The Purge of the Steppe

The horsemen appeared over the rise like ghosts, their approach silent save for the soft thud of hooves on the grassy plain. They were not a large force, no more than a dozen riders, but they moved with a grim purpose that sent a ripple of fear through the Mongol encampment below. At their head rode Altan, her face as hard and unforgiving as the northern landscape. She was no longer hiding. Her war party no longer flew the banner of a desperate rebellion, but a new, stark black banner that signified only judgment. The story of her raid deep into Siberia, of the execution of the Russian spymaster Morozov, had spread like wildfire, carried on the winds of rumor and whispered around campfires. She had been transformed. In the eyes of the people, she was no longer just Altan the rebel; she was Altan, the Scourge of Irkutsk, a divine spirit of vengeance.

The riders did not halt at the edge of the camp but rode directly towards the largest yurt, the dwelling of the clan's leader, Khan Chuluun. The people of the camp scattered before them, their faces a mixture of awe and abject terror.

Khorchi, his face a grim mask, dismounted and tore the flap of the yurt aside. He dragged the terrified, portly khan out and threw him to the ground at Altan's feet. Khorchi held up a piece of paper, one of the documents captured from Morozov's briefcase, its official Russian script a damning indictment.

"This is your name, Khan Chuluun," Khorchi's voice boomed, a deep rumble of accusation that carried across the silent camp. "It appears on a Russian payroll. It states here you took three hundred silver taels in exchange for providing their agents with shelter, with fresh horses, and with information on the movement of Qing patrols."

Khan Chuluun, his face slick with sweat, prostrated himself in the dust, his finery soiled. "Mercy, great Altan! Mercy!" he cried, his voice a pathetic whine. "I did it only to fight the Qing! I thought the Russians were our allies in the struggle! A means to an end!"

Altan looked down at the groveling man, her eyes devoid of any pity. "You took foreign silver to aid a foreign power in playing their games on our land," she said, her voice as cold and sharp as a winter wind. "And their games brought the Black Blood Blight upon us. You did not do it to fight the Qing. You did it for silver. While your people suffered, you grew fat on Russian coin. You betrayed your own kind for money."

She slowly dismounted, her movements deliberate and graceful. She looked past the trembling khan to the frightened faces of his assembled clan.

"The poison that infects our land comes in many forms," she declared, her voice ringing with the authority of a prophetess. "Sometimes it is a dark powder in a glass vial. Sometimes it is the silver in a traitor's hand. The land must be cleansed of all of it if our people are to survive with their souls intact."

She gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod to Khorchi.

The big warrior's face was grim. He drew his heavy sword. The blade hissed as it left the scabbard. Khan Chuluun let out a terrified squeal, but it was cut short as Khorchi's blade swept down in a single, clean, brutally efficient stroke. The traitor's head rolled in the dust. The clan watched in horrified, absolute silence. Altan had become judge, jury, and executioner.

"We are not finished," Altan said, her voice cutting through the shocked silence. She held up the list of names. "Every name on this list will be answered for. We will ride until the steppe is purified of this foreign filth."

Without another word, she and her war party mounted their horses and rode out of the encampment, leaving a terrified and leaderless clan behind them. They were heading for the next encampment on the list, the next name, the next judgment.

Miles away, in Admiral Meng Tian's command camp:

The atmosphere was one of quiet, efficient progress. The Plague Eradication Corps was having a profound effect. The spread of the anthrax had been halted, and the inoculation program was saving thousands of animals, earning the Qing the grudging respect and, in some cases, the outright loyalty of the Mongol clans. Meng Tian was with his chief intelligence officer, a man seconded from Shen Ke's network, reviewing the latest reports.

"It is as we feared, Admiral," the intelligence officer said, marking a new location on the map with a small black flag. "But also, perhaps, as we hoped. Altan has returned from the north. The stories are… incredible. They say she raided a Russian headquarters in Siberia itself. We can now confirm that Colonel Morozov, the head of their Far East operations, has been assassinated. It has thrown their entire network into chaos."

Meng Tian listened, his face impassive.

"More importantly," the officer continued, "she has acquired proof of Russia's involvement in the plague, and what appears to be a comprehensive list of their Mongol collaborators. She has begun a purge. She is moving from clan to clan, systematically executing any leader who took Russian money. The people are calling her the 'Scourge of the Steppe.' They see her as a divine spirit of vengeance, cleansing the land of traitors."

Meng Tian walked over to the map. His eyes traced the path of the black flags, the trail of Altan's bloody justice. He saw the pattern instantly.

"She is not moving randomly," he mused, more to himself than to his officer. "She is moving along the known Russian supply lines, from south to north. She is not just killing traitors. She is systematically eradicating Russia's entire intelligence and support network within Mongolia. She is doing our work for us, with a ruthlessness that even Viceroy Yuan would admire."

"Indeed, sir," the officer agreed. "But her methods are brutal. She is creating a power vacuum, leaving clans leaderless and ripe for internal conflict. It could lead to more chaos."

A slow, thoughtful look came over Meng Tian's face. He was seeing a deeper game, a longer consequence. "Is she?" he asked quietly. "Or is she clearing the ground for a new order? Think of who she is killing. The corrupt. The weak-willed. The leaders who were willing to sell their people to the highest foreign bidder. The leaders who remain, the ones she is sparing, will be the strong, the proud… the ones who will be harder for us to rule, perhaps, but who will never again trust an outsider—Russian, British, or otherwise."

Meng Tian realized, with a startling clarity, that Altan's personal vendetta was, paradoxically, serving the long-term strategic interests of the Qing Empire. She was unintentionally cleaning house for them. She was destroying Russia's influence far more effectively than any Qing army could, and she was cauterizing the very corruption that had made the region so unstable and vulnerable to foreign meddling.

He was faced with a new and complex dilemma. His mission was to bring order to the north. Altan was creating a temporary, bloody chaos, but the end result of her purge would be a Mongolia free of foreign influence, a land of chastened, self-reliant clans who had learned a harsh lesson. Should he stop this brutal vigilante, as his duty to impose Qing law would suggest? Or should he stand back, allow the 'Scourge of the Steppe' to continue her bloody but useful work, and then step into the power vacuum she created?

He made his decision. "Continue to monitor her movements," he told his intelligence officer. "Do not engage. Do not interfere. For now, the 'Scourge' is an asset. Let the wolf hunt the other wolves. We will deal with her when her work is done."