“All barbarians have beards. Why can’t they have beards?”
“They’re very . . . disadvantageous when you’re fighting. The Turks all have beards. Mustafa ibn Ismail has a beard. A lovely beard, too. I grew one like it once.”
“I thought—”
“I wanted to impersonate him. We looked like twins, with the beards.”
“János, will you beat them?”
“The Turks?”
She looked up at him. His face lost the twist his smile gave it. He looked at the cannon on the walls.
“Why,” he said, “that‘s why I married you, sweet. I sort of hope your nephews will beat the Turks and I won’t have to do it all by myself.”
“Humph. You’d think you were the King of Hungary.”
“I’m not. The King’s a fool. Anyone who goes near Buda is a fool, for that matter. They’re all mad up there. That’s why my commander’s Louis Malencz.”
“And it should be you.”
“Yes.”
“You’re certainly modest.”
“He’s more help to the Turks than he is to me. When — if he weren’t involved I might be able to beat the Turks in three or four years.”
“I really don’t understand this war.”
“Nobody expects you to. I don’t understand it, either. You really don’t want to go to bed with me, do you?”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Of course you did. You’ve been acting like a nun about to be raped since we left Vienna.”
“I have not. I’m just tired, that’s all. And I do want to know what this damned little war is all about.”
“You can’t do this forever. However much both of us might regret it, we are married.”
“Please, János.”
He got up. “Well, I suppose I could sleep next door. Tonight.” He went to his chest and opened it.
She looked out the window. The villagers were lighting fires down by the stream. She wondered if they were celebrating the marriage of their lord. “János,” she said, “what do those fires mean?”
He leapt across the room to the window. “God damn them to hell,” he said. He leaned out the window and shouted, “Everybody out! Arpád!”
“What’s wrong?”
He turned. “Stay in here. The Turks are burning the village.”
Rakóssy left Denis inside Hart and led all his men down toward the village. There was a strange, numb silence above the pounding of the horses’ hoofs. The flames from the village were leaping and waving in the wind.
The Turks fled at the first sight of the Magyars. Rakóssy on the black mare veered away from his band and raced to head them off before they could stampede the herds by the stream. Half the Magyar band galloped after him. The Turks raced in a ragged line, shouting insults. Rakóssy drove his men straight at them. For a moment there was close, muddled fighting.
Rakóssy pulled out of the fighting and drew back, watching. He waved the other group of Magyars on. The Turks forced this band backward, trying to outflank them. There were only about seventy-five Turks. Rakóssy shouted and half of the men in the band that was fighting made a concerted charge against the Turkish left flank. The Turks saw that the other fifty Magyars were almost on them. They raced away. Rakóssy swore at his men. They chased the Turks along the stream.
The Turks led them through the marshy ground by the lake. The black mare stretched out. Rakóssy was six or seven lengths ahead of his own men by the time they were back on solid ground. He drew the mare down slightly. The Turks whirled and charged back, trying to cut off the left quarter of the Magyars. Rakóssy hauled the mare around and was surrounded by Turks.
“Rakós’, Rakós’,” a Turk shouted. “Get him for me, my children!” He laughed.
Rakóssy flung off one Turk and ducked under a scimitar. His men were all around him, hammering at the Turks. Rakóssy pulled the mare back into his own lines.
“Mustafa!” he shouted.
That laugh rang out again. Rakóssy drove the hilt of his sword into a Turk’s ribs. Both sides were screaming insults. The darkness kept them from fighting well. The smell of sweat and close quarters made them choke.
A Turk on a tall horse charged Rakóssy. They fought clumsily for a moment. Rakóssy grabbed the man by the beard and dragged him off his horse. The Turk howled, jerked free, and dodged under the mare’s belly. She reared. Rakóssy felt her lose her balance. He jumped free. His outstretched arms slid over a horse’s sticky rump. He landed on his back and looked up at a horse’s lathered belly. A hoof smashed into his side. He lurched up, caught a Magyar stirrup, and clung to it.
“Get out of here, my children.”
Mustafa laughed again. The Turks retreated. Arpád shouted, “Hold, you dogs’ dirt. Hold!”
Rakóssy knelt, his fingers wrapped around the stirrup. His side ached. Arpád bent over him.
“Ribs,” Rakóssy said. “God damn it.”
Arpád hoisted him up. Rakóssy said, “Where’s my mare?”
“There.”
The mare was trotting beside another horse, shaking her head. She was not limping.
“Get the villagers up into the castle,” Rakóssy said. “We’ll never get that fire out.”
He slid into his own saddle. The pain drove through his side. He clamped his arm over his ribs. “I’m going back. Stay here until you’re sure everything is taken care of.”
“Yes, sir.”
He rode alone up to the castle. He could barely breathe. Denis held the mare while he dismounted.
“I broke every rib in my side,” Rakóssy said.
Denis and Catharine helped him up to his room. Denis took off his shirt and Catharine sent him away. She washed Rakóssy’s side. “You’re going to have a lovely bruise there, my dear,” she said.
“That was Mustafa. I heard him.”
“We couldn’t hear anything.”
“How much of the village was burned?”
“Practically everything.”
“Ouch.”
“This will hurt even more. Sit up.”
He sat up, groaned, and started to lie down again. She forced him upright and wound a bandage around his chest. “I was frightened,” she said.
“Not for me, I hope.”
“I have a weak heart.”
“Thank you.”
“Do you want some wine?”
“The ministering angel. You always seem to prefer me when I’m helpless.”
She went around the room pinching out the candles.
He shut his eyes. “You call me ‘my dear.’ I find it very touching.”
“Touching.” She went to the head of the bed and put out the candle. “Good night. My dear. Where am I to sleep, by the way?”
“Right here.”
“The Devil and the ministering angel in one bed?”
“You’ve got me so cinched up every move I make kills me, so you’re perfectly safe.”
“All right. I’m tired.”
She went away from the bed. Rakóssy watched her in the dim light. He thought she would make a fuss about getting undressed, but she did not. She took off her clothes, piled them on the chair, and climbed into bed. She lay down, rolled over once, and sighed. From her breathing, he knew that she was asleep right away.
“Probably it was a trap,” Kamal said.
“No.” Mustafa shook his head. “No. He was gone, and for a long time. But no one in Hungary knew of it. Your informant, this Gypsy. Did he say how he knew that Rakóssy was not in Hart?”
“He saw him just this side of the Danube.” Kamal shrugged. “At any rate, Rakóssy is back, and the Gypsy will serve us no more; his king found out about it and was angry. He brought us that news to defy his king.”
“It’s just as well,” Mustafa said. “The Gypsies are Rakóssy’s good and faithful servants and it is rarely useful to . . . patronize turncoats. The raid was rather successful anyway.”
Kamal opened his eyes wider. “My lord, I doubt my ears.
”
Mustafa smiled, a quick flash of teeth in his impeccable beard. “He can be hurt. He was nearly killed. His life is not enchanted. Ah, Kamal, the war is safe again, the Devil is fled home to Hell, and we alone inhabit the earth. Do you understand?”
“I usually don’t when you’re in this mood.”
Mustafa stroked his beard. “Of course not. He was nearly killed. That balances the disappearance into thin air of last summer.”
Kamal smiled. He watched Mustafa preen himself. Kamal thought, This past season has been the biggest failure since we came into these mountains. But look at him. It was time to spring the last tidbit of information, the delicious news the Gypsy had mentioned in passing, useless but titillating.
“Rakóssy is founding a dynasty,” he said.
Mustafa turned a fond eye on Kamal. “Rakóssy is a scion, my child. A son of dynasties. He could no more be a founder than I, the son of Ismail the son of Mehmet the son of . . . and so forth. A comparison of our genealogies might prove interesting, similar, like our fates. Except that I, unhappily, am unwed, denied such comforts, and he has taken to board and bed and bosom a daughter of the King of Aragon.”
Kamal stared at him. Mustafa was combing his beard, finding an acute interest in each particular hair. Kamal said, “You amaze me, my lord.”
Mustafa gestured neatly. “I pay attention to such things as dynasties more than is the wont of such as I. You recall that Harun my brother returned from Constantinople yesterday.”
“Yes.”
“He brought general news to us, of the well-being of the Sultan, may Allah bless his life, and of the power of the realm. And he brought me a special summons. I go to Constantinople in a month. Harun will go with me.”
“Am I to be left in command of Cliff’s Eye?”
Mustafa paused. Kamal watched the bright black eyes leap back and forth.
“Yes,” Mustafa said. “As for Rakóssy’s marriage to the Emperor’s aunt, find another informant and discover what you can about her.” He turned a blissful smile on Kamal. “I know that you will, in your infinite resources, learn all. Temper your might with caution and your mind with humility, and who can stand before you?”
“My lord,” Kamal said. He kept his voice neutral.
Mustafa turned away again, adjusted himself in the chair, and appeared to ponder.
Kamal said, “Another raid, perhaps?”
Mustafa shook his head. “No.” He blew out his cheeks and smiled again, not looking at Kamal. “No, I think that the next few weeks, plus the winter, should be a time for rest, for quiet, for meditation on the lessons of the past. Besides, we don’t have the men or the supplies. The bombard isn’t fixed yet.”
“And Rakóssy’s cannon?”
“Are no concern of ours, at the moment. Nor Rakóssy’s bride, save that I would know more of her. Nor Rakóssy’s ambitions. Leave me.” He glanced out the window. “It’s very nearly time for prayer.”
“My lord.” Kamal bowed himself out.
Mustafa thought briefly of the Gypsy, whom he had questioned privately after Kamal had finished with him. He remembered the look on Kamal’s face when Mustafa revealed the he knew of Rakóssy’s marriage. The memory wiped away any temptation he might have had to inform Kamal of his own conversation with the Gypsy.
He steepled his fingers and blew lightly on his fingertips. Rakóssy’s ambitions. He had thought for a long time that Rakóssy was involved in some great plot to . . . But he had expected nothing quite so magnificent, so complex and delicate, so perfectly delightful. It proved once again Mustafa’s fondest belief, that a clever plot, well conceived and strictly executed, was more advantageous than simple direct action. Rakóssy could not know how beautiful his timing was.
The woman, the woman . . . She was the master stroke. An Imperial bride, a new voice, a stranger seen but not met, refreshing after five years of the same people. He wondered how he could turn all this to his own uses. He was a hot-blooded man, Rakóssy. Hot-blooded, black-hearted, and cold in his mind, a nice balance of humors. How to tip the balance? He was a fragile thing, Rakóssy. So much of his success depended upon his . . . The cloud of superstitions and rumors and half-beliefs and terrors that surrounded him . . .
“La ilaha il-Allah; Mohammed-un rasulu-llah.”
Mustafa rose and washed his hands and feet and face. He went to the southern corner of the room and knelt to pray.
Alexander said, “This came while you were gone. I meant to give it to you yesterday, but I forgot. Special messenger it came by, in a fancy tabard and everything. With a baton, too.” He held out the packet.
Rakóssy took it and turned it over. It was sealed with the Seal of Saint Stephen. He glanced at Denis and put the packet into his doublet.
“Shall I read it?” Denis said.
“No. I know what’s in it.”
He went up on the walls and watched the people rebuilding the village. He sniffed. The air had a sting of snow in it. There was some light snow already on the rock of the mountains, above the timberline.
“Good enough,” he said. In a few weeks, at the most a month, the snow would block passage through the mountains, ending the raiding season. In a little more than a month travel over the plain would be almost impossible except by sleigh.
“It’s from the King, isn’t it?” Denis said.
“It’s the King’s seal.”
“You might as well read it.”
“No.”
Denis grinned. “I always wondered what a summons to the Council looked like.”
“ ‘János Rakóssy, son of Alexander son of Stepan, is ordered to Buda to stand trial before his peers on a charge of high treason.’ ”
“And János Rakóssy does not intend to go.”
Rakóssy said, “I can’t go until next spring, and by the middle of next spring this whole thing will probably be over and done.”
“Is there time for another raid?”
Rakóssy shook his head. “The snow will fall soon. It’s no fun to be caught in a snowstorm in the mountains.”
“I wanted to go.”
Rakóssy looked at him.
“I did,” Denis said.
Rakóssy turned back. “Not this year.”
“That’s too bad.”
“Gotten over your crush on Catharine, or is this your way of dying gallantly for unrequited love?”
“Can’t you ever take anything the way it’s meant?”
“What — a peace treaty? You’ll go raiding and I won’t push you around?”
Denis looked down toward the village, biting his lip.
Rakóssy pushed himself away from the wall. “Prove it, little brother,” he said. “Prove it.” He walked away, down the ramparts.
Catharine was sitting with Mari on the kitchen steps, showing her the alphabet. Rakóssy stopped beside them and looked down.
Mari lifted her face, laughing. “My lady says I can go with you to Vrath for Christmas Feast,” she said. “Can I?”
“We’re not going this year.”
Mari’s face drooped. Catharine said, “Oh, why not?”
He stamped by them into the kitchen. “Because I don’t enjoy being arrested,” he said. He shouted at Anna. They listened to him rant around the kitchen. Mari said, “Oh, he’s in a mood. He’ll be impossible for a while.”
“What’s the matter?”
“He’s fretting over something. The best thing to do is say, ‘Yes, Jansci, No Jansci, May I bring you anything, Jansci?’ and go off quietly and forget him for a while. He’s got a terrible temper.”
“I like the name János better than Jansci.”
“Everybody calls him Jansci behind his back. His mother did.”
“His mother sounds like an unusual woman.”
“I never knew her. They tell some stories about her would make your blood run cold. How she would go for days without saying a word, and take him when he was barely old enough to walk out to gallop around the mountains, and they�
�d be gone for days. They say when she died he didn’t even cry.”
“I can’t imagine him crying.”
“Stop talking about me,” Rakóssy said over their heads.
They looked at each other. “Yes, Jansci,” they said, in unison, and laughed. He swore and they heard him tramping off through the kitchen. A door slammed.
“He knows some words I’d never even imagined before,” Mari said. “Arpád says that he knows every curse that was ever invented.”
“He certainly does. In several languages. The young men at the court in Vienna used to follow him around to learn the new ones in German.”
“What was it like? What did they wear? Was it beautiful?”
“Yes,” Catharine said. “It was beautiful. It was the most beautiful, charming, merry place in the whole world.”
* * *
Rakóssy, Catharine and Denis ate supper together in the great hall that night. Denis joined Catharine in bright, witty conversation, and Catharine guided the talk carefully to innocent topics. Rakóssy maintained an absolute silence. Catharine told the servants to take away the dishes, and Rakóssy showed signs of wanting to leave.
Catharine said, “Denis, you remember Miguel de Guzman, don’t you? From Vienna?”
“Oh, yes. We had a long discussion about Lauter.”
“Luther,” Rakóssy said.
“Anyway, the heretic. He says that Luther is promising all the northern German lords that he’ll preach submission to the state if they’ll support him.”
Rakóssy shrugged. “Who needs a new religion for that? I get plenty of submission from my people right now.”
“I wasn’t implying—”
“Sorry. You’ve been trying so hard to be . . . helpful lately, I thought perhaps you’d discovered a new way to beat the Turks. Why don’t you suggest that we accept Islam? It’s the same thing. Submission.”
“János, I was only—”
“Being helpful, little brother. Being helpful.”
Denis stood up. “Good evening, Catharine.” He marched out of the hall. The door slammed behind him.
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