“Since then, I have fought on a dozen shores. I have been a slave. I have been whipped – just as my brother, Neboulos, was whipped. I, too, have felt the sting of the Spanish bastard’s lash. And I do not forget, schnecke. I do not forget any of it.” He stepped closer, his face barely inches from Theo’s. “But in all that time,” he said softly, “I have never betrayed the men beside whom I fight.
“My country may fall. My commander may leave. The world, it may end, and all I know with it. But this, schnecke, for me, this is all that matters in war and in life: the man at my side.” He stepped closer to Theo, his eyes hard. “Ask your question.”
“You paid Kyros in Arabic coin –” Theo began.
“Ask it!” Leofric pushed him with such force Theo stumbled.
Theo nodded slowly. “Did you take Arabic coin in exchange for information?”
“Ha!” Leofric’s eyes glittered dangerously. “So. Now we come to it. And I will answer, for though I fight now in the Slavic ranks, technically you are still my commander, and a man must answer his commander, ne, lest he find himself on the end of a whip, it seems. So.” He did not look away from Theo. “I drink in the Slavic tavern. Men there pay with Arabic coin. They gamble with it. I did not take the Arabic coin for whispers. I won it at dice. And before you ask – no. I do not know who takes this coin, or who speaks with Arabs. But if I were to make a guess – and I have, my old friend, I have made this guess many times – it would be that your Spanish bastard is somewhere behind that coin. For if ever I knew a man for whom corruption and coin alone are king, it is he.” He finished speaking and stepped back.
Theo cleared his throat. “I know it is too late,” he said quietly. “But for what it is worth, I am sorry, Leofric. I had no right to suspect you, let alone judge you. I was wrong.”
Leofric met his gaze with hard eyes. “Yes, Spaniard. You were wrong.”
Theo waited. After a long silence, he held out the wine flask. “This is yours.”
Leofric’s mouth curled, and when he spoke, his voice was cold with contempt. “Keep it. Some wrongs cannot be put right. With friends, I share wine. But you and I, Theudemir of Aurariola” – he shook his head, holding Theo’s eyes – “you and I are no longer friends.”
He turned and walked away, his back stolid and unyielding.
Theo watched him go for the second time, regret and shame curdling the wine in his gut.
40
Alaric
May, AD 692
Hispalis–Toletum
Road between Seville and Toletum
“Xristus jap Tyr, but it’s hot,” Alaric remarked to Teudolfo.
“And now you know the delights of riding in full mail, magula.” Teudolfo grinned and threw him a wine flask. “Not as you imagined war to be?”
“Not a hairus have we seen since we left Hispalis.” Alaric squinted at the blinding haze on the horizon, heat shimmering off the pale ground. “And for what?”
Teudolfo cast him a droll look. “I thought perhaps you had forgotten the Gothic word for sword after all this time swinging the spatha with your little Persian master.”
“I have not spoken so much of my own tongue since we rode out from Aurariola all those years ago. But Sunifred’s army is perhaps the most” – Teudolfo’s lips twitched slightly as Alaric searched for the word – “rustic company I have ever travelled in.” Teudolfo burst out laughing. The trials of the past months had bound them together, the two becoming almost as close as the brothers Alaric so missed. Now they rode alongside each other behind Sunifred’s broad back, the duke’s vivid red hair so like Rekiberga’s Alaric could barely look at it.
“Rustic is one word for it.” Teudolfo cast a disparaging glance at the motley lines of men in front of them. “Terrifying would be another.”
Alaric glanced around to ensure they were not being overheard. “Surely Sunifred does not intend to take Toletum with such a force.”
“No.” The humour faded from Teudolfo’s eyes. “But he knows you will deliver the men of Emerita. With them, and with you leading them, he thinks he will have enough.”
“My father has trained the men of the king’s thiufae in Emerita for decades. And the men from his lands around Emerita are sworn to him, not I, even if he remains in Aurariola from ill health. Even if he has said he will not stand in my way, still I know he does not bless this campaign. He has made his desire for peace very clear.” Alaric did not attempt to hide the bitterness in his tone. “The men of that city are bound to the king by every law we own. And to bid them follow my father’s banner, without even his true blessing, transgresses the last vestiges of honour left to me.” He shook his head wearily. “I do not like this, Teudolfo.”
“The men in Emerita will fight for you anyway.”
Alaric frowned. “Why do you say that?”
Teudolfo shrugged. “What choice do they have? Sunifred rides on the city with five thousand men. Trained warriors or no, with the forces Egica has already taken north, there are not enough left in Emerita to hold it against him.”
“That is not reason enough to turn traitor, surely. They are the king’s own guard – Emerita is the military headquarters for the Crown itself.”
Teudolfo raised his eyebrows. “Those who will not fight against Egica have already left to fight with him. Those who stay know what is coming. They either fight against Sunifred when he arrives or they join his forces. Like as not, those still there have already lost faith in the king. Your presence will be the deciding factor, whether you wish it or not, magula.”
Teudolfo was proven right.
Emerita Augustus might have flown the Chrismon and peacock, but it had been loyal to Alaric’s family for three generations and more. The Chrismon-and-peacock symbol was, to them, synonymous with the great general Geila, Alaric’s grandfather, and Geila’s brother, the legendary King Suintila, who had first united Spania beneath that very symbol. The soft-handed politicians and those who hoped still to find favour amongst the seniores of Egica’s court had, as Teudolfo predicted, prudently left as Sunifred’s hordes marched along the wide, sweeping plains from Hispalis to Emerita.
It did not come to a fight. The gates instead were flung open in welcome to Sunifred as if he were already king. For who, after all, was to say that he was not? War was in the air, and alliances were fluid.
The army, to which Sunifred referred in the old Gothic manner as harjis, or host, camped beyond the walls of the city. Alaric and the men of Sunifred’s own thiufa rode within and made the palace their home.
“I have never known a man more enamoured of a history he knows nothing of,” said Teudolfo drily, the first night they sat at the rear of the great stone hall Alaric and his brothers had once known as their second home. “Since gathering his beloved harjis, Sunifred has begun to sound like a relic from the days of Theodosius. What is next – blood sacrifice to old gods and parading about in animal skins?”
Alaric stifled a grin.
It was true that Sunifred had grown in swagger with every man, no matter how baseborn, to join his horde. He had spared no expense on the passage north, paying good coin for what his harjis ate, keeping his followers drunk on mead and posca, slaughtering beasts every day for meat.
“Half the men here ride only to keep their bellies full and the wine flowing,” said Teudolfo, casting a disapproving eye about at the raucous revelry in the hall. “Your little Persian would not approve.”
“Do I detect a faint measure of respect for Shukra’s tactics? Surely not!” Alaric speared his meat, openly laughing at his old friend. Teudolfo and Shukra, from the first day they met, had waged a cordial, if nonetheless pitched, battle over the best way to train young men.
“Say what I may about that conniving little listeigs,” said Teudolfo, “I will never call him a fool. This one, on the other hand…” He cast a scornful glance at Sunifred, who held court from the dais, red faced and bold as ever, his arm around a plump serving wench, fingering her breast with his hand.
>
“Aba dauhter minus!” he called genially to Alaric, raising his wine cup in their direction. “Husband of my daughter! Enjoy the lovely women of Emerita whilst you can, my friend! For tomorrow we will take Toletum, and you may be dead!”
“Tomorrow?” grumbled Teudolfo beneath his breath, raising his cup with Alaric and smiling politely at Sunifred’s exhortations. “We’ll be lucky to get this lot moving before midsummer.”
But Alaric wasn’t listening. “Whether we take Toletum or not,” he said grimly, “I’m marrying his daughter.”
Teudolfo smiled wryly. “Well,” he said, “you did deliver the men of Emerita, after all.”
In the end, it was another week before they rode out from Emerita, and tempers were already flaring. They passed Castra and turned west to Toletum, men joining as they rode. They met no resistance and a great many deserted fortresses. Whilst Sunifred took each abandoned village as evidence of his inevitable victory, Alaric was unable to quell a distinct feeling of unease – not aided by Sunifred’s unfailing arrogance.
As they entered the final approaches to Toletum, Alaric was wound tighter than a drum. The days were hot and still, and he feared for his men, the men of Emerita, who had rallied about Alaric’s flag as Teudolfo had predicted.
“Your men believe in our cause!” Sunifred had said, the day after they arrived in Emerita, clapping him on the back with such force Alaric had almost stumbled. The duke was bleary eyed and red faced, as he seemed always to be since they had ridden out from Hispalis. He began drinking as soon as he woke, and he rarely fell into bed less than insensible. Accustomed to the abstemious discipline of first his father’s household and then Laurentius’s training, Alaric found the excesses and wild temper swings unnerving and his own contempt increasingly difficult to conceal.
“And he is wrong,” Alaric said now to Teudolfo as they rode. “The men of Emerita do not believe in this rebellion any more than I do. They ride because I asked them to do so, and because I used my father’s name to force their hand. I forced honourable men to fight a rebellion they cannot win.” His voice was bitter. “I do not deserve their respect or their loyalty. I can barely bring myself to look them in the eye.”
“Not true.” For once there was no mockery in Teudolfo’s voice. “Every man here could have gone north to Egica. They chose to stay and fight. How you lead them from here will decide whether or not they remain.” He gripped the younger man’s shoulder. “If I did not think you could lead them, I would have left your side long before now, magula. Give them a chance to know the temper of your steel, and yourself a chance to wield it. Men will follow strength even when they do not believe in the cause, Alaric.”
“I wish I could believe in it,” said Alaric bitterly.
Teudolfo looked at him askance. “Then you do not any longer?”
“I know only that my father does not. Nor Laurentius, nor Athanagild – nor any of the men I have been raised to follow. And the more I follow Sunifred, Teudolfo, the more I understand why they will not.” He frowned into the sun. “I thought I could separate the cause from the man,” he said quietly. “But without good men to lead it, no cause can stand. I knew Sunifred was not that man. Now I fear men will die for a cause that deserved a better leader. Worse, they will die because they followed me to that cause – and to that leader.”
“Perhaps,” said Teudolfo, “it is you who will lead them to victory.”
“The only thing worse than a lost cause,” said Alaric bitterly, “is a divided one.”
Ahead, the final ridges bordering Toletum materialised through the shimmering light on the horizon.
“Unfortunately,” he said, “the time for division is past. Now we fight together – or we all die.”
A monk came to their camp in the night, sent from Sisebut’s monastery in Toletum.
“Egica is still in the north fighting in the mountains against the rebel Favila. His Grace, Archbishop Sisebut of Toletum, says Toletum itself is poorly defended. He promises that if you pass the forces on the plains, he himself will see the gates open for you, my lord.”
The monk’s words bothered Alaric more than he cared to admit. He had hoped for communication from Athanagild, but the monk was an officious, portly fellow who had carried no word from his brother. Can it truly be so easy? Alaric pondered as Sunifred plied the visiting monk with wine and meat to which he looked unusually accustomed for a man of the cloth. What game does Egica play? His brother’s warnings sounded in his mind, but Athanagild was not here, and Alaric knew there was nothing his brother could do even if he were. Alaric, though, seemed the only one of Sunifred’s company who was concerned.
“That fool Egica has left his city open for the taking!” Sunifred gloated, drinking deeply. “Did I not tell you how it would be, Alaric?”
“You did, Fráuja.” Alaric turned a frowning expression to the monk, who seemed remarkably unconcerned given the gravity of the news he brought. “But why has he left it so? Surely Egica knew we rode on Toletum?”
The monk bowed. “Perhaps, my lord. But the king” – he looked at Sunifred and flushed, realising his diplomatic error – “That is, Fráuja Egica, is far north in the mountains, with much of his forces occupied in putting down the rebellion there. Even if he wished to ride back to face your army, he would not have arrived before now. And I believe he thought your force significantly smaller, my lord,” he added, bowing respectfully to Sunifred.
“There!” Sunifred turned a triumphant expression to Alaric. “You have your father’s dour countenance, magula! Have faith! Has not the archbishop himself blessed our endeavour?”
“For one who invokes pagan gods at every turn and disobeys every dictate of the Holy fathers,” said Teudolfo as they backed out of the tent, “Sunifred bandies about the friendship of this archbishop with a deal of confidence.”
Recalling Athanagild’s dire warnings regarding the alliance between Sunifred and Sisebut, Alaric swallowed his disgust and made no comment.
He did not sleep at all that night.
He thought of Rekiberga as he had last seen her when they parted in Hispalis, of her blazing auburn hair and eyes the colour of the sea at midday. He thought of nothing but her during the long night before they rode for Toletum, so that if he must die, it would be with every inch of her flesh embedded upon his mind.
The memories lingered still as they rode across the wide, red plains, trampling olive trees in their wake, on the approach to Toletum. A paltry force rode out to meet them.
Sunifred’s front line, led by Alaric, took them in the first rush, beneath a hail of spear followed by cavalry. The survivors gave up the bridge with little more than token resistance and retreated behind the gates to the jeers of the attackers.
Not all found it amusing. “The bridge is but the beginning,” muttered Teudolfo, eyeing the city with misgiving. The walls of Toletum were high and wide, the city itself built on a hill. The bridge was narrow to deter a mass advance. Sunifred’s army must first cross the broad reach of the River Tagus, then attack a city from which the defenders had the advantage of high ground and robust defences.
It should have been, at the least, a siege. Alaric’s own father had helped plan the defence of Toletum. Alaric knew how hard it should be to take if it were properly guarded. But it was not, and in the end, it did not prove the great battle Alaric had expected, nor barely even a skirmish.
The city hid behind the walls for much of the morning, putting up no more than a desultory defence as Sunifred rode between his troops, directing ladders and bowmen, readying them to storm the walls. No more than a few desultory arrows had been loosed before a messenger wearing the brown robes of a monk was sent under a flag of truce.
“Fráuja – there has been a rebellion within our own walls,” said the messenger, red faced and flustered. “The palace guard is defeated, and to prevent further loss of life, the archbishop has declared he will open the gates if you, in turn, guarantee the safety of all in the city.” By early a
fternoon, Toletum was Sunifred’s, with barely a hundred lives lost in the taking.
“Why?” Teudolfo mused, as they rode at the front of a vanguard through the city gates. “Why would Egica relinquish his own capital?”
Because he knows he will take it back, thought Alaric bitterly. And because when he does so, it will be with all his enemies unmasked, revealed to him.
Archbishop Sisebut met Sunifred in the great square before the grand portico of the basilica. His robes were blazing white trimmed in gold thread, and he appeared carrying both mitre and sceptre. Sunifred dismounted and prostrated himself before the ornaments of God, Sisebut intoning the holy words of the sacrament above him: “In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti…”
It was not a coronation – not yet. But it was the Church’s blessing, and in Toletum they amounted to the same thing.
Alaric was not looking at the archbishop, however. His eyes were locked on his brother, who stood in a cluster of priests flanking Sisebut.
He saw Athanagild’s eyes search the array of lords behind Sunifred. They passed over Alaric twice. The third time, however, the hazel eyes flared with recognition, and a brief, blazing look of relief and joy passed over the thin face, so fleeting it was gone almost before it had occurred. It left Alaric feeling warm inside and oddly reassured.
When did it happen, he wondered, that Athanagild became what he is? He remembered for a moment the quiet, thin boy who had hung back from his and Theo’s games, watching always with a half smile. He recognised in the man before him the understated strength he had not noticed in those childish days, the calm intelligence that lay behind Athanagild’s reserve.
He watched Athanagild throughout the long afternoon. His brother remained close to Sisebut’s side, leaning in attentively when the archbishop spoke. Sisebut addressed a great many comments to Athanagild, Alaric noted. Once, when Athanagild had momentarily removed himself, Alaric saw Sisebut look around, a petulant frown on his face that only lifted when Athanagild’s quiet, tall presence reappeared, bending again to attend his archbishop with a thoughtful, measured air. A passage from Athanagild’s letter of several months ago passed through Alaric’s mind: Please do not be concerned for me. I find myself well able to navigate the complexities of my situation. At least I am able to aid Laurentius and our father by passing information on Sisebut’s plans, and in this, I believe I can at least be of service, even in a small fashion.
The King's Coin: Ambition is the only faith (Visigoths of Spain Book 2) Page 32