When he thought of this, his hand would sometimes stray to the dagger in his belt. Not to its hilt, but to the blade, which he could feel through the leather scabbard. His fingers would trace its outlines and he would wonder whether this steel had been responsible for Roger’s death. For there had been a moment, during the fight in the dark, when Raphael had collided with someone-someone armed and moving with a purpose-and his arm had lashed out unthinkingly and driven this blade home in a body. He was sure of that. He had not struck a limb, but a torso. He could remember how the grip had twisted slightly in his hand as the blade found its way between ribs. Raphael’s fist had thumped against the torso as the blade had gone in to its hilt. And that torso, he was quite certain, had not been protected by maille.
During this endless ride across the ruins of the Khazars’ empire, it happened a hundred times that, while ostensibly thinking of something else, he would glance down to find his fingers tracing the outline of that blade and realize that some part of his mind was reliving the fight in the tunnels yet again. When this happened, he would always tell himself the same thing: it meant nothing. Not all of the Livonians had worn maille. They had been accompanied by local monks, who, of course, didn’t even own maille.
Had they not been so worried that the Shield-Maidens above were being attacked, they might have stayed down there and sorted through the bodies, and Raphael would have found one, unarmored, with a small but fatal dagger wound in the ribs. But it had not happened that way. They had rushed up through the cellars of the priory to find nothing amiss and Feronantus and the other members of the party awaiting their return. Others had gone down later to retrieve the bodies. The thought that he might have slain Roger in the dark had not fully entered Raphael’s mind until late that night, when he’d seen it in a nightmare, and by that point, all of the corpses had been put under the ground except for that of Roger, who was allowed to lie in state in the church while they prepared a proper burial. Raphael had succumbed to what he freely admitted was a species of moral cowardice: he had not inspected the body, not looked for the wound that had done his friend in, because he was afraid of what he would find. The image of that hypothetical dagger wound was now burnt into his mind like a stigma.
8
Nothing but a vast emptiness, as if he lay naked on the steppes and the stars had all gone out…
Ogedei sat up with a gasp and then immediately fell onto his side, retching and puking. His head was caught in the grip of a horrid demon, squeezing his brain like it was wringing juice from a piece of fruit. His skin was hard and brittle over bones that seemed to smolder. Breathing was both painful and thrilling, as if he were stealing each inhalation, past the number he had been allotted for his life. He gasped and spat, trying to rid himself of the sour-tasting bile on the back of his tongue. His cheeks ached, and his vision was filled with dancing motes.
“You’re awake.” A voice from Heaven, proclaiming a great truth that he now had to live up to. Ogedei managed a guttural groan and rolled onto his back, fighting a wave of nausea that threatened to send him to the edge of the bed again.
“I have died,” Ogedei whispered.
“Not quite,” the voice replied. “Though, for a while, I was not certain you would ever wake.”
Ogedei turned his head slightly and peered around for the source of the voice. The speaker had admitted uncertainty, a lack of all-seeing knowledge. The voice could not be divine in origin; it came from a man’s throat.
He lay in a ger, the air around him heavy with smoke. A censer hung from the ceiling, seeping a hazy fog from a smoldering patch of herbs. The fog made the air fragrant and pleasing, but harder to breathe. Other braziers glowed, dull red splotches that cast dull shadows on the rough hide of the ger walls.
Sitting on a low stool near his bed was the young whelp of Chagatai’s.
Ogedei’s eyes drooped, suddenly heavy, and with a great effort, he forced them open again, forced himself to focus on the face of Gansukh.
“Where am I?” he demanded.
Gansukh roused himself at Ogedei’s question, sitting more upright. “My Khan,” he said, “you were not yourself last night. I had to escort you away…to someplace safe. Where you would not be disturbed. While you recovered from the-”
Ogedei squeezed his eyes shut and winced as sharp jabs of pain lanced back through his head. He dimly recalled a dancer-no, he had been the one dancing-and let out a long sigh as he realized there could be any number of indignities that Gansukh was not telling him.
“My Khan…” Gansukh tentatively broke the silence. “The path you have chosen for yourself. It goes nowhere. It-”
Ogedei smacked his hand against the bed. “You dare to lecture me?” His mouth moved uncontrollably, trying to swallow away the acrid taste of his saliva.
Gansukh said nothing, but in the ruddy light of the ger, the dark bruise on his face said enough.
Ogedei fumbled for another stinging accusation, but all he could think of was I’m grateful. Someone had come to his aid; someone had given him shelter and succor. Boroghul, he thought. He was seventeen again, back at Khalakhaljid Sands, lost and dying. “I made a spectacle of myself in front of the entire palace, didn’t I?”
Gansukh shrugged.
“You are right, young pony,” he sighed. “What path is this that I am on? This is not the road my father saw for me. This is not the path of the Empire.” He held his hands over his face and tried very hard to hold back the tears. “I’ve been so weak, haven’t I? I’ve been lost for so long.”
“The hardest thing,” Gansukh said, “is to admit you’re lost.”
“No,” said Ogedei, lowering his hands. “It is harder to find your way back.”
The ger belonged to a nameless shaman. As the old man mumbled and shook a deerskin rattle, Gansukh explained that he couldn’t have taken the Khagan to either of their chambers. They had to go somewhere where no one would find them, for as long as it took for Ogedei’s senses to clear. At first, Ogedei had bristled at the young man’s audacity, but he soon realized Gansukh had done the right thing. If they had been found, they would have been unable to have this moment of calm clarity. Ogedei, grudgingly, realized it was exactly what he needed, and what he never would have been able to find for himself, because no one in his court would have truly listened when he asked for such privacy.