The Only Game in Town

7

At sundown their unmerciful pace had brought the expedition into sagebrush and greasewood country. The hills were steep and brown; dust smoked under hoofs; silvery-green bushes grew sparse, sweetening the air when bruised but offering little else.

Everard helped lay Sandoval on the ground. The Navajo’s eyes were closed, his face sunken and hot. Sometimes he tossed and muttered a bit. Everard squeezed water from a wetted cloth past the cracked lips, but could do nothing more.

The Mongols established themselves more gaily than of late. They had overcome two great sorcerers and suffered no further attack, and the implications were growing upon them. They went about their chores chattering to each other, and after a frugal meal they broke out the leather bags’ of kumiss.

Everard remained with Sandoval, near the middle of camp. Two guards had been posted on him, who sat with strung bows a few yards away but didn’t talk. Now and then one of them would get up to tend the small fire. Presently silence fell on their comrades too. Even this leathery host was tired; men rolled up and went to sleep, the out-posts rode their rounds drowsy-eyed, other watch-fires burned to embers while stars kindled overhead, a coyote yelped across miles. Everard covered Sandoval against the gathering cold; his own low flames showed rime frost on sage leaves. He huddled into a cloak and wished his captors would at least give him back his pipe.

A football crunched dry soil. Everard’s guards snatched arrows for their bows. Toktai moved into the light, his head bare above a mantle. The guards bent low and moved back into shadow.

Toktai halted. Everard looked up and then down again. The Noyon stared a while at Sandoval. Finally, almost gently, he said: “I do not think your friend will live to next sunset.”

Everard grunted.

“Have you any medicines which might help?” asked Toktai. “There are some queer things in your saddlebags.”

“I have a remedy against infection, and another against pain,” said Everard mechanically. “But for a cracked skull, he must be taken to skillful physicians.”

Toktai sat down and held his hands to the fire. “I’m sorry we have no surgeons along.”

“You could let us go,” said Everard without hope. “My chariot, back at the last camp, could get him to help in time.”

“Now you know I can’t do that!” Toktai chuckled. His pity for the dying man flickered out. “After all, Eburar, you started the trouble.”

Since it was true, the Patrolman made no retort.

“I don’t hold it against you,” went on Toktai. “In fact, I’m still anxious to be friends. If I weren’t, I’d stop for a few days and wring all you know out of you.”

Everard flared up. “You could try!”

“And succeed, I think, with a man who has to carry medicine against pain.” Toktai’s grin was wolfish. “However, you may be useful as a hostage or something. And I do like your nerve. I’ll even tell you an idea I have. I think maybe you don’t belong to this rich southland at all. I think you’re an adventurer, one of a little band of shamans. You have the southern king in your power, or hope to, and don’t want strangers interfering.” Toktai spat into the fire. “There are old stories about that sort of thing, and finally a hero overthrew the wizard. Why not me?”

Everard sighed. “You will learn why not, Noyon.” He wondered how correct that was.

“Oh, now.” Toktai clapped him on the back. “Can’t you tell me even a little? There’s no blood feud between us. Let’s be friends.”

Everard jerked a thumb at Sandoval.

“It’s a shame, that,” said Toktai, “but he would keep on resisting an officer of the Kha Khan. Come, let’s have a drink together, Eburar. I’ll send a man for a bag.”

The Patrolman made a face. “That’s no way to pacify me!”

“Oh, your people don’t like kumiss? I’m afraid it’s all we have. We drank up our wine long ago.”

“You could let me have my whisky.” Everard looked at Sandoval again, and out into night, and felt the cold creep inward. “God, but I could use that!”

“Eh?”

“A drink of our own. We had some in our saddle-bags.”

“Well…” Toktai hesitated. “Very well. Come along and we’ll fetch it.”

The guards followed their chief and their prisoner, through the brush and the sleeping warriors, up to a pile of assorted gear also under guard. One of the latter sentries ignited a stick in his fire to give Everard some light. The Patrolman’s back muscles tensed—arrows were aimed at him now, drawn to the barb—but he squatted and went through his own stuff, careful not to move fast. When he had both canteens of Scotch, he returned to his own place.

Toktai sat down across the fire. He watched Everard pour a shot into the canteen cap and toss it off. “Smells odd,” he said.

“Try.” The Patrolman handed over the canteen.

It was an impulse of sheer loneliness. Toktai wasn’t such a bad sort. Not in his own terms. And when you sit by your dying partner, you’d bouse with the devil himself, just to keep from thinking. The Mongol sniffed dubiously, looked back at Everard, paused, and then raised the bottle to his lips with a bravura gesture.

“Whoo-oo-oo!”

Everard scrambled to catch the flask before too much was spilled. Toktai gasped and spat. One guardsman nocked an arrow, the other sprang to lay a hard hand on Everard’s shoulder. A sword gleaming high. “It’s not poison!” the Patrolman exclaimed. “It’s only too strong for him. See, I’ll drink some more myself.”

Toktai waved the guards back and glared from watery eyes. “What do you make that of?” he choked. “Dragon’s blood?”

“Barley.” Everard didn’t feel like explaining distillation. He poured himself another slug. “Go ahead, drink your mare’s milk.”

Toktai smacked his lips. “It does warm you up, doesn’t it? Like pepper.” He reached out a grimy hand. “Give me some more.”

Everard sat still for a few seconds. “Well?” growled Toktai.

The Patrolman shook his head. “I told you, it’s too strong for Mongols.”

“What? See here, you whey-faced son of a Turk—”

“On your head be it, then. I warn you fairly, with your men here as witnesses, you will be sick tomorrow.”

Toktai guzzled heartily, belched, and passed the canteen back. “Nonsense. I simply wasn’t prepared for it, the first time. Drink up!”

Everard took his time. Toktai grew impatient. “Hurry along there. No, give me the other flask.”

“Very well. You are the chief. But I beg you, don’t try to match me draught for draught. You can’t do it.”

“What do you mean, I can’t do it? Why, I’ve drunk twenty men senseless in Karakorum. None of your gutless Chinks, either: they were all Mongols.” Toktai poured down a couple of ounces more.

Everard sipped with care. But he hardly felt the effect anyway, save as a burning along his gullet. He was too tightly strung. Suddenly he was glimpsing what might be a way out.

“Here, it’s a cold night,” he said, and offered his canteen to the nearest guardsman. “You lads have one to keep you warm.”

Toktai looked up, a trifle muzzily. “Good stuff, this,” he objected. “Too good for…” He remembered himself and snapped his words off short. Cruel and absolute the Mongol Empire might be, but officers shared equally with the humblest of their men.

The warrior grabbed the jug, giving his chief a resentful look, and slanted it to his mouth. “Easy, there,” said Everard. “It’s heady.”

“Nothin’s heady to me.” Toktai poured a further dose into himself. “Sober as a bonze.” He wagged his finger. “That’s the trouble bein’ a Mongol. You’re so hardy you can’t get drunk.”

“Are you bragging or complaining?” said Everard. The first warrior fanned his tongue, resumed a stance of alertness, and passed the bottle to his companion. Toktai hoisted the other canteen again.

“Ahhh!” He stared, owlish. “That was fine. Well, better get to sleep now. Give him back his liquor, men.”

Everard’s throat tightened. But he managed to leer. “Yes, thanks, I’ll want some more,” he said. “I’m glad you realize you can’t take it.”

“Wha’ d’you mean?” Toktai glared at him. “No such thing as too much. Not for a Mongol!” He glugged afresh. The first guardsman received the other flask and took a hasty snort before it should be too late.

Everard sucked in a shaken breath. It might work out after all. It might.

Toktai was used to carousing. There was no doubt that he or his men could handle kumiss, wine, ale, mead, kvass, that thin beer miscalled rice wine—any beverage of this era. They’d know when they’d had enough, say goodnight, and walk a straight line to their bedrolls. The trouble was, no substance merely fermented can get over about 24 proof—the process is stopped by its waste product—and most of what they brewed in the thirteenth century ran well under 5 per cent alcohol, with a high foodstuff content to boot.

Scotch whisky is in quite a different class. If you try to drink that like beer, or even like wine, you are in trouble. Your judgment will be gone before you’ve noticed its absence, and consciousness follows soon after.

Everard reached for the canteen held by one of the guards. “Give me that!” he said. “You’ll drink it all up!”

The warrior grinned and took another long gulp, before passing it on to his fellow. Everard stood up and made an undignified scrabble for it. A guard poked him in the stomach. He went over on his backside. The Mongols bawled laughter, leaning on each other. So good a joke called for another drink.

When Toktai folded, Everard alone noticed. The Noyon slid from a cross-legged to a recumbent position. The fire sputtered up long enough to show a silly smile on his face. Everard squatted wire-tense.

The end of one sentry came a few minutes later. He reeled, went on all fours, and began to jettison his dinner. The other one turned, blinking, fumbling after a sword. “Wha’s mattuh?” he groaned. “Wha’ yuh done? Poison?”

Everard moved.

He had hopped over the fire and fallen on Toktai before the last guard realized it. The Mongol stumbled forward, crying out. Everard found Toktai’s sword. It flashed from the scabbard as he bounded up. The warrior got his own blade aloft. Everard didn’t like to kill a nearly helpless man. He stepped close, knocked the other weapon aside, and his fist clopped. The Mongol sank to his knees, retched, and slept.

Everard bounded away. Men stirred in the dark, calling. He heard hoofs drum, one of the mounted sentries racing to investigate. Somebody took a brand from an almost extinct fire and whirled it till it flared. Everard went flat on his belly.

A warrior pelted by, not seeing him in the brush. He glided toward deeper darknesses. A yell behind him, a machine-gun volley of curses, told that someone had found the Noyon.

Everard stood up and began to run.

The horses had been hobbled and turned out under guard as usual. They were a dark mass on the plain, which lay gray-white beneath a sky crowded with sharp stars. Everard saw one of the Mongol watchers gallop to meet him. A voice barked: “What’s happening?”

He pitched his answer high. “Attack on camp!” It was only to gain time, lest the horseman recognize him and fire an arrow. He crouched, visible as a hunched and cloaked shape. The Mongol reined in with a spurt of dust. Everard sprang.

He got hold of the pony’s bridle before he was recognized. Then the sentry yelled and drew sword. He hewed downward. But Everard was on the left side. The blow from above came awkwardly, easily parried. Everard chopped in return and felt his edge go into meat. The horse reared in alarm. Its rider fell from the saddle. He rolled over and staggered up again, bellowing. Everard already had one foot in a pan-shaped stirrup. The Mongol limped toward him, blood running black in that light from a wounded leg. Everard mounted and laid the flat of his own blade on the horse’s crupper.

He got going toward the herd. Another rider pounded to intercept him. Everard ducked. An arrow buzzed where he had been. The stolen pony plunged, fighting its unfamiliar burden. Everard needed a minute to get it under control again. The archer might have taken him then, by coming up and going at it hand to hand. But habit sent the man past at a gallop, shooting. He missed in the dimness. Before he could turn, Everard was out of night view.

The Patrolman uncoiled a lariat at the saddlebow and broke into the skittish herd. He roped the nearest animal, which accepted it with blessed meekness. Leaning over, he slashed the hobbles with his sword and rode off, leading the remount. They came out the other side of the herd and started north.

A stern chase is a long chase, Everard told himself inappropriately. But they’re bound to overhaul me if I don’t lose ’em. Let’s see, if I remember my geography, the lava beds lie north-west of here.

He cast a glance behind. No one pursued yet. They’d need a while to organize themselves. However.…

Thin lightnings winked from above. The cloven air boomed behind them. He felt a chill, deeper than the night cold. But he eased his pace. There was no more reason for hurry. That must be Manse Everard—

—who had returned to the Patrol vehicle and ridden it south in space and backward in time to this same instant.

That was cutting it fine, he thought. Patrol doctrine frowned on helping oneself thus. Too much danger of a close causal loop, or of tangling past and future.

But in this case, I’ll get away with it. No reprimands, even. Because it’s to rescue Jack Sandoval, not myself. I’ve already gotten free. I could shake pursuit in the mountains, which I know and the Mongols don’t. The time-hopping is only to save my friend’s life.

Besides, (an upsurging bitterness) what’s this whole mission been, except the future doubling back to create its own past? Without us, the Mongols might have well taken over America, and then there’d never have been any us.

The sky was enormous, crystalline black; you rarely saw that many stars. The Great Bear flashed above hoar earth; hoofbeats rang through silence. Everard had not felt so alone before now.

“And what am I doing back there?” he asked aloud.

The answer came to him, and he eased a little, fell into the rhythm of his horses and started eating miles. He wanted to get this over with. But what he must do turned out to be less bad than he had feared.

Toktai and Li Tai-Tsung never came home. But that was not because they perished at sea or in the forests. It was because a sorcerer rode down from heaven and killed all their horses with thunderbolts, and smashed and burned their ships in the river mouth. No Chinese sailor would venture onto those tricky seas in whatever clumsy vessel could be built here; no Mongol would think it possible to go home on foot. Indeed, it probably wasn’t. The expedition would stay, marry into the Indians, live out their days. Chinook, Tlingit, Nootka, all the potlatch tribes, with their big sea-going canoes, lodges and copperworking, furs and cloths and haughtiness… well, a Mongol Noyon, even a Confucian scholar might live less happily and usefully than in creating such a life for such a race.

Everard nodded to himself. So much for that. What was harder to take than the thwarting of Toktai’s bloodthirsty ambitions was the truth about his own corps; which was his own family and nation and reason for living. The distant supermen turned out to be not quite such idealists after all. They weren’t merely safeguarding a perhaps divinely ordained history which led to them. Here and there they, too, meddled, to create their own past… Don’t ask if there ever was any “original” scheme of things. Keep your mind shut. Regard the rutted road mankind had to travel, and tell yourself that if it could be better in places, in other places it could be worse.

“It may be a crooked game,” said Everard, “but it’s the only one in town.”

His voice came so loud, in that huge rime-white land, that he didn’t speak any more. He clucked at his horse and rode a little faster northward.