Staring at his sword's bejewelled hilt, Kei Bot gasped, "What is the meaning of this?"

"You have deliberately disobeyed my orders, and now you're fostering rebellion," Batu said, his voice cold and even. "That is treason."

"The emperor himself gave me command of the Army of Hungtze!" Kei Bot retorted, reaching for his weapon. "You wouldn't dare suspend my commission!"

Batu sidestepped the clumsy lunge, then brought the blade up and drew it across the stocky general's throat. "The penalty for treason is death," he said.Kei Bot clasped a hand over the wound, his mouth open in astonishment.

The surprised mutineer dropped to his knees, blood oozing from between his fingers. Finally, he collapsed and pitched forward onto the dirt floor.

"What have you done?" gasped Wak'an.

"Kei Bot disobeyed a direct order," Batu replied, nonchalantly cleaning the sword on the fallen man's k'ai. "He cost us the victory."

"Perhaps," countered Hai Yuan, "but to execute a general without a formal inquiry...."

Batu shrugged, then sheathed Kei Bot's ornate sword in his own empty scabbard. "He admitted his crimes," the general said wearily. "I have chosen his punishment."

Killing Kei Bot had cleared Batu's mind, and he finally felt as if he could concentrate. "Pe, get me some brushes and paper," he said, walking over to an empty table. "From what the prisoners say, there are over a hundred thousand Tuigan inside the city. We'd better do some planning."

Batu's two subordinates simply stared at him, astounded by his indifference to the man he had just executed. When they did not follow their superior to the table, the general from Chukei said, "Gentlemen, your thoughts may prove valuable."

Both men shook their heads as if to clear them, then joined Batu. While Pe supervised the removal of Kei Bot's body, the three surviving generals fell into a discussion of logistics, debating the best type of shelters to build for the months ahead, where they could secure a steady food supply, how their soldiers would fuel cooking and, eventually, heating fires, and a hundred other details.

By the end of the week, the Shou were making considerable progress toward establishing a siege camp. A group of scouts found a bank of clay on the sh.o.r.e of a nearby river, so the Chief of Works built kilns to fire bricks.

Without straw or something similar to add to the mix, the bricks would not hold together very long. That did not trouble Batu, for he needed them to last only a few months. Win or lose, the siege would be over by winter.

Just outside arrow range, under the guidance of the engineers, the Army of Hai Yuan was encircling the city with a trench that would eventually become a defensive fortification. The Master of Ample Supplies solved the fuel problem by developing a program to collect dried horse dung, reserving the small supply of wood within riding of distance of camp for firing the kilns.

Still, the Shou could not solve all their problems easily. Batu sent a messenger to the summer palace asking for artillery and reinforcements, but he knew it would be at least six weeks before any substantial aid arrived.

Food was especially scarce, for the barbarians had been camped outside Shou Kuan for nearly a month. To procure even small amounts of provisions, the Shou foraging parties had to travel over one hundred miles. When the riders did find a village that might have some grain, the lookouts mistook the filthy pengs for barbarians and burned the communal food-stores.

Batu and his subordinates were in his tent discussing these problems when Pe entered. "Excuse me, General," the adjutant said, bowing low. "The Tuigan have dispatched a messenger and ten escorts under a flag of truce."

The two first degree generals raised their eyebrows. "One thing is for certain," said Wak'an. "The enemy isn't surrendering this soon."

"Not ever," Batu replied. From the stories of his greatgrandfather, he knewthat the Tuigan did not ask or grant mercy. That knowledge only made him more curious about what the envoy had to say. "Bring the messenger to my pavilion."

Pe bowed, then turned to execute the order.

While he waited for the messenger, Batu supervised the rearrangement of the pavilion. The barbarians, he knew, were careful observers, and he wanted the messenger to return to Yamun Khahan properly impressed. The General of the Northern Marches had his chair placed in the center of the room. His subordinates' chairs were placed to either side and slightly to the rear of his own. Finally, he had fifty senior officers summoned to the tent. After arranging them in a standing circle, he explained that no matter what he said or did, they were to remain solemn and perfectly quiet.

A few minutes later, Pe entered the tent. Bowing very low, the adjutant said, "With your permission, General, I present the Grand Historian of the Tuigan Empire, Koja the Lama."

Batu nodded, then Pe opened the tent flap. Koja was not the stocky, fierce figure Batu had expected. Instead, the lama was a small wiry man with a priest's shaven head. His bulky armor hung off his hunched shoulders like rags on a beggar. He moved forward at an overly confident pace, studying his environment with alert, intelligent eyes.

Behind Koja came ten Tuigan warriors. They all wore black k'ai armor and skullcaps trimmed in sable fur. Their swords remained in their scabbards.

Batu nodded to the messenger's escorts. "Who are they?"

"My bodyguard," the messenger replied in stilted Shou. "The khahan insisted. I am his anda, you see."

Because Batu spoke the Tuigan language, he knew that by anda, the messenger meant he was Yamun Khahan's brother in spirit. Koja was politely informing the general that killing him would anger the khahan. Batu found it in- teresting that the lama thought he should be concerned about the khahan's temper.

"Your bodyguards will wait outside," Batu responded, frowning at the messenger. "If I decide to kill you, a hundred times that many men will not save your life."

The lama studied Batu with a dubious expression. When the Shou commander's face remained fixed, Koja turned to the bodyguards and, speaking in Tuigan, told them to wait outside. The frowning warriors reluctantly obeyed.

As soon as the escort was gone, Batu addressed his adjutant. "Have the bodyguards killed."

Pe barely stopped short of gasping when Batu narrowed a warning eye at him. The other officers in the room showed no emotion, though Batu felt certain they were as shocked as his adjutant.

"We came under a flag of truce!" Koja sputtered.

The only response to the lama's objection was Pe leaving the room to execute the order.

"The khahan will-"

"You need no bodyguard in my camp, historian," Batu interrupted, resting his elbows on the arms of his chair. "The escort was an insult."

Batu did not truly find the bodyguard insulting. The general simply wanted to impress upon the khahan that he was not afraid to fight. Doing somethingso deliberately provocative would send that message.

Outside the tent, there were several screams and thuds. A Tuigan warrior stumbled into the pavilion, three crossbow bolts protruding from his back. Two Shou soldiers followed and cut him down with their chiens. The lama watched the display with an expression of revulsion and utter disbelief.

A moment later, the scuffle outside ended. Pe returned and bowed to indicate that he had executed the order. As two guards dragged the dead Tuigan from the tent, Batu said, "Now, anda-to-the-khahan, you may deliver your message."

Koja's face went white. Nevertheless, he looked Batu in the eye. "On behalf of Yamun Khahan, Ruler of the World and Ill.u.s.trious Emperor of All Peoples, I am here to accept your surrender."

Many of the Shou officers could not stop from snickering. Batu saw nothing funny about the khahan's message, for he was keenly aware that the Tuigan warriors outnumbered his pengs three-to-two. Nevertheless, he purposely turned up his lips in what he hoped would appear an amused and confident smile. A few moments later, he frowned as if remembering decorum. He scowled at his troops to quiet them.

After the pavilion returned to silence, Batu said, "Tell Yamun Khahan that we have no use for surrender. Our only interest is his death."

Koja grimaced at the words, obviously envisioning his master's fury when he delivered the Shou response.

Batu dismissed the lama with a wave of his hand, then looked to Pe. "Give Koja his bodyguard's heads to take to the khahan. We would not want Yamun Khahan to think that his men surrendered instead of fighting." Batu did not truly think that Yamun Khahan would doubt his guards' loyalty. He was just trying to make their deaths as striking as possible, thereby giving the Tuigan leader something to think about besides strategy.

The adjutant bowed. "As you wish, my commander." He moved forward to take the lama away.

As soon as Pe escorted the messenger from the room, Batu turned to his subcommanders. "Prepare for battle," he said. "Position the Armies of Wak'an and Hai Yuan in front of the gates."

A buzz filled the tent as the officers moved to obey.

"An ingenious plan," commented Hai Yuan, rising. "We can't storm the city, so you're provoking the enemy into leaving it."

"That is not my intention at all," Batu replied, taking the time to address both of his surviving subcommanders. "We must not forget that there are one hundred thousand Tuigan and only sixty thousand Shou. Sooner or later, the barbarians will get hungry and decide to leave. If we're going to win the battle that follows, we'll need time to ring them in with our fortifications."

"Then why insult the messenger?" Hai Yuan asked. "Provoking the enemy will only make him attack sooner."

"That is where you are mistaken," Batu replied, a wry smile on his lips. "Do you think he really expected us to surrender? He sent the messenger to spy upon our camps and to see whether I was confident or afraid. By insulting the messenger, I told the khahan I was confident, that I wanted to fight. If he believes I want him to attack, he will wait."

"How can you be sure?" asked Wak'an, furrowing his brow skeptically. "Is it not possible that he will see through your ruse?""It is," Batu admitted. "That is why we must be ready for battle."

The next week was a tense one. The barbarians kept a large force on the walls and fired at anyone careless enough to enter the archers' range. The Shou kept one army on watch at all times, while the others prepared the trench around the city to receive its fortifications. At the same time, the survivors from the Army of Kao Shan spent the daylight hours laboring in distant woods or at the kilns, making bricks and sharpening poles. They were careful to stockpile these materials behind ridges and hills where they could not be seen by the Tuigan.

Yamun Khahan would not be concerned by a trench, Batu knew, for the Tuigan horses could easily jump over or into a simple ditch. However, when the khahan realized the Shou were building a defensive wall, the barbarian commander would try to attack before the fortification could be completed.

Batu intended to rob his counterpart of this opportunity. By preparing the wall's foundations in advance, the Shou general hoped to erect it in a single night.

Seven days later, the ditch was ready to receive its fortifications, and the survivors from the Army of Kao Shan had stockpiled enough sharpened poles to ring the city. Batu was inspecting the trench that evening, silently lamenting the fact that there was still a shortage of bricks, when the city gate opened.

The lama rode out, waving a white flag. This time, he was alone.

Before Koja could approach the trench, Batu took twenty guards and went to meet him. By riding into Tuigan archery range, he was taking a big risk, but he did not want the lama to see the preparations in the trench.

As the two men approached each other, the guards formed a ring around both of them. Koja ignored the soldiers and continued straight toward Batu, stopping only when their mounts stood nose to nose. The lama's horse looked haggard and hungry, its ribs visible beneath its hide. Across his saddle, the messenger carried two large bags. The general almost gagged as a rancid odor filled the air.

"What news do you bring from our city?" Batu asked, eyeing the lama appraisingly. Koja's cheeks were hollow and sunken, and there were deep circles beneath his eyes. Clearly, the messenger had not eaten much in the last week.

The little man's horse pawed at the dirt, then dropped its muzzle and began gnawing at the barren ground. Koja pulled on the reins, but the starving beast would not be denied its futile search for stray gra.s.s roots. After a moment, Koja gave up on the horse, then took one of the bags off his saddle and turned it over.

Five heads fell to the ground. Though they were in the early stages of decomposition, Batu could easily see that they had once belonged to Shou soldiers. Koja's starving horse nuzzled a head and decided it was no good to eat, then went back to pawing at the ground in search of food.

Before the general could say anything, the lama overturned the second bag. Another five heads fell out. This time, Batu recognized two of the heads.

One belonged to his father-in-law, Hsuang Yu Po, and another to Xeng, the Hsuang family steward.

"The mighty Yamun Khahan, Ruler of the World and Ill.u.s.trious Emperor of All Peoples, sends his greetings." Koja spoke as stiffly as he sat. "He wishes you to know that he meant no insult by sending an escort with his messenger.He repays the courtesy you showed him by returning his guards' heads, and sends to you the heads of ten Shou commanders who fell defending this insignificant town."

Batu barely paid the little man any attention. The general was staring at Tzu Hsuang. Though he had long ago accepted that his father-in-law had died in Shou Kuan, he could not help being shocked by the sight of the n.o.ble's gray-haired head.

A dozen contradictory emotions clouded the general's thoughts. He felt grief at the loss of a friend, and anger at the sight of a family member's mutilation. His thoughts turned to Wu and what he would to her say about her father's death. Would he reveal what he had seen? Perhaps it would be better to lie and say that Hsuang's body had never been recovered.

Koja's voice suddenly stopped droning. Batu realized that he had allowed his enemy to see his pain.

"Is something wrong, General?" Koja asked. The lama's face did not bear the smirk Batu had expected to see there. Instead, it showed a faint trace of surprise.

Batu shook his head, chastising himself for allowing familial feelings to interfere with his duty. "Nothing's wrong," he snapped, more harshly than he meant to. "Is this all your master sent you to deliver?"

"No," the lama responded. His horse moved forward to tug at a woody root.

Koja jerked on the reins, then said, "These are the words of Yamun Khahan."

He unconsciously straightened his back and sat high in his saddle. " 'I have killed a million of your people and laid waste to a million acres of your land.' "

The lama's hand swept the horizon.

" 'I have smashed six of your armies and killed two hundred thousand of your soldiers.'" The little messenger thumped his chest dramatically, as if he were actually the one who had done all these things." 'I have captured two of your cities and plundered all that lies within their walls.'"

Koja paused, allowing ample opportunity for his audience to consider the words. Batu remained unimpressed.

The lama continued," 'This I have done not out of greed, only to repay your treacherous attempt on my life. Now, I have learned that your emperor did not know of the attack on me. Two servants sent an a.s.sa.s.sin to my camp without his knowledge. Therefore, Shou Lung's punishment is complete. I will call an end to this war, keeping only the lands I have conquered.'"

Batu stared at Koja for several minutes, shocked by what the lama claimed.

Though the general had no doubt that Shou Lung employed a.s.sa.s.sins as diplomatic instruments, he could not believe an imperial servant would take such a drastic step without the Divine One's knowledge.

Finally, seeing that Koja was again scrutinizing him, the general looked toward Shou Kuan and said, "Even if I believed this lie, it would not be worth a single foot of Shou territory." Batu pointed at Koja's starving horse. "Within two weeks, your horses will not be fit to ride. Tell Yamun Khahan that if I were him, I would attack soon."

The lama frowned, clearly puzzled. "You will not consider the khahan's offer?"

"There is nothing to consider," Batu replied. He turned his horse away, indicating the parlay was over.

The lama did not leave. "Please! The khahan is not lying about youra.s.sa.s.sin. You must agree or thousands of men will die needlessly."

Batu looked at Koja out of the corner of his eye. "If the khahan wishes his men to live, they may surrender and the emperor will take them as slaves."

Koja sighed, exasperated. "The Tuigan are not the only ones who will die."

"That does not matter," the Shou general replied coldly, regarding the priest with an icy stare. "My men are ready to die whenever I command it." Batu motioned to the guards. "Send him back to his master."

A soldier took Koja's reins. After the guard had led the messenger away, Pe and Batu's subordinate generals rode to his side. "What did he want?"

asked the adjutant.

"There isn't time to repeat it," Batu replied. "We must erect our wall tonight.

The barbarians will attack tomorrow. Go and tell the loggers to bring their poles forward, then meet me at my tent."

"As you order," Pe replied.

Batu quickly a.s.signed supervisory duties to his subordinate generals, then rode to the kilns and asked for a report. The result was disappointing. There were only enough bricks to build a wall two feet high. Nevertheless, a two-foot barrier was better than none at all. If the wall was built on the far edge of the ditch, the men standing in the trench would have nearly four feet of cover.

Batu ordered the officer in charge to prepare the bricks for transport.

After leaving the kilns, Batu turned toward his tent. By the time the general arrived, dusk was falling. He paused and looked down toward Shou Kuan.

Already, thousands of torches were burning in the Shou trench.

The general went inside the pavilion and found Pe wait ing. While Batu's soldiers labored at the wall, the general from Chukei reviewed each unit's condition, formulated his battle plan, and issued written orders. Even with his wall, Batu was far from certain of victory. He was determined that his chances would not be fouled this time by a lack of communication or a misunderstood order.

By the time dawn came, Batu and Pe had finished their plans. Though the adjutant could not keep from yawning, the general was far from tired.

Antic.i.p.ation of the coming battle invigorated him. He fastened his scabbard onto his belt, then led the way out of the tent.

"Dispatch the orders, Pe," the general said. "I'm going down to inspect our wall." He mounted his horse and rode down the hill.

As he had hoped, the wall had been completed in a single evening. The men had not had time to mortar the bricks into place, but the wall would stop arrows all the same. The sharpened poles had been placed at a forty-five- degree angle in front of the wall. They were s.p.a.ced every two feet, close enough to impale any horse charging between them.