by Dan Davis
Behind them though came hundreds of akinji light cavalry. They too attempted to break through the infantry and cannon arrayed before them but again they found themselves surrounded on three sides and were no doubt confused about where our fire was coming from.
Our cannons kept firing at the bridge itself, blasting away continuously so that any who crossed were in danger of being blown to pieces before reaching the field beyond. Even when they crossed the bridge they would find more cannonballs crashing amongst them if they tarried there in order to assemble their companies.
“Fog’s lifting,” Walt said, his mouth full of slices of dried sausage.
“Reckon it’s the cannons and guns blowing it away?” Rob asked.
“Do not be absurd,” I said but perhaps he was right for in the coming centuries I would see that very thing happen for certain. Whether it was the gunpowder or the wind, the fog was rapidly thinning.
Perhaps it was this which gave William the confidence to send his Janissaries and sipahi cavalry across. They were superbly equipped veterans, professional horse soldiers who had fought everywhere in the empire and had won countless victories for their sultans. And William had thirty thousand of them.
They thundered across the reinforced bridge in a seemingly endless mass, their mail and lamellar armour a dull grey and their lances held high above them.
“Time to get to work,” I said to my men and we called for our helms.
A great cry went up everywhere at once and my own men beside me cried out.
“By Jesus the Christ and all His saints!” Walt shouted. “Would you look at that!”
Through the swirling banks of fog, the High Bridge was collapsing before our eyes. It was jammed with sipahis, packed flank to flank and nose to tail along its entire length. Whether it was the weight of horses alone or if a few lucky cannonballs had helped, the bridge supports snapped and came apart and the entire bridge tilted and slipped, spilling men and horses from the side as it went before the entire thing collapsed and sent them crashing into the river below.
Every man around me crossed himself and sent his thanks to God, for half the enemy army was yet on the far bank and they now had no easy way to cross. William was there and would be unable to send orders to his soldiers on the other side.
But even though it was not the whole army, we were still outnumbered by those who had crossed already. The sipahis on our side rapidly organised themselves in, I must admit, a rather impressive fashion. A testament to the professionalism of the officers and obedience of the men. It was impressive and worrying in equal measure. The mass of surviving azabs were arranged into some semblance of order and they advanced on our flanks, pushing away the hand-gunners and archers by their sheer numbers and their mad bravery. This allowed the sipahis to advance out into the valley toward our mercenary infantry and cavalry. Behind them the Janissaries formed up and followed, ready to exploit any opening the horsemen created.
I ordered the sluji to fall back and we kept our distance, watching as the azabs finally engaged our infantry. It was hard fought but the Turks were driven back once more, suffering incredible casualties. Azab bodies littered the field already.
“What are we doing?” Rob asked, prompting me for orders.
“Keep the men back,” I said. “Keep our distance. This is not yet our fight.”
William was on the far bank with his immortals and I now doubted we would get the chance to kill him that day. Still, the enemy threatened to overwhelm the Moldavians and so we might well have to fight a retreat all the way back to Suceava, which might present more opportunities to come at him, so I thought I should keep the sluji fresh and unharmed. On the other hand, if we won the battle, we might destroy William’s partnership with the Sultan. All I could do for the moment was hold my men ready at the flank.
Though the ground was soft, the sipahis advanced quicker than our infantry in the centre could retreat and so our mercenaries were ordered to hold their ground and fight off the cavalry. The sipahis began to charge and retreat in companies and larger formations. Cannons blasted continuously, sending their projectiles flying overhead and the hand-gunners fired at the enemy in front of them.
Behind the sipahis, the Janissaries began to manoeuvre out to both flanks. It appeared as if they meant to encircle our infantry while the sipahis kept them engaged. Our infantry were already being pushed back by the Turks and even if they were not surrounded by the Janissaries, their line might well have been broken and the order of the battle would disintegrate and in that chaos the numbers of the Turks, especially of mounted men, would mean the end for us.
It was the high moment in the battle, where most soldiers of both sides were engaged and only the reinforcements would decide the outcome. In the wooded hills all around us, King Stephen and his heavy cavalry waited for the moment when their charges would turn the tide in our favour.
But the enemy had tens of thousands of men close at hand, just across the river. If they could somehow be brought across before the day’s end, while the king’s cavalry was engaged, then everything might change.
“Rob?” I called. “Take ten men and ride around back to the river. See if you can see what William is doing. Do not engage anyone, even if it means returning without reaching the river.”
He called out the men he wanted and they thundered off toward terrible danger. I wondered if I would see him again.
“He will cut his losses,” Stephen said, riding forward to give me his opinion. “He will retreat. It is his nature.”
“He needs a victory,” Eva said in response, “or all his work with the Turks will have been for nothing.”
“What is a century to William?” Stephen countered. “Even if Mehmed orders him from—”
“Enough,” I snapped. “We shall see.”
Trumpets sounded from the trees, echoing through the hills. From the fog-filled woodland ringing the valley, the sounds of horses and men built until I could make out the colours and banners emerging from the shadows between the pines. King Stephen’s Moldavians in the centre, with the detachments of Hungarians and Poles on the flanks. As they advanced, I saw masses of the peasant army marching behind with their spears and flails and mattocks in hand.
Walt called to me. “Rob’s returned, Richard.”
A company of sipahis chased him but they broke off when they saw how many we were and retreated, allowing Rob and all ten of his men to approach.
“Turks trying to ford the river,” Rob said, breathing heavily from his gallop. His horse shook beneath him, its chest heaving, and Rob patted and rubbed its neck with his stump. “Thousands of them trying to use pieces of broken bridge and other timber and rocks and anything to make a dam or a ford at least.”
“Will they succeed?”
“Men being swept away. Water must be colder than ice. But there’s thousands of them. They’ll do it eventually.”
“Damn him!” I growled. “He will win the battle.”
“Should we stop them?” Eva said. “Take the sluji and stop them coming across?”
“They have cannons and guns. And he will send his Blood Janissaries to sweep us away while he remains unassailable on the far bank. No, we shall assist in the destruction of this army as swiftly as possible. Ready the men. We will assault the enemy after the nobles and the boyars complete their charge.”
“Who do you fancy?” Walt asked. “Get us some sipahi officers, you reckon? Lots of nice stuff on them, jewels and gold and the like. Nice for a drink, and all.”
I considered charging the sluji at the enemy cavalry but discounted it. “We will flank these Janissaries and wipe out as many as we can. They are the Turk’s best soldiers. The more we kill, the better it is for Christendom. And tell the men to steal their hand-guns, the ammunition and the gunpowder. If we survive this day, we should arm ourselves properly.”
The Turks had advanced so far into the valley that a good number of the Hungarian and Polish cavalry and Moldavian peasant forces emerged f
ully behind the main body of their army. There was no escape for them.
I brought the slujis close and arrayed them in two lines while the Polish horsemen rode by us, two thousand of them in whites and blues and reds, with pennants fluttering above them. The wealthiest lords were clad in shining plate and even the lowest of the riders were superbly armoured, as were their horses.
Like storm waves crashing against a promontory, the heavy cavalry crashed into the Janissaries, the azabs and the sipahis in the centre. The enemy were overwhelmed and crushed by the weight of the charge. Our men-at-arms were fewer in number than the enemy but were still unstoppable.
Their great charge flattened hundreds of Janissaries, many fell dead from lance strikes or were bowled down and crushed by the horses themselves. Those that avoided the first charge were met by a second line which brought down even more. The Poles slowed and turned about or moved through the Janissaries, thrusting with their lances or using their swords or axes or maces. Others formed up beyond them and prepared to charge the thousands upon thousands of sipahis in the centre.
My slujis’ war cry had often been the name of Vlad Dracula or that of their country. But considering there were Wallachians fighting in William’s army, we needed something else that would proclaim which side we fought for. There was one that all men knew, that was even older than I was.
“Christus!” I shouted, lifting my lance high over my head. “Deus vult!”
My men took up the cry behind me and we advanced on the Janissaries. I knew I would not need to tell my men to end the fight by taking a number of our enemies prisoner so that we might later drink their blood. We had fought together for years and they knew their business.
Despite being mortals, exhausted by their slog through the sodden ground and the shock of the heavy cavalry, the Janissaries put up a strong and sustained resistance. They were strong and well-trained individuals and even broken by our attacks they formed groups and fought back to back. None wished to surrender. For the thousandth time I cursed the Turks from ripping these fine men from their Christian families as boys and turning them into Mohammedan slaves, their minds broken and infested by the infidel religion. But my anger at the Turk and the sympathy for the boys that were and the men they might have been did not stay my hand when it came to cutting them down.
In time, all the living Turks in the valley broke and tried to flee. All were chased down and killed or captured.
And despite his attempted crossing of the gorge and freezing river, William did what he always did.
He took the remnants of his army, and he fled.
They all rushed south, back toward Bulgaria where they would be safe. All but Basarab and his Wallachian horsemen who abandoned William and rode west for Wallachia.
With William on the run, we knew we had a chance to catch him and kill him but he had a half a day head start and he somehow managed to keep his army in good order throughout the retreat. Though they were no doubt distraught by the loss of so many of their comrades, and the fact that they rushed through a winter landscape devoid of food or water, they maintained their cohesion. We attacked the rear guard repeatedly and each time we killed hundreds of them but our horses were no less exhausted than theirs were. The Poles and Moldavian light cavalry that rode with us were excellent soldiers but they were exhausted also by the battle they had fought. It was bitterly cold.
Four long days and nights, we whittled away their rear guard. We lost hundreds of men through enemy hand-gunners and ambushes and through accidents and exhaustion. We could not have pushed our people or our horses any harder. And still the Turks, and William, got away.
When the reports came in to King Stephen of the enemy losses, he had them checked again by his own priests and monks. And yet it was true. Our small army had killed forty-five thousand Turks in the valley and during the retreat. We had killed four pashas in the valley and a hundred enemy battle standards were taken.
In addition to the dead, we took thousands of prisoners of both low and high rank. The lords, King Stephen kept, while the commoners he had impaled.
It seemed he had learned a thing or two about frightening Turks from his cousin.
Unlike Vlad, though, he soon after ordered them cut down and burned rather than leave them rotting.
By any measure, it was a great victory, and King Stephen could do as he pleased without hearing a word of criticism from anyone. Indeed, the Pope proclaimed him an Athletae Christi, just as old Janos Hunyadi had been years before.
In Hungary, Mattias Corvinus did everything in his power to claim the victory as his own. In truth, not only had he not been there but he had sent the barest minimum of his men to fight the battle and yet he wrote a series of letters to the Pope, to the Holy Roman Emperor, and to all manner of other kings and princes of Europe telling them that he, Mattias Corvinus, had defeated a large Turkish army with his own forces. It was truly an incredible bit of dishonesty and whatever lingering flicker of respect I had for the man was gone the moment I found out.
King Stephen on the other hand not only refused to celebrate his victory but instead he fasted for forty days in order to show his devotion to God.
“It is to God that this victory should be attributed,” he said when I saw him a week after it was fought. “It was God that brought down the High Bridge.”
“It was your well-placed cannons that brought it down,” I replied, frowning. “And Zaganos Pasha sending too many sipahis over it at once in his eagerness to crush us.”
The king would not hear it. “God smote the bridge with his own hand.”
“Perhaps he did but it was the drummers and trumpeters that brought the enemy across.”
King Stephen smiled. He looked tired. “Yes, and I am certain that you would like to claim this victory as your own, Richard. But who placed that thought in your mind?”
“I did.”
His smile dropped. “God put it there, Richard, so that Moldavia would be saved.”
“Well then, My Lord King, I shall praise God for his deviousness and his martial cunning.”
Stephen frowned. “For his wisdom, yes. Now, you asked to see me and I believe I know what you wish to discuss.” He leaned back in his chair. “Wallachia.”
“Basarab turned traitor. He must be removed.”
The king sighed. “And your friend must be returned to the throne, is that it?”
“My friend and your cousin, yes, My Lord King.”
He leaned forward. “What will Zaganos Pasha do now?”
“Our agents suggested that this was the last chance he had to conquer Christendom. Now he has failed, Sultan Mehmed will take his armies east and south.”
King Stephen closed his eyes. “Then we shall have peace. Praise God.”
“If those things come to pass, perhaps. But if the Sultan takes his army a thousand miles away and leaves only garrisons, would this not be the best time to launch a reconquest?”
The king interlocked his fingers and peered at me. “We would struggle to fight off another invasion at this point. Launching one of our own is out of the question. Do you comprehend the size of Bulgaria? What would you have me do, besiege and conquer Sofia?”
“To begin with, yes. But not alone. With an ally on the Wallachian throne and support from Hungary and the Poles, it would be possible to—”
“No,” he said. “It would not. We have been ravaged by these wars. We need time to heal. Years, you understand, not months. By the time we are recovered, Sultan Mehmed may have defeated his enemies and then returned to assault us once more.”
“Precisely why we must attack now.”
King Stephen smiled and then laughed but it was with a certain affection. “I have long admired your military vigour, sir, and your relentless enthusiasm for war and conquest. But you have never understood us and our kingdoms here. We have been beset by the Tatars of the Golden Horde to our north for generations. The Turks have been at our gates in the south for almost as long. This is our life. Our b
urden. God is good to us. He has given Moldavia the wealth of the plains and the safety of the mountains. He has given us wheat and sheep and timber. He made our men courageous and our women strong. Moldavia will endure these barbarians from this day until the end of days and we shall prevail.”
“I pray that you will.”
“You want Vlad Dracula on the throne of Wallachia and I would not object. But he is bound to Corvinus, now. It is not my words of support you require but the assent of the King of Hungary.”
“Perhaps you might consider sending—”
“Yes, yes,” King Stephen said, waving his hand. “I shall have letters written.”
“There is of course the small matter of Basarab occupying the—”
“If I can spare the men when the time comes, I shall spare them. You have my word. Is that all or would you like to cut my purse while you are here?”
I bowed deeply. “Your wisdom and generosity is matched only by your prowess commanding armies, My Lord King. I will take the sluji west and do what I can to restore Vlad to his throne.”
The king nodded as if he did not much care either way. “And what will you do with regards to your brother? Our dear defeated Zaganos Pasha?”
“I pray only that he flees far from here along with the Turks.”
King Stephen pursed his lips, nodding slowly and regarding me closely for a few moments. He then abruptly dismissed me without any courteous words and I was escorted from the hall with Walt at my heels.
“Not true, is it?” Walt asked me, following me out. “We’re not praying William has fled with Mehmed?”
“Of course not, you bloody fool.”
“What will we do then?” Walt asked, lowering his voice. “How are we going to kill William now?”
“I have a notion,” I said. “But we will need to see Dracula return in order to achieve it.”
17. Dracula Returns