Casca 34: Devil's Horseman by Tony Roberts Read Free Book Online

War with the Mongols was often frequent, messy and quick.
    They soon passed out of Samarkand’s influence and entered the region ruled by the governor of Bukhara. Casca was dismayed by the devastation he saw. When he’d last been through the region, on his way to India, it had been green and fertile. Now it was turning into a desert. The crops had failed, the vegetation had turned brown and withered, and no sign of grazing animals could be seen.
    “Kaidur, what has happened here?”
    The Mongol looked around and shrugged. “We did not cause the trees to wither and die. I do not know what has happened.”
    But on pressing the warrior, Casca learned the truth. When the Mongols invaded the region, which had been part of the Shah of Khwarazm’s empire, they had sacked city after city as long as they had encountered resistance. It was the same old story. Surrender and live, resist and die. And when Mongols said die, they meant it. Everyone died. The lot.
    Those who tended the land died along with everyone else, and this meant that the carefully irrigated land was no longer cared for. The water came from underground canals, qanats, and if they silted up and became blocked, then no water was available for the land. And so the land died. By wiping out the farmers and irrigation experts, the Mongols had created a desert.
    Bukhara was hardly better. It had foolishly resisted and had been sacked mercilessly. It was a depressing and half ruined city, and they were glad to pass through swiftly. The road wound northwards and they saw fewer people. The land became flatter and the horizon wider and wider. After they re-supplied at Otrar, the last town before the steppes, they left the road, crossed the Oxus River and then were in the tribal lands of the Turkish nomads.
    They followed the Oxus north-west, traveling as fast as the wagons allowed, and at night unpacked the yurt and tents that had been stowed on the back of the wagon and slept under the hides. Casca and Ashira had one tent, while the guards, Kaidur and the drovers the other, bigger yurt. Casca made sure two guards were on duty at all times.
    The nights were warm, clear and balmy. The winds were soft, yet Casca knew that in this part of the world when winter approached it would turn and be hostile; shrieking winds, blowing dust and grit at first, then ice later. Sometimes the winds would blow for days.
    There were the nights, after Casca had made sure the camp was set and everyone settled down, that he would wander slowly under the stars, looking up into the sky. These peaceful times were almost unreal. He was a man of battle, a man of war. He’d taken part in conflicts for twelve hundred years, and often wondered why he kept on fighting. He kicked a loose stone along the ground. It was because that was what he did best, and he got bored of the peaceful life. And, he mused, there was always somewhere someone who needed his skills.
    Right now it was convenient to be once more with the Mongols. But they were bloodthirsty and all too frequently descended into bouts of massacre that sickened him. He’d been in Asia for too long. He felt a change was coming, a need to return to Europe. Maybe a return to the Empire, the Byzantine Empire, remnant of what had been the Roman world, and the last living link to his past. He’d lost track of it since he’d left its domain with the Crusaders a century and a half ago, and only rumors and fragmentary news had come to him from merchants and the occasional traveler.
    The Mongols were heading west from their camp somewhere close to the Volga River, and that meant Europe. Were they truly going to take on the European powers? How would they fare? Europe wasn’t a huge open plain; it had mountains, forests, rivers. Hardly suitable to Mongol cavalry tactics. And their armies weren’t lightly armored; they had heavy cavalry and well-armed dismounted knights. He’d have to find out what Subedei and Batu planned. Perhaps his knowledge would be