The Heretic

by David Pilling

  I would visit her several more times. She taught me more Bohemian, between bouts of fornication, than any tutor I could have hired. Fortunately the city was in a ferment, and nobody paid any heed to the evil conduct of an obscure foreign sell-sword. Fresh news arrived daily of some new victory won by Zizka, another town fallen, another castle stormed. The news of his triumphs was greeted by the joyous clanging of bells in Saint Vitus Cathedral, joined by the bells of all the lesser churches and abbeys. Prayers of thanks were offered up, ceaseless hymns, until my head rang to the cacophony of holy noise.

  Once my short leave was over, I returned to barracks at the castle, where the garrison had their headquarters. The next morning my company was ordered to turn out and muster in the inner ward. There our commander, a tall, spare knight with iron-grey moustaches and a livid pink scar on his cheek, barked out orders. I listened to him in blank incomprehension, straining hopelessly to understand, until one of my comrades took pity.

  “We’re being sent to Rabi,” the soldier to my left muttered in German, “a castle south-west of Prague. The Catholics hold it against us. Zizka is there with his army.”

  The soldier was the same fair-haired young man who had spoken to me on the ride to Hradec Králove. He had since introduced himself as Hynek, a wheelwright’s son from Kutna Hora. We became friends, of sorts, and through him I struck up a comradeship with several other men. They were much like the archers I had befriended in Normandy: rough, good-humoured (most of the time) foul-mouthed, much too fond of strong drink and loose women.

  While the nobles and high churchmen argued, we honest soldiers were sent off to help smoke out a nest of Catholic loyalists at Rabi. There were thirty of us in the company, ten men-at-arms and twenty crossbowmen. It was good to be on the march again, away from the fug of politics and religion. My comrades were cheerful, uncomplicated men, concerned with earthly joys instead of spiritual reward, and the task that lay before us was a straightforward one.

  “Rabi will be tough to crack,” said Hynek, “the castle is strong, and placed high on a hill. Hundreds of Catholics are holed up inside. The survivors of other defeated garrisons. This is their last stand.”

  “Promises to be good and bloody,” grunted another man, a gigantic ogre named Krusina of Trocnov. Krusina was enormously strong, possibly the strongest man I ever met, capable of pulling a wagon by himself. The closest I ever met to a real-life Little John.

  “The whoresons will fight to the last man,” he added. “Zizka won't accept any surrender. They either die by the sword, or hang.”

  I looked forward to meeting Zizka at last, the great Hussite general of whom I had heard so much. The citizens of Prague venerated him like a god. His name was rarely off the lips of the priests, who prayed day and night for the Almighty to keep him safe.

  Rabi Castle was just as Hynek and Peter described. An infernally strong fortress poised on a hill, stuffed with obdurate Catholics ready to fight to the death. Zizka was just as ready to oblige them.

  It was high summer, mid-June, and the siege had been in progress for several weeks. A forest of tents had sprang up around the castle. One glance at the camp was enough to tell me it was well-ordered and supplied, everything just as it should be, with no sign of the disease, dirt or slack discipline that often afflicts besieging armies.

  Hussite guns were in full voice as we rode into camp, filling the air with their stink and noise. These were bombards, of the kind I had witnessed the English army use in France: squat, hooped iron barrels mounted on wooden carriages, slow to reload and apt to burst if there was the slightest weakness in the cast, shredding the crewmen and any other unfortunates who happened to stand too close. Dangerous things. I always retreated to a safe distance before they belched out their shot.

  The outer walls of the castle were badly scarred by gunfire. In places the masonry was fallen away, and several of the towers had lost their roofs and upper storeys. The defenders shored up the gaps with baulks of timber. Their brave efforts were in vain. Sooner or later the guns would open a breach in the ancient walls. Then Zizka would send in his fanatical peasant-soldiers, wielding their reaping hooks and war-flails and awlpikes, to butcher everyone inside.

  “Look there,” Hynek said excitedly, “our gunners are at work.”

  He pointed at a broad stretch of open country, west of the castle. Here there were a number of timber palisades, trenches and pavises. Teams of Hussite gunners took refuge behind these defences as they reloaded their weapons. The noise was ear-splitting. Clouds of white smoke swirled lazily across the field, hiding the gunners from view.

  I had seen types of handgun used in Normandy, long iron barrels mounted on wooden stocks, capable of firing an arrow or small roundshot. The Hussite guns were more advanced. Their barrels were slender, over a foot long (hence they were called 'pipe-guns', pistala or pischtjala in Bohemian), and of different sizes.

  Some were small and light enough for a single man to use, holding the pole stock firmly under his left arm while he pressed a burning match to the touch-hole with his right hand. There were larger guns mounted on wooden frames or an axle and wheels taken from a wagon. As well as roundshot these could fire canister, bags of spiked balls, bits of sharp metal and lead bullets. While the bullets and gunstones rained down, the enemy could only cower behind the ramparts, unable to shoot back since our gunners were beyond the range of their crossbows.

  “The world changes, my friend,” Hynek shouted over the din, “and so does the nature of war. No armour in the world, however costly or well-forged, can stop a bullet.”

  I spent three days at Rabi, loafing with my comrades while the guns played their devil's music day and night. There was precious little amusement. Dicing and gambling were forbidden inside the Hussite camp, thanks to those dreary Regulations of War. So was the presence of females, save a few muscular, stern-faced cooks and washerwomen who might have been chosen to discourage male lust. Alcohol was allowed, of course, though in moderation. Any soldier who got drunk, not that it was easy to get properly drunk on the watered piss the Hussites called ale, risked a flogging, even mutilation.

  My chief interest lay in seeing Zizka, maybe even speaking with him. I was a little tired of my comrades. They were kind to me, of course, and helped me learn their tongue. Yet they were still peasants, ignorant, superstitious and dull. All their talk revolved around petty resentments, the sweethearts they had left at home, the imaginary deeds they had performed in bed and battle.

  I longed for the company of my own kind. I was a gentleman and the child of gentlemen, knighted by King Harry in person for services in the field. To masquerade for so long as a private soldier, plain John Page, yeoman of England, was both wearying and shameful. I could almost sense the force of my dead mother's disapproval.

  Zizka was struck down before I got the chance to clap eyes on him. One morning he strayed too close to the castle while inspecting the defences. The general wore no helmet, and his exposed head presented an ideal target to a crossbowman on the wall above.

  The bolt pierced Zizka's remaining eye. He fell back like a dead man, a fallen tree, signalling the downfall of his cause, the death of hope, the ruin of Bohemia. A wail of horror rose from our lines, echoed by cheers from the castle, as Zizka's attendants swiftly dragged the wounded man away to his pavilion.

  I saw none of this, but soon heard of it as the terrible news spread like wildfire through our camp. Men fell weeping to their knees, hands clasped in prayer. A few lost their wits completely and fled into the woods and fields. The demoralised marshals made little effort to stop them. Krusina, who could stun an ox with one blow of his mighty fist, cried like a baby and refused to be comforted.

  “The Devil is present in that castle,” he wailed, staring in pop-eyed terror at the fortress, “He shot down our general. Christ save us and have mercy on us – Jesu, Jesu have pity!”

  It was frightening, to witness such a big, powerful man collapse so suddenly. Nor was he alone. If, at that mom
ent, the Catholics inside Rabi had ridden out in force, they might have won an easy victory. Fortunately they remained inside, celebrating the death of their greatest enemy. I imagine the man who shot Zizka was practically drowned in ale.

  After the initial shock, a semblance of order was restored. Heralds rode furiously through the camp, quashing the panicked rumours of Zizka's death.

  “Lord Zizka lives!” they cried, “praise be to God and the Saints, the general lives! His will is greater than any wound. He wishes you to fight on, brave soldiers. Fight on and conquer!”

  “It's a lie,” muttered Krusina, “the nobles know we cannot fight on without Zizka. None of them are fit to lick his boots, never mind replace him. They lie to us, his loyal soldiers, his children.”

  His broad face reddened with angry blood. “They think we’re dirt under their noble heels. Of them all, only Zizka loves us.”

  “Let us wait and see,” said Hynek, “if Zizka is alive, he will show himself to us.”

  The next morning, after a vile night in which I was kept awake by the ceaseless prayers of Zizka's bereaved soldiers, the general emerged. Now completely blind, his ruined eyes covered by a bandage, he somehow found the strength to climb off his sickbed and mount a horse.

  Two esquires held him upright in the saddle, while another led the horse at a gentle trot through the camp. Delirious with joy and relief, our soldiers crowded around him, bellowing his name and stretching out their hands for his blessing.

  Thus I saw Zizka for the first time. Not the shining hero of my imagination, but a dumpy figure in a plain mail hauberk and stained coif, plodding along on a bow-legged mare. His face was strong and roughly hewn, with a firm jaw, thick moustache, high forehead and bony, aquiline nose. He wore his hair long, grey and thinning and swept back from his brow.

  Zizka looked formidable, but hardly striking or particularly noble. There was an air of strength about him, something unbreakable. The bandage over his eyes was stained with fresh blood, and he must have been in appalling pain – the surgeons had only extracted the bolt from his eye hours before – yet he stayed upright as a lance in the saddle.

  “Take heart, my children,” he cried in a hoarse, whistling voice. “God will not allow me to die. Not until our work is done.”

  This extraordinary bit of theatre restored morale, but almost finished Zizka. He fainted in the saddle and had to be carried back into his pavilion, where a fever kept him flat on his back for days. Once again his life was despaired of. At last he was carried off in a litter, back to Prague, where a team of surgeons worked frantically to save him.

  In his absence, the siege of Rabi failed. The garrison stubbornly refused to surrender, and our captains lacked the heart to try and storm the place. In the autumn dire rumours reached us of a fresh army of crusaders mustering in Hungary. King Sigismund had hired the services of a famous Italian soldier of fortune, and was ready to try his luck in Bohemia again.

  The Italian was Filippo Buondelmonti degli Scolari, better known as Pippo Spano. He was the kind of man I aspired to be. Pippo had grown obscenely rich leading Free Companies in the wars between the Italian cities, and was now in demand all over Christendom. Sigismund had hired his services, presumably at enormous cost, in the hope that such a hardened professional would prove Zizka’s match as a general.

  Meanwhile his allies among the German princes gathered their forces in the west. Sigismund's plan was brutally simple. His superior numbers would roll in from both ends of Bohemia at once, crushing all resistance, burning and slaughtering all in their path.

  The moment of crisis, long awaited, had come. My company, along with many others, was called away from Rabi and sent to join the Hussite garrison at Zatec.

  To await the storm.

  10.

  “On your feet, Englis! Here they come!”

  I took a last gulp of ale, crammed the stopper into the bottle, and picked up my sword. The blade was dinted in three places along the edge, where it had struck against German steel.

  For the third time in an hour, trumpets screeched from the other side of the curtain wall. Voices roared. Three times we had thrown the German infantry back. Three times they returned, driven on by the clubs of their marshals, a relentless tide of halberdiers, spearmen, axemen, swordsmen, men-at-arms and mercenaries. We threw down their ladders and grappling irons, cut their throats, pitched them off the wall.

  The ditch below was filled with a mound of dead and dying men. The survivors charged over the bodies of their comrades, slammed new ladders against the wall, surged up the rungs with desperate courage. They held papal banners and screamed death, death, death to the Hussites, the heretics, the enemies of God.

  I had a few precious moments to suck in breath, wipe the sweat and gore and dirt from my face. Gather up the fragments of courage. I was spent. It didn't matter. The searing pain in my shoulders, the cramp in my chest, the hot blood oozing from the knife-cut on my brow. None of it mattered. I could fight, or I could die.

  An armoured knight rose before me, lifting an axe. The lower part of his face was covered by a mail coif. His eyes burned with rage. I struck at him two-handed. My sword's edge blinded him. He gave a muffled scream and fell backwards off the ladder.

  I heard a grunt to my left. Glancing sideways, I saw Hynek with a crossbow bolt embedded in his chest. He looked down in surprise, plucked at the feathers, looked at me.

  He coughed blood, dropped his sword, tottered, plunged off the walkway. It was a long drop, some twenty feet. His body broke on the cobbles. Perhaps he was dead before he hit them. I hope so.

  One more gone. There had been thirty of us to defend this stretch of wall, between two towers on the eastern side of the town. The Germans sent their first wave against us at dawn. Now, about midmorning, sixteen defenders remained. Sixteen filthy, bag-eyed, bloodsoaked ghouls, red to the elbows like so many butchers, muscles and sinews creaking as we hefted our weapons, time and again, like so many butchers in a charnel house.

  “There is no retreat from here,” our officer had told us, “we must not yield a step. If the Germans gain the wall, Zatec is done for. If Zatec is taken, our cause is lost. The fate of Bohemia rests in our hands.”

  The officer nodded gravely while he spoke, gazing into each man's eyes in turn. Now he was dead, stiff and cooling on the walkway, his windpipe laid open by a German sabre.

  I was dead too, unless reinforcements arrived. It wasn't likely. The numbers of the garrison were stretched to breaking point, every man needed to fend off the relentless waves of German assaults. There were six thousand Hussite troops inside Zatec. No more could be spared to fend off the German invasion. The bulk of our army was mustered at Slane, near Prague, waiting for King Sigismund's host to appear on Bohemian's eastern border.

  Six thousand men, to fend off a hundred thousand. Led by the Margrave of Meissen, the Germans had poured across the frontier of northern Bohemia in August. With the Margrave were a number of high churchmen, including three German archbishops. These pious men, hungry for Hussite blood, allowed the German troops to act like brute beasts on the march. The crusaders destroyed towns, villages and forts, torched crops, put every Bohemian – Hussite and Catholic, it mattered little – they could find to the sword.

  Zatec, with its strong walls and castle, was the only safe haven. Refugees flooded into the town, carrying their few possessions and dreadful tales of the atrocities committed by the Germans. Our garrison was swelled by volunteeers, able-bodied peasants as well as soldiers from the various smaller towns and castles, who had quit their posts rather than wait for inevitable destruction. A Hussite army, laying siege to the castle of Most, was attacked by the Germans and suffered a crushing defeat. The survivors retreated to the safety of Zatec, a straggling ghost-army of beaten men, their wounded piled in carts.

  So much for their prayers, I thought as I watched them file through the gates, hundreds of bleeding and crippled men, some leaning on crutches fashioned from broken spears, others on
the shoulders of their comrades. This was the first significant defeat the Hussites had suffered in two years of almost constant warfare.

  After so many victories, this reverse had a shattering effect on morale. “The gates of Hell have opened,” I heard one soldier moan, nursing his broken arm, “all the hosts of Satan are unleashed. I have seen them. They march in iron columns. Plague, fire and death are their heralds.”

  “Don't be a fool,” snapped one of the fighting priests that always accompanied the Hussite armies, “we have beaten them before, and shall do so again. Christ is our friend and ally. He marches alongside us, under the banner of the holy chalice.”

  The wounded soldier didn't seem to hear him. “A plague of locusts,” he murmured, his eyes glassy, “spreads across the land. Devouring all in their path. Nothing on earth can stand against such a multitude. It is God's judgement. We have angered God. This is his punishment.”

  God's punishment or not, the Germans seemed intent on exterminating all human life in Bohemia. From the walls of Zatec, we watched in helpless dismay as a chain of fires raged across the land. A plague of locusts was a perfectly apt comparison to the German army when their vanguard finally marched into view; battalion after battalion of spears and lances and banners, the entire military wealth and might of a huge kingdom, come to trample little Bohemia into the dust.

  Now another German soldier struck at me. A wealthy knight, clothed in richly inlaid and decorated steel. Blinded by sweat, I stabbed wearily at one of the tiny slits of his visor. He batted aside the thrust with his arm and swung his flanged mace at my head. I sidestepped, but it caught me a glancing blow on the side of the helm.

  The terrific impact sent shockwaves through my skull. Blood filled my mouth and nostrils. My head rang fit to explode. Dazed, I almost lost my footing. Sheer terror, the well-honed instinct for survival, drove me to flight.