'I will send my scribes to your house at noon,' he said. He had to speak slowly and firmly so as not to slur his words, but the little man did not seem to notice. 'They will work out the details. I will pay in good silver, do you understand? Noon – not tonight, or days from now.'

The administrator nodded. He would be dead by noon; it did not matter what he agreed with this strange man and his ugly way of speaking. The smell alone of the Mongols took his breath away. It was not just rotten silk and mutton fat, but the dense odour of men who had never grown used to washing their skins in the far north, where the air was dry. In the south, they sweated and stank. The administrator was not surprised their khan enjoyed the gardens. With the pools and the stream, it was one of the coolest spots in Suzhou.

Something in the man's manner caught Ogedai's attention and he stopped on a stone bridge over a stream. Lilies floated serenely on the surface, their roots disappearing into the black water.

'I have dealt with Chin lords and traders for many years,' Ogedai said, holding his cup over the water and watching the reflection below. His mirror soul looked back at him, kin to the shadow soul that dogged his steps in sunlight. Its face looked puffy, he saw, but he drained the cup anyway and held it for another in an action that had become as natural as breathing. The ache in his chest subsided yet again and he rubbed idly at a spot on his sternum. 'Do you understand? They lie and delay and make lists, but they do not act. They are very good at delays. I am very good at getting what I want. Must I make clear to you what will happen if you do not complete my contracts by today?'

'I understand, master,' the man replied.

It was there again, some glint in his eyes that made Ogedai unsure. The little man had somehow moved beyond fear. His eyes were darkening, as if he cared for nothing. That too Ogedai had seen before and he began to raise his hand to have the man slapped awake. The administrator jerked back and Ogedai laughed, spilling more wine. Some of it fell into the water like drops of blood.

'There is no escape from me, not even in death.' He knew he was slurring by then, but he felt good and his heart was just a distant, thumping pressure. 'If you take your own life before the agreements are finished, I will have Suzhou destroyed, each brick removed from its companion, then shattered in fire. What is not wet will burn, administrator, do you understand? Heh. What is not wet will burn.'

He saw the spark of resistance die in the man's eyes, replaced by fatalism. Ogedai nodded. It was hard to govern a people who could calmly choose death as a response to aggression. It was one of many things he admired about them, but he did not have the patience that day. From past experience, he knew he had to make the choice to die result in such grief that they could only live and continue to serve him.

'Run and make your preparations, administrator. I will enjoy this little garden for a while longer.'

He watched as the man scurried away to do his bidding. His guards would hold back the messengers that came constantly to him, at least until he was ready to leave. The stone under his bare forearms was very cool. He drained the cup once again, his fingers clumsy. In the late afternoon, twenty thousand warriors mounted up outside Suzhou with Ogedai and Tolui. Ogedai's elite Guard made up half his forces, named men with a bow and sword. Seven thousand of his tuman rode black horses and wore black armour with red facings. Many of the grizzled warriors had served with Genghis and they deserved their reputation for ferocity. The remaining three thousand were his Night and Day Guards, who rode horses of pale brown or piebald and wore more common armour. Baabgai the wrestler had joined them, the personal gift of Khasar to his khan. With the sole exception of the wrestling champion, they were men selected for intelligence as well as force. It was Genghis who had begun the rule that a man had to serve in the khan's guards before he could lead even a thousand in battle. It was said that the least of them could command a minghaan if he chose to. Princes of the blood held the tumans, but the khan's Guards were the professionals who made them work.

The sight of them never failed to please Ogedai. The sheer power he could wield through them was intoxicating, exciting. Khasar's tuman was to the north, with lines of scouts between them. It would not be hard to find him again and Ogedai was satisfied with the morning's work.

As well as warriors, he had brought an army of scribes and administrators to Chin lands, in order to take a tally of everything he won. The new khan had learned from his father's conquests. For a people to be at peace, there had to be a foot on their necks. Taxes and petty laws kept them quiet, even comforted them somehow, though he found that mystifying. It was no longer enough to destroy their armies and move on. Perhaps the existence of Karakorum was the spur, but he had men in every Chin city, running things in his name.

He had punished skins of wine and airag that day, more than he could remember. As they rode north, Ogedai knew he was very drunk. He didn't care. He had his contracts for silk, sealed by the terrified local lord after he was dragged from his town house to witness the deal. The Sung emperor would either honour them or give Ogedai an excuse to invade his territory.

His buttocks were still rubbed raw each day by the wooden saddle, so that his clothes stuck to the pale fluids that seeped out of the broken skin. He could no longer undress without first soaking himself in a warm bath, but that too was just a minor hardship. He had not expected to live even so long and each day was a joy.

He saw the dust clouds ahead after just a short ride that cracked his scabs and made them weep all over again. Sung lands were ten miles behind by then. Ogedai knew he would not be expected from the south. He smiled to think of the panic that would follow the appearance of his tumans. In the distance, Khasar was engaging the last remaining army the Chin could field. Outnumbered on an open plain, all Khasar could do was hold them, but he knew the tumans with Ogedai and Tolui were coming. There would be a bloody slaughter and Ogedai began to sing as he rode, enjoying himself.

CHAPTER TEN

Khasar's sharp eyes picked out the banners of Ogedai Khan. The ground was far from perfect, a grassy plain where there had been no herds for years, so that saplings and scrub bushes grew everywhere. He stood on his saddle, balancing casually while his mount cropped the grass.

'Good lad, Ogedai,' he muttered.

Khasar had taken a position on a small rise, outside arrow range, but close enough to the enemy to direct his attacks. The army of the emperor was visibly battered after days fending off the Mongol horsemen. Yet the Chin regiments were disciplined and tough, as Khasar had learned to his cost. Time and again, they had held a solid line of pikes against his men. The ground prevented a full charge with lances and reduced him to picking them off with waves of arrows. As the morning passed, his archers had killed dozens, over and over, but all the while the Chin soldiers moved steadily south and the Mongol tuman drifted with them. Khasar saw weary heads turn to see the new threat, staring at the streaming orange banners of the Mongol khan.

Somewhere in those shining Chin ranks, a particular young man would be raging at the sight, Khasar thought. As a boy emperor, Xuan had knelt to Genghis when the great khan had burnt his capital. Khasar himself had trapped the young man in the city of Kaifeng before being called home. It was like hot blood and milk in his stomach to know the Chin emperor was once again in play, his life in Khasar's hands. It was an ending long in coming.