"The Mighty Manslayer" -- Harold Lamb (ADVENTURE, October 15, 1918) PART 1

Yes, Part 1.  Harold Lamb's "The Mighty Manslayer" is a longer story than "The Golden Snare" or "The Devil in Iron," and I didn't have the opportunity to read through the entire tale last night.  I'd like to do a post on BPaLGM every day, and so I've decided to break this story into two posts; later on, when I get a few novels in (for example,The Big Book of Adventure Stories concludes with the complete novel Tarzan the Terrible), depending on how much free time my day-job leaves me I may be reviewing it chapter by chapter.  Following a foray into swords and sorcery with "The Devil in Iron," we're back into strictly historical fiction today -- better known for his nonfiction, especially the biography Ghengis Khan: The Emperor of All Men and The Crusades, Harold Lamb also dabbled in fiction based on his research, with characters of his own creation interacting against a background of historical fact, most notably, Khlit the Cossack, whom we'll meet today.  Lamb also became a screenwriter at the behest of Cecil B. DeMille, who initially hired Lamb as a technical consultant when DeMille decided to adapt The Crusades for the silver screen.

"The Mighty Manslayer" (Adventure magazine, October 15, 1918, later reprinted in The Curved Saber, one of two Khlit collections published in 1969) follows Khlit, an aging ex-Cossack of the 16th Century who took off as an independent adventurer when faced with the prospect of a Cossack retirement, as he enters the city of Samarkand.  A pair of elephant statuettes catch his eye in the stall of the merchant Mir Turek, who is not interested in selling them - though he is very interested in Khlit's saber (unraveling the mystery of the saber is a subplot that is resolved over the course of Lamb's saga of Khlit) and offers Khlit a deal: Khlit can have the two elephants as a gesture of good faith if he will agree to escort Mir Turek and his entourage through the mountains of Central Asia and the Gobi Desert to the city of Karakorum.

Khlit is suspicious but agrees, in the process buying and freeing a young slave girl named Kerula whom Mir Turek has been abusing.  Along the way, Khlit's suspicions regarding Mir Turek and his primary henchman, Fogan Ultai, grow, especially once they welcome a gylong (a term, now out of date I think, referring to a priest or lama, though Lamb uses it in a way that seems to imply that Mir Turek and Fogan Ultain view the gylong as having some degree of knowledge or proficiency with black magic as well) into the party and have him start menacing Kerula (who has tagged along, having nowhere else to go).

Ultimately, Khlit discovers that the true purpose of Mir Turek's expedition is to find the lost tomb of Ghengis Khan and loot it of the gold and jewels contained therein.  Upon discovering the tomb, however, Khlit and Mir Turek are set upon by the Onon Muren -- the ghosts of the Great Khan's followers, sacrificed to ensure the secrecy of his burial's location -- and driven away.  Lamb makes it pretty clear here that toxic, possibly volcanic, vapors are leaching up through the ground here, and the characters are interpreting the beginnings of suffocation they're experiencing as being strangled by ghosts.

The expedition largely a bust, food supplies low and Kerula running a fever, it's suggested that the group make contact with the Tatar city of Altur Haiten to replenish their supplies and buy medicine for Kerula.  The city is currently in the midst of a siege by Chinese forces, but Fogan Ultai is adamant he can lead them through and into the city.  Khlit, worried for Kerula's safety, has no choice but to agree.  He has no idea he's being led into a trap until he's clubbed across the back of his neck, born down to the ground and a sack thrown over his head.

Hot damn, this is some good stuff! Lamb's complete Cossack adventures (totaling around 40 loosely-linked novelettes) were reprinted in a four-volume set in 2009, available on Amazon in paperback or for the Kindle -- I just threw them into my Wish List with plans to get them for my Kindle sometime in the next few weeks, paychecks permitting, because his prose is every bit as engrossing as Howard's, his characters are rich and believable, and the overall atmosphere is evocative and brings 16th Century Central Asia to life in vivid detail.

I was kind of surprised that Khlit was so easily led into the ambush at the end of what I'd read last night.  He'd been so suspicious of Mir Turek and Fogan Ultai for so long -- literally, months within the context of the story -- and then to follow Fogan Ultai, a conniving, sneaky bastard from the start, without a care in the world into a Chinese war camp.

Looking forward to reading the rest of the story tonight!