When the flow was just a trickle, Hoelun held the limp animal in one hand and patiently filled her own bowl to brimming before she drank. The goat still pawed at the air, but it was dying or already dead, and its eyes were huge and dark.

“We will cook the meat tomorrow night, when I am sure the fire will not bring the herdsmen looking for their lost goat,” she told them. “If they come here, they must not leave to tell where we are. Do you understand?”

The boys licked their bloody mouths as they nodded solemnly. Hoelun took a deep breath, crushing her grief somewhere deep, where she still mourned Yesugei and everything they had lost. It had to be locked away where it could not destroy her, but somewhere, she was crying, on and on.

“Will they come to kill us?” Temuge asked in his high voice, looking nervously at the stolen goat.

Hoelun shook her head, pulling him toward her to give and take a little comfort.

“We are Wolves, little one. We do not die easily.” As she spoke, her eyes were on Temujin, and he shivered at her cold ferocity.

With his face pressed against the frozen white grass, Temujin stared down at the two herdsmen. They slept on their backs, wrapped in padded deels with their arms drawn into the sleeves. His brothers lay on their bellies at his side, the frost seeping into their bones. The night was perfectly still. The huddled gathering of sleeping animals and men were oblivious to those who watched and hungered. Temujin strained his eyes in the gloom. All three boys carried bows and knives and there was no lightness in their expressions as they watched and judged their chances. Any movement would have the goats bleating in panic, and the two men would jerk to wakefulness in an instant.

“We can’t get any closer,” Khasar whispered.

Temujin frowned as he considered the problem, trying to ignore the ache in his flesh from lying on frozen ground. The herdsmen would be hard men, well able to survive on their own. They would have bows close by and they would be used to leaping up and killing a wolf as it tried to steal a lamb. It would make no difference if the prey was three boys, especially at night.

Temujin swallowed past a hard knot in his throat, glaring down at the peaceful scene. He might have agreed with his brother and crept back to the cleft in the hills if it had not been for the scrawny pony the men had hobbled nearby. It slept standing up, with its head almost touching the ground. Temujin yearned to have it, to ride again. It would mean he could hunt much farther away than before, dragging even large prey behind him. If it was a mare, it might have milk, and his tongue tasted the sourness in memory. The men would have any number of useful things on their person, and he could not bear to simply let them go, no matter what the risk. Winter was coming. He could feel it in the air and the stabbing needles of frost forming on his exposed skin. Without mutton fat to protect them, how long would they last?

“Can you see the dogs?” Temujin murmured. No one replied. The animals would be lying with their tails tucked in against the cold, impossible to spot. He hated the thought of them leaping at him in the dark, but there was no choice. The herdsmen had to die for his family to survive.

He took a deep breath and checked that his bowstring was dry and strong.

“I have the best bow. I will walk to them and kill the first man to rise. You come behind and shoot at the dogs when they go for me. Understood?” In the moonlight, he could see how nervous his brothers were. “The dogs first, then whoever I leave standing,” Temujin said, wanting to be certain. As they nodded, he rose silently to his feet and padded toward the sleeping men, coming from downwind so his scent would not alarm the flock.

The cold seemed to have numbed the inhabitants of the tiny camp. Temujin came closer and closer to them, hearing his own breath harshly in his ears. He kept his bow ready as he ran. For one who had been trained to loose shafts from a galloping horse, it would not be hard, he hoped.

At thirty paces, something moved on the edge of the sleeping men, a dark shape that leapt up and howled. On the other side, another dog lunged toward him, growling and barking as it closed. Temujin cried out in fear, desperately trying to keep his focus on the herdsmen.

They came out of sleep with a jerk, scrambling to their feet just as Temujin drew and loosed his first shaft. In the dark, he had not dared to try for a throat shot, and his arrow punched through the deel into the man’s chest, dropping him back to one knee. Temujin heard him calling out in pain to his companion and saw the second roll away, coming up with a strung bow. The sheep and goats bleated in panic, running madly into the darkness, so that some of them came past Temujin and the brothers, veering wildly as they saw the predators amongst them.

Temujin raced to beat the herdsman to the shot. His second shaft was in his waistband and he tugged at it, cursing as the head snagged. The herdsman fitted his own shaft with the smooth confidence of a warrior and Temujin knew a moment of despair. He could not free his own and the sound of snarling on his left made him panic. He turned as one of the dogs leapt at his throat, falling backwards as the herdsman’s arrow hummed over his head. Temujin cried out in fear as the dog’s teeth closed on his arm, and then Khasar’s shaft hammered through its neck and the snarling savagery was cut off.

Temujin had dropped his bow and he saw the herdsman was calmly fitting a new shaft to his string. Worse, the one who had been downed was staggering back to his feet. He too had found a bow and Temujin considered running. He knew it had to be finished there or the men would follow and take them one by one under the moonlight. He yanked at his arrow and it came free. He pressed it to the string with shaking hands. Where was the other dog?

Kachiun’s arrow took the standing herdsman high under his chin. For a moment, he stood there with his bow drawn and Temujin thought he would still fire before death took him. He had heard of warriors so trained that they could sheathe their sword even after they had been killed, but as he watched, the herdsman collapsed.

The one Temujin had wounded was scrabbling with his own bow, crying out in pain as he tried to draw it. Temujin’s shaft had torn his chest muscles and he could not bend the weapon far enough to take a shot.

Temujin felt his heart settle, knowing the battle was won. Khasar and Kachiun came to his shoulder and all three of them watched the man as his fingers slipped off the bow again and again.

“The second dog?” Temujin murmured.

Kachiun could not draw his eyes away from the struggling man, now praying to himself as he faced his attackers.

“I killed it.”

Temujin clapped his brother on the back in thanks.

“Then let us finish this.”

The herdsman saw the tallest of the attackers take an arrow from one of the others and draw. He gave up his struggle then and let his bow fall, drawing a knife from his deel and looking up at the stars and moon. His voice fell still and Temujin’s shot took him in the paleness of his throat. Even then, he stood for a moment, swaying, before he crashed to the earth.

The three brothers moved carefully toward the bodies, watching for any sign of life. Temujin sent Khasar after the pony, which had managed to jerk away from the smell of blood despite the reins around its legs. He turned to Kachiun and took him by the back of the neck, pulling him forward so that their foreheads touched.

“We will survive the winter,” Temujin said, smiling.

Kachiun caught his mood and together they whooped a victory cry over the empty plains. Perhaps it was foolish, but though they had killed, they were boys still.