Even later, he never doubted Jamuga’s love and devotion to him. Nor, in spite of many things, did he ever doubt Jamuga’s fundamental loyalty. Only to Jamuga could he ever talk freely and simply. There was in Temujin an eternal thirst for freedom and simplicity, untainted by laughter and subtleties and all other wearinesses. He came back to them like a man returning to an oasis after long forays. Whatever other lusts there were in him, there was this deeper thirst. He satisfied it in Jamuga.
He could talk to Jamuga. They did not often agree. They were too dissimilar, and liked opposing things. But they trusted each other, and understood each other. Temujin said to Jamuga that all the devotion of others was based on individual illusions as to his real self. But Jamuga knew his anda completely, and so could love him completely. He, Jamuga, would never be long shocked nor disconcerted by Temujin, no matter what he did. Not because of love, but because of comprehension, even when it was a distasteful comprehension, alien to his own nature.
Sometimes others were offended and jealous because of the young men’s habit of riding off alone together. But it was a necessity for Temujin, who felt that when he was with Jamuga he was truly alone, an alter ego accompanying him with whom he need not pretend. Often he had to lie. Lying was tedious for him, for it was a waste of time. With Jamuga he never needed to lie. There was joy in being himself, as though he had stripped off hot and cumbersome clothing, and plunged, naked, into cool water.
Because of his enemy, Targoutai, who had declared himself overlord of the northern Gobi since Yesukai’s death, Temujin’s people had had to deviate considerably from their usual course in their travels from winter to summer pastures. Temujin had at first raged, but it was not in his nature to rage long against the inevitable. Only fools wasted the substance of their soul in unavailing fury. It embittered him to have to lead his people stealthily into poor pastures, in order not to infuriate Targoutai. But he recognized the necessity of convincing Targoutai that Temujin was no longer a foe that had to be annihilated. He knew that his best weapon against Targoutai was Targoutai’s own contempt for him. Let Targoutai say to himself: “This young khan is a small yellow dog not worthy of mine enmity and my hunt.” Thus would Temujin continue to live, and grow strong. In the meantime, he had sent a tribesman to Targoutai, pretending treachery. The tribesman, allegedly deserting to Targoutai, had been schooled to say:
“Temujin hath realized he is no true leader, and wisheth in his heart to swear allegiance to thee. But he hath a little pride, and desireth to attain some strength, in order to present himself proudly to thee saying: ‘I am worthy to be one of thy vassals, one of thy noyon.’”
Later, it was reported to Temujin that Targoutai had laughed scornfully, and had said: “He, then, hath more sense than I believed possible for a son of Yesukai. Let him prove his worth, and mayhap I shall later allow him to swear allegiance to me.”
Temujin, turning pale with wrath, was yet able to smile grimly at this report. Despite his tumultous nature, he had the terrible patience of the nomad. But he did not have the nomad’s pliability and fatalism. He could not shrug, and forget. He might shrug, but he never resigned himself to inexorableness. Fate, to him, was never inflexible, but only a sword that could be seized by a strong man.
In the meantime, his people complained because of their increasing poverty and the poorness of their pastures. Temujin was apparently resigned to the little leader of a miserable ordu. He heard their mutterings, and his lips tightened. But he said nothing, only looking at them in silent balefulness, so that they were filled with terror of him.
One evening, near sunset, he rode off with Jamuga to be alone for a while. Sometimes, in spite of himself, his anger and gloom were too much for him. He had to go away where he could think.
Because of their fear and poverty, the people had had to skirt about the good pastures, and in their travels they had been forced to enter the foothills of great mountains, where pasture was scarce and the country harsh and rugged. Here there was good hunting for antelope and bear and fox, but little good grass.
The air was fresh and cool, and ageless, impregnated with the pungency of fir and the purity of rock. Temujin rode a little ahead of Jamuga with sudden impatience, as though some sharp thought spurred him. His white stallion leaped lightly to a stony ledge, and then stood like a statue, his long white mane and tail rippling slightly in the wind. Against a background of bright pale sky and intense blue mountain, horse and rider stood motionless, something impelling and fateful in their attitude. Temujin’s dark and violent profile was full of somber melancholy; planes of faint but vivid light lay on his cheek, like a reflection of snow. The sun, far and cold and shining, glimmered on his harness and the hilts of his dagger and scimitar. His eye had borrowed the hue of the sky, and sparkled like hard blue stone. His shoulders, broad and thin and straight, and his back, were the form of a soldier. His uncovered red hair glinted with threads of fiery gold. Savage, wild and grim, his bronzed skin lined and harsh, he was part of this enormous landscape of blue and white, this tremendous vista of sky and mountain.
Of what was he thinking? Jamuga asked of himself, watching his friend with deep gravity. He remembered the younger Temujin, turbulent and vehement, laughing and tumultuous. It seemed to him that Temujin was like a vivid and moving being, full of impetuous movement, imbued with flame and passion, which had suddenly frozen into eternal immobility, caught in the moment of an heroic attitude. His youth had gone forever, and something terrible had taken its place.
Jamuga, seized with a sudden vague fear, spurred his narrow black horse, and reached Temujin’s side. They stood together for a long time without speaking, while Temujin’s eye ranged the mountains and the water-threaded valleys with a dark hunger. There were nothing but silence and pallid sunlight, and the wind moved without sound.
Then Temujin said: “We must have pastures. Many pastures. Or we die. My people are afraid of me, but they are more afraid of death. At the end, this fear will win. Somehow, I must overcome Targoutai in open combat. I must be lord of the northern Gobi.”
“Why not offer to join him?”
Temujin did not move for a moment nor reply, and then he turned to Jamuga and regarded him with an eye that blazed. But his voice was quiet:
“No. I must overcome him. I must invoke the aid of Toghrul. But first, I must make Toghrul value me as an ally. I have thought of something. I shall take the cloak of black sable to him, and convince him I am worthy of his aid.”
“How canst thou do that?”
Temujin smiled. He flicked his white stallion with his whip, and the horse flung up his head so that his snowy mane rose like a foaming crest over it.
“Look thee, Jamuga: At the best, what are we, and what was my father? Beggarly robbers—quarrelsome hunters of good pasture. One of thousands of the little aristocrats of the steppes, which fight bloodily among themselves, and are no better at the end. Raiders, hunters, fighters, boasters, slaves to poverty and hardship, constantly fearful of annihilation. Yet, all together, bonded and sworn, they would be formidable, a powerful menace to the towns and the cities, who could be made to yield tribute.”
Jamuga knitted his brows. His wan lip became rigid.
“Tribute,” he murmured. “But we seek only pastures. And peace.”
Temujin smiled again, this time with contempt. He regarded Jamuga with a sparkling eye. He went on, as though Jamuga had not spoken:
“A man who seeketh peace is a rabbit among foxes. Only he who hath fought well and conquered deserveth peace, and only he shall have it.
“Look thee, again: each of our little lords seeketh to attract followers, in order that he might be strong enough to raid weak tribes. Each little noyon must succeed or die. This constant success and failure doth destroy the small aristocrats, the tiny khans. Each man must prove himself strong by force of arms, and not by gifts, as is the way of townsmen. A weak man who giveth gifts is an object of contempt. Only the strong dare offer presents. Men will follow a strong man who is g
enerous. Therefore, it is necessary that raids be continual, and warfare among us unremitting. A strong leader doth attract many followers. Why not, then, a single strong leader, a kha khan, exacting obedience and loyalty from all the dwellers of the steppes, instead of such like Toghrul Khan and Targoutai, who hate each other, and who bring about anarchy and disorder with their constant struggles with each other, and others like them?”
Jamuga gazed at him earnestly. “And thou dost think that by uniting all the little khans and leaders under one resistless man thou canst bring about harmony and peace, and all men, thereafter, can dwell together without fear, and in comfort?”
Again Temujin smiled, but this time he looked away from his anda and stared at the mountain. His voice, strong and hoarse, dropped to a low note:
“Peace! The man who desireth peace is a man who looketh at his grave!”
He spurred his horse, and it sprang down from the ledge. Temujin suddenly shouted, lifted his whip and struck the stallion fiercely. It leaped into the air, swung about, rearing on its hind legs, and Temujin stood against the sky like a statue come suddenly and violently to life. His face had taken on itself that wild and fateful quality which filled Jamuga with a nameless terror. His eyes were green flame. Then the horse, fallen to his four feet again, raced off like a mad thing down into the valley, leaping from ledge to ledge, sliding in a cloud of golden dust down a steep incline. The noise of their going awakened echoes, until all the air was filled with a near thunder.
After some time, Jamuga followed thoughtfully on his light black horse. He coughed in the yellow dust. Temujin had stopped below, in a level crevice between the mountains. His horse was panting. But when Jamuga came up, Temujin looked at him with the sweet and magnetic smile which no one could resist. Yet, there was amusement in his eyes, as well as indulgent affection for his anda.
“If thou wert not so brave, Jamuga, I would suspect thee of being one of the eunuchs of the city, of which Kurelen doth tell us.”
Jamuga flushed. His rare color came reluctantly into his pale face, and only when he was deeply angered or disturbed.
“I do not understand thee, Temujin!” he exclaimed. But he felt faintly ill, as though with premonition.
But Temujin had already forgotten what he had said, and the mood which had caused it. He lifted his whip and pointed.
“Over there lieth the Khwarizmian Empire of Central Asia. And over there, the Kin Empire of Cathay. Both rich and elegant and vast, full of academies and universities and temples and libraries and palaces, and white streets tree-bordered and jewelled with pools and gardens. Kurelen hath told me. He hath also told me that these empires are rotten, like fat old lustful men with diseased bowels. They sit in their gardens, with singing women about them, their fingers coveted with jewels, their many chins sunken on their breasts, their slothful bodies clothed in cloth of gold and embroidered silk, their feet as soft as their pallid hands, and puffed as bladders. They move only to eat and drink; they listen to philosophy, and converse with scholars. They lust after weak strange pleasures, when they are infrequently stirred to motion. They smile with sleepy delight at the music of many languid singers. Their bellies droop with fat. Wealth and degraded lusts and safety have made them eunuchs in soul, as well as body. They are ready for destruction, for death by the clean strong sword.”
He paused. He fixed his smiling eyes, which were now innocently blue, upon Jamuga, who was frowning in his efforts to understand.
“Jamuga, dost thou remember the stories the Persians tell, which Kurelen hath spoken of, about a strange conqueror who came from the west, and who was called Alexander of Macedon, the godlike, the Conqueror?”
Jamuga, believing he was being made game of by Temujin, in his incomprehensible mood, assumed an expression of dignity to hide his confusion.
“But what hath all this to do with seeking protection for our people from Targoutai, and finding and keeping good pastures for them?”
But Temujin only smiled. His breath was short and quick, as he stared at Jamuga.
Jamuga, still affronted, said: “Thou dost speak of one ulus, or confederation. That is impossible. The Tatar, the Merkit, the Turk, the Urghur, the Naiman, the Taijiut—these can never dwell together in harmony under one leader.” He paused, then said in a low voice: “But can they not?” He added, in a louder voice: “I have always loved peace. But where is the man who can bring it about?”
He looked questioningly at Temujin, whose eyes had begun to glitter with restless impatience. But Temujin did not reply. He, even as he stared at his anda, seemed absorbed in some vague and enormous dream, whose outlines were slowly becoming clearer to him.
Jamuga, raising his voice as though Temujin were deaf, asked:
“But what hath all this to do with good pastures for our herds?”
His horse suddenly shied, for Temujin had burst into a savage shout of laughter.
“Nothing! Nothing!” he cried.
And then again, he reined in his horse, so that the stallion stood again on his hind legs. And then, swinging about, he raced away so swiftly that Jamuga, sitting motionless on his horse, despaired of catching up with him. He stood in silence, a strange sad dejection upon him, a cold premonition about his heart. He watched Temujin winding furiously through the narrow valley below. And then he spoke aloud, in a voice of increasing bewilderment and fear:
“But no one could ask more than pastures and peace!”
Chapter 21
For some reason he could scarcely name, Jamuga avoided Temujin that night. He ate quietly with his half-brothers at the campfire before their yurt. They were all young boys, gay and boisterous. The youngest one had to be caught from hurtling into the fire at intervals. But there was a simple animalism about them that Jamuga, for all his fastidiousness and silence, found refreshing and soothing tonight. A painful suspicion was awakening in him that there was something secret and menacing in Temujin which he had never suspected before, and that the youth he had thought all turbulence and vehement speech and gestures was some one he did not know. His lack of perspicacity troubled him more than the thing he learned about his anda, for his egotism, for all it was not aggressive, was only the deeper and he could not endure any affront to it.
In the midst of his disturbed thoughts he glanced up to see that the pliant and amiable Belgutei had joined the group about the fire. Upon catching his eye, Belgutei smiled, caught the youngest child deftly from his latest surge towards the fire, and set him on his feet. He sat down, and began to joke humorously with the children, who responded to him enthusiastically. Jamuga, frowning perplexedly, watched the youth in his play with the children. He seemed to see Temujin’s younger half-brother for the first time. Belgutei was slight and active, and had an affable and responsive face, and no enemies. That seemed sinister to Jamuga, yet he could not help but admit to himself that the reason might be because Belgutei offended no one, was never aggressive or arrogant or fierce, but always ready for laughter and friendship, and amiably disposed to any one who made overtures to him. Still, Jamuga doubted. Open looks frequently hid devious hearts. Pleasant smiles were sometimes the smooth door behind which villainy waited. Moreover, he had always had the feeling that Belgutei never said anything he meant. He laughed without venom, but sometimes venom was too crafty to betray itself.
Jamuga’s mother now came scolding for the young children, and Jamuga and Belgutei were left alone. Then it was that Jamuga thought with pale contempt: It is not mere friendliness that bringeth him here. For, out of the corners of his eyes he saw that Belgutei was studying him speculatively. When he looked fully at the other youth, Belgutei immediately broke into an artless smile, which Jamuga did not return.
“I have heard it rumored that Temujin will soon seek the aid of Toghrul Khan,” said Belgutei, in his agreeable voice.
Jamuga shrugged. “Who knoweth?” he answered, coldly.
Belgutei eyed him with pleasant reflectiveness, knowing him undeceived.
“I ha
ve always loved Temujin,” he said, candidly. “I have always believed in his destiny.”
For some reason this irritated Jamuga, and he said impatiently:
“What destiny? It is strange that every one is mouthing that word, like a camel eating thorns. But thou didst not come here to me, Belgutei, merely to discuss Temujin’s vainglorious dreams.” When he said that, he was conscious of a feeling of slight sickness, as though he had been self-caught in treachery. But there was a sore and aching spot in him, which he had to rub.
Belgutei laughed lightly and good-temperedly. “Thou art right, Jamuga. I did not come to discuss Temujin’s plans. I only came from motives of brotherly concern. Last night, an attempt was made to poison Bektor, my brother.”
Jamuga was startled. He turned and faced Belgutei fully and hastily. “But Temujin would not stoop to the wickedness of poisoning Bektor! Thou art a fool, Belgutei! What quarrel there is between them will be settled openly and fairly.” But to himself, with mounting sickness, he thought: How do I know this? Do I know Temujin at all?
Belgutei shrugged placatingly. “I am glad that thou dost believe this, Jamuga. It doth relieve my mind of many apprehensions. I love Bektor. Nevertheless, though I am inclined to believe thee, an attempt was made to poison him. He hath not been in good spirits the last few days, and could eat little. Therefore, his life was saved.”
Quickening with anxiety, Jamuga exclaimed: “Tell me!” His very lips felt cold.
Belgutei said, new gravity darkening his friendly face: “Last night Bektor was passing Temujin’s yurt. Bortei was stirring the pot, in which she was cooking a fine antelope stew. Temujin was dining with Kurelen, as he often doth, and Bortei, seeing Bektor, assumed an air of affection and kindness and offered to share the meal with him, calling him ‘brother.’”
He paused, and fixed his eyes, suddenly piercing, upon the silent Jamuga.
“She did declare to Bektor that she was much annoyed at Temujin’s fondness for Kurelen, and that he often left her lonely. My brother—he is a simple and tormented soul. He doth respond to friendliness like a wounded dog. Under all his formidable and sulky appearance, he longeth for kindness and peace. All his fierceness doth spring from his aching desire to be accepted. His bullying manner doth conceal his bewilderment. Men like this can be tamed to loyalty and generosity; misunderstood, none can be more terrible.”