by Peter Darman
‘There are a number of siege engines there that Master Thaddeus will play with when we recross the river. My question to you, Marshal of Estonia, is will your Estonian warriors be willing to accompany us in our war against the Semgallians? The bishop desires to gather as many men as possible so we may have a quick victory.’
During the winter there had been many courier pigeons flying to and from Riga and the castles of the Sword Brothers to alert the castellans of the bishop’s plans.
‘They are loyal, master,’ replied Conrad, ‘but they look to our order to liberate their lands.’
‘You can inform your warlords that once the Semgallians have been taught a lesson the bishop intends to march north and liberate Jerwen and Rotalia.’
‘An ambitious plan,’ remarked Conrad.
‘The bishop believes that the Semgallians must be punished,’ said Rudolf, ‘and I agree with him.’
‘And the Danes?’
Rudolf’s expression hardened. ‘They too will learn that it is unwise to incur the wrath of the Sword Brothers.’
Conrad told Andres, Hillar and Tonis of the bishop’s intentions immediately after the meeting with Master Rudolf. None of them knew where Semgallia was.
‘It is south of the River Dvina,’ Conrad told them as they all stood round the campfire in the Army of the Wolf’s camp.
‘We are to march south, not north?’ said Hillar.
‘For the first part of the campaign, yes,’ said Conrad. ‘But after the bishop has taken the great fort of the enemy he has promised to march north to free Rotalia and Jerwen.’
‘We are sworn to your service, Susi,’ stated Andres. ‘Where you go, we go.’
‘It is as my brothers says,’ added Tonis. ‘My wolf shields have taken an oath of loyalty to you, Susi.’
Andres and Hillar nodded in agreement.
‘You have my gratitude,’ said Conrad. ‘Soon, my friends, you will all be back in your homelands.’
He neglected to tell them that the price of freeing their homelands was the conversion of their people to the Holy Church. They probably knew that already, they were not fools, but Conrad comforted himself with the thought that the benign rule of the Bishop of Riga and the Sword Brothers was far better than the savagery of being under the heel of the Oeselians or enduring the tyranny of the Danes. After all, had not both terrorised and persecuted the inhabitants of the lands they had conquered? But in Livonia the indigenous Livs and Letts lived in harmony with the new German settlers under the protection of the Sword Brothers.
‘When do we leave, Susi?’ Hillar snapped him out of his daydreaming.
‘In seven days.’
Courier pigeons flew from Riga to each of the order’s castles with Grand Master Volquin’s desire that each garrison provide a certain number of soldiers for the forthcoming campaign: twelve brother knights, thirty sergeants, forty crossbowmen and the same number of spearmen, together with enough supplies to sustain a two-month campaign. So Wenden’s park of carts and wagons, located in the west of the outer perimeter grounds, was emptied as the transports were loaded with food, tents, tools, spare weapons, ammunition and Master Thaddeus’ siege engines.
The old quartermaster general was in an excitable state as his engineers supervised the loading of the constituent parts of the two trebuchets on to four-wheeled wagons. Conrad had been observing Kaja and the novices being put through their paces by Lukas and saw the distinctive lean features of Thaddeus overseeing the loading of wagons in the distance. He left the trainees and walked over to him. The old man’s wispy white beard was almost the same colour as his skin and Conrad wondered how his apparently frail constitution survived Livonia’s winters.
Thaddeus spied him approaching. ‘Ah, Conrad, is your army ready to march?’
‘My warriors travel light, sir. They can be on the move in a matter of hours.’
Thaddeus nodded thoughtfully. ‘Lightly armed pagans can move like a leaf on the wind but we are forced to travel at the speed of an oxen. Logistics is a millstone that we have to endure.’
‘Your machines are not easy to transport over the rutted tracks of this land,’ said Conrad.
Thaddeus pointed at the wagons. ‘These trebuchets are being taken to the Gauja where they will be transported down the river before being unloaded and moved to Riga and then Holm.’
‘The bishop means to batter Mesoten into submission.’
Thaddeus rubbed his hands. ‘These two machines pale into insignificance when compared to the trebuchet that currently resides at Holm. I sent Master Godfrey detailed specifications regarding its construction and the grand master despatched engineers from Riga to carry out its assembly. I based the design on the trebuchet employed at Acre all those years ago. That was a mighty siege.’
‘No mangonels?’ asked Conrad.
Thaddeus rolled his eyes. ‘They are also being assembled at Holm. They are simple machines and easy to build. I just hope that Master Godfrey has remembered to stockpile suitable ammunition. There is no point in having siege engines if they do not have any ammunition. I think I will write a missive that a pigeon can take to Riga. It is just the sort of thing that gets overlooked amidst the chaos that surrounds preparing for a campaign.’
He nodded and went to walk away.
‘I wanted to thank you sir,’ said Conrad.
Thaddeus stopped and looked at him. ‘Thank me, for what?’
‘For teaching me to read and write.’
Thaddeus raised an eyebrow at him. ‘You know the rudiments, that is all, Brother Conrad. You must practise if you are to become proficient.’
‘Even so,’ said Conrad, ‘what I learned from you allowed me to read the words on the headstone of my wife’s and son’s grave. And for that I am in your eternal debt.’
Thaddeus looked kindly at him. ‘Well, I am glad to have been a part of such an important quest.’ He raised an eyebrow again. ‘Even if you were a difficult student. Now if you will excuse me.’
He turned and walked in the direction of the castle as his engineers continued to load the various parts of the trebuchets on the wagons.
Conrad thought of Daina and Dietmar as his Estonians and the garrison of Wenden struggled south towards Holm trying to traverse flooded meadows and pass through the damp undergrowth of forests of oak, spruce, elm and maple. The bog forests of pine were avoided altogether as men, animals and wagons could sink without trace in the dark, stinking pools that filled them. Liv guides led the way, tracing a meandering path through a land that was drenched but also bursting into life after the frozen desolation of winter. The meadows were filled with buttercups, the forest floor covered with bilberries and cowberries and fungi sprouted around the lower reaches of tree trunks.
Nature was stirring and as well as the profusion of growing flowers and plants the forest was filled with the grunts of wild boar, the bleats of elk and the tapping of white-backed woodpeckers. The skies were filled with black storks, lesser-spotted eagles, black grouse, corncrakes and great snipe. The mornings were mostly sunny but cool, the afternoons often cloudy and wet. The rivers were at their peak, filled with meltwater, moving rapidly over effervescent rapids and providing the army with cool, fresh drinking water. However, though water was in abundance it was also a major hindrance, and after two days of achieving a miserable daily rate of advance of four miles, Master Rudolf called a meeting in his tent following vespers and supper.
‘Because it is so early in the spring the ground is too wet,’ stated Rudolf, sitting at his table in his oblong pavilion, candles on stands around the walls providing a yellowish illumination. Also around the walls stood four novices in their plain gambesons, their hair cut short and their faces clean-shaven. They served those invited to the meeting with wine as Thaddeus, Walter, Conrad and leather face, now the commander of all Wenden’s crossbowmen and spearmen, took their places. Rudolf wore the expression of a man at the end of his tether. He took a gulp of wine and ordered one of the novices to refill his cup.
‘Our wagons are getting stuck in mud. At our current rate of advance it will take us a month to reach Holm, which will delay the army’s crossing of the river. I am thinking of abandoning the waggons and loading their cargoes on the horses and ponies. Conrad, as your Estonians are all mounted I think that we could use their ponies as our draught animals.’
Thaddeus was shaking his head.
‘You disagree, Master Thaddeus?’ asked Walter.
‘Having spent a considerable amount of time organising the loading of the wagons,’ said Thaddeus, ‘I would consider it gross negligence to abandon them so early in our march.’
The patter of raindrops on the tent’s roof caused Rudolf to look up. ‘More rain, which means that in the morning the wagons will have to be dug out of the mud, further delaying our progress.’
Thaddeus took a sip of his wine. ‘How many soldiers do you command, Master Rudolf?’
Rudolf did a mental calculation for a few seconds. ‘Just over a hundred and twenty men of the garrison and Conrad’s eight hundred warriors.’
‘Eight hundred and thirty,’ Conrad corrected him.
‘Nine hundred and fifty men,’ said Thaddeus, ‘plus the Liv men hired to drive the carts and wagons. More that enough to construct a road to ease our passage.’
Rudolf laughed. ‘A road?’
‘It is a shame that the nobility of Christendom chooses to spend its time engaged in warfare at the expense of exploring the writings of ancient scholars,’ said Thaddeus.
Rudolf rubbed his eyes as Walter politely paid attention. Conrad had no idea what Thaddeus was talking about but the engineer continued regardless.
‘I remember reading a passage in Tacitus concerning a Roman army marching through terrain that was very similar to Livonia in springtime, that is to say wet and muddy.’
‘This is all very interesting,’ sighed Rudolf.
‘If it is interesting then you will wish me to continue,’ said Thaddeus brusquely. ‘The point is that the Romans constructed a log road. They cut down trees and fashioned logs that they arranged side by side and perpendicular to the direction of travel that the army wished to take.’
Conrad laughed. ‘A log road? Surely you are not suggesting that we cut down trees to create this road as we go along?’
‘That is precisely what I am suggesting,’ replied Thaddeus. ‘We have an adequate supply of saws, axes and hammers with which to fell trees and cut logs, and hundreds of men who can do it.’
‘It would be quite an undertaking, sir,’ said Walter.
The rainfall on the roof increased. Thaddeus looked up.
‘As would hauling wagons and carts through mud.’
Rudolf also looked at the roof that was now being pounded by heavy rain.
‘You are confident that this log road will shorten the time spent on the march, Master Thaddeus?’
Thaddeus nodded. ‘I am certain of it.’
‘Then make it so.’
The next day Thaddeus was busy organising parties to fell trees, other groups to ferry the trunks back to camp by using the ponies of Conrad’s Estonians where they would be cut into logs. The logs would then be laid parallel to each other under the direction of the quartermaster’s engineers. It was a mammoth undertaking but one that Thaddeus tackled with gusto. The warriors of the Army of the Wolf thought the whole enterprise highly amusing and intriguing, and as the first day wore on there developed keen competition between the Saccalians, Jerwen and Rotalians as to who could fell the most trees.
It was as though a thousand woodpeckers had suddenly been awakened as axes and saws went to work on the surrounding pine, spruce and birch trees. Most of the trees averaged a height of around sixty feet, though some were up to a hundred feet high. The rate of felling averaged two hundred trees an hour, which meant that by the end of the day one thousand, five hundred had been cut down. Thaddeus and his engineers managed to lay four miles of road on the first day, five on the second and a further five on the third. When the scouts led the army through stretches of forest with thick moss between the trees there was no need to lay logs as the waggons did not get stuck in mud and so the rate of advance was increased to seven or eight miles a day. But when the army was forced to move across meadows and skirt peat bogs then the ground became very soft and the saws and axes were needed once more. Nevertheless, Rudolf was extremely happy as the army got nearer to Holm with its full complement of wagons.
All the brother knights, sergeants and novices also took part in the tree felling, Conrad, Anton and Hans forming a team that employed the techniques they had been taught by Lukas during the siege of Fellin nine years earlier. Conrad and Hans used a two handed saw to make a straight cut into one side of the trunk, then a downward cut above it at and angle to forty-five degrees that created a notch that Hans knocked out with a hammer. The tree fell on the ground and they went to work with axes to chop off the branches. Then they called to an Estonian with a pony who hitched the timber to the saddle and pulled it to camp.
Conrad recognised the long blonde hair of the Estonian who tied a rope around the end of the trunk with some dexterity.
‘You should be in camp, Kaja,’ he said.
She spun round. ‘Why? You think I cannot hold my own when it comes to manual labour, Susi? I was once a farmer’s daughter and know all about long days full of toil.’
‘That’s told you,’ grinned Hans.
Kaja checked that the knot was tight. ‘You should spend some time being a farmer, Susi, and then you would realise what a hard life it is.’
‘I was a farmer once,’ said Conrad softly, ‘but only for a short time.’
She looked at him. ‘I was told that you came to this land to be a Sword Brother.’
He sighed. ‘It does not matter. Just make sure you do not over-exert yourself.’
Kaja gave a girlish laughed as she vaulted into the saddle and clasped the reins. ‘You worry too much, Susi.’
She urged the pony forward and the hardy beast with stubby legs grunted and hauled the trunk away.
‘She has a fiery temperament,’ said Anton, pointing his axe at Kaja.
Conrad shook his head. ‘I would have preferred her to have stayed in Saccalia but she insisted on accompanying me to Wenden. I just hope she does not get herself killed.’
He heard rustling behind him and turned to see Master Thaddeus approaching, a great creaking noise followed by a crashing sound coming from the left as another tree fell to the ground.
‘I hope you have not pressed that young girl into service,’ said Thaddeus sternly as he observed Kaja urging on her pony.
Two other trees crashed to the ground.
‘She is a willing volunteer, sir,’ said Conrad. He looked around at the frenetic activity in the forest. ‘You plan has exceeded all expectations, sir.’
‘I merely applied mathematical principles,’ remarked Thaddeus. ‘As such my calculations have neither exceeded nor disappointed my expectations, merely fulfilled them as I expected. When one is familiar with the writings of Pythagoras such things become very straightforward.’
‘Was he at Acre?’ asked Conrad in ignorance.
Thaddeus looked shocked. ‘Acre?’
‘The siege in the Holy Land,’ said Conrad. ‘Was Pythagoras a fellow engineer?’
Thaddeus was momentarily lost for words.
‘Perhaps it was a mistake teaching you to read and write, Conrad.’
‘Sir?’
Thaddeus rolled his eyes. ‘I sometimes think I am wasting my time here. Perhaps I should seek employment with the Saracens. Heathens they might be but at least they appreciate a sound mind. Go back to your chopping, Conrad.’
He walked off, shaking his head.
‘I think you’ve upset him,’ said Hans.
‘Obviously he and this Pythagoras did not get along,’ suggested Anton. ‘They probably fell out over something.’
It took three weeks for them to reach Holm, leaving many miles of log road behind
. The garrison of Wenden and the Army of the Wolf was the last contingent of the bishop’s force to arrive at the Dvina, the castle sitting above a great camp that circled it like a besieging army. As it waited to invade Semgallia across the short distance over the fast-flowing waters of the Dvina, the thousands of men and animals produced a great amount of smoke, dung and stink. It was the aroma of an army of unwashed warriors and crusaders filling the air for miles around. At least the heat of summer was some way off so the odour did not turn into a stench but many men covered their faces with masks to avoid the ill humours that everyone knew were contained in bad-smelling air.
The camp of the Sword Brothers was positioned immediately north of the castle itself, the master’s hall having been given over to house Bishop Albert, the Duke of Saxony and Fricis, the leader of the Livs. Around the order’s shelters was the tent city that housed the crusader army, the standards of northern Germany decorating the banners, shields, surcoats and caparisons of the knights who had come to avenge the previous year’s treachery against the bishop. The black lion on a yellow background of the Duke of Saxony predominated but there were also the red and white, black and white and yellow standards of the nobles of Franconia, the blue Panther of the knights of Thuringia, the golden lion that adorned the heater shields of Bavaria’s lords, and the white, green and blue flags carried by Swabia’s knights.
The Livs occupied the ground to the west of the castle and Conrad thought he would have an opportunity to visit his friend and brother Rameke, the brother of Daina and now the second-in-command of Fricis’ warriors. But no sooner had Wenden’s tents been pitched and those of the Army of the Wolf sited to the east of the castle, beyond the shelters of the crusaders, who had objected to pagans being planted in their midst, than he was ordered to the castle in the company of Rudolf. The master had been in jovial spirits following the building of the log road but was now in a grisly mood.
‘You remember when we fought at Riga all those years ago?’ he said as they walked across the castle’s drawbridge, the air filled with the smoke of a thousand campfires. Conrad nodded.