by Peter Darman
They rode fast, galloping along wet tracks turning to mud in the sleet. The going was firmer in the trees, the wind and sleet abating markedly to give them some respite. But then they would leave the shelter of pine and spruce to enter a meadow or ride beside a hill, to be again buffeted by an icy wind and sleet that struck any exposed flesh like hornet stings. Soon Ykintas’ face and hands were numb, notwithstanding his padded helmet and thick gloves. To compound his misery he was riding into the wind. He gritted his teeth and crouched lower but then smiled as he thought of the warm welcome the Kurs would give him. But why were they approaching from the east, it made no sense. Perhaps they had conquered Aukstaitija and his was the last kingdom still free from the murderous Duke Arturus. Useless thoughts.
He was leading his men along the base of a long, low hill, its slopes blanketed with alder and ash. There was a river to their left, around two hundred paces away, the ground between it and the hill becoming filled with waterlogged meadow grass as it narrowed. He suddenly pulled up his horse, those behind doing the same in a desperate effort to avoid colliding into their lord. Instinctively they continued forward to flank him, manoeuvring into two lines. Ykintas stared at the mass of warriors marching towards him: men wrapped in cloaks, heads bowed, shields slung on their backs with spears clutched tightly to their bodies. He saw no horsemen. No, that was incorrect. There were two at the head of the ragged column.
‘They do not look like Kurs, lord,’ said his bodyguard’s commander.
‘No,’ agreed Ykintas, ‘but there are many of them.’
But who were they? He decided to take a close look, spurring his horse forward towards the unknown invaders. These had now halted and formed into a shield wall of sorts, though it appeared more of a huddled mass. They certainly were not Kurs. The only riders among the enemy’s ranks had withdrawn behind locked shields and as he and his men drew near he identified the symbols on them: wolf, bear, stork and boar. He saw a tall, thin man wrapped in a cloak standing in front of the shield wall and spotted red hair when one of the figures on horseback pointed at him. The other figure pushed his horse through the warriors and galloped towards him, the red-haired individual following. He drew his sword and his men closed around him but then his jaw dropped open when he identified the redhead.
‘Morta?’
He sheathed his sword when he saw Mindaugas riding towards him.
‘Stay your weapons,’ he ordered his men, ‘they are friends.’
He was overcome with joy as his brother- and sister-in-law jumped from their horses and he climbed down from his saddle. The three threw their arms around each other to hug in relief and joy. Tears welled up in Ykintas’ eyes as he beheld the miracle before him.
‘How, why are you here?’ he uttered.
‘We came to fight by your side. I bring three thousand men to support you,’ said Mindaugas proudly.
‘You and they are most welcome,’ said Ykintas.
‘I bring a powerful ally, my brother,’ smiled Mindaugas, ‘the Kriviu Krivaitis.’
Ykintas’ eyes widened with surprise as the tall man with black hair and piercing blue eyes walked up, his bearing imperious, as he examined the leader of the Samogitians.
‘Greetings, Duke Ykintas.’
Ykintas bowed his head. ‘Dismount and pay homage to the Kriviu Krivaitis,’ he shouted to his men.
He and they knelt on the ground before the high priest. Mindaugas and Morta did the same as hundreds more also went down on one knee on the soft earth, the wind having dropped as a pale sun showed itself among the slate grey clouds overhead. It was still bitterly cold and the sleet was still falling as the Kriviu Krivaitis raised his arms aloft.
‘We thank you, your servants, great Perkunas, for guiding us safely to the land of Duke Ykintas. With your help and his we will rid the world of the heathen Kurs and throw back the detested Christians across the Dvina so they no longer pollute this blessed land. Bring forth winter, great Perkunas, so that we may prepare for your holy crusade next year. Hail Perkunas.’
Hundreds of voices joined his acclaim of the Heavenly Smith before rising to their feet and raising their weapons to the heavens. For Ykintas the Kurs suddenly appeared greatly diminished in size.
Chapter 7
Bardowick in Saxony had once been a prosperous city until Henry the Lion, one of Germany’s most famous warlords, had decided to raze it to the ground. In a gesture of piety he had given orders that no churches were to be destroyed as his soldiers swept through the streets, killing, looting and burning what they could not steal. That had been thirty-six years ago and though the wooden buildings and walls had been rebuilt Bardowick had never recovered its former status. Commerce was badly affected by the incessant wars that cursed Germany, including the recent conflict between the Danes and the north German nobles.
Of late the violence had abated somewhat due to King Valdemar being imprisoned by those German nobles and the failure of the king’s Danish vassals to free him, resulting in their defeat at the Battle of Mölln. That had been months ago and since then there had been a truce of sorts between the protagonists. The Pope, eager that the two most powerful alliances in northern Europe should no longer tear at each other’s throats, had lobbied hard for peace. In truth both sides had suffered significant losses in the conflict and were amenable to a peace treaty, as long as the terms were agreeable to both sides. The weeks of haggling with bishops acting as moderators had resulted in two armies descending on Bardowick, though happily for its impoverished residents they had not come to fight each other or sack the town but to ratify a treaty.
Count Henry shivered as he held his hands to the brazier.
‘It would have been preferable to have done all this when it was summer. Living in tents in November is not my idea of amusement.’
His brother Gunzelin rolled his eyes.
‘The treaty could not be signed until all the terms had been agreed by both sides, you know that. Besides, don’t you find the winter air bracing?’
‘Bracing? My bones feel as though they are wrapped in ice.’
‘That’s because you are old,’ Gunzelin chided him.
Henry snarled at his younger brother but in truth Henry, Count of Schwerin, ‘Henry the Black’, was feeling his age. He had just turned sixty and was growing tired of war. He had been the instigator of the German revolt against the Danes and had been vigorous in the campaign against Valdemar’s soldiers. But now he wanted only two things: an end to the war and to see the back of King Valdemar and his son. For nearly two years they had been confined to Dannenberg Castle, a stronghold belonging to his ally and friend the Duke of Saxony. Their confinement had been comfortable, though that had not stopped the pair whining constantly like cats. Henry had considered having both of them executed, an idea that horrified his allies. To his deep regret they persuaded him that a treaty with Valdemar was preferable to seeing his head mounted on a spike.
‘Let’s get this over with, then,’ Henry said to his brother. ‘Go and fetch our illustrious guests so we can be rid of them.’
Gunzelin strolled off towards the large pavilion where the king and his son were accommodated, guards in the livery of Schwerin flanking the entrance. Henry looked around at the muddy camp, groups of knights huddled round braziers and common soldiers sitting round campfires. There had been a sharp frost the night before that had turned the ground to stone. But now everyone’s boots were covered in mud as a result of hundreds of feet churning up the ground.
‘Miserable,’ Henry complained to himself.
‘First sign of madness, you know, talking to yourself.’
Henry turned to see Albert, Duke of Saxony, picking his way through the mud, his head wrapped in a fur-lined cap and a thick cloak encasing his body. Twenty years younger than the Count of Schwerin, he had a narrow face and a long nose that gave him the appearance of a scholar rather than a soldier. But in battle he was fearless and Henry was glad to have him on his side. The younger man held out his hands
to the glowing coals.
‘Do you think Valdemar will abide by the treaty we have spent weeks agreeing?’
‘Of course not,’ said Henry, ‘he’s a king and kings can make and break treaties on a whim.’
‘Then why are we here, my friend?’
Henry smiled cunningly. ‘Because, my dear duke, the treaty will show to the whole world that Danish power has been emasculated in northern Germany.’
Albert looked uncomfortable but knew that Henry was correct. Much time and consideration was given to the selection of a place for the two sides to meet when concluding a peace treaty. Each side needed to avoid any appearance of weakness or subordination. As a consequence parties usually met on an island in a river, at the mid-point on a bridge or even in a boat. Bardowick had been selected because it was in Saxony and only forty miles southwest of Schwerin Castle itself. The Danes had been forced to cross into the lands of their enemies, a deliberate snub on the part of Count Henry. He frowned when he heard the pealing of the city’s bells.
‘They have started early.’
‘It is a great honour for the city authorities to host the peace treaty,’ Albert told him.
To prevent widespread looting in the city the soldiery of both sides had been ordered to stay outside the walls, though this did not prevent people exiting the city to try their hand at making money. Each day a steady stream of hawkers, whores, fortune tellers, jugglers, pickpockets and priests came from Bardowick to try to trade with, steal from, preach to or entertain the soldiers of both sides. The city’s traders and less desirable elements were doing a roaring business, another reason Henry suspected the city authorities ordered the bells to be rung.
The count’s squire brought his master and the Duke of Saxony silver cups of warmed wine as the pair observed Gunzelin coming from Valdemar’s pavilion in the company of the king and his son.
‘At least your wine cellar at Dannenberg will have a chance to replenish itself now the king and his bastard prince are leaving, my lord,’ remarked Henry caustically.
‘A small price to pay for peace,’ said Albert.
King Valdemar had a narrow face and since his imprisonment it had worn a morose countenance that made him look older than his fifty-five years of age. But today the royal visage had a cheerful appearance. Freedom was close now; he could almost taste it. Ignoring Count Henry and the Duke of Saxony, he walked with his son to where squires held horses for them both. Behind them sat half a dozen of Count Henry’s knights, their blue surcoats, shields and the caparisons over their horses displaying the yellow griffin of Schwerin.
‘Bring me my horse,’ Henry barked to his squire.
The Duke of Saxony finished his wine and took his leave, tramping through the mud back to where his horsemen and foot soldiers were camped. Half an hour later he and Henry were riding at the head of their knights in the company of Valdemar and his son, both of whom maintained a stony royal silence as they headed to the city’s western gates. Ahead of the mounted party walked the man who had helped to broker the peace treaty: Archbishop Gebhard of Bremen. The portly Gebhard liked to portray himself as a man of piety and an upholder of canon law. He did this by being able to raise thousands of soldiers that answered to him alone thanks to the revenues raised from the territories he controlled, which were all the lands between the lower River Weser and the lower River Elbe. Behind the archbishop walked two bishops, six priests and the same number of monks. Then came Count Henry, Gunzelin and the Duke of Saxony, accompanied by Valdemar and his son, Valdemar the Young.
Count Henry was bored to distraction as the ridiculous ceremony was played out. The Archbishop of Bremen and his equally portly counterpart, Andrew, Archbishop of Lund, had worked out the details of the ceremony, leaving nothing to chance. The Germans were to enter the city via the western gates, the Danes by the eastern gates. Both parties were to have exactly the same number of mounted knights, a condition which also applied to trumpeters, scribes and churchmen. Two documents, on which the minutiae of the treaty’s clauses were listed, had been produced and they were identical. Seals would be applied to the treaty at the city’s merchant hall positioned in the exact centre of Bardowick. To Count Henry the ritual was a form of torture. The only bright spot was the agreement between the two sides pertaining to the city authorities or populace violating the sanctity of the occasion and threatening or using violence against either party. If such a thing occurred both armies were free to storm the city and put its inhabitants to the sword. Sadly the good people of Bardowick cheered and waved as the two mounted groups made their way to the merchant hall.
By the time each of the main protagonists had applied their seals to the treaties Count Henry had a headache, made worse by the incessant pealing of bells from every church in the city. He closed his eyes and prayed that the citizens would try to storm the hall so he could draw his sword and die a happy man. But instead he was tormented by the archbishops’ interminable prayers and salutations, and dismayed by the politeness that broke out between former enemies. Even Valdemar smiled, though not at him, and thanked the Duke of Saxony for his manners and hospitality during his confinement.
‘He sounds like a woman thanking a midwife for delivering her child,’ whispered Gunzelin.
‘Pray God that is the last we have seen of King Valdemar and his impious son,’ replied Henry.
‘You won’t be seeing them again, they will be too busy raising their freedom money.’
Henry grunted and stared at the two copies of the treaty that were being carefully placed in leather carrying cases for shipment to the capitals of the two archbishoprics: Bremen and Lund. To buy his freedom Valdemar had agreed to pay Henry and his allies forty-five thousand silver marks, a truly staggering sum. Each mark consisted of eight ounces of solid silver and Henry doubted there was such a quantity of the metal in all Christendom. Normally Valdemar would have plundered his German domains to pay such a sum but the other clauses of the treaty forced him to renounce his claims on Schwerin and Holstein, to renounce his overlordship of all German territories, to grant the cities of northern Germany complete freedom of trade and, finally, to renounce his right of revenge.
On his journey to the eastern portal of the city Valdemar no longer wore a smile, shouting to the Archbishop of Lund to either mount a horse or get out of his way. Now that the ritual was over the archbishop, who had been enjoying the accolade of the crowd, duly mounted a horse so he could ride beside his liege lord.
‘The whole of Denmark is beside itself with excitement in anticipation of your return, majesty,’ he told Valdemar.
‘How healthy is the royal treasury?’ Valdemar asked.
‘It was very healthy, majesty, but regrettably the loss of your German domains plus the large amount of silver we are paying Count Henry will empty it, I fear.’
Valdemar used his spurs to quicken the pace of his horse.
‘I am surprised, archbishop, that you give credence to the demands of rebels.’
‘Rebels, majesty?’
Valdemar closed his eyes and breathed in the winter air as he rode from Bardowick towards the Danish camp, at last a free man.
‘What else would you call those who rise up against their sovereign lord, archbishop? Count Henry, the Duke of Saxony and their supporters are rebels and heretics who have raised their swords against their king. Was I not appointed by God?’
‘Yes, majesty.’
‘Then I would be failing in my duty to Him if I did not take up the sword against His enemies. I have no intention of adhering to the traitorous document I was forced to submit to so you have no need to worry about my treasury. I will avenge Mölln and afterwards have Count Henry and his allies executed.’
The king’s humour had not improved by the time he reached his stronghold of Dronningholm Castle, despite the thousands of Danes who lined the route, waving and cheering the return of their ruler. Perhaps it was because he had been frequently lashed by winter sleet and rain on his journey, or possibly he fo
und the company of the Archbishop of Lund tiresome, but whatever the cause by the time he and his son had reached the castle Valdemar’s mood was as black as the clouds in the sky. He refused to see his children, his advisers and anyone else as he locked the doors of his bedchamber and let rage embrace him.
The next morning it had burnt itself out, due to the fact that the archbishop had sent the king’s mistress, the Lady Helena, to his bedroom the previous evening. The blonde-haired, blue-eyed Swedish beauty was a landowner in her own right and had become involved with the king when she had visited Roskilde to petition him regarding the return of her family’s ancient lands that had been seized by a Danish lord. Valdemar returned the lands to her family but kept Helena as his mistress. Queen Berengaria, the raven-haired Portuguese woman whom everyone had feared and hated, had been dead four years and such was the relief that noble and commoner alike felt at her passing that no one objected to Helena acting like a queen. Whereas Berengaria had been cold hearted, callous and vindictive, Helena was generous, kind and affable. She should have gone back to Sweden when the king and his eldest son were imprisoned but the king’s courtiers and priests petitioned Archbishop Andrew to let her stay, if only so she could care for the king’s other four children: Eric, Sophie, Abel and Christopher. The archbishop had agreed, which he was extremely grateful for the night Valdemar returned home.
The next morning Valdemar convened a meeting of his advisers in a small, warm room by the side of the throne room. Unusually Helena was present and looked tired, no doubt having been ‘entertaining’ the king all through the night. Valdemar himself looked invigorated and, more importantly, calm. Servants wearing yellow tunics with motifs depicting three blue lions surrounded by red hearts served wine and kept the fire burning as the king laid a hand on the arm of his mistress and smiled at her. Valdemar the Young sat at the opposite end of the table to the king.