The Minstrel and the Mercenary

by David Scoles

  The sun rose again as it always did, as it always will and each man knew hope once again. All save for one. The Hoia-Baciu forest had claimed a tithe at some point during the night. The Cumans followed a single set of footprints which led from the camp to the edge of the tree line and disappeared. One of the boys was gone.

  Chapter 4

  That night Radu and Gwilym camped by the side of the road under the stars. Tomorrow they would reach Acheux and undertake their search for the bounty of Hugo the Long. More blood. More killing in a village of brigands, mercenaries and killers. Gwilym felt strangely ambivalent towards it. His mind drew together the threads of Radu’s tale like a half finished tapestry. Radu had ended his tale without explaining what had happened to his brother in the fell forest. Nor was there any mention of how the Nachzehrer’s path intertwined with his own.

  “That came much later.” It was all Radu had said on the matter. So why had Radu felt it important to tell him that part of his life?

  Radu believes he is cursed and that Marat’s curse against Tihomir also affects him. Why? Did it have something to do with how some called Radu’s homeland The Cursed Land? Did others know the tale and believe it as well? Was the Nachzehrer himself a part of this curse? Did Radu believe that ending the Nachzehrer’s life would somehow end the curse? Gwilym sighed as he tried to find sleep. So many thoughts whirled around in his mind like a thunderstorm. So many doubts and questions unanswered. Eventually, however, the storm subsided and sleep came.

  For most of the next day Gwilym and Radu rode sometimes upon the road and sometimes left it behind as Radu took shortcuts and hidden paths that Gwilym never questioned. The mercenary seemed to have an unerring sense of direction. If they needed water, he found a stream. They had brought no meat with them from Saigneville, but once Radu suddenly drew a knife and threw it into the side of a plump pheasant they had startled from the bushes when riding by.

  “You are an experienced woodsman, Radu, as capable as any huntsman I have ever seen!” Gwilym commented as he sucked on pheasant bones. They had stopped for an early supper before pressing on into Acheux. Radu had felt it wise to slip into the village under the cover of darkness and ferret out Hugo the Long quietly. Radu had cleaned and spit the bird upon his Arming Blade and had even found some local herbs to sprinkle upon it that gave it an almost lemon-like aftertaste that Gwilym found delicious.

  Afterwards, Radu cleaned the Arming Blade and began to sharpen it. He again loaned Gwilym a whetstone and bade him sharpen his own blade. Gwilym gulped and did as he was bid, reminded again that this was no holiday jaunt he was upon.

  “What will you do when we find Hugo?” Gwilym dared to ask. Radu seemed surprised by the question.

  “Kill him, of course. The bounty said it wanted him dead so I’ll take his head off like I did to Vladimir Kessenovich, you recall?”

  “How could I not?” Gwilym remarked wryly. Radu shrugged.

  “Even if Godemar du Fay wanted him alive I would probably still kill him.” Radu fixed Gwilym with a stern look. “The man is purebred scum and he would likely kill you, unless he thought he could get a ransom for you. When we engage him either stay back or attempt a distraction as you did with both Vladimir and Esteban. You are capable at that at least.”

  “Why thank you, Radu the Great! Whatever would I do without your expert guidance in these matters.” Gwilym retorted.

  “Probably die. Horribly.” Radu said. Both looked at each other and burst into laughter. Then as abruptly as the laughter began, it ceased. Radu looked both surprised and embarrassed by his uncanny outburst.

  “Well…,” Gwilym finally said, trying to dispel the awkwardness of the moment. “We should probably get going.” Then he added with a grin. “The prize awaits!”

  “Indeed,” Radu agreed. He stood and brushed dirt and pheasant bones from his lap.

  “Radu?”

  “What is it?” Radu asked glancing at Gwilym as he snagged his horse’s bridle.

  “If Hugo the Long is the Nachzehrer’s right hand man as you say, then what is he doing in Acheux and not with his master in Paris?”

  “That I cannot fathom, but it works to our advantage to take him alone. If he is alone,” Radu said frowning. He hoisted himself into the saddle and took the reins then looked down at Gwilym. “He is a formidable fighter by all accounts. You should be prepared.”

  Gwilym swallowed and nodded weakly. Radu nudged his horse into a cantor and Gwilym mounted his own horse reluctantly. The wind picked up and the rain scent Gwilym had smelled earlier was growing in strength. One of France’s frequent summer storms looked to be nearly upon them. He worried for the English army trapped between two rivers that might become swollen with water and flood their banks, further complicating a river crossing.

  Nudging his own horse to follow Radu, Gwilym prayed to Saint George for the courage he sorely needed. There was so much to pray for! Although it had been years ago, Gwilym wished he had paid the four silver pennies for that bit of bone a peddler had sworn came from the skull of John the Baptist.

  “As ye know, the whore Salome danced for the pagan King Herod who gave her the head on a silver platter,” the peddler had lisped through cracked lips and teeth the color of soot. “What mayhaps ye didn’t know was that the head was preserved in olive oil and made the journey all the way here to England as a trophy of a Roman Consul! Aye, the skull was discovered by me dear old mother whose eyesight became miraculously cured when she dug up the skull out of a pig’s refuse pit!”

  “Fascinating.” Gwilym had dryly replied to the peddler’s clearly well thought out lie. Now in his current situation, Gwilym wasn’t sure he would have turned the peddler down. If only to have something to hold onto that might bring the Saint’s eyes upon him. Suddenly Gwilym had a thought.

  “Radu!” he called ahead to the mercenary who was several meters ahead of him.

  “What is it now?” Radu griped. He turned about in his saddle and fixed Gwilym with an irritated look.

  “Do you pray to the Saints for aid?”

  “No.”

  “Perhaps this would be a good time to start?” Gwilym ignored the glare he received as a response. Radu sighed. He thrust out his arms and gazed into the gray sky and prayed aloud.

  “I beseech the protection of whichever Saint believes that killing the ones who seek to destroy everything that is good in this world is deserved and right. If not, then kindly mark me a place in Hell near the coarse women and men who drank too much.”

  The next few hours passed in silence and night began to fall early. As if on cue a light rain began to mist the landscape and the dull cloak of gray slowly gave way to the darkening night. A flicker of distant torchlight marked their destination. Acheux was the only town of its sort around for miles. Farms were nonexistent. The ground was too rocky for crops and livestock could find little sustenance on the loamy mush left behind by inconsistent rain and more frequent droughts.

  Gwilym and Radu had little trouble approaching Acheux unseen. It looked to be a larger than average town laid out in the traditional manner of a single lane lined with buildings propped up against one another. There were small buildings here and there behind or slightly away from the central lane, people’s hovels Gwilym surmised, but there was also a large building dead center two stories high. Gwilym marveled that it seemed to be made of both stone and wood. Radu went straight for it. Gwilym quickly discerned why.

  Raucous noises and sounds of merriment could be heard from within. Horses were penned in a stable off to the side, which was filled to bursting. No fewer than three stable boys spread hay, poured oats and rubbed down horseflesh.

  “Strange to see so successful an Inn way out here,” Gwilym remarked to Radu who led them around the back, eschewing use of the stable.

  “May have to leave in a hurry. Best to keep the horses saddled,” was Radu’s only explanation.

  Gwilym had expected the town to be asleep. Curfews were usual in so rural a place. No Night Watchme
n here then. This certainly wasn’t England. Unless they are drunk within… or worse. I suppose a town full of wanted men have no fear of a battle creeping up on them. Aye and perhaps drinking their cares away that it shall soon spill over onto them. Poor sods.

  Radu did not immediately enter the tavern. He had said something about checking the stable and so Gwilym waited for him in the alleyway between the Inn and what could only be the Farrier’s hovel. It smelled of horse sweat, leather and hay. It reminded Gwilym of home and for a moment he felt a pang of homesickness.

  See you here now Dafydd ap Gwilym. Crouching in an alley in some obscure village in France with a man who plans to murder another man whether he be eating supper or shitting? What madness holds you in its grip? Ah, Llanbadarn Fawr! Will I ever tread your green fields and barrow mounds again?

  “If my father and brother could witness me now,” Gwilym whispered aloud.

  “We have a problem,” a voice said behind him.

  Gwilym jumped and whirled about. Instinctively, he had half drawn his saber. He felt sheepish when he saw Radu’s smirk. “I found this tabard in the stable.” Gwilym’s brow broke out into a sweat when he recognized the bloody sword upon a yellow field. The Red Swords mercenary company from Germany was in Acheux.

  Radu nodded when he saw the dismay on Gwilym’s face. “Horseslayer is here.”

  Chapter 5

  “The man always seems to be one step ahead of us,” Gwilym muttered in dismay. Their search for Hugo the Long had just become much more perilous indeed! If Johannes Abelard, or Horseslayer as Radu named him, saw Radu, it was over. The Mercenary Leader of the Red Swords would undoubtedly want to flay the skin from Radu’s hide for what had been done to him in Caen… and would probably do the same to a poor minstrel! “This will be our unmaking, by Saint Brendan’s foundering cog!”

  “The roof is lower in the back. An ingress might be found through one of the wood hatches I saw above.” Radu referred to the slabs of wood raised and lowered by means of a rope tied to iron rings in the roof of the structure. A crude substitute for glass, but effective in keeping out the worst of Winter’s frost.

  “Would it not be easier to scout the taproom first? Learn its layout and where each man stands as to better plan our sortie?” Gwilym asked, hoping beyond hope that Radu might be convinced of the folly of moving forward with any sort of plan that involved fighting a score of well-armed and trained soldiers. Even he must recognize the limitations of two blades against so many! Besides, we came here for one man guilty of crimes against a lord, not to slake a thirst for vengeance against a cad!

  “I see your point,” Radu answered begrudgingly and Gwilym breathed a silent sigh of relief. “Go within and ply your trade.”

  “I… what!?”

  “You are a bard, are you not? You certainly state such often enough! Cause a distraction as you did with the Castilian so that I can enter from above and scout for Hugo. With luck I’ll slit his throat and we’ll be gone before any notice.” Radu said it all with such calm matter-of-factness that Gwilym was momentarily without a reply.

  “What if Hugo is not here?” Gwilym finally managed to find words. “We could be placing ourselves at risk for naught!”

  “Then I shall exit as I enter and none the wiser. You shall sing a few songs then leave and meet me behind the stables.”

  “What if Hors… I mean Abelard should recognize me? I was there when you laid him unconscious at the feet of the Compte do not forget!”

  “It is likely he will not. Recall that I hit him the moment he opened that door. He would never have seen your face.”

  “And yet surely he will have heard of the two who robbed him of such a weighty prize? He will have long since learned it was his old foe Radu the Black and the famous Welsh bard Dafydd ap Gwilym!”

  “You do know how to amuse, Gwilym,” Radu said with a grin.

  “He has probably placed bounties upon our heads!”

  “I’d have heard of it,” Radu said, beginning to sound impatient. “Leave your saber with me. Such a weapon would certainly raise suspicion.”

  “You would risk the life of the Flower of Brogynin in such a way?” Gwilym’s wail turned into a sigh when he saw Radu’s brow furrowing even further. “Alright, I shall endeavor to entertain an undoubtedly surly group of music-hating Germans and a dangerous maniac possibly skulking within as well. Do me a kindness and tell his Majesty to remember me to my father.” Gwilym unbuckled his blade and handed it over to Radu grudgingly. Its weight had become familiar and he felt its absence acutely.

  “Just go!” Radu growled and he shoved Gwilym in the direction of the Inn’s entry door. The sounds of conversations and the smell of food filled Gwilym’s senses. Always before had such things been inviting to Gwilym. A promise of entertainment, coin and possibly even a lass or two. That he should now dread it! Or did he?

  Gwilym would have denied it weeks earlier, but he felt a stir deep inside him with each step he took towards the door. It was excitement. Something had awakened within him when he had first risked entering Caen to aid those he called friends. At first he had thought it madness, then he had explained it away as a desire to construct an epic ballad upon his heroism. Perhaps he would still do so, but now he knew it to be so much more than that. A part of him wanted to be Radu’s companion in this mad adventure.

  This dangerous, blood drenched path of the mercenary. These terrible men Radu hunted, men like the Nachzehrer and Hugo the Long. He wanted to see them with his own eyes. Witness their evils, because they seemed so unbelievable. To Gwilym, if he could just remain by Radu’s side and bare witness! Fulfill his own role in ridding the world of such horrors then perhaps the story that Gwilym would one day tell would not just be of men warring over borders, titles and crowns. It would be a tale of good men fighting against evil men, because it was right and just. Even if those good men were only a simple minstrel working for fame and a mercenary working for coin.

  Dafydd ap Gwilym lifted the latch on the door and stepped into the Inn’s common room. He allowed the door to slam behind him, and faced the room’s inhabitants with a wide smile. Without waiting to see what sort of impact his entrance had caused, he bowed low and swept his hat from his head.

  “Goodmen!” Gwilym shouted. He looked up and quickly glanced around. Every eye that he could see was fixed upon him. Most wore the arms and armor of the Red Swords. More than a score. There were others as well. A motley collection of men wearing huntsmen’s leathers or chainmail and half-plate armors. A dirty, scruffy looking bunch all around although Gwilym spotted a few women here and there as well. Most wore the dark under eye make-up, low bodices and ill-kept hair of experienced tavern wenches. One such girl, a pretty little thing with hair as red as a Dane’s beard, sat upon the lap of Johannes “Horseslayer” Abelard. She looked at Gwilym passively. The others regarded him with unconcealed malice.

  “Ah, forgive me. What I meant to say was ‘Hail, Goodmen and Good Ladies!’ What now comes hither for your enjoyment and all around merry making is a well-traveled and might I add thirsty troubadour whose songs and tales shall increase our general wellbeing. Innkeep! A flagon of your finest! Give me but a moment all to unsheathe my weapon! Now, now ladies, I do not mean that weapon. Perhaps later such prowess might be demonstrated! Rather I refer to this instrument I carry with me. We shall strike up a tune and wassail the night away. Acheux shall be the playground of Bacchus himself this night!”

  What began as glowers slowly melted into smiles as Gwilym kept up a steady stream of bardic wordplay and chatter. There were sincere chuckles and even the wenches guffawed in response to his saucy remarks. His French was perfect, yet not overly pronounced or nuanced. He kept it simple as though he had spent his life mincing about the countryside with dairy farmer’s wives and dallying with wealthy vineyard daughters.

  Gwilym was like them or so they now believed. Slowly but surely men went back to their conversations and drinks were poured from kegs by a large man who looked a
former soldier himself with scars criss crossing his arms and an eyepatch over his left eye. He set a large flagon foaming at the top upon a table near Gwilym and nodded. This was an old tradition. There would be a meal and a bed waiting for Gwilym as well if he kept the man’s guests happy, entertained and respectful.

  Gwilym took a long pull and savored the hoppy flavors of French beer brewed… Gwilym blinked. From where he was standing he could see a stamp upon the beer kegs he well recognized. It was the seal of Brevnov Monastery in Bohemia! I knew this beer was too good to be French, but where did these louts get a keg of Brevnov?

  Gwilym reluctantly set the tankard aside and removed his lute from its case. After a quick tuning his fingers expertly began plucking out a tune popular in Welsh drinking halls. Soon, he had the whole Inn fist pounding their tables and cheering. It got louder. Gwilym knew that if Radu was sneaking in through the upper floor, he would not be heard. He grinned in spite of himself. He stole glances at Horseslayer, who had been eying him suspiciously moments ago, but the Mercenary leader (who was sporting a wicked looking black eye) was once again immersed in the young girl upon his lap.

  Whenever a song ended, Gwilym would immediately start another. Some were his own, tunes without words and mere instrumentals, and others well known enough that others joined in the singing. He started to lose track of time. His first flagon was finished and another was placed by him. He started to feel the familiar warmth of inebriation stealing its way into his mind. He briefly wondered where Radu was and if Hugo the Long lay dead in a room somewhere up above, for he had seen no sign of the man whose visage lay upon Agace’s coal sketch in the common room.

  Gwilym’s hand started to ache so he set down his lute. There were disappointed calls from the crowd, but Gwilym held up a hand for silence and with his other tipped back his flagon and drained his beer without stopping. That drew some catcalls and jeers from the wenches who were warming to this handsome singer. One in particular licked her lips suggestively when he glanced her way.