The tumen left Samarkand before first light.
Torghul had the column moving an hour before the sky began to change in the east, the men pulled from sleep by the watch change and the organized noise of a forced departure. Horses were brought from the lines before the animals were fully awake and the relay riders were already in their positions in the dark.
The pace was set higher than the column had been running on the southern route, and it was set from the first stride rather than being worked toward.
The city fell behind them in the dark and the agricultural land of the upper Zerafshan opened ahead, the road running northeast through fields that were still black shapes in the last hour before dawn.
The region carried its sound alongside the tumen, the river running at its spring volume, higher than it had been on the approach, fed from snowmelt further east in the mountains that were not yet visible but were present in the cold air coming off them and in the smell of the wind.
