At Yumen, Casca found a large city of ten or more thousand. Here was the crossroads from east to west and north to south and the southernmost outpost of the Emperor Tzin. It was well garrisoned with tough-looking soldiers standing guard on crenelated mud walls, most of them carrying a weapon he had not seen before. It looked like a miniature arbalest and shot short arrows with tremendous force. A week there told him much and his usage of the language of Chin increased even more. Minding his own business, he watched everything and was watched, though with courtesy. He was asked his business by a plain looking man with an air of importance and when shown the packet of letters from the King of Kushan, was bothered no more. Messengers were favored and not to be interfered with in the business of kings.
Glam grew fat again in a short time. His powers of recuperation were almost as outstanding as Casca's. The road to the Jade Gate was clear and well marked. When he left Yumen behind, he knew he was on the final part of his journey. The name itself had a magic to it-The Jade Gate-or was it that he still sometimes in his sleep felt on his face the mask of Jade he once wore among the Teotec tribes so far away?
A steady gait dissolved the miles behind him. He was now heading southwest, keeping the Na Shan mountains to the right. He traveled on; summer was full on them and usually he rode at night, taking shelter in the shade of crags and crevices until the worst of the heat was done. He would ride on, lost in his thoughts and dreams of his life and past and what might be, while sitting on Glam's back, like a hairy ship. He dozed and dreamed of faces and sounds which rocked him on his journey: Rome, Persia, Germania, the hold at Helsfjord, the Roman square standing with locked shields or forming the tortoise to assault a city's walls. And always he awoke with the sour taste of battle in his mouth.
Thirteen
One-thousand-five-hundred miles of stone forming the greatest single work in the life of the world, turned and twisted, like a monstrous serpent, and seemed to fall back on itself as it crested the twisting mountains and turned and finally disappeared over the horizon.
Casca wore a cloak of wild goatskin and breeches of camelskins made pliable by the chewing of the hides and scraping and pounding of the women of the Yueh-chih.
The wind was blowing from behind, in from the plains. Soon the direction would change and the wind come from the seas bringing the spring rains and floods, but for now, the jacket and breeches were welcome to cut the chill edges that searched through the lacings of his clothes. His hair had grown long and hung to his shoulders; his face was darkened by the winds and the sun.
Old Shao Tze was right, the wall seemed to run forever. He had told Casca on the galley that it had been started by the Emperor Shih Huang Ti, two hundred and fourteen years before the birth of the crucified prophet, Yesuah. It had been designed to keep out the marauding Mongolian peoples who preceded the Huns.
Riding alongside the wall, after four days he finally came to a portal where one of the permanent garrisons was maintained. Frequently he had seen mounted riders and archers watching him from the walls, but no words were spoken. However, long before he reached the portal, his coming was well known.
From the height of the wall, he resembled to the watchers one of the wandering nomads of the steppes. Stopping for the night in the sheltered crevices among the rocks, he would feed on chunks of horsemeat which he placed under his saddle and rode on to tenderize it; learning from the nomads, he made use of the droppings of horsemen long since gone, to build his small*1 campfires and keep the worst of the chill away until he rolled up in his blanket of felt and slept until the break of each dawn, which would bring a greater chill stirring him to waking. He would eat cold horsemeat, washed down with a draft of strong-tasting water from the goatskin sacks that served as canteens and ride on. Often he would have to stop and lead his shaggy-haired horse over the rougher spots, marveling at how the little beast could eat almost anything and still keep its strength. The finest steeds from the imperial stables of Rome would have starved to death in the first week if they had to subsist on the same diet of some of the wild beasts of the high plains of Asia.
Standing before the portal, he called out in the language of Chin. It was close enough so many of the watchers could make out what he was saying: "I bear a message for the King of Tzin from the Tribes of the Yueh." Holding a scroll above his head to the watchers on the towers, he hoped this might lend emphasis to his words.
The great gates swung open on iron hinges which were kept oiled to keep the rust away and squeaking under the strain of their massive weight. They opened and Casca was told to enter with a wave of a lance.
Entering a courtyard, he was greeted by a contingent of armed pikemen and archers carrying the strange curved bows of laminated horn and sinew that could drive an arrow four hundred yards with killing efficiency and could wound at eight hundred. The bowmen wore wrist guards of wood and ivory to protect their gut strings. Silently they stood in the ranks, orderly and disciplined, watching through dark intelligent eyes.
Casca was brought to the commander, Sung Ti Aman. Taller than his subordinates, he looked with distaste at the barbarian before him, wrinkling his nose at the high odor that came his way from this rider.
Nevertheless, he performed the prescribed rules of etiquette required to be given to any messenger from a chieftain of another tribe.
Casca took his place downwind from Sung Ti Aman who, after making the usual courteous inquiries, requested to see the scroll bearing the words of the Chief of the Yueh-chih.
The scroll had been written by a learned man living with the tribe who had left the realms of the Chin because of legal problems. The calligraphy was properly done and sophisticated enough in style that it gave the words written a degree of worth.
Food was brought, brown rice and vegetables artistically arranged to please both the eye and the palate; delicate morsels of river fish on bamboo spears in thin sauces tasted like paper to Casca after his long diet of raw meat and millet, but it was more filling than it appeared, the rice settling comfortably in his gut.
The commander made a gift to Casca of a clean tunic and trousers; anything to get rid of the odor of the damp sheepskin.
Sung Ti perused the contents of the scroll, pondering how best they could be transported to the court of the Son of Heaven. The regular courier service was not due for another fortnight and he was too short manned to send any of his men the long way. The next imperial courier station was two hundred miles to the south.
Casca was shown to the quarters kept for guests and basins of water were brought to him, to clean himself if he was so inclined. He was. After washing, his face felt like the ass of a newborn babe, lighter in color from the wind-burned cheeks and brow. Putting on a tunic of plain silk and trousers of loose wool tucked into his boot tops, he entered the compound.
Taking in the appearance and equipment of his host's soldiers, he noted most wore jazerins of scaled armor and helmets of lacquered wood, embossed with ornamental plaques of brass and bronze. Everything clean and in its place, the men were well-ordered and mannerly, no sign of rowdiness. They looked to be quite efficient, though, to his way of thinking, their armor would scarcely stand up to the heavier blades of the Roman or Germanic tribes. The bowmen impressed him the most. Several were having target practice in the courtyard, sending arrow after arrow unerringly into the target set some two hundred paces away, the arrows sinking half their length into the fiber targets, attesting to the power of the bow.