Master of Mayhem

by Peter Darman

  ‘They wouldn’t run away, surely?’ said Jaan dejectedly. ‘I have been practising hard during Sergeant Werner’s lessons, master.’

  Conrad knew where this was leading. ‘I’m glad to hear it, Jaan. In a few more years you will be ready to take your place in the battle line. But not until then and not today.’

  He dug his spurs into his horse’s side and cantered away, leaving a disappointed teenage boy behind.

  The army was stirring now, squires and pages running around preparing their masters’ destriers, weapons and armour. Sergeants and captains were bellowing orders to companies of mercenary crossbowmen and spearmen. Trumpets and drums were sounding assembly for the Count of Lauenburg’s retainers. And around the tent of the grand master dozens of brother knights and two hundred and fifty sergeants were awaiting orders from their commander.

  Volquin was dismounting from his horse when Conrad arrived at the bishop’s pavilion, novices taking his mount as the grand master called him over.

  ‘Looks like the Kurs have accepted our invitation, Conrad. A party of scouts ran into a group of them at the foot of a hill they appear to have occupied.’

  ‘How far away, grand master?’

  ‘A mile west of here by all accounts.’

  The bishop was ecstatically happy. ‘This is the day we have waited for, my lords,’ he stated as the army’s commanders stood before him, ‘the day we avenge those innocents killed by the Kurs at Riga and others who have fallen to their godless weapons. We are the Lord’s avengers.’

  ‘Praise Him!’ bellowed Timothy, causing Count Albert and Grand Master Volquin to frown and Glueck to smirk.

  ‘Praise Him indeed,’ said the bishop. ‘The Count of Lauenburg will form our right wing out of respect for his devotion to the Holy Church.’

  ‘It will be my honour, lord bishop,’ stated the duke, bowing his head to the prelate.

  ‘Conrad,’ continued the bishop, ‘your army will form our left wing supported by Sir Richard, if that is agreeable to your grace.’

  Sir Richard slapped Conrad on the back. ‘Most agreeable, lord bishop.’

  The bishop walked forward and grabbed the arms of Fricis. ‘Valiant king whose warriors are the backbone of Livonia, I ask you to lead all the foot that will stand in the centre of our battle line.’

  Glueck looked most unhappy at being placed under the command of a Liv but Fricis was glad to accept the charge and embraced the bishop. No one gave any thought to Timothy the Cook who appeared deliriously happy that he and his followers were about to smite the heathens.

  Conrad wondered if the heathens would lose patience and drift away as the army’s contingents took an age to get organised and on the move. Every tenth man in the Army of the Wolf was left behind to safeguard the ponies, carts and supplies in case a Kur attack was mounted on the camp, a thought that did not occur to the crusaders from Germany who left no one to guard the hundreds of non-combatants left behind. Conrad thus commanded just over seven hundred men, his numbers augmented by Sir Richard’s crossbowmen and the English lord’s horsemen.

  He rode to the battlefield, as did Hans and Anton, in the company of Sir Richard, his squire and knights. When they reached the place where the Kurs had been sighted it was mid-morning and the sun had burnt away any traces of mist to leave a clear, sunny day. There was no wind and the air was already heavy with the scent of meadow grass. Conrad and his friends rode to take a close look at the Kurs who formed a thin line near the summit of the hill immediately ahead of where the crusader army was deploying. The hill was not high, its slope was gentle and just below its summit began a forest of pine.

  The hill was wide, perhaps half a mile in extent, sloping down to a narrow valley that ran between it and another hill that was wholly covered in trees. And beyond these hills were more rises, part of the Kandava Hills that Master Ortwin had spoken of.

  ‘They appear few in number,’ observed Hans.

  ‘And yet show no alarm at our obvious superiority in numbers,’ observed Sir Richard as the Count of Lauenburg’s knights and foot soldiers made a leisurely appearance and began to deploy on the right flank. The Army of the Wolf was already in position on the left, though as the Kurs were making no hostile moves its members were sitting or lying on the ground to conserve their strength for the day ahead.

  The crusader army numbered nine and a half thousand men, though not all of them were soldiers as three thousand were the followers of Timothy the Cook. They rushed to the battlefield, the Bishop himself having to ride forward to order their leader not to immediately attack the black mass on the hill in front of the pines that was growing in size by the hour. On the right the crusader horsemen, the warhorses of the knights covered in brightly covered caparisons, massed around the banners of Lauenburg, the Sword Brothers, Bremen and the Buxhoeveden family. When the sun was at its mid-point over seventeen hundred horsemen were concentrated on the army’s right flank.

  Next to them stood the five hundred soldiers of the Livonian Militia, among them and conspicuous on his magnificent warhorse the portly Magnus Glueck. To the militia’s left stood a thousand mercenary foot paid for by the burgomasters of Holstein, Rostock, Mecklenburg and Hamburg. These men were equipped with helmets, shields, a mixture of mail armour and gambesons and spears and swords.

  Next in the battle line stood the rabble of Timothy the Cook. The centre left of the army comprised Fricis’ Livs, their king having decided he would rather be closer to the Kurs and the Army of the Wolf than the fanatics of Timothy the Cook.

  There was actually a second line of foot soldiers: the spearmen and crossbowmen of the Sword Brothers and Count of Lauenburg respectively. Everyone knew that the followers of Timothy the Cook were worthless and so the count, Grand Master Volquin and the Bishop of Riga had come up with a simple battle plan to defeat the Kurs that satisfied their knights’ honour and also minimised the participation of Timothy the Cook. The crossbowmen would march forward with their spearmen protectors to shoot at the Kurs, after which the knights would charge and put to the sword any of the enemy that had survived the hail of crossbow bolts. For no pagans would be able to withstand a wall of horseflesh, mailed Christian knights riding knee to knee with lances couched. North Germany’s knights and the horsemen of the Sword Brothers would win the battle; the rest of the army would be reduced to the role of witnesses to the slaughter of the heathens.

  But it was also a godly army and so, after all its contingents had at last been marshalled into position, Bishop Albert ordered prayers to be said. Monks and priests among the soldiery commanded everyone to kneel as they called on the Lord to give the army victory. Every knight, lesser knight and Sword Brother dismounted, knelt on the grass and bowed their heads as their priests implored God to turn their swords into scythes that would reap a harvest of pagan souls.

  And then hundreds of Kur archers ran forward, pulled back their bowstrings and loosed volley after volley at the Christian army deep in prayer.

  Wearing only boots, tunics and leggings the archers were able to spring forward, bows in hand, to two hundred paces in front of the Kur line. They concentrated their volleys against the crusader horsemen, volleys of arrows arching into the sky to fall among the dismounted riders. The iron-tipped missiles did not pierce the thick caparisons of the destriers but they did wound the uncovered horses of the lesser knights, causing terrified and injured horses to bolt away from the arrows. Some horses collided with those nearby and within minutes the right flank had been reduced to a mass of panicking horses. The caparison-covered warhorses, used to the sounds and sights of battle, were easier to control but even these great beasts became skittish as Kur arrows continued to fall among them. Knights were also struck and injured as they had all removed their helmets to pray. But if what was happening on the right was disconcerting what happened next in the centre prompted chaos.

  For Timothy the Cook led his followers forward.

  It was a wild rush to get to grips with the archers that were torment
ing the knights on the right. Timothy raised his spit, shouted something and began running up the gently sloping grassy slope. Seconds later there was a great cheer and his fanatics followed him. The Kur archers were perhaps four hundred paces away and temptingly close. Timothy’s men were lightly armed or not armed at all and so they moved quickly, and for half a minute it appeared that they might reach the archers. But the Kurs were also unencumbered by armour, shields or helmets and so they were able to turn tail and sprint back to their lines. They passed through the ranks of the spearmen who locked shields and levelled their lances just before the Christian wave hit them.

  There was a sickening grinding sound as hundreds of men flung themselves at the Kur shield wall, which momentarily buckled under the strain. Timothy was in the forefront of the attack, hurling abuse at the Kurs as he swung his cooking spit at the heathens. He killed one man with a blow that split his helmet, screaming in triumph as he barged his way through the Kur front rank. It was the last sound he made as Kurs in the second rank thrust their spears into his bulging belly. The cook turned prophet stood, defiant, as more spear blades were driven into his chest, belly, groin and neck and then collapsed and disappeared from view, and history.

  Horn blasts sounded from the rear of the Kur ranks and those in front began forcing their way through the fanatics, smashing with their oblong shields and ramming their steel rims into the ground before thrusting their spears forward. The broad spear blades were stabbed over the shields and pierced flesh with every strike: chests, necks and faces. Timothy’s followers suddenly turned from avenging angels into cowering sheep as they met the brutal realities of battle.

  Most of Timothy’s followers had been persecuted villagers who had thronged to a man they believed was beloved of God. They had rallied to a man who had offered them sanctuary from the marauding mercenary bands that plagued Germany. They had taken ship to Livonia because the Buxhoeveden family had supplied them with large amounts of food for the journey. Riga had also fed them when they arrived and supplied more rations for the campaign in Lithuania. For people who had always existed on the edge of starvation Livonia was indeed the land of milk and honey. But they had been like the fatted calf: readied for slaughter.

  On the other side was a man who had a natural instinct for battle, who could see events beyond the horror, chaos and seemingly uncontrolled drama that was close-quarter combat. Lamekins, seated on his horse at the treeline, observed the discomfiture of the Christian horsemen, the wild charge of some of their foot soldiers and the ease with which his soldiers had repulsed them. Arturus, for the moment not present, would perhaps have counselled caution, but the prince’s instincts were screaming at him to seize the moment and so he did.

  He saw the crusader foot soldiers, who appeared woefully ill-equipped, stagger back down the slope, those that had not been killed by his medium foot. He issued orders that the Kurs were to follow at speed. There was a shrill blast of horns and five thousand warriors surged forward. Lamekins ordered the archers to divert to the left to shoot more arrows at the crusader horsemen, the missile troops sprinting forward in the wake of the Kur medium foot to once more torment the knights and their horses. Then he turned and ordered his reserve – three thousand heavy foot armed with the fearsome two-handed broadaxes – to attack the crusader horsemen. It was a move that should have led to a Kur disaster that would see the destruction of Arturus’ army and the subjugation of his homeland.

  But history remembered it differently.

  ‘Prepare to advance,’ Conrad said to Tonis beside him, ‘we will advance and then wheel right to lend our support to the centre.’

  He, the rest of the Army of the Wolf and Fricis’ Livs to their right had had a glorious view of events thus far. They had seen the archers descend the hill to shoot their arrows and had been witnesses to the absurd attack of Timothy the Cook’s followers. Now the Kurs were flooding down the slope and Conrad was determined to assist the crusader centre that would bear the full brunt of the enemy attack. The horsemen on the right flank would no doubt also attack the Kurs who had foolishly left their strong position on the hill. Horns were sounding among the ranks of the Livs, indicating that Fricis had the same idea. The Kurs were advancing to certain defeat.

  But the Army of the Wolf did not move from its position.

  ‘Horse, horse!’ shouted Leatherface as a black mass appeared ahead, between the hill and the forest of fir on the left. A great banner fluttered at the head of the hundreds of horsemen, a black seagull on a light grey background – Duke Arturus had arrived.

  ‘All-round defence,’ ordered Conrad as the Kur horsemen approached.

  The signallers blew their horns and the Army of the Wolf formed into a square, each side numbering around two hundred men. Conrad saw what appeared to be thousands of Kur riders swarming into the valley.

  ‘Hans, give Sir Richard my compliments and tell him to bring his horsemen into our square.’

  Hans nodded and hurried away. The Kurs were riding at a canter so their commanders could more readily appraise the situation, which gave both the Army of the Wolf and Fricis time to prepare.

  ‘Find your targets and shoot at them before they get close,’ Leatherface was rushing up and down behind the crossbowmen that were in the second ranks of the square.

  Conrad, Tonis and Anton took up their positions as their men locked shields, the first rank levelling their spears to present a row of iron points on all four sides of the square. The army’s banners were grouped in the centre of the square where Sir Richard’s one hundred and sixty knights that had accepted Conrad’s invitation joined them. Sir Richard himself ordered his men to form a reserve and then searched out the Marshal of Estonia. Already the crossbowmen were shooting at the Kur horsemen at the maximum range of their weapons.

  ‘Don’t let them get close,’ screamed Leatherface as bolts hit horses and brought them down.

  The frantic shooting had the desired effect because the Kurs swerved away from the Army of the Wolf to swarm around the Livs.

  ‘If they get too close, your grace, they will shower us with their javelins,’ Conrad told Sir Richard who had pushed his way through the ranks.

  Conrad was incorrect to call them javelins because the Kur spisa could be used as a lance as well as a missile to throw. And as Arturus’ horsemen surrounded Fricis’ Livs, who had no crossbowmen or archers, they hurled their spisas at the closely packed warriors. Each rider carried two spisas and within minutes hundreds of Kurs were launching their javelins at the helpless Livs. The Army of the Wolf was given a respectful distance but all thoughts of assisting the centre of the army was forgotten. This was perversely fortunate for Conrad’s men for the centre of the army no longer existed.

  The mercenaries and Livonian Militia had closed ranks once the Kur foot rushed down the hill. But in front of the black-uniformed spearmen were the fleeing remnants of Timothy the Cook, which ran headlong into the crusader foot soldiers. The mercenaries stood in their ranks and speared the fanatics but the Livonian Militia dissolved and joined the flight to the rear, which meant that within minutes the mercenaries were surrounded. And either side of them Kur spearmen poured through the gaps.

  There was a second line in the crusader centre – the Count of Lauenburg’s foot soldiers and the mercenary foot of the Sword Brothers – but before they could move forward they were battling Kur spearmen. And on their left flank groups of Kur horsemen were appearing to add their weight to the enemy attack. Everywhere there were black-uniformed foot soldiers and horsemen and a banner bearing a black seagull. The crossbowmen of both contingents loosed a series of controlled volleys as they began to withdraw from the field, realising that the battle was lost, especially as the crusader horsemen had seemingly already fled the scene.

  The horsemen on the right had not in fact fled but they were in disarray, first being showered with arrows and then being assaulted by Kur heavy foot. The arrows ceased as the axe men ran among horses and knights, achieving an initial v
ictory but then being halted as the flower of German chivalry rallied, dumped their lances and went to work with their swords, maces and axes. It was a grim, bloody battle but then the cry went up.

  ‘Save the bishop.’

  No one knew who first uttered this plea, though it must have come from the ranks of the Sword Brothers. But it was soon being echoed among the mailed knights who began to withdraw, having fought the Kurs to a standstill. Most of the destriers, protected by caparisons and trained to lash out with their rear legs against enemies, left the field uninjured, though many of the unprotected horses of the lesser knights suffered horrific arrow and axe wounds.

  The discipline of the Kur heavy foot soldiers was excellent as they reformed in their ranks and waited for the archers to join them to provide missile support for their further advance. But Duke Arturus was livid. He had led his horsemen on to the battlefield, attacked the left flank of the crusader army and directed his riders to support his medium foot that had fractured the bishop’s centre. He had seen the axe men descend the hill to attack the crusaders’ knights and for a moment had thought that they might cut the men of iron to pieces. But his élite foot soldiers had been stopped in their tracks and he was not happy.

  He galloped over to where his axe men stood, his banner fluttering behind him.

  ‘On, you maggots, or I will kill you myself.’

  He looked away from them to see the mailed knights riding away, the white-uniformed brother knights and sergeants of the Sword Brothers forming a rearguard as they did so. The duke cried out in rage and frustration.

  ‘My lord. My lord Arturus.’

  Arturus turned and, a red mist engulfing him, prepared to cut in two the man who dared to use his name. He raised his sword, his face contorted in rage as Lamekins looked at him in alarm. A sliver of reason amidst the fury stopped Arturus killing his deputy as he froze, stared at Lamekins and then hollered at the top of his voice. Then the rage was gone, he let his sword arm drop and he sat slumped in the saddle. Lamekins briefly closed his eyes in relief and then gave voice to his thoughts.