The Golden Horde

In the winter of 1238, Mongol cavalry swept through the Rus principalities, only to encounter a terror beyond swords and spears in the snowy mists of Chernigov. Two thousand of their finest horsemen slaughtered one another in the fog. The sole survivor was on the verge of death, his mind seemingly gone. Not long afterward, Batu, grandson of Genghis Khan, had the skull of an enemy prince made into a blood cup and gave it to his youngest son, Saren. Three years later, as the Mongol army stood before the gates of Vienna, poised to devour all of Western Europe, its commander Batu suddenly ordered a full retreat east. The history books called this mysterious withdrawal “the Return of God’s Scourge,” but no one could guess the real reason. Only Saren knew. A modern soul trapped in the body of a conqueror’s son, he was both a prince of the Mongol Empire and the “key” chosen by an ancient land. He had to navigate the suspicions of his father the Khan, the ambitions of the royal princes, and the ancient spirits of the Rus, awakened by war. On one side lay the glory of the empire and the hopes of his forebears. On the other, a call and a warning growing ever clearer from deep within the land. When two irreconcilable truths tore his world apart, Saren had to choose: become the empire’s sharpest blade, or the last fragile shield of this scarred land. History never recorded what kind of war between humans and the “inhuman” lay behind the retreat east that determined Europe’s fate. That war is only just beginning. “Traditional historical fiction, ensemble cast, no System, slow burn. A little patience is recommended.”