Interesting! When I was studying Russian, I read from a lot of primary Russian history sources that the Tartars were the Mongols' elite mounted shock troops, that some of the conquered Tartars allied to the Mongols as a permanent elite military class, but political underclass.

I never looked into it any further than that, and I'm glad to read your very informative story.

By the way, in Russia, Ukraine, and elsewhere in the Slavic world, many people identify with or revere the Cossacks, warlike horsemen with their own turkic language and custom traditions. Slavic folk history often positions the Cossacks as descendents of those ancient Tartar shock troops, but maybe Cosaacks fit in better with your account of members of the Golden Horde slowly adopting turkic and Muslim language and practice.

If you ever want to write about the Cossacks, I'd be quite interested in reading.