The Three Palladins E-Book

Harold Lamb

• Herausgeber: Reading Essentials
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

The Three Palladins is a novel of Temujin, who became the Great Khan, and his  palladins - his warrior heroes - in a day of the sword. Here are high adventures that move across the mysterious and mighty Asiatic continent. The  palladins  are led to fabled Tangut, land of fertile fields, blue lakes, and the black walls of the castle of the magician, Prester John of Asia.

Leseprobe

The Three Palladins 

by Harold Lamb

First published in 1923

This edition published by Reading Essentials

Victoria, BC Canada with branch offices in the Czech Republic and Germany

[email protected]

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except in the case of excerpts by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

The Three Palladins 

by 

Harold Lamb

Introduction

THE THREE PALLADINS appeared as a three-part serial in Adventure during the year 1923, at a time when that popular magazine was published three times a month. Noted here are some of Harold Lamb's observations, written at the time of publication.

Genghis Khan is almost unique among the conquerors of the world, because he came out of the desert. No armies were ready to his hand: no cities offered him the thews and sinews of war. He had had no schooling, of the book variety.

When he was fifteen or sixteen this chief was at the head of a tribe of forty thousand tents, about two hundred and fifty thousand souls, all told. He was surrounded by enemies. The northern Gobi desert was—and is—much like our northwestern plains. A place of extremes of cold and heat, of a never ending struggle for existence.

Out of these high prairies, just below the Arctic Circle, the Mongols rode to the conquest of China, and—as we know them to-day—the Himalayas, Afghanistan, Persia and northern India. Eventually his followers overcame the Russians, the Magyars, and defeated the Hungarians and the knighthood of Germany in Silesia.

We have gained the idea that the Mongols were a great mass of barbarians that conquered their enemies by weight of numbers and a vague kind of ferocity. As a matter of fact the Mongol Horde numbered only a hundred and fifty thousand horsemen. It had no infantry. Sometimes, of course, it had allies.

Instead of having numbers on his side, Genghis Khan usually had the smaller army, and displayed strategic powers of the highest order. It is rather amusing that our histories should try to teach us that the Mongols and Tatars were unthinking barbarians when our language uses the phrase "catching a Tatar" to imply a clever trick.

To rank Genghis Khan with Caesar and Alexander would raise quite a clamor of protest. Just by way of starting the debate—both the Roman and the Macedonian were generals of great empires that had been established before they were bom, while the Mongol had only a tribe of herders and cattlemen to work with. Also Caesar and Alexander were products of a high civilization—both carefully schooled. Their conquests did not extend as far as those of the Mongols. (By the way, neither of them had to tackle the great wall of China.) The enemies they encountered were of a lower order of intelligence—always, in Caesar's case, usually in Alexander's. They did not find in their path such cities as Pekin, Samarkand, Bokhara and Herat.

It usually happens that the feeling of the men of an army for their leader is the best possible indication of the leader's character. No man, the proverb runs, is a hero to his valet. Certainly no commander ever fooled his enlisted men.

While Caesar and Alexander were trusted and admired by the soldiers who followed them—Alexander particularly—both had to deal with mutinies at various times. Genghis Khan was beloved by his warriors. It is said that, in a battle, the Khan would give his horse to an injured man. One of his followers was frozen to death holding a fur windbreak over the sleeping king during a blizzard. In the annals of the Chinese—his enemies—appears the phrase that he led his armies like a god.

It looks as if Alexander were a greater strategist than the Mongol, but as a leader of men and as a conqueror Genghis Khan ranks ahead of him. And of Napoleon, too, for that matter. In comparing the achievements of men of other ages we have no standards except results. The empire of Napoleon fell to pieces before he died, and before that—there was Waterloo, you know. And then crossing the Alps is not quite the same as taking an army over the Himalayas.

The story of Genghis Khan is one of those things that grow on you in writing, and for the last year I seem to have gathered enough knowledge of the Mighty Manslayer to try to tell his story. As to that, it is a story that never will be told in full because the Mongols, unlike most nations, kept no annals. There are no "tombs" to be opened. So one has to proceed from Mongol myth—the few legends, anecdotes, that have come down to us—to the histories of the enemies of the Mongols. That is, to what the Persian, Arabic, Greek, Chinese and Russian chroniclers have said about Genghis Khan.

No work for three years has been so full of interest in the doing! The tale is imaginative for the most part, but is based on events that actually took place. Prester John for instance—legendary as far as medieval Europe is concerned, but a real king in the annals of Asia.

The "pony express" of Genghis Khan in the Gobi is rather interesting for the reader who remembers the pony mail of the far West in the late sixties and seventies. I'm working up some information as far as possible on the relative speed made by the Mongol couriers. They covered more ground in a day than our express riders, but conditions were in their favor.

Mingan is one of the vague shadows of history—a prince of Cathay who acted as guide, councilor and friend to Genghis Khan and his sons, and who, in fact, built up the wisest and most enduring part of the Mongol system of government. Ye Lui Kutsai Mingan is known to present day historians as Yelui Chut-sai.

Harold Lamb

I

The Shadow

The gong in the palace courtyard struck the third hour of the morning, awakening Mingan, prince of Cathay, from what would otherwise have been his last sleep.

He was a boy of fifteen, and the echoes of the gong had not died in the upper corridors of the slumbering palace before he was wide awake, before he had slipped from his teak pallet and opened the lid of the ebony chest beside it.

The day was the fifth of the fifth moon, and it was to be a feast day—the feast of Hao, in mid-Summer of that year of the Ape, by the Chinese calendar, otherwise the year of Our Lord 1100. But what had aroused Mingan was the recollection that at dawn the old emperor would assemble the court and ride forth on the customary hunt of the festival of Hao.

The hunters would go from the palace, out of Taitung—the Western City—to the Western Gate of the Great Wall, and beyond, to where Cathay ended and the wide desert began. Mingan wished to be ready in plenty of time. He was quivering a little with excitement—and the damp air that swept through the open arches of the sleeping chambers—as he took out from the chest the new garments he was to put on.

And then he saw the shadow.

Inside the entrance to his room stood a screen, placed there so that evil spirits might not have easy access, because demons must walk in a straight line and can not turn comers. In the corridor outside the screen a lantern was hung. Athwart the embroidered silk of the screen was now the black figure of a tall man whose head was bent a little forward.

Mingan smiled—he hardly ever laughed—thinking that it was one of the men-at-arms on guard in the upper halls, who had fallen asleep. The figure, however, held no spear, nor did it wear the helmet with the dragon crest of the Liao-tung guardsmen, who came from Mingan's province on the northern coast and were the picked men of the emperor's host. As he watched, the figure advanced a step, and Mingan knew that it was a man standing against his screen, listening. A cupbearer or slave might, perhaps, do that. Many such were paid to listen at doors in the imperial palace—Mingan had surprized them more than once, because the boy had been bred in the northern forests and could move as quietly as a panther when he chose. He wondered who paid them to do it.

Mingan put on the new garments, the soft boots, the silk tunic and wide, nankeen trousers, the over-robe of yellow and cloth-of-gold, and lastly the black velvet hat with its peacock feather—the insignia of manhood and nobility that he was to wear for the first time that day.

By now the man at the screen had come into view around the end, and proved to be a Cathayan of unusual stature, clad altogether in white, his head shaven.

"The Servant of Mercy," breathed Mingan, and no imaginable devil could have been a less welcome visitor in that place and hour.

Because the Servant of Mercy was the executioner of the court, serving the emperor by strangling culprits whose rank made them immune from beheading, Mingan's heart leaped and struck up a quick beat, akin to the roll of the kettle-drums of the mailed cavalry of Liao-tung whose regimental emblem the prince wore and whom he should command in a few years.

Without a sound Mingan moved backward, and out of the tall window that gave access to the balcony of the tower where he was quartered. There was only the one door to his room, and there was no other entrance or exit to the balcony than the window. Leaning against a carved pillar, Mingan observed the Servant of Mercy advance soundlessly to the bed, feel of it and peer around the ill-lighted chamber. The quilts in which the boy had slept were still warm.

"Wan sui—live for a thousand years!" The executioner whispered. "Ye Lui Lutsai Mingan, Bright One of the North, Prince of Liao-tung, it has been decided that you must go in this hour to the guests on high, to face the honorable ones, your exemplary ancestors. Are you afraid?"

Mingan had seen two of his kindred take the happy dispatch by poison put into their wine cups, and he was afraid. The tall man was listening again, his head on one side. And then he was moving toward the balcony, where he had heard the prince breathing. From his right hand hung the loop of a silk cord.

The boy's body did not move, but his mind probed for the reason of his death—secret, and bloodless, by token of the strangler's cord.

His uncle, the emperor, had never noticed him; his father and his Liao-tung mother were dead: Chung-hi, the heir and son of the emperor, was his classmate—a powerful youth, given to brooding and superstition.

Chung-hi had been good-natured with Mingan, had gone on escapades with him, when the two princes went out incognito and joined the ranks of the court troupe of actors, or played on the ten-stringed lute in the gardens of the courtesans.

Now Mingan's studies were at an end, and his tutors had announced to the emperor that Mingan was a little inclined to shirk his books for the hunting chariot, at night, when he climbed down from his room, and drove his matched horses out of the walls of Taitung. He was expert in sword-play, well-versed in the wisdom of the sages, and in history.

An old proverb came into his mind as he pondered.

"A hunted tiger jumps the wall," he said in a low voice.

The Servant of Mercy stepped through the window, made the triple obeisance of respect, and paused.

"An intelligent man recognizes the will of the heavens," said he.

"Panthers," rejoined Mingan steadily, "eat men in the northern mountains, and," he added reflectively, "panthers eat men in the southern mountains too. Yet it is written in the books that for everything there is a reason."

He perched himself on the railing by the pillar.

"Tell me who gave the order for my death. I will never speak of what you say."

The Servant of Mercy moved a little nearer, and the ghost of a smile touched his thin lips. No, Mingan would not speak hereafter. Yet now!

"Pledge your slave," said he, "that you will make no outcry, and I will relate the cause of my coming."

"I pledge it you."

"Then, O Prince of Cathay, look into the sky behind you and see the cause."

Mingan turned a little, so that he could still watch the man in white. Hovering at the horizon was a red moon, as if a film of blood had been drawn over a giant eye of the sky.

Miles distant, outlined against the moon, Mingan could trace the line of the great wall. That night he had dreamed of the Wall. Standing alone on the summit he had labored at casting down rocks at a mass of beasts that had run in from the vast spaces of the steppe and the desert of Gobi, to leap and snarl at him—the beasts changed to a pack of horsemen clad in furs, figures that grinned at him and rode their shaggy ponies up the sheer side of the wall—

Mingan knew now that he had been thinking of the men from the country of the Horde that lay even beyond the hunting-preserves of the emperor. He had often been tempted to drive his chariot out to the steppe to catch sight of these barbarians, who—his tutors said—were no better than beasts. Perhaps—

"What mean you?"

He slid his boots from his feet and braced his toes in the lacquer work of the balcony.

"Your birth-star, ill-fated one, shines in the favorable constellation of the Lion, betokening power and success to you. The star of the dynasty of Cathay has entered into the region of ill-omen, foretelling disaster. So that the prophecy of the stars may not be fulfilled, your death has been decreed."

"By whom?"

Instead of answering, the executioner cast the loop of his cord at the boy's head. But Mingan gripped the pillar with both hands, and swung himself out, over the railing. His feet found holds in the lacquer work on the tower's side, and he let himself down swiftly, escaping the clutch of the executioner's hand.

Often in this way he had escaped his tutors, to snatch the forbidden joy of the stables and a ride under the stars.

For the nonce he was free; if the emperor was his foe, he would not be safe, even beyond the wall; if, however, some favorite in the court had sought his removal, now that he was about to assume his rank and ride with the armies, there was hope. Mingan had been taught to obey implicitly the will of the Dynasty, yet he had in him a wild streak that would not let him be taken easily. He shivered a little, as he felt a surging impulse to turn and flee. To run would be to reveal his movements; to stay where he was would be impossible.

Mingan folded his cold hands in his sleeves and walked slowly to the stables, beyond the gardens of the palace enclosure. Here a Manchu slave nodding beside the glow of a horn lantern, started up at sight of a young noble, clad in the dragon robe.

"I will ride," said Mingan composedly, "in a small, hunting-chariot. Harness two horses to the shaft. Make no noise, for the Court sleeps."

The Manchu held up the lantern to look keenly into his face. Recognizing the prince he hastened away. Often in the last months he had obeyed similar commands from Mingan, yet this time he was prompter than usual and the prince saw that the two matched horses were of the best.

"Wan sui!" breathed the slave, making his obeisance. "Live for a thousand years."

As Mingan stepped into the chariot—a low, two-wheeled affair of light, gilded cedar—the man's glance fell upon his bootless feet. The slave hesitated, and put the lantern behind him.

"The gate of the palace enclosure is barred and guarded, by the order of Chung-hi, the Discerning, the elder prince. Your servant dares to mention that the lane to the horse pastures behind the stable is not guarded. Drive with a loose rein and—forget not that the night air is not healthy for a Northerner."

Understanding the covert warning, Mingan nodded and turned his chariot slowly in the stable yard, until he reached the grass lane. Here he tossed the reins on the horses' backs and let them graze, while he slipped to the ground and walked back through the gardens, starting at glimpses of stone pillars and evergreens trimmed to the height of a man. He knew well the bypaths of the gardens and presently crossed a bridge over a miniature lake, entering a grove of plane trees where the shadow was like a heavy cloak over his head.

Feeling the tiles with his bare feet, he made his way to a wall illumined by the glow from an incense brazier. Taking fresh powder from the bowl under his hand, he dropped it on the smoking incense, and kneeled in front of the tablet of his ancestors that hung in the shrine.

"Honored Ones of the North," he whispered, bending his forehead to the tiles, "I unworthy, have put upon my person the insignia of a warrior prince, casting aside the garments of childhood. In this hour I, inexperienced, will set my feet on the highway leading from the palace where my elders have taught me wisdom. It is my prayer that no act of mine will make it impossible for me to look into the faces of my illustrious sires with clear honor."

Nine times he made the ko-tow, and withdrew, satisfied. The bronze tablets hung in their places as always, the smoke from the brazier curled upward; no sign was vouchsafed Mingan that what he was doing was dishonorable. His senses were keyed to perceive any omen. All he saw was a gleam in the upper corridors of one of the residence palaces of the enclosure.

It was the only light visible, and he stoppped to puzzle over it, realizing that it must come from the palace of Benevolent Youth, the quarters of Chung-hi, the heir-apparent. Chung-hi, then, like himself, was awake. Mingan wondered if Chung-hi had sent the Servant of Mercy.

Then, as he passed the stables again, he caught the glow of the Manchu's lantern, and drew closer. The slave seemed to be asleep, but Mingan knew that he could not have dozed so quickly. The face of the slave was composed, but from the breast of the man who had warned him the hilt of a knife projected.

The Servant of Mercy had traced him to the stables, had discovered that horses were missing, and slain the attendant, and then—what? Although nothing was to be heard, Mingan caught the reflected glimmer of lanterns moving toward the gate of the palace enclosure. Guards were already searching for him in that direction; there would have been just time for the executioner to arouse them and order them to the gate to stop him. Then it was probable that his chariot, in the back lane, had not been discovered. Listening intently, he could make out the crunching of the horses as they moved over the grass, and the faint slap of the traces.

Seconds were precious and he ran to the vehicle, caught up the reins, and urged on the horses. They were fresh, and he passed out of the lane to the pastures swiftly, turning here into a path that led to the highway running out of Taitung to the northwest. Once on the road, smoothed and beaten for the passage of the emperor that day, he gave the horses their heads and sped on through the darkness.

The moon had set and the brightest of the stars over his head was the planet of his birth. Mingan, feeling the damp of the dew on his face and the chill of the wind on his skin, wondered that men should so believe in the stars that they should be impelled to slay him because of this omen. It seemed ridiculous that he, cold, shivering, fleeing with throbbing pulse, should be destined to a higher fortune than the Dynasty.

And yet—he had been taught the stars never lied.

The dawn had flooded the sky behind him when Mingan reached the Western Gate of the Wall of China, and found a hundred men-at-arms drawn up beside the barred portal. The captain in command informed him respectfully that orders had been issued from the Court that no one was to pass through the gate before the emperor, who was on the way to the hunt.

Mingan decided to wait where he was. If he went back, he would meet the cavalcade from Taitung; if he turned aside from the highway into one of the earth lanes, his chariot would be bogged down in the mud before he had passed beyond view. So he stood in the miniature chariot, to hide his bare feet, and let his horses breathe.

By the eighth hour of the morning, the gong on one of the gate towers was sounded and the hundred soldiers lifted down the massive bar, swinging open the iron-studded gates. Then they threw themselves down on their faces. A troop of horsemen bearing wands appeared around the first bend in the highway.

Mingan, being of royal blood, and in robes, kept his feet while the horsemen passed, saluting him. He watched a company of the palace guards march past with drawn swords on their shoulders, followed by the dignitaries of the Court, under canopies carried by slaves. Then, at the head of the princes of the blood, and the palanquins of courtesans, appeared the sedan chair of the Emperor.

The prince left his chariot and kneeled by the road, feeling his heart quicken as the sedan halted, and the side lattice was lowered at a command from within. The thin face and shrewd eyes of the Son of Heaven peered out at him. He heard the emperor ask his name, and the attendants answer.

"Young nephew," the modulated voice spoke from the opening in the yellow lacquer, "it was said to us that you had left our presence, during a revel of the night thus showing us disrespect, inappropriate in the young in years."

Mingan bent his head nine times.

"Live for a thousand years! I, presuming beyond my merit, ventured to await your passing, to pay my respects for the first time in the robe of a man."

"You are young to be a warrior and a councilor? Have you passed your examinations?"

Before Mingan could answer a sedan approached and was set down a few paces in the rear of the yellow chair that bore the monarch. From it dismounted Chung-hi, the heir apparent, a thick-set youth of twenty years with a broad, stubborn face. He bowed three times to his girdle and folded his hands in his sleeves.

"Live forever, O my father. Know that Mingan, cousin of the northern forests, has been lacking in his studies, and has given himself overmuch to driving his chariot of nights, and to making melody with his lute."

The old emperor tapped gently with his fan against the opened lattice and the lines about his mouth deepened. The devils of sickness had been plaguing him of late and he felt that his years were numbered. Also, the astrologers had dared to point out that the star of his Dynasty was sinking, which troubled him.

"Why do you tell me this, Chung-hi?"

"Be it forgiven me, O beloved of the Dragon! Those who are enemies of Mingan would be affronted at sight of the boy, who is yet a student, appearing in robes; they might think him exalted by the ascendency of his star, and do him harm."

"Who are your enemies?"

The Cathayan turned to Mingan.

"I know not."

The emperor sighed. As his sight failed, he perceived nevertheless a growth of arrogance in Chung-hi, his son. Presently he looked up and began to question the heir-apparent as to what lay beyond the Great Wall. Taken by surprize, Chung-hi answered haltingly, proving ignorant of more than a smattering of geography and history, although he had just been appointed Warden of the Western Marches.

Realizing this, the emperor nodded to Mingan. "I will test your knowledge and so decide whether you are fitted to assume the duties of a warrior prince at our court. When was this wall built?"

Today Mingan was to have been examined by the old monarch on his studies. Now, however, he was caught leaving the palace before dawn, and he was forced to speak under the stolid stare of the elder prince.

"Thirteen hundreds of years ago, your majesty," he responded quietly. "It was built to keep out of Cathay the marauding tribes of the steppe and the desert of Gobi."

"What tribes?"

"In the steppes are the Taidjuts, who live by raising and stealing cattle and by largesse from your majesty's hand. They provide huntsmen for the time when the peoples of the world watch the Son of Heaven ride to the hunt.

In Mingan's thoughts was the question: Had the emperor ordered his death, or was it Chung-hi, or another?

"Beyond the Taidjuts?"

"Begins, O most wise of the sages, the desert and the people of the desert—Tatars, Mongols, the Jelairs of Turkish race, and the gipsies. The strongest of these are the Mongols, whose chief is Yesukai, and who are called the Brave. Of their homeland we know only that it is in the high prairies, by the Three Rivers. From there to the south they move their tents, which are their houses, thus giving their herds seasonal pasture. They number forty thousands of tents, and they are hostile to us—"

"Wherefore? Of what are you prating?" demanded the emperor testily.

"In your memory, O beloved of the Dragon, Kabul, khan of the desert tribes, was bidden to the court of Cathay, where he behaved like a wild boar. On his return he was given poison by servants of Cathay, and—"

"Enough!"

The man in the sedan waved his fan impatiently.

"The prince of Liao-tung," spoke up Chung-hi, "comes from the land next to the tatars on the north and speaks their language. Surely he shows knowledge of them, when he is close to their counsels."

The emperor frowned slightly. The Mongols were a thorn in his side. He questioned Mingan on strategy and the art of war, and was answered readily.

A gleam of pleasure penetrated the faded eyes of the emperor.

"We," he said, "sitting as judge, decide that the youth Mingan is qualified for the decree of master of scholars, and councilor. Would there were more of his merit to defend our western marches against the raids of the people of the Horde. He has put to shame your learning, O my son, and you are appointed Warden of the Western Marches."

His glance was an accusation, and the elder prince paled a little with anger.

"Lord of Ten Thousand Years," he responded, "while Mingan has spent his days in pondering books and shooting mock arrows, I have taken measures to safeguard your hunting, and the shaft sent from my bow will strike in the heart of Yesukai, khan of the Mongols, your enemy."

He hesitated, looking around at the bowed heads of the attendants, and lowered his voice so that Mingan could catch only snatches of what he said.

"By giving some gold to the Taidjuts—like Kabul, foe of your grandsire—nothing failed, and no one suspects—will not trouble your hours of pleasure."

Mingan thought only that Chung-hi had arranged for the Taidjut tribesmen to protect the wide area of the coming hunt, and that a blow against the Mongols was in prospect. He drew a deep breath, knowing that he had had a narrow escape, for if he had failed to satisfy the emperor, he would have been sent back to the Taitung palace, and guarded closely and before many hours had passed he would have received a second visit from the Servant of Mercy.

He suspected now that Chung-hi, not the emperor, had plotted his death, and now it would not do to return to Taitung. The heir-apparent had lost face in the examination before the monarch of Cathay and he would allow Mingan little time to enjoy his success. Within the Great Wall, there would be no safety for the Manchu.

The emperor turned to him, after dismissing Chung-hi, satisfied with the tidings the prince had whispered.

"It is the feast of Hao, of the fifth day of the fifth month. Speak then, and say if there is any award we can make in honor of your new rank as prince-warrior."

Mingan thought quickly, aware of the covert scrutiny of Chung-hi and the ministers of the elder prince.

"If the Son of the Dragon is pleased, my reward is more than enough," he said slowly. "Yet I crave one thing, to drive my chariot in advance of the imperial guard, to be courier this day for the coming of your benevolent presence."

"It is granted."

The emperor shook his sleeve and signed to the bearers to lower the side of the sedan and take up the poles. Chung-hi seemed satisfied with the request, and Mingan reflected that his enemy was in command of the imperial huntsmen, by virtue of his office as Warden, and that an arrow, loosed in the turmoil of the drive, would end his days as surely as the hand of the Servant of Mercy.

The voice of the old man reached him from behind the lattice.

"Swear to me, Mingan, that you will be faithful to the Dynasty and seek to build up by every act the greatness of Cathay, as the stone layers built up this Wall."

A rush of feeling swept over the Manchu, at the faint words of the oath administered to every one of blood kin to the emperor on arriving at manhood. The splendors of Pekin, the halls of the philosophers, the massive walls of a hundred cities, the never ending lines of junks on the rivers and the laden camels on the caravan routes—the myriad warriors he had watched at maneuvers during his childhood—these were some of the pictures that flashed through his mind. Cathay!

"I swear!" he cried, his voice unsteady, his heart thumping.

Chung-hi raised his fan to hide a smile.

So Mingan had the wish of his boyhood when he drove his chariot through the Western Gate, in advance of the wand-men and the court.

Not until the emperor's chair had passed did the guards of the gate venture to raise their faces from the dust.

"Live for ten thousand times ten thousand years!" they cried, holding up their spears.

A group of aged men in long robes, mounted on fat, ambling mares, looked up at the shout and fell to talking together, disputing with much head-wagging. The astrologers were debating hotly the honor shown Mingan, wondering how the youth was to win to greater dignity and the Dynasty fall into decay at the same time, when Mingan had sworn fidelity, and Mingan was known ever to keep an oath.

The highway was broad and its surface level as a stone-paved courtyard. The horses were rested and drew the youth swiftly onward. They passed the villages of farmers that became more scattered as they began to ascend the foothills of the Kinghan Mountains.

Watch-towers, wherein beacons were placed ready for the torch, sped past them. When the horses tired, Mingan changed at a post-station: at mid-day he changed to fresh beasts again, pausing only to drink a bowl of tea.

By nightfall he had put eighty miles behind him and had outdistanced the cortege of the emperor. He slept at an inn. He was a light sleeper and in the early hours of the morning he heard a clatter of hoofs on the highway. Listening, he made out that the rider halted only a minute at the post station near the inn; then the crescendo of hoof beats again, dwindling out on the road. Only a courier from a high official, on business of the emperor, would be given a horse at the relay station.

A messenger from the court had passed him. And the odds were that the message was sent by Chung-hi, Warden of the Western Marches. Was it merely routine business—that sped a rider through the small hours of darkness?