The Heretic

by David Pilling

  When dawn came, I let Nicholas sleep on and took our guest some breakfast. “Come,” she said quietly in response to my gentle tap on the door. I crept in to find her sat upright in bed. She had taken off her bonnet, and her unwashed black hair tumbled in untidy ringlets over her shoulders.

  She clutched a small wooden cross on a thread about her neck. “Nothing to fear,” I said lightly, holding up the platter, “except a touch of indigestion. I'm afraid we live off rough victuals here.”

  Jana ventured a tight little smile. Her big green eyes watched me carefully as I drew up a stool and sat beside the bed. Breakfast was watered wine, a hunk of bread, some fresh cheese and a couple of wrinkled pears.

  I offered her a pear. After a second's hesitation, Jana took it and bit greedily into the fruit, closing her eyes in relish as the juice dribbled down her chin. We ate and drank in silence for a while. After her second cup of wine, she was ready to talk.

  “I left Tábor,” she said, “of my own free will. Nobody is chasing me.”

  This was some relief, at least. I tried not to let it show.

  “I couldn't be one of them,” Jana went on, “though I tried. I prayed every day, listened to their priests, did my best to understand. I thought I owed them something, you see. The Táborites were kind to my people when we begged them for food and shelter after leaving Prague.”

  Her finger gripped the cross. “I thought they acted out of Christian charity. I was wrong. They were kind because they wanted us to join them. That's all.”

  “Did any of your people agree to join?” I asked.

  She nodded. “Yes. All except myself and Father Tomislav. He argued with their priests. Said they had misinterpreted holy writ. When he was killed in battle they said it was the judgement of God.”

  Her voice rose in anger. “Their sermons are monstrous! The Táborites talk of nothing except death and damnation and the final judgement. If they ever took control of Bohemia, thousands would die or be driven into exile. They even talk of marching on Prague and purging it of unbelievers.”

  Such a purge, I suspected, would turn Prague into a mass grave. Another image of the corpses in the marketplace at Nemecky Brod flashed through my mind.

  “At last I decided to leave,” said Jana in a quieter tone, “Tábor is not a prison, and those who reject Táborite teachings are free to go. None of the people of Graz, not even my closest kin, offered to come with me. I was alone in the world.”

  “Did you meet an Englishman named Ralf at Tábor?” I asked, “he was my servant once.”

  Her wan face darkened. “Oh, yes. I knew Ralf Englis. He is no priest, and his grasp of Bohemian is a little clumsy, but they let him preach regardless. He is naturally cruel, I think, and wants to get as much blood on his hands as possible. Talking to him, listening to his speeches, made my skin crawl. I know of your past friendship. He told me a little about you.”

  “All to my credit, I hope,” I said drily. “So why did you come to find me after leaving Tábor?”

  “Because I needed a friend. Someone who might protect me. I remembered how you fought for us at Graz against the raiders. How you acted as scout on the journey to Prague, risking your life time and again on our behalf. You didn't have to. I thought you must be a good man.”

  A good man. God help us. “There's something else,” I said, “something you're not telling me.”

  She gently her hand over mine. “Is it so obvious, then?” she whispered, “I was never any good at hiding secrets.”

  My heart beat faster at her touch. “You're not a Hussite,” I said in a low voice, “you don't share any of their beliefs. In your heart, you remain a Catholic.”

  The shaft hit home. She swallowed, and her eyes moistened. “Yes. You're right. Jan Hus brought nothing but war and misery to my country. I think it would be better if he had never been born.”

  “He came to preach at my village once, when I was a child. I remember him very well. A small man, grubby and unshaven. Nothing to look at. But when he preached, his entire body shook with passion. There was something about his voice. People were spellbound by it. He frightened me. Still does. His spirit haunts Bohemia.”

  She looked at me timidly. “I thought perhaps you...you also...”

  “You thought I shared your lack of belief,” I said bluntly, “because I am a foreign sell-sword, and fight for pay rather than God. Mercenaries don't believe in anything except money. Isn't that so?”

  “You have told me your secret. Let me share mine. We understand each other. Back home in England, my mother's family was crippled by debts owed to the church. I hated the idea of Christ's ministers behaving like usurers, and never understood why they were allowed to live in grand palaces and eat off gold plate while the poor were starving. When I heard of the Hussites, and how they wanted to rid the church of corruption and take away all its earthly wealth, I was keen to join them. Theirs was a cause a man could be proud to fight for.”

  “Then I came to Bohemia and witnessed the reality of this great cause. In the past year I have fought alongside men who murder innocents and kill enemies after they have surrendered, all in the name of God. Lord Zizka is a good soldier. He turned a peasant rabble into the finest army in Christendom. It has been a privilege to serve under him. But he disgusts me. They all disgust me. Father Tomislav was right. The Hussites, just like the Catholics before them, have failed to understand the word of God.”

  “So what will you do?” she asked after a long silence, broken only by the faint rumble of Nicholas snoring in the next room.

  “Fight,” I replied, “fight on until Bohemia is either free or enslaved. I broke the terms of my last indenture. I won't break this one. Fight, and draw more men to my banner, and pile up as much wealth as I can. When I am rich, I can do as I please.”

  “Can I stay with you, at least for a little while?” she asked.

  “Of course,” I replied with a smile.

  I shouldn't have been so hasty. I was attracted to Jana, yet something about her disturbed me. She was tough, in her way – it took courage for a woman to make the journey from Tábor to Prague, alone, on foot – but also brittle. The loss of her young family, slaughtered by German blades, might have unbalanced her. Or perhaps the seed of madness was always in her brain, slowly waiting to fruit.

  There was little time to reconsider. Two days after her arrival Nicholas stumbled into my quarters with news of fresh trouble brewing, this time near Hradec Králové in the far eastern district of of Bohemia.

  “It's Lord Cenek, sir,” Nicholas said breathlessly, “he's raised his standard, and put himself at the head of a band of nobles. Together they have raised an army against Lord Zizka.”

  I bowed my head and made the sign of the cross, for all the good it would do.

  My worst fear had come to pass. Civil war.

  24.

  I had expected Cenek to show his hand sooner or later. Yet I overrated the man's abilities. His rebellion, when it came, was no carefully plotted affair, but the messy result of an idiotic quarrel.

  The whole affair might have easily been avoided. Cenek had a gift for making enemies, and got himself entangled in a violent row with two Bohemian knights, brothers named Bernard and Bartos of Valecov. More knights joined in on the side of the brothers, probably encouraged by Prince Korybut, who had no love for Cenek. The prince was on his way home to Lithuania by now, but still found time to dabble in intrigue.

  Zizka was the key to it all. He had made his home in the eastern part of Bohemia, surrounded by loyal followers who called themselves Orebites, after Mount Oreb in the Bible (my apologies, O Sultan, for the confusing number of factions in this tale. Your Majesty must blame the Hussites for their eternal infighting, and not the poor storyteller).

  The brothers Valecov were close friends and allies of Zizka. When he heard of how they were oppressed by Lord Cenek, their lands raided and their tenants robbed and slain by his soldiers, he flew to arms.

  I struggled to understa
nd Zizka's desire for conflict. Perhaps he was bored by months of inaction. The old war-dog was born to fight, and now he rushed into war against his former ally, at the expense of the peace they had both fought so hard, against such desperate odds, to win for their country.

  He sent a summons to Prague, ordering all loyal soldiers to muster at once and march to join him in the east. I was named among his captains in the letter he sent to the capital:

  “By my order Sir John Page alias Jan Englis, knight of England, is promoted to a captain of horse and foot. A hundred lancers and three companies of infantry are to be placed under his command.”

  “Lord Zizka trusts you,” said Jana as she helped me to arm. Nicholas, who usually performed this duty, glowered resentfully in the background.

  “He wants to trust me,” I corrected, adjusting the shoulder-straps of my breastplate, “his list of friends grows thin. If the reports are true, Lord Cenek had recruited a great many nobles to his banner.”

  “With the nobles come the smaller men,” said Nicholas, “men-at-arms, squires, tenants, servants, foresters and the like. Bohemia is divided against herself.”

  A stubborn woman, was how Ralf described Jana, and so it proved. Despite all my protests (quickly fading to pathetic entreaties) she refused to stay behind and keep house when I rode off to war.

  “Women in England might be content to stay at home while their menfolk risk all on the battlefield,” she said fiercely. “Bohemian women are made of harder stuff. I cut a German's throat in the fight at Graz, and am perfectly capable of wielding a mace, like the Táborite sisters.”

  There was no dissuading her. Jana marched happily with the infantry when my little army hurried east to meet Zizka. For once we didn't have to fight our way through snowdrifts and across roads made virtually impassable by thick layers of frost. It was April, and the snows had melted, leaving just a few traces glimmering like white crystals on the hilltops. Warm spring sunshine beat down on the Bohemian countryside, where the forests and hedgerows were just coming into bloom after long months of winter.

  I was grateful for the warmth beating on my back, yet had to fight off a sense of dread as we neared Hradec Králové. The district held evil memories for me. A few miles to the north lay the little village of Police, where the Silesians had committed a brutal massacre of the inhabitants. Those dead boys stacked in the village square still haunted my dreams. Sometimes they came alive and danced around me with hideous jerky motions, like clumsily operated puppets, flaunting their ghastly wounds as they sang:

  “Christ is worth all your sacrifices, He will pay you back an hundredfold,

  If you give up your life for Him you will have eternal life,

  Happy is he who believes this truth.

  The Lord commands you not to fear bodily harm...”

  Had these fine words been any comfort to those children, I wondered, when the Silesian knives cut into their naked bodies? Why had Christ not come to their aid? What reward could He possibly offer their souls in Heaven, that would make up for the unspeakable torments they had suffered on earth?

  Questions such as these made me uncomfortable. They opened up a range of horrifying possibilities. Perhaps God was absent from Bohemia, and from the world in general. Perhaps He didn't exist anywhere.

  These were the type of thoughts that led men to the stake. I deliberately suppressed them, and did my best to concentrate on the task in hand.

  A troop of Hussite outriders met us on the road west of Hradec Králové. “Lord Zizka sent us to find you,” said their officer, saluting me, “he is dug in at Horice, eight miles north-east of here.”

  “Where is the traitor Lord Cenek?” I asked.

  “Close. He advances from the north. We must hurry. The armies may already be engaged.”

  I ordered the column to turn northeast. Our cavalry pressed on, leaving the footsoldiers to follow up as quickly as possible. I was grateful to leave Jana behind, and prayed all would be over before she reached the battlefield.

  Our horses ate up the miles. Before noon we rode across a crest overlooking the wide sweep of the plateau near Horice, a village nestled among some brown fields half a mile to the east.

  Northeast of our position, Zizka's army was drawn up on the flank of a small hillside. Perched on the hill was a church with a spire, and the general had used the wall of the cemetery to guard his left flank. Sunlight glinted on the barrels of his field guns, set up behind the wall. In typical Zizka style, his centre and right were defended by lines of war-wagons. For a man with no eyes, he knew how to choose ground.

  There were maybe five thousand Hussites on the hillside. To the north, a great cloud of yellow dust heralded the advance of the rebel host. Lord Cenek moved fast. He enjoyed huge superiority in numbers and meant to win a quick victory, crushing Zizka before reinforcements could arrive.

  “Cenek has all his knights on foot,” I said to my officers, “see there – they form the centre, supported by their retinues. Lighter troops on the flanks, a few in reserve, archers and crossbowmen jogging ahead.”

  I could see or hear no rebel cannon. Perhaps Cenek had left his artillery in the rear, thinking he could swamp Zizka with numbers alone.

  Our own guns started to fire from the heights. They were handled expertly, and the storm of iron roundshot tore into the middle of the rebel infantry, smashing gory lanes through the packed ranks of knights and nobles and men-at-arms.

  I winced at the dreadful carnage. Steel bodies were pulped or blown high into the air. Body parts and severed limbs pattered like obscene rain upon the heads of their comrades. The rebels closed up and marched on remorselessly, banners waving, drums hammering and pipes playing, thousands of deep voices raised in a familiar shout:

  "Hrr na ně! Hrr na ně!"

  The war-cry of the Hussites, roared by our troops at Zatec and Kutna Hora and Nemecky Brod as they drove the enemy from the field, was now uttered against former friends and brothers-in-arms. The sick irony of it was enough to make me weep. All that glorious effort, all those victories won against incredible odds, fated to end in mutual destruction.

  Lord Cenek's skirmishers were driven away by the barrage, but the solid core of his army ploughed bravely on. They gained the foot of the steep hill and started to climb, three dense phalanxes of heavily armoured men on foot. Above their heads fluttered the standards of a score of Hussite nobles. The front ranks lowered their pole-arms as they advanced with heavy, inexorable tread, terrible and faceless behind the gleaming steel masks of their helms.

  I looked over my shoulder for any sign of our infantry. A smear of dust over the hills indicated they were still miles away. Much too far to have any influence on the battle. At least Jana might live through the day.

  So far the enemy had failed to spot us, poised on the southern edge of the field. “Sir,” said one of my officers, “when Lord Cenek's vanguard is engaged, I suggest we charge his right flank.”

  He pointed at the extreme edge of the enemy flank, where the rebel infantry marched in the wake of the vanguard. They were peasant-soldiers, veterans of the wars against Sigismund. Thousands of pikemen, clubmen, flailmen. Zizka's beloved children, now turned against him. Above the din of martial music and marching feet I heard the refrain of Ye Who Are Warriors of God. I could only wonder whose side God favoured here. Perhaps the Almighty fought against himself.

  The rebel drums pounded. Their trumpets screamed. We watched in anxious silence as the glittering ranks of Cenek's vanguard tramped to within a spear's length of the wagons. I spotted a burly figure on horseback at the summit of the hill, where the Hussite standards flew. The general himself. He rose in his stirrups and brandished his mace.

  “Now,” I whispered through gritted teeth, “it must be now.”

  The wall of the churchyard, protecting Zizka's left flank, suddenly vanished in a rolling cloud of white smoke and stabs of orange flame.

  Zizka had chosen his moment perfectly. His pipe-gunners, concealed behind the wall,
rose at his command to fire a single concentrated volley of bullets into the enemy. At such close range they could scarcely miss. His field guns, their muzzles angled downwards, switched from firing roundshot to canister.

  Cenek's forward ranks staggered under the avalanche of shot. Gaping holes appeared in their line. Their advance ground to a halt.

  “Again!” I shouted.

  There was no respite. While Zizka's gunners reloaded, his crossbows and pipe-guns inside the wagons unleashed a second storm of missiles. The bullets, capable of punching holes in the finest armour, ripped the orderly rebel lines to shreds. The slope in front of the wagons was littered with the broken corpses of Bohemian knights, watering the grass with their noble blood.

  Just over four minutes had passed since the Zizka gave the order to fire. Now there was a pause. Cenek's nobles, reeling from the shock, bravely tried to re-order their tattered lines and press forward again. His reserves, still bawling hymns, had come to a dead halt at the foot of the hill, stranded behind the vanguard.

  I chewed my lip. We, too, needed to pick our moment. The mass of rebels on the hill lurched forward again, their battered ranks all broken and jumbled up together, yet grimly determined to get within striking distance of the Hussites.

  “Fire!”

  Zizka's missile troops and artillery shot as one, a terrible, howling discharge that echoed inside my head like a thunderclap. For a moment the summit of the hill was wreathed in smoke, hiding both armies from view. When it cleared, the wreckage of Cenek's vanguard was strewn about the hill; banners torn to rags by flying shards of metal, scores of twitching, bullet-riddled bodies, hideously wounded men staggering about in a daze, arms blown off and faces ripped away.

  The phalanxes were torn to rags. Incredibly, some brave men still lumbered forward, or tried to rally around those rebel standards that still flew. Our gunners fired in disciplined relays, pouring volley after volley of shot into the decimated rebel host.