"Why should I spare you when you never stood up for me? You sat there next to Mehmet II as his father allowed his soldiers to torture me. You were the favored one. You were given special treatment, and now it's time for you to understand the things I had to overcome; things, until now, you were shielded from," Vincent raised the dagger to Radu's throat.
Suddenly, Vincent heard a deafening crack that burned his ears. He swayed backward and rolled from his knees onto his feet, gripping his ears the whole time. With wide eyes, Vincent whirled around to see artillerymen advance toward him from the forest, mounting what looked like small cannons onto the ground and then firing them.
"Piyade Topçu!" Vincent shouted and picked up his feet, racing to Hadúr as fast as he could.
In the distance, he saw another figure on a horse who had bodies of wounded officers piled onto its back end. It was galloping toward him at an alarming rate, but Vincent then recognized the rider to be Ladislaus. His face was stricken, and the look of defeat completely etched into his muscles as his shoulders sagged and form wavered out of fatigue as well. Vincent stuck one foot in his stirrup and swung his leg over and into the saddle.
"They are overwhelming us! We must retreat!" Ladislaus shouted as he rose up next to Vincent, "I have sounded the retreat. The surviving soldiers are to meet us over that hill over there."
Vincent growled at the nobleman, "You fool! Did I not specifically warn you?"
Ladislaus's face furrowed even deeper into a look of despair, "The more I think of this skirmish, the more I realize it was more of a death march, a battle that could never have been won in the first place."
Vincent reached over and grabbed the man's collar of his chest plate, "It could have been won! But you indulged into your hubris and cost us however many casualties! I told you if we had struck and then receded back over the hill like we HAD been doing, then this would never have happened. But because you had to satisfy your ego, we are now where we are, my dear Lord. Have you learned nothing of what I was trying to show you?" Vincent shook Ladislaus.
The nobleman batted Vincent's arm successfully away and shot him an angry glance, "The more we argue, the closer those men are going to get! Let us resume this conversation elsewhere, when the environment suits it!"
Both men exchanged death glares, but kicked their horses and galloped off into the grassy fields for safety.
After a minute of silent, continuous riding, Ladislaus turned to the Wallachian and added, "I truly am sorry, Vincent. My deepest regrets and apologies."
Vincent grunted in disgust, wondering how he had rehearsed that line so well and perfectly, adding just the right amount of noble coating to make it actually sound sincere. But suddenly, his thoughts wandered back to a fair Lady he had not the fortune of laying eyes on for months it seemed, and all of his anger at once diminished.
"Richard?…Richard?"
The young woman opened her eyes and looked up from her kneeling position as she finished her prayer and noticed her sister nervously glancing at her.
"Yes, William?" Richard asked.
"W-what are we going to do?" Her eyes widened, "I mean, father has turned Sir Vincent loose on his younger brother, Radu Bey. What if Sir Vincent fails? What if he dies? What if he joins back with the Ottomans? Then we won't have any cards left in our hands in our favor! We can't let that happen, sister!"
Richard swiftly stood up and awkwardly tried to comfort William. Hesitant to reveal any mothering side of herself, she settled for a few pats on the shoulder and cleared her throat, "William, please do not worry about anything. However it all plays out is the way God would have wanted it. We must only hope for the best."
"And prepare for the worst," William softly added and sighed.
They both silently agreed to push their beds together and lay atop them, just chatting to shed the time. Laying on her back, Richard perused the lazy trails of the garish tapestry and gaudy ceiling swirls of carvings and painted colors throughout the room, how they bled into each other, and the excessive never-used furniture that forever robbed her room of enough space.
All this was to ultimately show the family's wealth, and, Richard thought, what an ornamented and cheaply ostentatious way of living it was, especially without the promise of ruling something…anything. She had to sit there, and eventually wait for another man to claim her like a prize. But that was what she was: a prize to be won.
"Did you know Pip heard father and Royal Vizier, Lord Leroy Rodriguez, talking the other day about their plan to throw Radu Bey at Sir Vincent in the first place. They both knew all along that Radu was the commander of the army sneaking around our borders," William stated as she plopped onto her soft pillows and ruffled them gently with one hand.
Her older sister shook her thoughts aside and glanced at her in slight shock, "What news would a guard have? How did he hear this?"
William shrugged, "Castle guards are known for hearing gossip. They escort and stand with father and his many subjects as silent protectors, and we royals oft forget their presence entirely. It is assured that he would have heard something, some slice of secret information that accidentally slipped out and into the open."
Richard slowly nodded, "It would seem that they were almost scheming against Sir Vincent, but I can hardly accuse them of wrong-doing. I would need proof in order to believe that he could resist the temptation of returning to the Ottoman Empire as well."
William grunted, "Yes, but don't you think it's a bit on the cruel side of reason?"
"…Yes…" Richard admitted, "But this act is buried within sound justification. It is well supported."
William nodded, "And what of Ladislaus?"
"He can definitely handle Sir Vincent, and he has an entire Hungarian army at his disposal. It's not as if Sir Vincent could convince the Christian soldiers to defect to the Ottoman Empire, and that is assuming that he wants to in the first place. No, it's one 'Ottoman' against thousands of Christians. If Sir Vincent made any trouble, he would have been executed by now, and you can be sure that we would have caught word of it as well."
"I suppose your right," William anxiously fidgeted with the open sleeves of her dress.
Attempting to soothe her younger sibling, Richard changed her facial expression into a polite smile, one of noble composure, reminding William of the fact that they needed to stay calm in the midst of any chaos thrown their way. William, recognizing the look, the same look their mother gave them to use as a shield when imminent trouble was approaching, reflected the expression calmly.
"You're right. We mustn't lose our heads. They will return; I'm certain of it," William nodded.
A light knock on the door startled the girls, but Walter opened it gently, a disarming action, and entered the room. With the way his face was already twisted into a mournful image, Richard feared the worst. In those quiet, silent moments where anticipation outweighed everything else, when the knowledge of the fate of someone was in limbo, between two worlds, neither alive nor dead, neither confirmed nor denied, the only measure by which one can assure himself not to turn to insanity is by taking a deep breath in before the plunge. Richard could hardly do that much, as she felt the air in her lungs catch in her throat.
"Well? What news?" Richard insisted.
Walter faltered, which only caused the young woman's heart to lurch forward. His already weathered face and weary eyes concealed too much of the truth from her. His hunched posture communicated to Richard that he had definitely been awake the entire night attending to her father's business. Rolling his shoulders therapeutically forward slowly and then back slowly, Walter ran a nervous hand through his wild crop of brown hair and drew in a ragged breath.
"Out with it!" she could no longer hold in her anxiety.
"My Lady," he began soothingly, "The regent-governor has sent out scouts to look for Lord Ladislaus, but to no avail. There has been no sign of them, only the trail of blood that they left behind."
"And does that trail of blood lead us somewhere?"
Richard pressed.
"Unfortunately, no," Walter said and quickly checked his surroundings suspiciously, "I am here against the regent's wishes. But I could not keep avoiding you, knowing you would have, within the next few days, pinned me to a wall in order to extract any information out of me."
"She definitely would have. She was already planning it," William giggled. Richard shot her a reproachful glare at her secret being exposed.
Walter attempted to smile, "And I would have expected nothing less…Lady Richard, I must warn you-"
The elder sister waved a dismissive hand, "Must you always warn me of the dire and desperate times we live in? How everything is within a delicate balance and that one little misstep could cause it to tip…I know the consequences of my actions, mostly."
Walter's eye visibly twitched as he inhaled and straightened his collar, and in that moment his sanity as well, "You may note the immediate consequences of your actions, but do you honestly understand the repercussions as well? Any act is like a drop of water in a pond. This drop causes the initial ripple as well as the following ones."
"Indeed, it does."
"Then perhaps you will consider the idea of restraining yourself from doing anything rash…oh, say, like escaping from a direct order to remain in your bed chamber and running out into the open where the soldier's pitch their tents in the hopes of finding an injured horse…" Walter bluntly stated with an edge of disdain.
Richard paused and blinked at him. He was calling her a fool for not knowing the results of her actions, like a father would a child; like a master would a servant.
Aware of her sudden turn into hostility, Walter added, "I only say this because the regent can become…angered by your outbursts and it always ends up in my hands. The last thing we need is a divided family."
"Servant, I doubt I need lectures from anyone else today. It was enough at lunch after father lectured me on my pestering him at how to rule his Kingdom," she stated tiredly.
"And with all due respect and chivalry, you did not deserve such a lashing in my eyes," Walter added quickly, "I understand that there are many things you would change to the way he rules, and they are valid ideas."
"But when it comes to seeking justice-"
Walter hushed her lightly, "My Lady Richard, you do not need to voice Sir Vincent's injustice; he will do that on his own when he returns," Walter's eyes unfocused, as if remembering a past event that would further his point, "I believe he will want a word with the regent after his plan failed."
"Remind me to certainty: How do we know he didn't ally himself back with the Ottoman Empire?" William asked.
To this, Walter gave a grin, "For the reason of all of the dead Ottoman bodies he left for us to find. We know that he is heading back in our direction, and I suspect his arrival within the next few days."
"Let us pray, then, that he and Ladislaus receive a safe trip home," Richard began to kneel once more.
The soft gravel sound of sword tips dragging in the dirt was enough to weigh heavy on Ladislaus's heart like an anchor to a ship. The slow moving pace of the wounded army that barely survived their own initiated attack did nothing short of embarrassing them as well. The men were exhausted from running away, the horses were exhausted for running and carrying them, and to top it off, there were neither enough weapons to defend a third of their slim numbers nor enough food to feed and give them energy to use said weapons.
And yet, their spirits were far from broken. Beaten, yes; embarrassed, yes; crushed, perhaps; but snapped in twain? Not in the slightest. They had punched a very large hole into the Ottoman's army that had attacked them, despite the fact that the Hungarians had lost more men.
Ominous clouds banked to the left of the army as they traveled back to the heart of their homeland. The beginnings of thunder reverberated the ground to where even the smallest pebbles began to shake. Lightening continued and thunder followed again as a never-ending cycle of rain commenced pouring down.
Ladislaus's armor squeaked and grinded against the cold liquid as he watched his men from atop his mount. They seemed slightly glad for the change in weather, and that the rain was quite literally washing away the blood from their hands and weapons, and consequently clearing and cleansing their minds for what they had done. Defending their own country or no, they had fought and killed men; hundreds, if not a thousand of them, and that was enough of a burden on any man's conscience.
Glancing to his right, Vincent was silently riding next to him along with the few remaining officers. Ladislaus watched as Vincent appeared to be seething in his saddle, restlessly waiting for the opportune time to give the Lord a verbal beating for what had occurred and how they could have prevented it from happening. No argument came, even after supper and during mornings when he and Ladislaus were gathering the men to start their travel back. Instead, he sat on Hadúr and seethed, probably imagining all of the ways he could tear the Lord to pieces.
Ladislaus could only guess and understood that Vincent was not half wrong. Clearing his throat, he reluctantly turned his head to the Wallachian.
"Sir Vincent…"
The man slowly turned his head to face his superior, his eyes slightly glazed over from the hours of riding, "What do you wish of me?"
The Lord hesitated, "…I gave you my sincerest apologies. My sole desire was for a quick win…but now…after the battle…I only wish I had understood that the Ottomans really did have greater numbers than us still. And the fact that they have those men who shoot those massive…what do we call them?"
"Piyade Topç," Vincent reiterated.
"Pardon?"
"It is the words for 'foot artillery'. They carry what you call guns, which are apparently a new thought here. The Ottoman Empire has experimented with guns, and is in works of perfecting it into a smaller carriage," Vincent clarified.
Ladislaus suddenly looked troubled, "Perfect it? You mean they have more of those…guns…? Our soldiers picked up a few from the battlefield, and I know of a few amorers who were working with gunpowder. Most of us believed them to be crazy, until I actually saw one work. Massive thing, it was. But the ones the Ottomans were carrying were smaller, more efficient."
"They are extremely dangerous, and I fear that our swords hold no candle to their artillery. Our weapons will soon grow obsolete," Vincent sighed.
Ladislaus, reminded by the sigh, cleared his throat again, "To my original point, I am sorry. And I definitely was not aware of the fact that your brother was in command of the army."
Vincent winced, causing his armor to squeak, and Ladislaus then realized what he had been thinking of and seething about this entire time: family. Something Ladislaus was also trying to avoid thinking of as well.
"He will be back. He will try to re-capture Wallachia. But perhaps they have bigger fish to catch."
"What do you mean?"
Vincent grinned absentmindedly, his eyes fixated somewhere in the distance, "We are not the only territory they wish to claim. For longer than I care to remember, the Ottoman Empire has had their sights on Constantinople. And last I was commander I remember hearing them amassing more reinforcements."
"You don't think-" Ladislaus's eyes grew wide.
"I know they are capable of anything, my Lord. In the case of will against numbers, sheer numbers always wins in the end. Even you know this now," The man shook his head sadly.
But suddenly, Vincent's eyes snapped to a figure on the ridge of a hill in front of what was left of the army. The person was on a horse, and one of his hands was holding something tall…a flag…bearing the Hungarian coat of arms. A massive wave of relief washed over both men as they smiled in utter glee. They were home, or close to it.
It seemed to have been months since they caught sight of the familiar castle, the hilltop and bridge, and the moat forming with the spring rains. The rider galloped for them as men cheered, waving his flag proudly with a smile. The remnants of the army raced for him as well, throwing hats in the air and flailing their arms a
s they embraced one another. Ladislaus rode to the man with Vincent on his flank, and they opened their hands to shake.
"My Lord! You are alive and well! The Kingdom has been praying for your safety!" the scout bowed his head in recognition.
"Rejoice, my friend! We have returned. The castle is not far now," Ladislaus laughed as he bowed his head in thanks.
"Just over the next hill," the scout pointed and neck-reined his horse in the direction, "The regent will be pleased to hear of your arrival."
The men shouted in an uproar that made the horses skittish, but the Lord could hardly blame them. They had finally returned after hunted and being hunted for too long with nary a respite. The Hungarian warriors rejoiced and began to dance and sing along their short way back. It had been too long since the Lord had seen his men happy.
He may have been nobility, and for all of his bravado to maintain the upper hand from a certain Wallachian, he ultimately did not rule; he served. He served his people. True altruism could not have defined it better. His people's happiness was his own, their troubles were his troubles, their triumphs were his triumphs. He really was a servant to his people, the only difference being a title, a name. And there was nothing he ever wanted more than to serve and protect.
Once the army cleared the last hill, they caught sight of the familiar castle walls, and tried to race each other to the gates. Ladislaus laughed as he kicked his horse forward and went bounding off. Men fell out of their ranks, dropped everything, and made a mad dash for the castle. Nothing could have made the spectacle any sweeter in Vincent's eyes.
And yet he was the only one not running to the fortress of safety. He kept his horse at a walk, and watched the men become mere ants as they grew smaller and smaller in the distance. No doubt, he was incredibly happy for them, but a certain emptiness filled him as he watched his own men shout the name of their homeland in such love and devotion.
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