat Jochi the same as his brothers. She did not seem to understand the way he needled him at every opportunity, but Genghis needed peace in his own ger. He took a moment to master his temper.
"It is not a game we are playing here," he said. "I do not choose to crush Chin cities because I enjoy the flies and the heat of this land. I am here, you are here, because they have tormented us for a thousand generations. Chin gold has had every tribe at the throat of all the others for longer than anyone can remember. When we have peace for a generation, they set the Tartars on us like wild dogs."
"They cannot do that now," Jochi replied. "The Tartars are broken and our people are one nation, as you say. We are too strong. Is it vengeance then that drives us?" The boy did not look directly at his father, only risking glances at him when Genghis turned away, yet there was genuine interest in his gaze.
His father snorted. "For you, the history is only stories. You were not even born when the tribes were scattered. You did not know that time and perhaps you cannot understand it. Yes, this is vengeance, in part. Our enemies must learn they cannot ride us down without a storm coming after." He drew his father's sword and turned it into the sun, so that the shining surface flashed a golden line onto Jochi's face.
"This is a good blade, made by a master. But if I buried it in the ground, how long would it keep its edge?"
"You will say the tribes are like the sword," Jochi said, surprising him.
"Perhaps," Genghis replied, irritated to have had his lecture interrupted. The boy was too sharp for his own good. "Anything I have won can be lost, perhaps by a single foolish son who does not have the patience to listen to his father." Jochi grinned at that and Genghis realized he had acknowledged him as a son even as he sought to wipe the arrogant expression off his face.
Genghis pulled open the gate to the goat pen and stepped inside, holding his sword up. The goats struggled to get away from him, climbing over each other and bleating mindlessly.
"In your cleverness, Jochi, tell me what would happen if the goats attacked me."
"You would kill them all," Chagatai said quickly behind him, trying to be involved in the contest of wills. Genghis did not look back as Jochi spoke.
"They would knock you down," Jochi said. "Are we goats then, united as a nation?" The boy seemed to find the idea amusing and Genghis lost his temper, snapping out an arm to heave Jochi over the rail and send him sprawling among the animals. They ran in bleating panic, some trying to leap the barrier.
"We are the wolf, boy, and the wolf does not ask about the goats it kills. It does not consider the best way to spend its time until its mouth and paws are red with blood and it has conquered all of its enemies. And if you ever mock me again, I will send you to join them."
Jochi scrambled to his feet, the cold face dropping over his features like a mask. In Chagatai, the discipline would have earned approval, but Genghis and Jochi stood facing each other in strained silence, neither willing to be the first to turn away. Chagatai leered on the edge of Jochi's vision, enjoying his humiliation. In the end, Jochi was still a child and his eyes filled with hot tears of frustration as he broke his father's gaze and clambered back over the wooden bar.
Genghis took a deep breath, already looking for some way to smooth over the anger he had felt.
"You must not think of this war as something we do before we return to quieter lives. We are warriors, if talk of swords and wolves is too fanciful. If I spend my youth breaking the strength of the Chin emperor, I will consider every day a joy. His family has ruled for long enough and now my family has risen. We will not suffer their cold hands on us any longer."