by Iny Lorentz
“We Czech noblemen have to unite against this damned pack flocking to the preacher Jan von Tabor, or we’re all doomed,” another knight added. “His followers are becoming increasingly adamant that birthright and personal property should be abolished, and the servants think only of what they could plunder on the next raid, instead of staying to work our fields. We have decided to put an end to the Taborites’ heathen nonsense and unite as the league of Calixtines. We need the support of every decent nobleman to act against those wanting to overturn the divine order. Come to your senses! Renounce Sigismund, because he was deposed six years ago . . .”
“By precisely those fanatics whose influence you fear today,” Count Václav interrupted him grimly.
“That’s why we have to put them in their place! Open your eyes, Václav. We turned against Sigismund because we wanted a king from our own country, not one who collects crowns from all over Europe while remaining a stranger to his countries.” Ottokar jumped up and grasped the high back of his brother’s chair.
“Václav, if you hesitate any longer, it will be too late! The upstart Vyszo is already gathering people to march against your castle, and I won’t be able to hold him back much longer. Come to Prokop with me, give him that German’s head as a present, and join our cause.”
Václav Sokolny stood up and glared angrily at his brother. “This German, whose head you demand, saved my daughter’s life. I’d rather die than let anything happen to him!”
“Then send him away! I can vouch for his safety until he has passed our borders.”
Václav Sokolny’s face was fraught with indecision, and Michel and the others anxiously awaited his answer. Michel was surprised at the discord among the Hussites, who had not only made the kaiser their enemy, but also many German nobles. If the Taborites, who were solely responsible for the raids, according to the heated words of the guests, and their noble fellow countrymen were turning against each other, they were just playing into Sigismund’s hands.
It seemed an eternity before Count Sokolny harshly rejected his guests’ suggestion. When Ottokar Sokolny and his friends left the castle disappointed the next day, the count appeared to have aged considerably, and seemed to already be watching his castle go up in flames. But Michel understood. The oath Václav Sokolny had sworn to God and his king was sacred to him, even if it might seal Falkenhain’s downfall.
PART FOUR
TO BOHEMIA
1.
The noise around the jousting arena was almost unbearable. Marie wanted to cover her ears, but she was holding Trudi in her arms. Several Nuremberg servants tried to push Marie and Black Eva aside to get to the front row of spectators. Marie snarled angrily at one of the brash fellows, and when that didn’t help, she braced herself against him and was shoved to the front. The rope separating the lower-class section from the arena stretched, and its stakes were almost ripped out of the ground. Several tournament workers came running, forcing Marie and the others back with the shafts of their pikes.
Marie envied Michi, sitting with some other boys in the branches of an ancient beech tree at the edge of the ring of spectators and protected from the scorching sun by the thick canopy of leaves. She lifted Trudi above her head to keep her from getting crushed, while still defending her spot in the front row. Black Eva managed to stay by her side, grimacing. “I understand that the kaiser wants to display the bravery and daring of the knights he has mustered, but did he have to do it on the common, right outside town, where every dolt and washerwoman can come watch?”
The kaiser had just taken his seat at a large stand covered in colorful cloths, where sizable canvasses protected him and his company from the blazing July sun burning down from a perfectly blue sky. Since there wasn’t even the slightest breeze and no shade where she was standing, Marie was soon sweating from every pore, and her tongue felt like a dried piece of leather. Trudi also whimpered with thirst. Marie wanted to go to the stands serving wine, beer, and fresh springwater that had been set up behind the arena. To get there, however, she’d have to give up her spot, and then all she’d see of the tournament would be the tips of the knights’ lances before they lowered them to ride against each other.
Her eyes turned to the grandstands, and she watched enviously as the kaiser had his cup refilled with wine. The ladies in his entourage were wearing expensive dresses of velvet and fustian along with bonnets of various shapes with richly hued veils, and holding creatively decorated fans to keep themselves cool. The noblemen—all advanced in years, since no able knight wanted to miss out on the chance to shine in front of the kaiser—were dressed just as magnificently, albeit a little less flamboyantly.
“The lords should be focusing on proving their courage against the Hussites, not jousting one another.” Marie realized she had spoken her thoughts aloud when she saw the shocked look of the fishwife standing next to her.
“Well, I’m glad the kaiser and his troops are staying here in Nuremberg to offer us protection and safety,” the fishwife replied fiercely, and the people around her strongly expressed their agreement. For the Nurembergers, as long as they felt safe under the kaiser’s protection, few were concerned about the Hussites’ plundering of Saxony or Austria.
A fanfare of trumpets captured the crowd’s attention. Looking across the field, Marie saw the imperial herald entering the lists to announce the first round. Since more than five hundred knights wanted to take part in the tournament, they would first fight one another in groups. Only at the end, when their ranks had thinned drastically, would the remaining knights face one another one-on-one to determine the victor. Marie tried to find Heinrich von Hettenheim and Heribert von Seibelstorff in the first two groups, but instead she spotted Falko von Hettenheim and his palatine friends.
Falko was wearing a suit of plate armor and was only recognizable by the pennant with his coat of arms, a blue shield transversed by a golden wave, with a silver griffin and a broken Saracen sword. He looked magnificent, and the spectators who had heard of his apparent successes in the fight against the Hussites broke out into loud cheers when he appeared. Marie felt like spitting.
“Sir Falko will certainly win!” shouted a man who had pushed his way between Marie and the fishwife.
Marie snorted with contempt. “I wouldn’t count on it!”
The man bared his yellow teeth in a pretentious grin. “What do you know of knights, woman? I, on the other hand . . .” He broke off as the two opposing groups started to move.
The ground shook under the hooves of the heavy stallions, and the metal armor rattled so loudly that Marie’s ears ached. She saw the knights charging and heard the blunt lances hitting shields and armor. Injured horses shrieked, men cried out in anger and pain, and for a few moments a cloud of dust turned the fight into a heaving tangle, with weapons and pieces of armor flying everywhere. When the knights who had stayed in the saddle reached the ends of the lists, the dust settled, but all there was to see were the squires and servants rushing to the injured or catching the riderless horses to lead them off to the side.
“Falko von Hettenheim has lifted his man out of the saddle,” the man behind Marie declared triumphantly.
Marie grimaced. “Why don’t you bet on him!”
The man stared at her, licking his lips. “I will! And if Sir Falko wins this tournament, you’ll grant me a cozy hour behind a bush.”
Marie wanted more than anything to slap his smirking face. If her wishes had any power at all, the arrogant Falko von Hettenheim would be lying in the dust.
She threw her head back, and glared at him challengingly. “What will you pay if I win?”
“Five shillings!”
“What? That’s all it’s worth to you? Then we’ll hardly come to terms.” Scoffing, Marie turned away and watched the next two groups. Because of the large number of participants, there would be ten rounds to begin with, each with more than fifty knights. The victors in thos
e encounters had to continue to fight one another in groups until only a handful of knights remained. The highest-ranking knights had already started fighting, and each following group would consist of less-important knights, so that the higher nobles could rest before the next round, while the last fighters hardly had time to wipe the sweat from their brow.
Marie spotted her friends Heinrich von Hettenheim and Heribert von Seibelstorff in the second group. Sir Heinrich was dressed far less lavishly than his cousin, and young Seibelstorff had merely put on a new breastplate. But both prevailed. As their adversaries fell from their saddles, they left the tangle unscathed.
The sun rose to its highest point, leaving the spectators panting in the heat. Even the kaiser was being fanned, while sipping on chilled Rhine wine. To give simple folk an opportunity to refresh themselves, there was a break after five rounds, during which canny Nuremberg innkeepers sold wine and beer. Since people were packed so closely together, money and drinking cups had to be passed along from person to person. It was no wonder that an occasional coin disappeared or that some cups reached the person who had paid for it almost empty.
Marie bought a jug of beer, which was bitter but thirst quenching, and she thought about what to give Trudi. While scanning the area for someone selling water, she saw a one-legged man with a wooden leg who was sitting in the grass in the front row, staring grimly at the knights. He looked so familiar that she paused and looked again. Could it be Timo, Michel’s servant and sergeant?
Without delay, she bent down, slipped underneath the rope, and hurried toward the man. When she reached him, she made the sign of the cross. It really was Timo sitting there, one-legged and gaunt. Since he didn’t notice her, she shook his shoulder. Irritated, he turned around, ready to growl at her, but his harsh words died on his lips and he started in surprise. “Lady Marie? By all the saints, is it really you?”
“Yes, it’s me, but don’t use my title. I’m an itinerant merchant here,” Marie replied quietly.
“But what brings you here, and why the disguise? It’s not appropriate for a lady of rank.”
“What good is it to be a lady of rank if I don’t have Michel anymore? I am on a search for my husband, because I don’t believe he’s dead.”
“I can’t tell you what happened to him, either, because nobody saw him again, dead or alive.” Timo uttered the words with a snarl, consumed with fury.
Marie listened carefully. “You have to tell me everything that happened, Timo.”
Timo lowered his head sadly. “That’s not much to tell, unfortunately, because I was wounded in the very first battle and had to stay behind in Nuremberg, while Sir Michel left with Heribald von Seibelstorff’s group to fight the Bohemians. I only heard rumors about what happened there.”
“What did you find out?” Marie asked.
Timo didn’t reply; he had just noticed the similarity between Trudi and her mother and was staring in wonder. “Don’t tell me you conceived a child from my master after all!”
Marie nodded. “Trudi is one of the reasons I had to dress up as an itinerant merchant. Since Michel was made a knight of the Reich and is considered dead, they wanted to take my daughter away from me to be raised at the count palatine’s court. I was supposed to marry some wealthy merchant.”
“But the noble lords found you’re a tough nut to crack!” Grinning, Timo remembered his mistress’s powers of self-assertion well.
“Tell me about Michel!” Marie said.
“I will, but let’s go somewhere quieter before the noise starts up again,” Timo replied, pointing at the knights preparing for the next round. Marie helped him to his feet; then they slipped underneath the rope cordoning off the field, annoying the tournament servants who were supposed to keep the field clear for the knights. Two of them, wearing colorful surcoats, ran toward them with their pikes raised. “Get off the field, riffraff!”
Timo tried to walk faster, but his wooden leg caught in a hole and he fell. Marie put Trudi down to help him. One of the tournament servants swung his shaft, but the little girl ran toward him with her hands raised above her head. “No hurt!” she shouted.
“Help the man get away, or do you want to hit the child?” one of the spectators shouted at the servant. He grumbled sullenly, but pulled Timo up, then shoved him so that the spectators had to catch him to keep him from falling. “And now off with you, or I’ll have you locked up in the tower!”
“We’ll be gone in a minute,” Marie promised, leading Timo and Trudi out among the knights preparing for the next round. They passed the tents where the fighters were being cared for, and struggled through a mass of horses and swearing servants. Marie was too busy trying to dodge stomping hooves to notice Falko von Hettenheim watching her intently.
The knight had recognized her immediately. Only a few days ago, he had received a letter from his wife that her chaplain had written for her. Aside from expressing the hope that she might finally be carrying his long-awaited heir, she had told him that Michel Adler’s widow had given birth to a daughter after his death. When Falko saw Marie walking past with her child and Michel’s former servant, his suspicion of a few weeks ago became a certainty, and he realized that she had become even more beautiful since the birth of her child. Desiring her even more than ever, he pledged that he would first win this tournament and then he would have her. She wouldn’t get away from him this time.
Timo led Marie through the meadows until the screaming and clanging sounds became muted. Then he stopped and grasped her hands, lowering himself to sit on a warm rock under the dappled shade of a broad tree. “I am so happy to see you, mistress, and especially to see the child! Sir Michel would be overjoyed had he been allowed to witness her birth.”
“I don’t believe he is dead! I often see him in my dreams, and my instincts tell me he is still alive.”
“I wish to God it were true! But my hopes aren’t high after all this time.” Timo sighed and ran his tongue over his lips. “My throat is very dry, my lady. I’m not sure my words will sound as I want them to.”
Marie stood up and looked around. About fifty paces away, an innkeeper had set up his barrel in the shadow of a mighty pine tree and was refilling his guests’ cups. “Stay with the old man,” Marie told her daughter, and hurried away.
Making a face, Trudi backed away a few steps from Timo, a bit scared of his rough appearance. But she stayed close until her mother returned with a jug of wine, some water, and three cups. Crouching down, Marie poured a cup of water for Trudi, wine thinned with water for herself, and straight wine for Timo, who at first tried to decline with a wave of his hand, then gratefully accepted.
Emptying his cup in a single gulp, Timo wiped his mouth contentedly and brushed the drops from his beard. Then he began his long story. At first Marie didn’t learn anything new, but then Timo mentioned Wiggo, who had served as Michel’s squire, and Marie looked up with interest.
“Can you tell me where I can find the fellow? If he was in that final battle, he should know what happened to my husband.”
“That’s what I thought, too, so I questioned him closely when he returned to Nuremberg with the troops. At first he didn’t want to talk, but then he admitted to fooling around with some other lads and missing the scuffle instead of staying with his master. He just knew that the two surviving knights, Falko von Hettenheim and Gunter von Losen, returned with only two servants and frantically shouted at Heribald von Seibelstorff, their commander at the time, to beat a hasty retreat.”
Marie looked up. “So there are no other witnesses to Michel’s last hours apart from those two knights?”
Timo refilled his cup but took only a sip. “You forget the surviving servants, my lady. I also wanted to know what happened to my master, so I went looking for them. It took me a while to find one of them, and then I had to spend most of my money getting him drunk enough to talk. What he told me was very strange. He sai
d there was no reason at all for a hasty retreat, because Hettenheim and his followers had sent the handful of Bohemians they had encountered back into the woods. Sir Falko forbade him and the others from taking care of their fallen comrades, ordering them back to the camp while he and the other knight tarried before following them. They hardly would have done so if there had been imminent danger. But most important, the fellow was certain that although your husband was wounded, he was still alive when they left the scene of the skirmish. Then on the way back to camp, he heard snippets of a conversation between Hettenheim and Losen, in which they mocked Sir Michel and imagined his end in the hands of the Hussites.”
“They left him lying there so the Hussites would torture him to death!” Marie covered her face with her hands.
Timo grabbed her by the shoulder and gently shook her. “That may be true, but they had scattered the Bohemians, and who knows if they actually returned.”
Marie looked at him with renewed hope. “Maybe not. At least the traitors gave Michel time to take care of his wounds and disappear into the forest. You know how resourceful he is.”
“I know,” Timo agreed. “And it is said there are still castles and towns in parts of Bohemia that have remained loyal to the kaiser and resisted the Hussites so far. Maybe he made it to one of those places and is safe now.”
Marie looked at him doubtfully. “But if that was the case, then why hasn’t he sent word?”
“I can’t imagine that he would send a messenger across rebel ground. Nor could he leave those who provided him shelter and helped him.” Timo saw that Marie was absorbed in his account, taking it as gospel truth, and he raised his hands in caution. “No, no, my lady! I don’t mean to give you false hope. These are nothing but wild guesses, do you understand? Unfortunately, your husband most likely bled to death at the scene of the fight, or fell into Hussite hands. We should only pray that he met a quick and merciful end.”