God Within Us

The sun crested past the Khurvan mountains, casting the Valley of Milk in shadow as it sank behind the high peaks. From where the first son of Tsaagandai-khan stood, the lengthening shadows that swallowed the great sea of yurts below reminded him of a hungry serpent swallowing whole its prey.

As far as the eye could see, the Valley was covered by a single great city of felt roofs and cloth tents - the sprawl of scattered tribal camps and market stalls unconfined by walls or gates. The Great Horde took a hundred great cities in its conquest - the marbled desert cities of southern Huwaq, the black-stone fortresses of the eastern Tan Ninh, and the great temple-cities of the western elven republic. But to Nariman, none of the great cities’ ordered opulence could compare to the raw, beautiful vastness of the growing kurultai.

As he traced his gaze from north to south, Nariman counted two dozen different tribal banners fluttering in the soft wind - a little more than half of the Hungry Steppe’s major tribes, though more and more trickled in every day. Beneath the banners, lanterns and torches slowly came to life to dispel the mountain’s shadow, illuminating the Horde’s many subjects and tributaries that milled about in a flowing patchwork of different faces, colors, and styles of dress. Dark-skinned Sunset Islanders wearing patterned shirts as colorful as their exotic jungle birds, long-haired Vinh Huo merchants clad in silk robes with drooping sleeves, ruddy-faced river-farers from distant Newo Gardas, and even pale and willowy elven blood-sorcerers from Yllahana accompanied by their squads of eunuch slaves - all mingled together with Khormchak nomads, all hawking goods from across the known world. Wherever the tribes gathered, so too did foreign merchants, many of them seeking to negotiate and flatter their way into lower tariffs with the tribes whose lands their caravans passed through.

Satisfied things were calm outside, Nariman ducked back into his own grand yurt nestled halfway up the Khuvan slopes. While the other tribes camped in the Valley, only the Great Khan and his kin were allowed to occupy the sacred Khuvan from which flowed the Jigai river - the greatest of rivers that served as the lifeblood of the Hungry Steppe. Stepping inside, he gave a slight nod to his father’s keshik guards - and the blood-sworn sentinels made themselves scarce.

Of all the family yurts, Nariman kept his luxuries second only to his father’s, as was the unspoken rule. Patterned carpets from Huwaq decorated the walls and the floor, which itself was made of a hard, purple wood imported from Vinh Huo. Several shelves and cupboards bore the many gifts he received over the years from his father’s courtiers and merchants - a golden statue of a wise philosopher from Tan Ninh, a black komuz lute from the mountain tribes of the south, and a miniature horse carved entirely from ruby, gifted by an Yllahanan envoy. It was all a far cry from his first memories of growing up in a plain, drafty yurt - back when the Qarakesek were but a lowly, third-rate tribe, and when the Khormchaks were a divided people whose ambitions barely stretched beyond raiding their neighbors and grazing rights. Now the Khormchaks stood at the top of the world, and the great nations tripped over one another to bequeath their gifts to earn the favor of the Great Khan and his heirs.

Said heirs turned to look at Nariman as he drew closer to the dining table, and assumed his seat at the head. A slave quickly brought a drinking bowl and filled it with arkhi wine, but was just as quickly shooed away.

“Pace around any longer, and you’ll begin to wear down those carpets you’re so fond of,” remarked Gulsezim, who was busy studying a merchant’s ledger. “The kurultai won’t disappear into thin air when you’re not looking, you know.”

“It’s not the tribes I’m worried about.” sighed Nariman. He shifted on his stool, and adjusted his loose-fitting chapan. He was fidgeting. It infuriated him to no end that he did so whenever he was nervous. “Yesugei still hasn’t returned. He hasn’t even sent out a messenger.”

Nariman recalled his younger brother - the ninth son of Tsaagandai from his third wife. Yesugei was always quiet - even when Nariman had held him as a newborn his brother never cried, and into adulthood he always blended silently into the background whenever things occurred at court. The number nine held special meaning as a number of good luck, and so the shamans foretold great accomplishments in Yesugei’s life - of battles won, of immense plunder and wealth, and a great boon to the bloodline of the White Khan. Yet for all their predictions, Nariman’s brother turned out to be only startlingly adequate - Yesugei led no great conquests, and killed no great foes besides a ragged Quanli noyan late into the war between Jirghadai and their father. It was thus food for thought as to why their father had assigned Yesugei and Kaveh - another vanishingly impressive son, and a Huwaq half-breed at that - to hunt down as important of a man as Dagun-noyan.

“They’re probably just lost.” Japed Talgat, the second son of their father. “Watch - Dagun will end up back here on his own before those two fools figure out their heads from their asses.”

Together with Gulsezim, the vast majority of their father’s holdings would fall upon Nariman and Talgat - a fact all were well-aware of. Younger siblings such as Yesugei, Kaveh, Inkar, and Erasyl would receive their own portion of their father’s lands, but their holdings would be relatively minor - certainly not enough to threaten the stability of the greater unified Horde. Talgat and Gulsezim however, were right below Nariman for inheritance of the throne, and their personal followers and armies were already numerous. But despite all potential for the Qarakesek to fracture into squabbling factions on their father's death, the three true-borns of Tsaagandai got along well enough - sleeping, hunting, laughing, and crying all together. But with Dagun’s disappearance, it was as if a heavy pall were now hanging over all three - despite Talgat’s attempts to make light of it.

The Qarakesek emissary going missing would normally be of little consequence. But with the approaching kurultai, any sign that could be misconstrued as weakness could be catastrophic. Their uncle Jirghadai-khan’s return to prominence meant many of the tribes would be curious as to how the Great Khan would handle the changing status-quo - how he would handle his old rival gathering friends to his banner.

When you break a man, you must offer him a hand to stand back up, his father had said many years ago, when Nariman had counseled him to finish off Jirghadai. Otherwise, you will need to take the head of every man who dares defy you. And such a ruler will find few friends - only fearful subjects ready to turn or flee as soon as they can.

Even years later, after half the known world bowed to the White Khan, Nariman found himself still wondering whether his father had made the right decision to spare Jirghadai.

In times of war, in the times of the fractured Hungry Steppe, little justification was needed to kill a man, or wipe out a tribe. Few outside the immediate kin of the dead would care, and fewer still would be willing to take up arms to avenge spilt blood. But with peacetime and empire, erstwhile allies who had grown wealthy off the back of conquest now had things to lose, and under the law of the White Khan himself tribal wars were made a thing of the past.

It was no great crime for a khan to surround himself with friends, nor was it a crime to put one’s name forth in the kurultai - the gathering of khans to vote on the next Great Khan to lead the Horde. But as much as everything felt legal, it did not feel right. Jirghadai had too few allies to have any chance of winning the kurultai election through guaranteed votes, but if the other khans sensed weakness in Tsaagandai - say, a protected envoy disappearing - then the election would be less certain. As much as his father spoke of loyalty and friendship, friendship to most Khormchak khans was a fickle thing - even their most loyal allies could take flight if they sensed the winds of change blew against the Qarakesek, for loyalty was always to one’s blood and one’s tribe before any lofty rulers or Great Khans.

The entire matter only made Nariman more and more frustrated. He had grown too complacent, too concerned with matters in his own lands and blinded by his seemingly-guaranteed succession to see the Quanli gathering their knives in the dark. He gave a sigh, then spoke to Gulsezim.

“What news do your scouts bring of our favorite uncle?”

Gulsezim closed her ledger, giving her brother a sly, questioning look. “You know brother, I’d say with-”

“What do your scouts say?” Nariman interrupted, raising one hand. He felt his chest grow hot with frustration. “I’m not interested in playing your games.”

His sister sighed and gave a sour frown before replying. “He and his horde were spotted near Balai a day ago - he should arrive here sometime in the evening. Just on time for the feast.”

“And his allies?”

“Traveling with him. The Zhalair joined him at Ongainur, and the Bura and Oshaks at Bayan.”

Nariman rested his chin on his steepled fingers as he thought aloud. “Three tribes. Then I assume the Suan will be joining him separately. They must be…how many? Twenty, thirty thousand?”

“Thirty-five, pushing forty by my estimate. My spies say he’s also taken into his company several strange foreigners - advisors from out west, probably.”

“What’s this interest in our uncle, Nariman?” piped Talgat. “A war just before the kurultai is bad form, you know.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

“I’d hardly say it's a stupid question when you’re having Gulsezim screening his party every step of the way,” responded his brother, sitting back on his own stool as he studied Nariman. “You think I haven’t noticed you mobilizing your own men? Planting them throughout the camps, the markets? What’s your plan, brother?”

“You’ve spent too much time in Huwaq’s nest of vipers, Talgat.” Nariman sneered, but inside he felt a queer mix of pride and fear.

It had been a while since he had last spoken with Talgat - before his brother had headed out to govern the southern desert-cities as a noyan. Clearly time spent in Huwaq’s courtly intrigue had imbued the normally dim-witted Talgat with a certain perception for cunning - if only he’d known sooner, perhaps he could have involved Talgat in what was to come. But it was too late now.

“This is promising to be the largest kurultai in ages. You think all of the men here will leave their grudges back home just because it's a kurultai? My men are out keeping order among the tribes - making sure we don’t suffer a war in camp before the feast.” It was only a half-lie he fed to his brother - the warriors were given orders to keep the peace and punish thieves, but several of his own blood-sworn were given a different task.

Even now they were putting the final touches together - keeping a watchful eye on who clasped hands with whom, who feasted whom, who drank with whom. For seven days now they watched, they recorded, and they learned which tribes and noyans could be relied upon. Who would stand firm by the Qarakesek if chaos were to erupt. Whose throat to slit and whose yurt to burn if violence did take place.

Talgat seemed unsatisfied with his answer, but didn’t respond. Between Gulsezim’s knowing smile and Talgat’s questioning, Nariman felt the walls of his own yurt begin to feel suffocating. Glancing up through the open crown of the yurt, he saw the skies had already darkened. Only a few hours remained before the feast began, and Jirghadai’s host arrived. Suddenly, his entire plan felt as if it were built upon a foundation of fragile twigs. Nariman felt doubt cloud his mind as he closed his eyes and once again, only saw a thousand different ways things could go wrong. And in all of them, he saw blood. And fire. So, so much fire.

If he hadn’t been the first son of the White Khan, his father often said he would have wanted Nariman to become a shaman. Indeed, he often found that when he closed his eyes, he saw visions. Visions of possible futures, so vivid and powerful he had awakened often as a boy babbling of death and doom that never came to be, but was always just narrowly avoided. But his visions had always aided him before, always showing him the path ahead to avoid doom - hidden mountain paths to bypass an enemy stronghold, ditches and valleys to conceal troops and, once, which table an assassin had concealed a poisoned knife to kill him with during a feast. He learned how to parse the likely from the unlikely, and found he was far more often correct than wrong. But this time was different.

Every time he tried to focus on how to forge a path ahead, what future lay in store for him and his kin, all he saw was blood and fire. And then nothing.

Every time he saw the visions, he revised his plans - double-checking with his spies, asking Gulsezim for updates on Jirghadai’s host, and even heading into the city of yurts himself to observe the gathered tribes. Things should go well - he had rehearsed the plan and contingencies in his mind a thousand times by now, and made sure every one of his blood-sworn could recite the steps in their sleep. But then why did he feel this creeping feeling that things would fail?

Why did his visions of the future never include himself?

Nariman felt himself spiraling into what felt like despair. He vaguely heard but didn’t perceive the voices of Gulsezim and Talgat as they spoke of other matters that didn’t concern him - they may as well have been a thousand miles away. Nariman stood up, hurriedly securing his silk chapan around his shoulders before striding out of the suffocating yurt. As he walked out, he beckoned the two keshiks that stood guard by the entrance.

“Fetch my palanquin. I’m heading out.”

***

In the shadow of the Khurvan mountains, two shaved-headed slaves led the palanquin’s path with oil lanterns while a dozen more slaves hoisted the long palanquin poles on their shoulders. Ten of Nariman’s own keshiks, clad in gilded suits of steel lamellar plates, flanked their blood-sworn brother.

Through the small window bars of the lacquered-wood-and-gold palanquin, the scents of countless different spices, perfumes, and foods mixed into a single queer smell that was unlike any other in the world. Nariman took in the sight of the yurt-city as it passed him by, silently observing the flowing patchwork of the Horde’s subjects up close.

A Tan Ninh merchant with a long, drooping beard nodded in agreement with a pointed-eared Yllahanan elf and his slave translator.

A small Khormchak boy, no older than four, ran past the legs of adults holding a fabric doll.

Two Solarian priests, their heads shaved in the strange manner of their sect, proselytized to a group of traders from Newo Gardas.

A man with cracked, gray skin stared at him through the crowd with glowing yellow eyes.

Nariman bolted upright as he felt a stab of terror through his heart. He moved up close to the windows of the palanquin, hoping to get another look at the gray man, but only saw more of the milling, murmuring crowd. His eyes scanned through the shifting sea of bodies, but the gray man was gone - if he even existed to begin with. Perhaps the sleepless nights were finally beginning to take a toll on him, and he had finally started seeing things in the waking world as well as in his dreams. Nonetheless, he checked the curved knife tucked into his belt.

Soon the palanquin came to a gentle stop, and Nariman drew out into the open air. Before him stood a tall tent marked with the purple and red colors of the Yllahanan Republic - the largest of the elven slave-states to the distant west. The elven folk of the Republic were normally a proud, sneering folk who derided all folk that were not of elven blood - seeing them only as natural-born slaves. Yet the elves hungered for wealth and gold as much as any human, and so they sent out emissaries to trade for spices and slaves, and to spy on the Horde. This particular tent however, was different.

A pair of young, slightly-gaunt Klyazmite slave girls opened the tent flap before Nariman. As he stepped inside, he was hit by a wall of sickly-sweet scent. A half-dozen incense burners hung from the poles of the great merchant’s tent, drowning out all other smells from the outside and soaking every piece of furniture with the same sweet odor. A pair of shaved eunuchs bowed forth and offered to take Nariman’s gold-chased shamshir, but he waved them off. He focused his attention on the two stately figures that sat at a large wooden table before him - their faces lit by candle-light.

“I was thinking you’d get cold feet.” said the first of the two - a woman with high cheekbones and olive skin. In the dim light of the tent her silhouette looked almost human, were it not for her strange purple eyes and the way her ears ended in points - symbols of her proud Yllahanan heritage.

The other person seated at the table, a middle-aged man from Klyazma with a full beard and short-cropped hair, eagerly pulled forward a chair for Nariman. As he lowered himself to sit, a young slave boy no older than twelve appeared at his side with a tray bearing chilled fruit and wine.

“I had other arrangements to take care of,” said Nariman. He pushed the offered wine and fruit to one side as he carefully eyed his companions. “Jirghadai-khan will be arriving soon.”

“Wonderful!” said the Yllahanan woman with a small clap of her hands. On one long, slender finger sat a golden signet ring which seemed to wink at Nariman in the candlelight. “As much as I am fascinated by all of this gathered…culture, I would much rather return home as soon as I can.”

“You will want to make yourself scarce soon then,” replied Nariman. “Jirghadai brings forty-thousand riders with him to the kurultai. I have my men in place, but there is always the risk of things spilling out into a skirmish. And a Senator looks much like any other elf in the chaos of battle.”

To this, the Klyazmite man who had remained silent thus far allowed himself a small chuckle. He wore a simple traveler’s cloak, but underneath it Nariman saw the man’s heraldry - a blue griffon wreathed in gold.

“You keep your concerns to yourself,” sniped back the Yllahanan woman. She gave a sidelong glare at the Klyazmite. “And you…they’ll be hunting after Klyazmites, not Yllahanans, if things turn sour.”

“Things won’t turn badly for us - I’m sure our princely friend here will make sure of it,” said Radomir. The aged man was an advisor to Prince Vladimir, the lord of Gatchisk, who ruled as one of many tributaries under the Horde’s authority in Klyazma. Once, the princes of Gatchisk stood against the Horde alongside the Quanli as allies - now their successors consorted with old enemies, embracing their lot as Horde vassals more eagerly than most. “I’m not the one who stands to lose an empire if fortune goes against us. All I’ve to lose is my head - as wise as it is.”

The wise Radomir was, in truth, the third and last person to join the plan. Where Nariman had schemed and the Senator provided money, Radomir - or rather, his liege lord Vladimir - was but an opportunist. But more than that, the nobility of Gatchisk were ambitious.

For years now, Gatchisk’s nobility openly expressed their desire to replace the Horde's current appointed overlord - Igor of Belnopyl - as collector of the Horde’s tribute in Klyazma. Of the three that gathered today, Radomir and his house had the most to gain - lofty new titles, the right to demand gold and slaves from the other Klyazmite princes under the Great Horde’s authority, and the chance to build their own wealth from what gold the Horde would allow them to skim from the top. Yet they were by far the most expendable, as vassal nobles were - to the Horde, bloodlines and aristocratic ties were of little import so long as tribute was delivered on time, and Igor of Belnopyl was no less efficient a tax collector than Vladimir of Gatchisk. Both would make for convenient scapegoats for Jirghadai’s death either way, as both had lost kin fighting the Khormchaks nearly two decades ago. Yet Gatchisk had more to gain, and thus was easier to convince of the plot.

On the other hand, the involvement of an Yllahanan Senator seemed curious - steppe politics rarely interested the Republic and its bureaucrats beyond trade deals, yet it was the anonymous Senator who had first reached out to Nariman and offered her assistance. In her words, the diplomacy and reform-minded White Khan was much preferable to Jirghadai - who only promised the Horde a return to the perpetual old ways of raiding and conquest. Shifts in Khormchak power demanded raids on neighboring lands as a new show of authority, and the Republic - already engaged in costly wars of its own to the south - would hemorrhage gold for little gain mobilizing its legions east to defend against a new and violent Great Khan. For the Yllahanans and their stagnant Republic - it was in the cold interest of preventing future needless losses, rather than any gain of land or titles.

With a small wave of her hand, the Senator summoned a slave - a Klyazmite man, perhaps twenty years of age. Flowing dark hair framed a handsome, thin face, and beneath the clothes of a household servant the man had the slender body of a dancer, or perhaps an acrobat. But when Nariman looked into his eyes he saw no light, no hint of life or soul within the slave.

“Meet your assassin - handcrafted to start a perfect little war,” said the Senator. “Hot irons, drowning, the breaking wheel…whatever tortures your men can come up with - this one will endure, for you cannot hurt a body without a mind. He will die telling the khans only what tale we want them to hear.”

“Are you certain?” asked Nariman as he sized the slave up. He had heard of Yllahanan magic before - how they were able to erase the minds of their slaves to turn them more obedient than dogs. It was an expensive art - one slave with such an enchantment was worth a hundred household slaves in Khormchak flesh markets - and only the wealthiest Yllahanans usually kept such pets for whatever degeneracy they practiced in their houses of marble.

“You think to question me now?” smirked the Senator. “It’s a tad too late - you either take this loyal beast, or you can do the job yourself.”

Nariman studied the slave once more, then stood up and pulled his shamshir slowly from its sheath. He felt the Senator's and Radomir's eyes on him, as well as the scared looks of the other slaves in the Senator's tent. As he drew the sword free, Nariman commanded the slave to remove his shirt.

The man did so obediently, exposing a bare, hairless chest as pale as milk. Nariman placed his blade against the slave’s flesh, expecting at least a flinch, but the man continued to stare ahead.

The slave didn’t flinch even when Nariman pressed the blade deeper, swelling a droplet of blood from his left breast. The man continued to stare ahead, his breathing remaining slow and steady as Nariman gently drew the biting blade across his chest from left to right - slicing a thin, bleeding gash that cut through his nipple. The slave remained stood to attention, as unmoving as a corpse - and Nariman felt a chill run down his spine as he averted his eyes from the slave’s blank gaze.

Radomir reached into his cloak and broke the uncomfortable silence that befell the room with a sack of coins hitting the table. “Belnopyl eagles - our man’s pay. Enough for the life of a Great Khan.”

“Though not enough to buy a poisoner clever enough to see the job done properly,” mused the Senator with a thin smile as she took a sip from a silver cup of wine. “It’s almost tragic - the quarrelsome sworn brother of the Great Khan killed by a poison meant for his liege, just as they had made amends.”

“Accidentally poisoned by his own son-in-law, no less.” added Radomir. “Igor of Belnopyl, who only sought revenge for the Great Khan’s killing of his own father years ago.”

“The tragedy of this tale doesn’t concern me, only that it is believed.” Nariman said as he wiped the slave’s blood from his shamshir with an offered cloth from one of the Senator’s other pets.

To poison Jirghadai alone would immediately bring suspicion down upon the Qarakesek - and might lead to a costly, internecine civil war that would only weaken the Great Horde and embolden their conquered subjects to rebel. Yet a treacherous scapegoat - especially one as wealthy as the Klyazmite prince of Belnopyl - would deflect the blame and provide a convenient external foe to mobilize the Horde's strength against.

Some of Jirghadai's allies might find the timing of the convenient failed attempt on the Great Khan's life suspicious, that was certain. But most of those that doubted the invented story of the failed assassination would go along with the lie regardless if it meant partaking in the sacking of the wealthy trade-cities to the west. And if there were those who would choose to react immediately at the news of Jirghadai's unfortunate death - perhaps to take revenge against the blameless Qarakesek - Nariman had his keshiks scattered throughout the yurt-city, daggers sharp and at the ready to cut down any flowers of rebellion before they could bloom.

He studied the clean blade, honed to a razor’s edge. In the polished steel’s reflection, the face of the dutiful first son of Tsaagandai-khan gazed back - his stare hard and resolute.

“If your pet is ready, then so are my men.” Nariman sheathed his sword as he prepared to leave. His mind spun in anxiety of the growing plot - the reality he had planned for months now crept up on him with every passing moment, and all he could feel was fear. He cast one final glance at his gathered co-conspirators - the ambitious and easy to read Radomir, and the Yllahanan Senator whose intentions remained frustratingly mysterious to him. As much as they too had a stake in this plot, he felt nothing but loathing for the two.

“I do not wish to see either of you again - once Jirghadai is buried, we are nothing more than strangers.”

Nariman left his half-threat hanging in the sickly-sweet air of the tent as he stepped back out into yurt-city. He felt as though he had just appeared out from the underworld, and took a deep breath of scented air that felt light and crisp in comparison to the oppressive perfumes of the Senator's abode. He closed his eyes for a moment, and felt a terrible pain bolt through his skull - the visions flooded his mind as they had never before.

Fire. Fire everywhere. He saw a surging river of flame pour from the Khurvan, consuming the Valley of Milk and the yurts below.

For a lingering moment, Nariman wished he had never come to the divine peaks. He wished the Qarakesek had never risen to its dizzying heights above the squabbling tribes. He wished that years ago, he had the courage to defy his father's commands and slit Jirghadai-khan's treasonous throat when he had the chance.

By now, the sun had fully set below the horizon. In the dark skies above, Nariman saw a thousand heavenly eyes staring down on him. Watching. Waiting. Whispering.

Whatever happened next, whatever his visions told him, he could only be certain of one thing. The age of blood-oaths and loyalty, of birthright and security earned on the back of his father's conquests - would soon come to an end.

This would be an age of starving wolves.