The Tiger Queens Read online

  I knew not whether Ala-Qush was a man for revenge, but I had no doubt Orbei would find a thousand little ways to seek her vengeance for this. Yet without her husband’s power behind her, her jabs would be toothless.

  I should have felt flush with this first victory, but instead I felt only emptiness. I had won this battle, but the war had only just begun. I still needed to convince these people that I was able to rule them, and I knew one thing for certain as I looked at the hostile faces of Ala-Qush’s wife and the Onggud around me.

  The battle lines had been drawn.

  Chapter 17

  I spent the day after meeting Ala-Qush erecting my ger. Tradition demanded that my husband’s family assist me, but I wasn’t foolish enough to expect Orbei to offer her help. Mine was the only tent in this city of walls, setting me further apart as something different and foreign, yet I couldn’t find it in myself to pack away my mother’s felts and allow wooden walls to entrap me more than I already was. The felt panels of a ger represented the Eternal Blue Sky, its smoke hole the Golden Light of the Sun, and the floor the Earth Mother; without them I would be truly lost.

  That night brought angry shouts from the Great House, eventually replaced with the grunts and moans of a rutting couple after most of the village had drifted to sleep and the stars glittered overhead. I punched my pillow until camel hair bulged from the seams and tried in vain to stuff my ears to shut out the sounds of Ala-Qush with Orbei. I contemplated marching over and demanding they stop, but the thought of Ala-Qush’s wrath or, worse, their laughter kept me in my narrow bed.

  That bleak night was the first time in my life that I’d slept alone, without even the snores of my father’s men to carry me to sleep.

  Night was painful, but the coming day was far worse.

  Enebish came to attend me on the morning of my wedding, but her scowl was too much like Orbei’s for my liking and I sent her away. Of all my clan, only Shigi would remain with me when my father left, but I could scarcely ask him to dress me in the silken trousers of my wedding finery or button my deel over my breasts. Instead I managed on my own, gingerly slipping into Ala-Qush’s gift of a long yellow robe made of camlet and tying it with a red sash. This was the reason for all the camels we’d seen: the Onggud specialized in the production of silk woven with the finest camel hair, a material softer than the downy feathers at the bottom of a swan’s nest. Orbei’s robe from the previous day was made from camlet, and I’d later learn that her ancient family controlled the trade of the precious commodity and, thus, most of the economy of Olon Süme.

  I wondered then if I’d done the right thing in insisting that my husband set aside his wife. Yet the deed was done.

  I emerged from my ger to find my father waiting for me outside. The Khan of Khans wore a brown felt deel, and the curved sword in his belt matched the silver hairs threaded through the black of his braid. Even without his fur-lined helmet and the ragged bearskin draped over his shoulders, it would have been impossible to mistake him for anyone other than the leader of the Thirteen Nations. My father wore the bearskin only when dealing with potential enemies, relishing the image of the savage they all believed him to be and therefore making them more likely to capitulate to his demands. Yet this was a wedding between allies; I didn’t know why he wished to intimidate the Onggud today.

  It was only after he lifted his arms to embrace me that I noticed the smear of fresh blood on my threshold. It was bad luck to step on the exact border of a ger and infinitely worse to spill blood there. My father’s eyes flicked to where Shigi shuffled off with something hidden in his arms.

  “What is that?” I called to him.

  “Don’t, Alaqai,” my father warned.

  “I wish to know what was left on my doorstep,” I said, storming in all my wedding finery to where Shigi stood, his back to me. I opened the brown felt blanket wrapped around the bloody gift, revealing a dead marmot.

  I drew back, swallowing back bile at the stench and the flies feeding on the creature’s eyes. “It was generous of Ala-Qush’s wife to leave me such a gift on my wedding day,” I said, covering my nose and waving the thing away. “Wasn’t it, Father?”

  My father drew my arm through his, his voice low. “The best revenge is success, Alaqai. I could kill Orbei for this or you could punish her, but it would be better still to conquer her people.”

  “As you did with Jamuka?”

  He smiled. “Perhaps with less bloodshed. After all, the people of Ala-Qush’s wife will be our people after today. And you must always serve our people faithfully.”

  I wondered which people my father meant: his or the Onggud. Perhaps both.

  We passed priceless cauldrons stewing freshly slaughtered horses on our way to the Great House; both the iron pots and the meat were wedding gifts from my father. Most of the town had turned out to examine me, but there were no cheers or shouts of joy, only the sound of boiling water and the smell of horsemeat.

  My father squeezed my hand and we entered the Great House together. I touched the emblem of Toregene’s god at my throat, needing protection from all the gods and spirits to keep my stomach from rebelling as I faced the man who was about to become my husband.

  Ala-Qush sat on the center of a wooden platform, flanked by various advisers and nobles. Orbei was conspicuously missing, prompting me to thank the Eternal Blue Sky for small miracles. Again I noticed the absence of my husband’s eldest son, Jingue, and filed away the insult. There would be plenty of time later to sniff out the recalcitrant boy.

  At home, my appearance as a bride might have prompted shouts and taunts about the upcoming evening in the bridal tent, but this ceremony was as silent as the winter sky. Ala-Qush scarcely looked at me when my father handed me to him, but I stood tall and arranged the folds of my deel while my gaze skimmed the heads of my father’s entourage. I was thankful for Shigi’s calming presence in the crowd; he stood serenely in his blue cap while others of my father’s men jostled Ala-Qush’s chosen representatives. If things didn’t go well, my wedding might be celebrated with fights instead of songs and toasts.

  My father began his speech, but I heard little of it until the end. “Now I give my daughter, Alaqai Beki, to Ala-Qush of the Onggud,” he said, joining our hands together, “so they become two shafts of the same cart.”

  He presented Ala-Qush with the ceremonial arrow, smaller than a real quarrel, with a silver tip carved with a snarling wolf. I wondered if my new husband recognized the wolf as my father’s totem, meant to convey my father’s continuing protection over me. If Ala-Qush noted the symbolism, he hid it well. Instead, my husband removed my Mongol headdress and replaced it with the towering Onggud crown with its strange gold horn, likely removed from the bedside of his leather-faced wife only that morning. The beaver ruff’s scent of mildew made my nose itch, and the strings of carnelian beads obscured my vision.

  I was now Beki of the Onggud. A beki would never break, no matter how life strove to break her. Only one thought echoed in my mind as Ala-Qush wrapped an arm around my waist, claiming me as his own.

  I would not break.

  * * *

  My resolution was sorely tested that night, but not in the way I expected.

  There were no wild celebrations for my wedding, no merry dancing around campfires or impromptu wrestling contests in honor of the groom’s virility. A late autumn wedding at home had meant that the colts were weaned and every guest could drink their weight in airag. Olon Süme offered only neatly stacked wooden casks of Onggud wine, served warm and meant to be sipped from tiny porcelain cups.

  I watched my father and his entourage ride away on their open path to the Tanghut outpost of Wulahai, their cloud of dust finally disappearing over the horizon into the night, leaving me with only Shigi and a new title: the Princess Who Runs the State. I’d heard many soldiers comment on their eagerness to leave Olon Süme’s walls and filth behind, and I wished I
could join them. Instead, I retreated to my ger, where Enebish waited to ready me for my husband’s attentions. I suffered her presence out of necessity, sure that Orbei had instructed her to spy on me. The weight of loneliness settled upon my chest then, and I found myself yearning for Sorkhokhtani’s music or even my mother’s lectures to distract me. I attempted a few notes on the buree, but my scowling daughter-by-marriage yanked off my headdress and the camlet robe and tugged the coils from my hair until they tumbled down my back like a black waterfall. I endured the pain with a tight smile when she pulled the tortoiseshell comb harder than was necessary.

  I heard my husband coming before he entered, accompanied by a distorted voice and followed by a rude guffaw of laughter. Enebish bowed her head to him when he entered. “Rest well, revered father,” she said, and he ruffled her hair with tenderness. The door closed and he turned to face me, although he didn’t look pleased about it.

  Toregene’s advice about all the tricks and secret ways to pleasure a man crowded my mind and made me flush. I longed to put this night behind me and greet a new day.

  “Good evening, husband,” I said. I stepped close and ran a finger up his chest, my palm cupping his cheek.

  He grabbed my wrist, so hard I winced. “I’m hardly your husband,” he growled, shoving my hand away. He filled two fists with the camlet at my collar and ripped the robe open so it fell to the ground at my feet, exposing my nakedness. My cheeks flared and I shuddered with shame and revulsion, but his next words flared my fury. “I find myself saddled with a mare I never sought and now find abhorrent. I shall never call you wife.”

  I yanked my robe back up, ignoring the scarcely restrained outrage in his voice and not troubling myself over his rearranging the facts over who had sought whom. “If you think I’ll let you speak to me like this—”

  “I’ll speak to you as I please,” Ala-Qush said. “After all, I’ve bought and paid for you, haven’t I?”

  “I am your beki, not your slave,” I said, hugging the camlet robe closed over my breasts. “No one speaks to the daughter of Genghis Khan in such a manner.”

  I knew they were the wrong words the moment they left my mouth.

  “Your father’s no longer here to protect you.” Ala-Qush grabbed my wrist and twisted my arm behind my back. “Some of my nobles encouraged me to support your upstart father, yet still others desired an alliance with the ancient Tanghuts. I cast my lot with you, yet you and your father humiliated me before my people and made a spectacle of the wife who has served me for longer than you’ve lived. Everything about you heathens offends me, from your stench of sour milk and the filthy skins you wear to the way you cook your horses, eyeballs, assholes, and all.” He stepped back and spat at my feet. “And above everything, you offend me most of all.”

  I tasted the copper tang of blood as I bit my tongue. I wished I had my father’s power then, that I could make Ala-Qush cower before me. Instead I gave my husband the insult of my back, unwilling to let him witness the riot of emotions on my face.

  “I won’t listen to this,” I said. “Nor shall I share your bed until you’ve apologized.”

  His cruel bark of laughter made me cringe. “No, Alaqai Beki, daughter of Genghis Khan, it is you who shall never share my bed. Not this night or any other.”

  I sputtered, then whirled around in time to see the door slam shut so hard the frame of my ger shuddered. A gust of cold air hit me in the face, almost guttering the fire.

  My mind struggled to make sense of what had just happened; then I hurled the Onggud headdress into the opposite wall, followed by the silver bowls of wine left out for after the bridal bedding. I could imagine my mother shaking her head at me, the disappointment writ clear in her eyes. I gave a cry and flung myself on the bed, staring at the stars through the smoke hole and wishing I could burn all of Olon Süme to the ground.

  It wasn’t long before I heard the same grunts and moans from the night before, Ala-Qush and Orbei mocking me in my empty ger.

  Only this time they were louder, so the whole town could hear them and know my shame.

  * * *

  In the days and weeks that followed, I recalled words my father once said when recounting the hardships he faced after his father’s death at the hands of the Tatars.

  “Life is like an arrow,” he had stated, his features made sharper by the flickering fire. “Both must be pulled back before they can be launched forward. Remember that when you feel as if nothing shall ever be right again.”

  I understood what he meant now. My husband and I scarcely shared the same air, and if I happened upon him, he’d growl like a bear and order me away. More than once I heard the deep bellows of his men’s laughter when he made some comment at my expense. After several days of this constant humiliation and nights listening to him with Orbei, I waited for him outside the Great House. He attempted to ignore me, but I used my tiger sword to bar his exit, earning a scathing glare that would have made even my mother quake with fear.

  “Return to your tent, Alaqai Beki,” he said. “My head pounds like the inside of a drum and I won’t make it worse by listening to another of your tirades.”

  “This arrangement is unacceptable,” I said, ignoring the men behind him.

  His smile was icy. “I find it preferable to the alternative of locking you in a wooden cangue for the rest of your days. I believe your father withstood such a punishment once.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  “No?” He threw open his arms. “And who would stop me?”

  It was a challenge, then, a test as to whether I’d invoke my father’s name again. But even if my father weren’t off campaigning, we both knew I wouldn’t admit to being unable to manage my responsibilities as wife and beki.

  “That’s what I thought.” Ala-Qush leaned in and I noticed his pupils were strangely dilated. “Now, run along and play with your bow and arrow, wife. I have a kingdom to rule.”

  My husband’s advisers laughed and cast me withering looks, drawing the hems of their pristine robes close as they passed me. I forced myself to stand and watch them go, leaving me alone on the threshold of the Great House.

  Something had to change. My husband despised me and refused to visit my bed, and his people loathed me.

  There had to be another way to conquer the Onggud.

  * * *

  The idea came to me at midnight a few nights later, a time when restless spirits roamed the winds, looking for sleepless souls to torment. I should have known better than to trust a plan born of meddling shades.

  Ala-Qush was gone again, seeing to the border patrols the Onggud had maintained for centuries. I’d thought to invite myself along, but the idea of spending a week with my husband sounded as enjoyable as having a rotten tooth removed. I’d already been rebuffed when I sent him a paper envelope stuffed with powdered gingerroot from Olon Süme’s market. Shigi recalled that Toregene had once boiled the herb into a tea for him to alleviate a terrible headache. I felt an emptiness in my heart when I thought of Toregene and Sorkhokhtani, for without any messengers, it was impossible to know how they fared. “I miss them, too,” Shigi assured me, and that night we poured a bowl of milk into the earth in a prayer for their health and happiness. Shigi, Toregene, and Sorkhokhtani didn’t share the blood in my veins, but sometimes it seemed that they were more my kin than the brothers who’d been born from my mother’s womb. I noted the way Shigi’s eyes grew distant when my sisters and our home were mentioned, the way he seemed to retreat within himself as if pulling memories around his shoulders.

  Still, although Shigi might not return home for several years, it was difficult for me to muster much pity for him, knowing that I might never see my family or former home again. And so I would continue to attempt to ingratiate myself with the Onggud and my husband.

  Regardless of the efficacy of Toregene’s herbs, Ala-Qush’s messenger returned the pack
age with a sniff of disdain.

  “Ala-Qush, Prince of Beiping, does not require your dried weeds,” he said, dropping the rumpled envelope in my hand before turning on his heel and stomping off.

  Fine. Let the demon in my husband’s head devour his skull for all I cared.

  Now that Ala-Qush was gone, I planned a dinner for his children, masking the command that they attend in a polite invitation. I’d face them alone, although Shigi protested when I ordered him to leave for the evening.

  “The Khan will never forgive me if something happens to you,” he said, planting his feet while I worked to close the smoke hole against the night air. Two long-nosed dogs lay at Shigi’s feet—Olon Süme was full of the flea-riddled beasts and I’d made the mistake of feeding these mangy specimens. My father had always hated dogs, so there were few in our camp when I was growing up, but I didn’t have the heart to kick these ones away. It was quite likely they’d end up my only companions once Shigi left.

  “I’m sharing dinner with children,” I scoffed. “The worst they might do is spit in my food.”

  “Jingue is a grown man, not a child.”

  “It will be difficult for my husband’s eldest to eat with us when he’s not even within the city walls.” I’d overheard Orbei tell Ala-Qush before he left that she expected Jingue to return over the coming days. She claimed to be toiling over a homecoming gift for her eldest son, likely another camlet robe, or perhaps a winter hat made from the stuff. I was heartily sick of camlet, the constant smell of camels, Onggud wine, and everything else that reminded me of this miserable new life of mine.