‘If she were guilty, there would be no point in us being there. Therefore I assume she must be innocent, or Ko would not want us to go. Oh, it will suit him that we are in some forsaken backwater of the Khan’s empire, leaving him free to plot his way back into favour at our expense. But if it were only that, I would not be worried too much. No, I am certain we are being set up to be in an impossible position. We will find her innocent, and have either to suppress the truth, which Ko will use against us, or judge in her favour and embarrass a highly placed Mongol official. We can’t win, Master Nick. Ko has us in a stranglehold.’
I grimaced, my mind racing.
‘You said at the beginning that whether the command originated directly from Kubilai or not, we would have to go, yes?’
‘Yes. Ko must have persuaded him of the importance of the matter.’
‘Then we do not have an option. We must go, so let’s get on. There will be time a-plenty to plan our strategy on the journey there, if it takes as long as you say.’
Lin appeared almost relieved by my apparent fatalism. He gave a short nod of his head that I took as approval.
‘As ever, you cut through my indecision like a sword through a watermelon, Nick. We will make ready.’
I didn’t point out to him that my decision sounded, even to me, more like avoidance than decisiveness, and had been driven by my desire not to have Mongotai’s sword slice through my cheating brain as through the previously mentioned melon. But twas the decision made, so I grabbed the sulky Gurbesu’s arm and pulled her to her feet. Throughout my discussion with Lin, I had failed to consult her, and I knew she would now resent being dragged off to pack for a long journey that she had not agreed to. But I knew she fancied the chance to see more of Cathay, and wouldn’t object for long. I grinned and looked down at her bare feet.
‘Come on, Gurbesu. Be good, and I might even buy you some new shoes.’
I know how to win the heart of a girl, don’t you think?
G urbesu and I hurried back to Old Yenking in the south of Khan-balik in order to tell the others our new plans. The buildings there still clung to the old grid of streets laid out before Kubilai’s grandfather, Chinghis, had laid waste to the Chinee city. Ironically, this act had assisted Kubilai. Fifty years later, he had fewer buildings to clear away in order to build his new winter capital. Many had already been obliterated. Most still remained to the south, and that is where we were living. Like most of the foreigners in the Great Khan’s empire.
My little entourage was made up of Gurbesu — the Kungurat Tartar girl from the North, Tadeusz Pyka — a Silesian Pole from Breslau, and Friar Giovanni Alberoni — a Venetian like myself. He and I had come together in strange circumstances, each drawn to the pole star that was Kubilai Khan. Friar Alberoni had picked me up out of the gutter in Sudak in an area some call Crimea. I had been going through a bad patch in my life, forced out of Venice through little fault of my own. Missing my lover, Caterina Dolfin, I had for once made a mess of my business dealings, and had resorted to the consolation of the bottle. Though I would not admit it to him, Alberoni saved me from myself, and offered me a job as bodyguard for his trip to the furthest edge of the world that was the Mongol Empire. The friar was an odd cove who had set his heart on chasing a myth, though he didn’t see it that way. You see, things had seemed to be going from bad to worse in the Middle East. Saracens were grabbing chunks of the Holy Lands back from Crusader knights, who had taken their eyes off the prize, and set themselves up as mercenary kings and counts of various tracts of God’s country. The successes of previous crusades were therefore crumbling away. Suddenly, there was a tale circulating of a great Christian king in the East, who would save Christendom in its hour of need. He went by the name of Presbyter, or Prester, John. Alberoni wanted to do something about it by seeking him out and pleading for his help. I thought he was wasting his time, as to me it was all a scam relying on people’s yearnings for a saviour, who would descend from the heavens at the final moment. Such miracles did not occur in my world. But the trip to Xanadu drew me, and I agreed to help him. Predictably, our initial search failed dismally. But then, just as we were about to give up, we had come across stories of Nestorian Christians in Kubilai’s empire. And in Xanadu, we had encountered an old man, a prisoner who had been long incarcerated by Kubilai’s family. He could have been the man Alberoni was looking for. The trouble was he had disappeared as mysteriously as he had appeared to us. One moment, there he was in his cell, the next moment he had slipped into the shadows like a will o’ the wisp. Alberoni’s search had thus come to an end. But it was what had brought him and me to Xanadu in the first place. And led me to be Kubilai’s hunter of murderers.
Gurbesu, we had met on the way to Xanadu. As I told you, she was with a bunch of young girls intended to be Kubilai’s virgin brides — part of an annual tribute from their tribe. Unfortunately for Kubilai, Gurbesu had been wilful enough to respond to my seductive manner. She had also been wild enough to escape from the harem, and take up with me. Her black, oiled hair, and shapely curves were in complete contrast to the willowy figure of the blonde-haired Cat, who I had left behind in Venice. But I didn’t know if I would ever see my Venetian lover again. So who could blame me for taking up with Gurbesu? I certainly didn’t feel guilty, especially when Gurbesu’s dark-skinned arms were wrapped around me.
The final member of our group was Tadeusz Pyka. He had experienced a more turbulent means of reaching Kubilai’s court. More than twenty-five years earlier, in 1241, the Tartar hordes had swept across Europe. They had seemed like a terrifying army of the Devil, killing all Christians in its way. And indeed, Tadeusz had been lucky to survive the devastation of his home town of Breslau. What had saved him was that he was a silversmith. The Mongols were beginning to see the value of skilled men, and he had been brought back to Xanadu in chains to ply his trade for the benefit of the Great Khan. Twenty years on, he had no longer any wish to return to a home where he would find no one he knew. Kubilai’s court was now his home, and, when we met, his local knowledge had assisted me in my quest to find a murderer at that court. Besides knowing his way around, he had other skills — his nimble fingers could pick almost any lock in Christendom and beyond. He was therefore invaluable to me.
It was Tadeusz who was at the door of our lodgings in Khan-balik when Gurbesu and I returned with our news. He is a small, wiry man with a stubbly beard that doesn’t grow on one side of his face where he was once badly burned. That deformity is the legacy of the Tartar invasion of his country. Now, the burned side of his face glowed bright red, and I knew he was worked up about something.
‘Nick. I am so glad you are back.’
‘Why, Tadeusz? What on earth is the problem?’
He grabbed my arm and dragged me into the large room that we all shared. It was in a state of chaos. Well, to be honest, it was usually in a mess. With four independently-minded individuals occupying the same lodgings, it was not to be expected that everything would be neatly stowed. I did try and make an effort at tidying myself. I mean to say, I had often told Gurbesu to tidy the room, but this had been met with a stony stare that reminded me of Cat in many ways. I don’t know why I seemed to be burdened with incompliant women in my life. But I suppose I would have it no other way. Arguing with your woman had its compensations when it came to making up afterwards. Suffice it to say, our quarters in Old Yenking were rarely tidied up.