“When studying the affairs and actions of men, truth is less important than one would think. For men do not act on truth, but on their perception of the truth, which may, or often may not, align with the real truth of their times.”-Demetrios III Sideros, in A History of the Great Latin War.
1633/34 winter: Compared to the Romans or Spain or even the Triple Monarchy, which as that name suggests is still linked by personal union, the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation is a quite decentralized polity. Even describing it as a singular polity is questionable. But it helps make up for that by being massive. Not counting the lands of northern Italy that are still technically part of the HRE, there are over 26 million inhabitants in those dominions (compared to 18 million in the Roman heartland plus another 6.5 million in the Despotates, 22.5 million in the Triple Monarchy, and 14 million in the Ottoman Empire). Hungary and Poland between them add another 8 million to the lists.
Despite her misgivings about her brother’s plans, the Lady Elizabeth sets to work gathering the resources Theodor needs for his great gambit. Manpower is fairly easy given the previously mentioned population pool, but resistance to the press gangs is growing ever more widespread. But said resistance remains on the small-scale, mainly in the form of desertion, rather than escalating into rebellion.
Getting equipment and supplies is more difficult, but the Holy Roman Empire has several districts that are quite highly developed by pre-industrial standards (chiefly Saxony, Silesia and the Cologne-Rhineland). And overall the Imperial princes are, for their size, wealthy and their territories advanced.
Theodor spends most of the winter crisscrossing the Empire to drum up support, leaning on recalcitrant princes and encouraging others, calling in favors and debts, promising concessions and privileges. The Wittelsbach name is still highly regarded, for the family has overall done very well by the Empire. There are mutterings, but they remain mutterings, for now. No prince wants to be the first to stick his neck out to see how sharp the talons of the Wittelsbach eagle still are.
An important factor in all this is Emperor Henri II, who is doing all he can to encourage Theodor to resume the offensive. Aside from wanting to weaken the Wittelsbach house further in eastern campaigns, he is also alarmed by the growth in Roman power. The attacks in the Caribbean and the reports of the size of the Roman army are disturbing. For the same reason, he is also encouraging Ibrahim to remain in the fight.
Part of his efforts include leaning on his contacts amongst the Imperial princes to cooperate with Theodor, which is a key factor in the success of Theodor’s diplomacy. The chief contact is with King Ottokar, who very begrudgingly agrees to restore Bohemia’s contribution back up to 20,000 by the spring. Without Henri backing him, Ottokar doesn’t feel strong enough to refuse.
Henri is playing a double game here. On the one hand, he wants Ottokar as a weapon to use against the Wittelsbachs. But on the other, he doesn’t want Ottokar to get too strong either, so having him waste resources in the east is ideal too. (Having other Imperial princes weakened as well is a nice bonus, but Bohemia is the main threat after the Wittelsbachs.) Henri has no desire to destroy the Wittelsbach behemoth and find it replaced by a Bohemian giant or Roman leviathan. There are reports that the most expansionist members of the Roman court are arguing for annexations as far afield as Vienna and the Alpine frontiers of Italy. The last in particular infuriates Henri.
He is far from the only one to hear those suggestions and be irritated by them. Jointly, the ambassadors of Arles, the Bernese League, and Spain meet with Demetrios III to express their concerns over what they diplomatically title ‘distressing rumors’. They have no desire to see any kind of “super Roman Empire”, regardless of if its ruler comes from Germany or the Bosporus. An Italian peninsula entirely under Rhomania’s banner is an unacceptable threat to their security, one they will not tolerate “if this hypothetical scenario were, by the vagaries of fates, to happen to arise.”
Demetrios III takes the hint and replies that he entirely understands their concerns, but that they are unwarranted as such a hypothetical scenario would not happen to arise. The ambassadors leave satisfied. Overall the relations between the three states and the Roman Empire are undamaged but Demetrios is nevertheless frustrated. A shot across his bow has been fired in relation to the war with the Lombards and more importantly, the affair has sunk his efforts to bring Spain and Arles into the war on his side. Kings Ferdinand I and Basil II are now wary of helping to slay Behemoth and thereby make room for Leviathan.
Following the Three Johns meeting (all the ambassadors involved were named in their language’s version of John), Ferdinand, Basil, and representatives from the Council of the League meet in Perpignan (Arletian since the Aragonese War of Succession), where they draft and sign the Roussillon Accord. Much of the agreement has been a long time in coming. There are articles designed to increase commerce between the three realms, reducing or abolishing customs on certain products. Others aim to resolve colonial and trade disputes between Arles and Spain in the Caribbean and in the east.
But the most significant clause, at the time, is the one that creates a mutual defense pact. If any one of the states is attacked by a foreign power, including the League’s titular sovereign the Holy Roman Emperor, the League will provide at minimum 15000 men, Arles 50000, and Spain 60000 in defense of the assaulted power. The alliance is mainly for the ‘benefit’ of Henri II, but it is also a reminder to Demetrios III that he needs to continue to consider the Accord members’ concerns.
Those same “distressing rumors” also prove very useful to Lady Elizabeth who embarks on a highly developed propaganda campaign, inspired partly by what she saw in Rhomania during her marriage to Andreas III.
There are alarms in the Holy Roman Empire as the reports of the growing size of the Roman army trickle in from the Danube. The use of Scythian cavalry by the Romans, plus the now-centuries-old Latin stereotype of the Greeks as semi-Turkish, help to conjure up memories of the nightmare steppe hordes of yesteryear. Adding extra color to this image are reports of Romans firing prisoners from the mouth of cannons, an execution method copied from Vijayanagar. It should be noted that this was only done to those Allied soldiers who turned brigand during the retreat from Ruse, but that is either not reported in the HRE or simply ignored.
The expansionist rumor only fuels the threat of the Roman menace. King Stephan of Hungary is certainly alarmed, fearful of another Mohacs and Buda, or worse. Without support from Henri, who is not willing, or Ottokar, who is not able, he turns in a more pro-Theodor direction. King Casimir, who is also disturbed by rumors of a planned Vlach-Scythian invasion of Galicia next year, also ups his contributions to the war effort.
Exactly how effective Elizabeth’s propaganda campaign is in working up more support in the Holy Roman Empire itself is unknown. There is a clear surge in the winter of 1633/34 and into the new year, but its effects are limited and mostly concentrated in the towns. Desertions are still high amongst the new recruits, with orders sent to the press gangs to only use roads that have wide clearings on both sides which makes it harder for men to abscond into the woods. If there is any impact on the rural lands, the upcoming Ravens’ Rebellion is proof it was short-lived.
One factor that helps is Henri II encouraging some of the most prominent moneylenders in the Triple Monarchy, including some of the premier traders on both the London and Paris stock exchanges, to offer loans to Elizabeth. That inspires moneylenders in the HRE to be cooperative with Elizabeth’s efforts to raise more loans from sources inside the HRE.
Henri II has a couple of reasons for his actions. Firstly, it is another way to encourage Theodor in his eastern ambitions. Secondly, throughout their tenure as Holy Roman Emperors, the Wittelsbachs have used their overall-good-credit to loan to princes or corporations in the HRE. The resulting debt is a useful political lever when necessary. By spiraling up the Wittelsbach debt, Henri II removes that weapon from Theodor’s hands.
Lastly, Henri will need the support of the mercantile elements of his kingdoms to finance a Second Rhine War, but those elements are also heavily involved in trading with Lotharingia or the Hansa. As such they may not be as cooperative as Henri would like. However if they have large and unpaid debts from the Holy Roman Emperor, they’ll be more inclined to be supportive if Henri II marches and promises to get satisfaction for their claims.
That said, even with pressure from Henri and/or Elizabeth, the moneylenders would be uninclined to offer credit to the Wittelsbachs if they did not expect to receive repayment. And they do expect it, for throughout western and central Europe the expectation is that the Wittelsbachs will, if not win, at least not lose. In fact, in the winter the attitude there is more optimistic than it was during the fall with the news of the retreat up the Danube.
This is much to the surprise of most modern readers, but they have a clear view of all theaters and the advantage of hindsight. The people of western and central Europe in 1633/34 do not. They are relatively knowledgeable regarding the war in Italy and along the Danube. But their information of the war in Syria/Palestine/Mesopotamia is poor. There are reports of Romans raiding and taking cities in Mesopotamia, but nobody recognizes those names. But they do know that Ibrahim has taken Damascus and Jerusalem and threatened Egypt, and everyone knows those names. Clearly he must be winning.
So Theodor is able to rebuild his armies. Blucher and his now indispensable right-hand man General von Mackensen set to work training and drilling the new recruits, with an enlarged artillery train developed to compensate for their inexperience. Mackensen is clearly Blucher’s protégé, being groomed as his successor to the extent that Mackensen’s son marries a granddaughter of Blucher. But Mackensen is an ennobled commoner. While the rank and file love and admire him for his bravery and coolness under fire and his leadership of the rearguard during the retreat from Ruse, King Casimir, Crown Prince Vaclav, and the vast majority of the Imperial princes and noble officers wouldn’t accept him as Supreme Commander. Meanwhile Elizabeth can’t help but be impressed by the revival wrought by their leadership, but she bluntly informs Blucher another revival after this will not be possible.
For more manpower Theodor turns to his Despot Lazar of Serbia. The Despots of Egypt and Sicily are, between them, fielding something like 80 tourmai so it seems reasonable that his Despot can provide at least a half dozen or so. Lazar is far too nervous and cowed to refuse, so he gathers together a force which by May numbers nine thousand. The recruits are not enthusiastic about the war, but serving in the army hopefully means pay and rations, and for all the talk of a common Orthodoxy and hatred of Catholics, plundering Roman lands has been a source of wealth for Serbians for centuries.
The position of Prince Durad of Serbia is made rather awkward by the news and the accompanying declaration from his older brother that all Serbs serving within the Roman armies after a three-month grace period will be considered traitors. His legal position is confusing. He is treated as an allied sovereign, yet Demetrios III still recognizes Lazar as the ruler of Serbia, not wanting to alienate him in the hope of pulling Lazar back into the Roman camp.
Yet even on the ground Durad’s ‘ally’ status is questionable. He is part of the Paramonai which is made of foreign troops. Yet the Spanish, Arletians, and Pronsky are all foreign mercenaries, even if the Spanish and Pronsky came as formations rather than individuals. Ivan Sapieha and his Lithuanians are a special case as they are personally his men, but he has subordinated himself to the Roman army leadership.
As an ally rather than a subordinate, Durad should be responsible for maintaining his troops, which at this point number just over four thousand. Yet he lacks the resources for it since he is not the leader of the Serbian state. Like a good portion of the Serbian nobility, he has some scattered estates throughout the Roman Empire of which he is absentee landlord. (This is a practice sometimes encouraged by the White Palace as the threat of the appropriation of those estates in wartime is a good way to keep their owners inclined to peace with Rhomania.) With those he can maintain his personal guard of 200, but the rest are clothed, fed, and paid by Roman quartermasters.
To resolve the awkwardness, Prince Durad and Emperor Demetrios III meet shortly after the Three Johns discussion. Despite his weak hand, Durad is insistent that Demetrios recognize the independence of the Serbian state. If Demetrios wants to recognize Durad as the leader of the Serbs, it has to be as King, not Despot. He argues strongly that if he is just Despot Durad of Serbia, the Serbians will have no reason to favor him over Lazar, especially since an overlord in Germany will be less onerous than one in Constantinople, simply because of the greater distance. While if Constantinople promises independence and Munich doesn’t, they’ll be more inclined toward him. Plus, there is the precedent of the Serbian governor of Bor recognizing Durad as King of Serbia back in the spring of 1632. Finally, when Demetrios II crowned Durad’s father in 1610, it was as King, not Despot.
Demetrios decides not to argue the point. Even if now he could impose a Despotate of Serbia, history makes it clear that will guarantee the Serbs allying with the next Latin invasion to come rolling down from the north. It might even encourage said invasion, since a prospective invader would be equally aware of that fact. In contrast, an independent Serbia will fight for its independence against an invader.
So he decides to recognize Durad as King of Serbia. The church of Saint Mary of the Mongols [1] is temporarily ceded to Durad so that his coronation can be on ‘Serbian’ soil. He is crowned there by the Hegumen of the Hilandar Monastery on Mount Athos, the great Serbian monastery of the Holy Mountain, as King Durad I.
Proceeding outside, he is greeted by the Megas Logothete and escorted to the White Palace where he has a public audience with Demetrios III. Durad promptly ‘cedes’ the church back to the Emperor and in return receives a formal alliance with the Roman Empire, along with an official subsidy to maintain his men. An additional grant helps pay for propaganda for use back in Serbia, with a thousand men eventually slipping over into Rhomania to sign up under Durad’s banner.
More sources of manpower open up for Demetrios III as the other wars in Europe are beginning to die down. To the west, Malaga has fallen to Spanish arms but Granada still remains defiant. Extremely well-fortified with fertile environs supplying the city, it is a tough nut to crack and the defenders still remain defiant. A faction inside the city tries to betray Granada into Spanish hands to avoid destruction, but the plan leaks and the dismembered portions of the plotters are catapulted out into the Spanish forces who were to sneak into the city. So a siege it will be.
Yet one city is not enough to absorb all of Ferdinand’s unsustainably-large army so he is still looking for outlets for his demobilizing soldiers. Demetrios III hires enough to replace all the losses the Paramonai Spanish took during the 1633 campaign, but that is it. After the Three Johns Affair, Ferdinand is wary of sending more Constantinople’s way. King Albrecht III of Lotharingia is a better choice. He is hiring and putting Spaniards into his ranks is more likely to work for and not against Lisbon’s interests.
Better opportunities for Demetrios III lie to the north. Although Novgorod and Pronsk are the only two Russian principalities officially at war with the Empire of All the North, plus Prussia, there are contingents from Lithuania, Scythia, and even Khazaria fighting against the Scandinavians. Although Novgorod has by far the most at stake in retaking the lands lost during the Great Northern War, there is a strong sentiment throughout all the Russian states desiring vengeance for that humiliation.
However that is not enough. The Alliance may rule the land but Scandinavia still dominates the sea. The result is deadlock.
Enter Albrecht III. He is one of the youngest crowned heads of Europe, only twenty-six years old, and he has been on the throne for four years. He speaks Dutch and French fluently, although when emotional a faint but noticeable Dutch accent creeps into his French speech. He also can read Greek, Latin, and Spanish, although he is slow of speech in those tongues.
By his day the Lotharingian court has been near-totally Dutchified. During the twenty-two year reign of his father Charles II, the Dutch merchant marine and economy has expanded substantially from its already rather large base. The Dutch merchant marine dominates much of the carrying trade of northern Europe, especially the Baltic, and has a sizeable trade with the Mediterranean. Most malmsey leaving Rhomania goes out on Dutch hulls and a few kaffos houses have opened up in Antwerp, Ostend, and Rotterdam.
Their presence in eastern waters has also grown dramatically, although they are not quite on the level of the big three (Triunes, Spanish, and Romans). Lotharingian trading outposts are in the Vijayanagar Empire, the Kingdom of Pegu, the Kingdom of Ayutthaya, the Kingdom of Palembang (Sumatra), the Kingdom of Siak (Sumatra), the Sultanate of Brunei, the Sunda Kingdom (Java), and Guangzhou.
In the west their main activities are along the northern coast of South Terranova, exploiting the pearl beds of Venezuela, the salt mines of Curacao, and sugar plantations on Trinidad and Grenada. Supporting all these endeavors are a national bank (the new Imperial bank charter is modeled after the Lotharingian) and stock exchange in Antwerp, plus a system of agriculture that is already the most efficient and productive in Europe.
The weakness of Lotharingia is its long and exposed frontier with little to nothing in the way of natural defenses and a small population (3 million) compared to its neighbors. So Lotharingia is both rich and weak, a very bad combination.
Albrecht III is painfully aware of that fact and knows the longstanding Triune desire for his domains. He has been doing all he can to dissuade Theodor from his current course, but he only succeeds in alienating the Holy Roman Emperor who finds him ‘defeatist’. So he is looking elsewhere.
One obvious choice for allies would be the members of the Roussillon Accords. Unfortunately while they sympathize with Albrecht, they are not willing to have him formally enter their agreement. The Accords are designed to prevent a war with one of the great powers of Europe and Ferdinand in particular thinks that having Lotharingia join with them would inevitably cause a war between the Accord members and the Triple Monarchy, probably at a very inconvenient moment. In Arles, old King Basil II is ailing and his heir is eight years old.
Adding to Albrecht’s trouble is the situation with Scandinavia. While the Empire of All the North would theoretically be a useful ally against the Triunes, the attempted Scandinavian monopoly on the Baltic is highly damaging to Lotharingian trade. There have been frequent disputes over the Sound Tolls. Almost as soon as Archangelsk fell to Russian forces, Lotharingian ships sailed in to start trading for furs, much to Malmo’s irritation. Finally, Peter II of Scandinavia is Henri II’s brother-in-law.
Needing the Baltic trade to pay for his Spanish mercenaries, Albrecht III moves to intervene in the Baltic War. As Blucher is laying siege to Ruse a powerful Lotharingian fleet commanded by Joris Andringa sets out from Albrecht’s domains. Because the shallow Dutch coast limits the draft of warships, Albrecht doesn’t have any of the 80+ gun monsters like in the arsenals of the Triple Monarchy, Rhomania, or even Spain. But he has sixty of the 50-60 gun battle-line ships, plus some 70-gun warships as squadron flagships, backed up by another thirty 40-gun warships, in his arsenal. Not all of these are sent to the Baltic.
The armada, after five days of fighting, seizes the castle of Kronborg guarding the narrowest portion of the Øresund, a humiliating and devastating blow to the Scandinavian monarchy. The Scandinavian fleet, rallying from its blockade stations along the Prussian coast, arrives in force and offers battle three days later.
The Scandinavians have sixty-three warships to the Lotharingian sixty-eight, although the two biggest warships in the fight are 76-gunners on the Scandinavian side. The battle is a confused brawl until around three in the afternoon when the Scandinavian flagship explodes, after which the Scandinavians retire. Losses in men are quite close, even with the flagship explosion, but the Lotharingians only lose 2 ships to 9 Scandinavian.
With the Lotharingian fleet now in position to bombard Malmo, the Scandinavian capital, Joris is able to force a peace on the Scandinavians. Yet he is not to be too harsh; Albrecht doesn’t want to drive the Scandinavians into the arms of the Triunes if it can be avoided.
Envoys from Prussia and Novgorod are ferried over and under the guns of the Lotharingian fleet a peace is hammered out in the Treaty of Kronborg. The Sound Tolls levied on Lotharingian ships will now be halved. Meanwhile Pernau is ceded to the Prussians and Narva to the Novgorodians, in exchange for three years of payment from Riga and Novgorod, the Scandinavians keeping Reval and St. Petersburg. Furthermore ‘in exchange for its support’, both Prussia and Novgorod form most-favored-nation trade agreements with Antwerp regarding grain, timber, fur, and amber exports, reducing export duties on those products for Lotharingian merchants. There is a mixture of gratitude and annoyance in the Prussian and Novgorodian lands regarding Lotharingia after the treaty is signed.
With the Baltic quieting, Roman ambassadors are more successful in their efforts to secure Russian support. The Pronsk Veche, in exchange for a generous payment, offers twelve thousand infantry and two thousand cavalry that can march out in the spring of 1634, with the possibility of more if the Vlach-Scythian invasion goes forward. Unfortunately with Lithuania’s continued state of political infighting, which may be veering toward civil war, the support of Vilnius is out of the question. There are preliminary discussions as well with Prussia about an anti-Polish alliance, but right now Riga’s exchequer is in shambles and there is a limit to how many subsidies even Demetrios III can offer.
Some valued manpower for the Roman Empire has come about as a direct result of the Danube campaign, in the form of prisoners of war. In Latin Europe, it is still a common practice to enlist captives in the armies of their captors, but attempts by Theodor to entice Roman soldiers into his service have been miserable failures and there is no way the Romans are giving their Latin prisoners weapons. But by this point there are thousands of Latin captives in the Roman Empire and while they can’t fight, they can work as replacements for the Roman men who are out fighting.
The various prisoners are put into work gangs, building bridges, repairing roads, farming fields, cobbling shoes, fabricating barrels, salting pork, or any other work the government needs done. They are provided clothing and food, and high productivity is often rewarded with some folloi, enough to buy a few tankards of ale from the local watering hole. Men are usually given the same tasks they did in pre-war times, if they have certain skills such as tailoring or blacksmithing. Those with a useful trade have it best. They have quotas to meet, but oftentimes are allowed to sell any surplus for extra money, although the government takes a cut for the cost of materials.
Officers are not required to labor, but junior officers are kept with their men to keep order and to supervise their work. Senior officers are separated, typically placed in guarded villas where they are given much food and wine to loosen their lips, attended by women selected for their skill in enticing pillow talk. This is done to extract potentially useful information and secure defections.
There are no attempts at converting the rank and file (senior officers are another matter), but some, particularly Hungarians, do convert. They are still kept at labor, but they’re given lighter duties, more food, and extra folloi are rewarded more often. At the same time, if one then attempts to backslide out of Orthodoxy to their original faith, the beatings are most brutal.
Some of the work gangs are hired out. Auctions are organized where bids are made on lots of laborers. The winners are responsible for feeding them but don’t have to pay them wages, unlike Roman workers, which is the attraction for those bidding. Sometimes these contracts are ‘for the duration of the war’ and other times for specified periods. Sometimes lots of laborers are ‘bequest’ to organizations or individuals the government wishes to reward.
One of the lots bequest is that of Friedrich Zimmermann and the remains of his company. Their ‘employer’ is the Monastery of St. Constantine, which is on an island of the same name in Lake Apolloniatis near Prousa. The monastery also controls three of the other islands and many lakeshore estates. Aside from the typical produce and livestock, the monastery lands also produce raw silk, a common product of the region.
The men are set to work tilling the land, caring for the livestock, digging ditches, mending tools, and all the other assorted agricultural labor. The men are all former peasants, so none of the tasks are unusual to them. Friedrich, as their leader, keeps them well behaved and their spirits up. While deploring their faith, the monks respect their discipline and hard work and Friedrich convinces the Hegumen to grant the Bavarians some vegetable patches for their use to supplement their assigned rations. Later he manages to talk the Hegumen into loaning them some chickens so their sick can eat the eggs, and granting them the right to whatever fish they can catch off a small dock, although it’s up to the Bavarians to make their fishing equipment.
While working there, Friedrich makes the acquaintance of Alexios Asanes. Born in Arsamosata in the eastern reaches of the Empire, where Christians and Muslims often share the same holy men and holy sites, he became a priest as a young man. Most of his career was spent in the east, serving first in Alappuzha, then Jaffna, then Mersing, then Singapore, and then Pyrgos before he returned to the Imperial heartland. During that time he has rubbed shoulders and discussed theology and philosophy with Hindus and Buddhists and Taoists (in Singapore from the former Wu community).
It shows; for an Orthodox priest his personal theology is rather unorthodox. The most obvious sign is that he believes in reincarnation of the soul. His argument is that God, being just and merciful, would want humans to have every opportunity to turn toward him, so they are given multiple lives on earth as a literal second (or more) chance. Although souls only reincarnate as humans, not as animals, their station can vary depending on their conduct in a past life, usually to teach them a lesson. An overly proud man may be born to beggars, for example.
Some souls however, do not need this reincarnation to turn toward God, so after death their souls go straight to the bosom of Abraham while awaiting the Final Judgment. The saints of the Church are the obvious candidates here. The similarities to Buddhist beliefs of the souls of the virtuous achieving nirvana and breaking the cycle of reincarnation are noted by many of his contemporaries.
However the similarity to Buddhism does not end there. Inspired by the concept of the Bodhisattva, Alexios argues that sometimes those souls return to Earth to help the living, perhaps to right a wrong, secure justice, or guide them to salvation. Perhaps the sight of saints in battle is of those blessed to see the souls return to Earth?
Alexios is familiar with many king-under-the-mountain stories throughout the cultures he has encountered during his life, tales of how a legendary king sleeps beneath a mountain, to arise again when he is needed. The Good Emperor is the obvious example for the Romans themselves, but he is far from the only one. Alexios argues that those stories, while not physically possible, can be “spiritually” possible. The king himself is long dead, but his soul may return to Earth when he is needed, reincarnated in another body. Or at the very least, he returns to aid and guide a new king, like Krishna did for Arjuna in the Mahabharata.
A key point that he stresses throughout all of this is the fundamental equality of all souls. That dynatos might once have been a beggar; that fisherman may once have been a king. “All souls, male and female, are equal before the eyes of God,” he repeats frequently in his writings. That, in and of itself, is nothing unusual. But he argues that therefore inequality on this earth is solely man-made, and therefore of no real value. And if it causes oppression and suffering to many people while benefiting only a few, then it is an active evil. And evil must be opposed.
Friedrich is most interested in Alexios’ ideas and the two become unlikely friends. The priest certainly has no friends in the Orthodox Church hierarchy. It is because of his heretical views that he is here at St Constantine’s, as a sort of house arrest to keep him from spreading his doctrine. He is a hermitic monk attached to the monastery for ‘supervision’ by the Hegumen, but while he is not allowed to disperse his ideas amongst the Romans, nobody cares if he talks about them with the Catholics.
Meanwhile to the north Odysseus Sideros returns to Constantinople, accompanied by his friend Michael, now nicknamed Pirokolos (fire-ass), much to the Kaisar’s amusement. Stefanos Asen-Palaiologos, commander of the Paramonai, came down with a really bad case of pneumonia and has been invalided out of the army. Because of the heterogeneous nature of the formation, someone of high and preferably royal rank is needed to take his place.
That someone is Kaisar Odysseus. While he is only coming on twenty-one, he now has some combat experience and his Imperial status is very useful in leading a force containing a Serbian king, a Lithuanian grandee, and Spanish and Arletian nobility. Tourmarch Romanos Amirales, younger brother of the commander of the Army of Mesopotamia and former commander of Alexandros Drakos during the battles of Nineveh, is appointed as his chief of staff and unofficial advisor.
* * *
Serbia, April 21, 1634:
Wilhelm Sebastian von Blucher looked on at the stark gray monument, grim and forlorn. He sighed.
The blast of musty air from his lungs helped a little, but it did nothing to solve the underlying problem. He was good at hiding it, really good at it, concealing it from Theodor, from Elizabeth, from his generals, and especially his boys who did not need that burden.
He was tired. So very tired.
He’d been a soldier for over sixty years, three-quarters of his long life. And he was tired of it. But it, plainly, was not tired of him. Despite the ache in his bones, the fatigue in his limbs, duty demanded he stand and fight. His sovereign commanded it, an oath demanded it. And so he would do it, no matter the cost. He would do his best, whether it would, or would not, be enough.
But he certainly wouldn’t have minded if this fool’s errand had passed from him to someone else. But it hadn’t, and so here he was.
I’m certain you, of all people, would understand.
Silence. Of course there was silence. He sighed. Soon he would know if he was right. He’d sent his updated will to his eldest son back in Mecklenburg. He looked to the south, to Macedonia. This would not be the end of war, but one way or another, it would soon be the end of his part in it. And with that thought, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief.
He turned and left the memorial to Leo Neokastrites and the Chaldeans.
* * *
“Zhuge Liang’s sole thought was service,
Himself he would not spare;
But Qiao Zhou had watched the starry sky,
And read misfortune there.”
-Romance of the Three Kingdoms (OTL)
[1] Different person ITTL but I like the name.
