Rogue Angel - The Spirit Banner Part 41

Davenport shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. When I came to, I found you lying there unconscious. There's a guard at the door who won't let us leave, but I haven't seen anyone else."

Annja swung her feet off the bed and sat up, realizing only as she did so that she was naked beneath the blanket. She made a quick grab for the covering and managed to keep from exposing herself, but only just.

"What the heck happened to my clothes?" she demanded.

Davenport blushed. "Sorry. Meant to warn you about that."

He got up and crossed to the center of the room where a metal stove sat framed by two orange posts. Annja let her gaze follow them upward to where they met a roof made from a lattice of wooden strips covered with what looked to be layers of canvas and felt. The walls around them were constructed the same way, but instead of the plain, undecorated fabric used in the construction of the roof, these were covered with designs in bright, rich colors.

Clearly they were in a ger ger, the traditional tentlike home used by the nomadic Mongols for centuries.

Her clothes were neatly folded in a pile on the low table that stood near the stove. Davenport carried them over to her and then turned his back while she carefully dressed.

As she did so, she took a thorough look at her injuries and tried to make an accurate a.s.sessment of her condition. She was bruised and battered, but otherwise hadn't suffered any broken bones in their unorthodox escape attempt. Her head hurt and when she reached up she discovered a thick bandage wrapped around her skull. Must have hit it on something while I was in the water, she thought.

Well, at least they had tended to her injuries. That was a good sign. Better than killing her outright, anyway. Now to see about getting out of here.

She got up and walked over to the doorway. When she pulled aside the thick felt covering that served as the door, she found herself looking into the face of a large Mongol warrior standing just outside. He was dressed like the other warriors she'd seen from the bridge, in a long del del and armored coat. A sword hung in a scabbard at his hip. and armored coat. A sword hung in a scabbard at his hip.

"Excuse me," Annja said and moved to go past him.

The guard, for that was what he was, stepped in her way.

"Ugui," he said sharply, putting a hand on the hilt of his weapon. he said sharply, putting a hand on the hilt of his weapon.

Annja had been in Mongolia long enough to recognize the word no. no.

She tried again, this time moving around him in the other direction, but he stopped her again, repeating his command more loudly and shaking his head to clarify his point.

Annja knew she could take him down if she wanted to; he was seeing only an unarmed and apparently injured woman, no match for a trained Mongol warrior. But there was nothing to be gained by giving away her secret at this point, so Annja decided to play nice and see what happened. She could always bust them out later if need be.

"All right. Okay," she told the guard. "No need to get uptight."

Without taking her eyes off him, she backed up and returned to the tent.

"The guard's still out there, I take it," Davenport said, when she came back inside.

"Yep. And as ugly as ever."

Her comment got a quick smile out of Davenport, which was what she was hoping for. If they could keep their spirits up, they'd be more prepared when the time came to get out of here.

There was tea on the stove and a covered platter that turned out to be some kind of noodle dish with chunks of meat, maybe lamb or mutton, Annja wasn't sure. But she was hungry and that was all the excuse she needed to dig in. She convinced Davenport to have some, as well, not knowing when they might get another chance to eat. It was always best to keep their strength up in situations like this.

"Who are these guys, Annja? What do they want with us?"

She'd been thinking about that herself. Legends stated that the tomb of the Khan had not only been hidden from human eyes but that a special guard, the Darkhats, had been posted to watch over it for all eternity. She had put that story right up on the shelf next to the one that said that Genghis would return to the Mongol people as their leader when they needed him most; both of them had seemed ludicrous to her. Maybe at one time there had been such a group, and perhaps they were the reason everyone but the Khan's descendants had stayed out of the Ikh Khorig, or Great Taboo, but to expect that group to continue their duties for eight hundred years or more was crazy.

Of course, so was a mystical sword that could vanish into thin air.

Maybe she had to reevaluate her thinking on the matter.

She explained about the Darkhats to Davenport and suggested that maybe these people were the descendants of that original group.

As she was finishing her explanation, the door was pushed aside and four men entered the ger ger. The leader, a short thin-faced man with a wide scar on his left cheek, rattled off a long sentence in Mongolian.

Unable to understand anything he was saying, Annja and Davenport simply stared back at him.

He repeated it, and then said something sharply to the men standing behind him when his captives still didn't understand what he wanted. The three men moved around and behind Annja and Davenport and, using their arms, began herding them toward the door.

"I think they want us to go with them," Davenport said.

Annja refrained from thanking him for stating the obvious, though it was a close call.

Outside, the sun was high in the sky, letting Annja know it was at least a day, maybe more, after she'd taken the plunge into the river. Around them, camp was being dismantled. Groups of Mongols were breaking down and storing nearby gers gers that were practically identical to the one they'd just left. Horses were being loaded and a few dogs roamed freely about, looking for sc.r.a.ps. that were practically identical to the one they'd just left. Horses were being loaded and a few dogs roamed freely about, looking for sc.r.a.ps.

As they pa.s.sed by, the workers stopped and watched them with impa.s.sive faces. There was neither welcome nor anger in their eyes, just a casual indifference, as if they had already ceased to exist, and that worried Annja a bit more than she let on. She had a feeling things were going to get worse before they got better.

The gers gers had been set up in an orderly fashion, two long rows of them on either side of the encampment, leaving a makeshift road down the center aisle that led to a larger, more ornate tent that probably belonged to the leader of the group. Apparently they were going to find out if she was right, for it was toward this that they were being led. had been set up in an orderly fashion, two long rows of them on either side of the encampment, leaving a makeshift road down the center aisle that led to a larger, more ornate tent that probably belonged to the leader of the group. Apparently they were going to find out if she was right, for it was toward this that they were being led.

They were almost to their destination when another group emerged from the right and joined their own. There were ten men in the group, eight Mongols and two foreigners. The first was a muscular Hispanic man with a carefully trimmed goatee, the second a nondescript sandy-haired man in his midforties. Annja didn't recognize either of them, but Davenport did. He leaned in close to her so the others couldn't overhear.

"The one on the right is Ransom. The other man is his bodyguard, Santiago."

Seeing the architect of all their trouble so close at hand enraged her. Her mind was already calculating the angles, deciding who she had to take out first to get close enough to strike at Ransom, and then decided it wasn't worth getting split in two by a Mongol sword for the trouble. Ransom would get his; she'd make sure of it, one way or the other. She just had to be patient.

The trouble was that patience wasn't one of her virtues.

40.

As they drew closer to the final ger ger, a man came out to greet them. Annja recognized him immediately as the one who had confronted her at the bridge. He still wore his armor, but he had removed the feathered helmet, which gave her a better view of his features. Even from here she could see his deep gray eyes as he looked them over, the anger clear on his face.

The captives were marched to the end of the pathway to stand in front of the wooden platform on which his ger ger had been constructed. The added height required them to look upward to meet his gaze and Annja almost laughed at the obvious psychological ploy it represented, but then decided being in his good graces was probably best for the near future. had been constructed. The added height required them to look upward to meet his gaze and Annja almost laughed at the obvious psychological ploy it represented, but then decided being in his good graces was probably best for the near future.

Much to her surprise, the leader spoke to them in English.

"I am Holuin, the Voice of the Wolf. It is my duty to inform you of the charges against you and to ask how you plead."

"Wait just a minute, you stupid, arrog-"

Holuin gestured slightly and one of the escorts next to Ransom drove his elbow viciously into the other man's gut. Ransom stopped in midsentence, his lungs paralyzed by the sudden strike, and he toppled over as he fought to regain his breath.

"I will read the charges."

The leader read out a long list of charges, or, at least, what Annja thought were charges, for the recitation took place in Mongolian and she couldn't understand more than a word or two. She did notice that the escorts around her grew angrier as the list continued.

This was not good.