"Temuge would be honored to take on the work. You know he would."

Genghis did not reply and Kachiun went on as if he sensed no objection.

"He is less likely to steal from you than other men, or to abuse the position. Give him a title like 'Master of Trade.' He will be running the camp in a few days." Seeing that his brother was unmoved, Kachiun chose another approach.

"It might also force him to spend less time with Kokchu."

Genghis looked up at that, seeing the waiting men take a step forward in case he was about to rise. He thought back to the conversation with Chen Yi in Baotou. Part of him wanted to make every decision himself, but it was true that he had a war to win.

"Very well," he said reluctantly. "Tell him the task is his for a year. I will send him three warriors who have been maimed in battle for the work. It will give them something to do and I want one of them to be your man, Kachiun, reporting only to you. Our brother will have many chances to skim the cream from whatever passes through his hands. A little will not hurt, but if he is greedy, I want to know." He paused for a moment. "And make sure he understands that Kokchu is to have nothing to do with his new role." He sighed then. "If he refuses, who else is there?"

"He will not refuse," Kachiun said with certainty. "He is a man of ideas, brother. This role will give him the authority he wants to run the camp."

"The Chin have judges to pass on the laws and decide disputes," Genghis said, looking off into the distance. "I wonder if our people would ever accept such men among them?"

"If they were not from your own family?" Kachiun asked. "It would be a brave man who tried to settle blood feuds, no matter what title he was given. In fact, I will send another dozen guards to Temuge to keep him safe. Our people are not beyond showing their resentment with an arrow in the back. He is not their khan, after all."

Genghis sneered. "No doubt he would have his dark spirits snatch it out of the air. Have you heard the stories growing around him? It's worse than with Kokchu. I sometimes wonder if my shaman knows what he has created."

"We are from a line of khans, brother. We rule wherever we are placed."

Genghis clapped him on the back. "We will find out if the Chin emperor feels the same way. Perhaps he will have his army stand down when he sees us coming."

"Will it be this year, then? In winter? I think it will snow before too long."

"We cannot remain here, without better grazing. I must make the decision quickly, but I do not like the thought of leaving their army at this Badger's Mouth without a challenge. We can stand cold that will leave them slow and useless."

"But they will have fortified the pass, sown spikes on the ground, dug trenches, anything they can think of," Kachiun said. "It will not be easy for us."

Genghis turned his pale eyes on his brother, and Kachiun looked away at the mountains they would dare to cross.

"They are so arrogant, Kachiun. They made a mistake in letting me know where they are," Genghis said. "They want us to ride against them where they are strongest, where they wait. Their wall did not stop me coming. Their mountains and their army will not."

Kachiun smiled. He knew the way his brother thought. "I saw you have all the scouts in the foothills. That is strange if we are to risk it all on a strike through the pass."

Genghis smiled wryly. "They think their mountains are too high to be climbed, Kachiun. Another of their walls runs across the range, and only the highest peaks are left as their own protection, too high for men." He snorted. "For Chin soldiers, perhaps, but we are born in the snow. I remember my father turning me out of the ger naked when I was just eight years old. We can stand their winter and we can cross this inner wall."

Kachiun too had wailed at the door of their father's ger, calling to be let back in. It was an old custom that many believed would make children strong. Kachiun wondered if Genghis had done the same with his own boys, and even as he formed he thought, he knew he had. His brother would not allow weakness, though he could break his sons in the process of making them strong.

Genghis finished his meal, sucking hardening grease from his fingers. "The scouts will find trails around the pass. When the Chin are shivering in their tents, we will come at them from all sides. Only then, Kachiun, will I ride down the Badger's Mouth, driving their own people before me."

"The prisoners?" Kachiun asked.

"We cannot feed them," Genghis replied. "They can still be useful if they soak up the arrows and bolts of our enemies." He shrugged. "It will be faster for them than starving to death."

At that, Genghis rose to his feet, glancing up at the heavy clouds that would turn the Chin plain into a wilderness of snow and ice. Winter was always a time of death, when only the strongest survived. He sighed as he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. The watching men had seen him rise and they hurried closer before he could change his mind. Genghis stared sourly at them.

"Tell them to go and see Temuge," he said, striding away.

GenghisLordsoftheBow

T HE TWO SCOUTS WERE STARVING. Even the porridge of cheese and water in their packs had frozen as they climbed high above the pass of Badger's Mouth. To the north and south, the second Chin wall ran across the mountains. It was less massive than the wall the tribes had crossed to enter Chin lands, though this one had not been allowed to crumble over the centuries. Preserved in ice, it wound its way through distant valleys, a gray snake in the whiteness. It might once have been a marvel to the Mongol scouts, though now they merely shrugged. The Chin armies had not sought to build their wall right to the peaks. They thought no one could survive the rocks and slopes of solid ice, so cold at that height that the blood would surely freeze. They were wrong. The scouts climbed past the level of the wall into a world of snow and ice, looking for a way over the mountains.

Fresh snow had come to the plains, whirling from storm clouds on the peaks that blinded them. There were moments when the gales punched a hole in the whiteness, revealing the pass and the spider legs of the inner wall stretching away. From that height, both men could see the dark smudge of the Chin army on the far side. Their own people were lost to sight on the plain, but they too were there, waiting for the scouts to return.

"There is no way through," Taran shouted over the wind. "Perhaps Beriakh and the others had better luck. We should go back." Taran could feel the ice in his bones, the crystals in every joint. He was certain he was close to dying, and it was hard not to show his fear. His companion, Vesak, merely grunted without looking at him. Both were part of a group of ten, one of many who had gone into the mountains to find a way to attack the rear of the Chin army. Though they had become separated from their companions in the night, Taran still trusted Vesak to smell out a route, but the cold was crippling him, too vicious to resist.

Vesak was an old man of more than thirty, while Taran had yet to see his fifteenth year. The other men in his group said Vesak knew the general of the Young Wolves, that he greeted Tsubodai like an old friend whenever they met. It could have been true. Like Tsubodai, Vesak was of the Uriankhai tribe far in the north and he did not seem to feel the cold. Taran clambered down an icy slope, almost falling. He caught himself by hammering his knife into a fissure, his hand nearly slipping from the hilt as he jerked to a stop. He felt Vesak's hand on his shoulder, then the older man was trotting again and Taran staggered on, trying to match his pace.