Tom Swan and the Siege of Belgrade: Volume Six

by Christian Cameron

  ‘You will sing hymns in hell,’ Hunyadi the Younger said.

  Swan shrugged. ‘I’m not good at desperation,’ he said. ‘I like to win.’

  ‘We have that in common,’ László Hunyadi said.

  They rode into a camp as busy as a beehive and Swan took a moment to take his captain aside.

  ‘László,’ he said. ‘Don’t, I beg you, communicate what we just saw to these men and women.’

  Hunyadi nodded. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘But in Christ’s name, Ser Suane. How much must we do?’

  Swan sighed.

  He stripped out of his finery, and went down to the saw pits to find that the whole camp was there working on boats – even Ser Orietto and Ser Columbino and all of Hunyadi’s lieutenants, and their camp followers too. If a man flagged, another would all but push him off the frames. The best woodworkers were now making oars.

  Old George didn’t grin or do anything foolishly demonstrative. But the sweep of his hand showed sixteen completed hulls.

  ‘Three days,’ he said. ‘It is incredible. I pray to Saint Steven that they do not all sink when they are launched – whores and soldiers! By all the saints, there are a hundred reasons a woman should never touch a boat.’ He crossed himself. ‘But as this is for the crusade …’

  Father Pietro was filthy with dust. He had insisted in taking all of his shifts in the windless pits, and now he was taking a turn shovelling sawdust out.

  Swan helped caulk a seam, and before he’d rammed the last tarred tow into the last two feet, he found that the hands paying the tow were slim and feminine.

  He raised his head, expecting a Hungarian girl, and when he saw Šárka he smiled without thought.

  She smiled back.

  They worked together in silence for as long as it took the finish the seam, and then began on another. When Father Pietro, now stripped to hose and a shirt, began a hymn in Latin they both joined him. So did a thousand other voices, and the hymns rolled up into the clear blue sky from all the men and women working, and the sound of hammers on the hollow hulls drove the rhythm of the music.

  Later, some of the Serb cavalrymen appeared with torches made of resined wood, and two boats were finished by torchlight while other hands cooked. And Old George and Little George and Father Pietro – unlikely leaders, and yet clearly in charge – sent the people to their food.

  Swan sat with his back to a wagon wheel, his knees touching Šárka’s, and ate a bowl of the most delicious stew he’d ever eaten. The butchers had killed half a dozen bullocks – meat was plentiful.

  Later, she lay with her head on his shoulder as if she’d been there all along.

  Nothing much was said.

  The days had a sameness. On Thursday Swan rode back across to Barcsa and saw Capistrano and Hunyadi together. He reported that they would have twenty-five boats ready to fight in a day.

  Capistrano blessed him. ‘You have done well, my son,’ he said.

  Swan stayed kneeling. ‘Your carpenters were our salvation,’ he said.

  ‘You use wit where piety would serve you better,’ Capistrano said. ‘But …’ He smiled. ‘A carpenter is every man’s salvation, as you must have meant.’

  Hunyadi didn’t look good – pale, almost grey, and silent. But he raised his eyes to Swan and nodded.

  ‘Fra Giovanni has put metal into the garrison,’ he said.

  ‘I put God into the garrison,’ the friar said. ‘As I will put God into this fornicating, gluttonous, sin-filled army until my God drives out all their sins and heresies, and we are victorious.’

  From another man, it would have sounded like hypocrisy. But his face was stern, his narrow cheeks and bulging, tonsured head spoke only of truth, righteousness and conviction.

  Swan found him far more frightening than Ladislav the Bohemian with his dead eyes, or Niccolo Zane with his enormous strength, or even Hunyadi and his power. The friar’s conviction was terrifying.

  ‘The Lower Town is almost destroyed,’ Hunyadi said. ‘And friar, I mean no heresy when I say that I would prefer four hundred armours from Milan and as many swords and halberds to accompany them to all the piety in Rome.’

  ‘Rome is a cesspit,’ Capistrano said.

  ‘And there is nothing we can do to save Belgrade unless …’ Hunyadi’s son put in, eager to diffuse the obvious tension between the two commanders. ‘Unless we can cross the river.’

  Hunyadi stared out at Belgrade. The lower city had fires burning in it. The walls were already collapsed in three places, and the guns fired every few minutes from the Ottoman camp. But above the lower city, the fortress crouched like a vast grey stone toad, squat and powerful. The walls of the upper city were as yet untouched.

  ‘My brother-in-law, Michael, has almost eight thousand men,’ Hunyadi said. ‘All of my infantry. Some of my best people.’ He watched as two of the Ottoman guns across the river spoke together – pam-PAM. They were well laid, and a short section of masonry hard against one of the southern towers subsided like a small avalanche, creating a rubble ramp.

  ‘At this rate, he will turn the fortress into a field in two weeks,’ Hunyadi said. ‘You know he has taken all the bells from all the churches in the Morea and melted them to cast bronze guns? You know his guns were dragged here by Christian slaves, and he let them die as they worked?’

  Swan could think of nothing to say, although it sounded like an impractical method of moving heavy guns. And, if true, it suggested that Mehmet had crossed the nearly invisible dividing line from conqueror to monster.

  Swan had read enough history to know that, sooner or later, most conquerors became monsters. But he remained silent.

  Capistrano had never sat down. Now he took his great carved cross from an acolyte and waved his hand in benediction. ‘I go to preach,’ he said. ‘There are many here for whom these will be the last days and their first chance at salvation. For others it is their last chance.’ His eyes bored into Swan’s. Swan crossed himself and bowed his head. When he raised it again, the Dominican friar was gone. He was alone with the two Hunyadis for perhaps the first time in a week.

  He knew what he had to do. It was odd, how superstitious he had become about the ring. He was painfully aware, for example, that during the fight with the Turkish Akinjis he had been supernaturally lucky – that every chance had turned his way, and that his armour had shed blows the way a ship’s hull shed water.

  But for once, Swan believed. He wasn’t sure what he believed, beyond that the victory of the Hungarians under the walls of Belgrade was more important than one Ser Thomas Swan, knight of Venice and London.

  While all these thoughts chased themselves around his head, Hunyadi ordered his son to fetch Mattias. ‘The friar is a pious fool,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry to say that we must make a difficult choice. For ourselves, and perhaps for the Kingdom of Hungary.’

  László bowed. ‘I think we can still be victorious,’ he said.

  The Ban nodded. ‘I agree that it might happen that way, my son. But I am responsible for many things, and my own reputation not the least. Go fetch your brother. Ser Suane – I regret that this will be a family conference.’

  László’s eyes begged Swan for aid. But he turned, his anger plain in his body, and left the pavilion.

  Hunyadi raised his arm to call his chamberlain, but Swan stepped forward quickly – quickly enough to make the Hungarian tyrant reach for his dagger in automatic response. Swan knelt, very close to the Ban.

  ‘Lord, I have another gift for you from the Pope, and Cardinal Bessarion,’ he said, forestalling Hunyadi’s puzzlement.

  ‘You have another twenty thousand ducats?’ Hunyadi asked.

  Swan shrugged. ‘Perhaps, my lord. What I have is very precious, but it will not buy you more men.’ He took the ring from his finger, savouring it one more time. He had worn it with the collet turned in for weeks, so that it appeared a plain gold band, and rather pale gold at that. But now, turned in his hand, the great diamond caught the sun in a brillian
t explosion of light that filled the tent like a shower of thaumaturgy. Hunyadi actually flinched for a moment.

  ‘It is called the ring of the Conqueror,’ Swan said. ‘It was made before the time of Christ, and worn by Alexander the Conqueror. Many men have owned it – they say that both Hannibal and Caesar wore it.’ Swan looked up from the ring to Hunyadi’s face. ‘I believe that Sultan Mehmet hungers for it.’ He extended his hand to Hunyadi. ‘Bessarion sends it to you.’

  Hunyadi took the ring, and his face lit with a grim fire.

  He put it on. ‘Whose head is carved in this pagan gem?’ he asked.

  ‘That is Herakles, or Hercules as the Romans called him,’ Swan said.

  Hunyadi stared at the ring. ‘Bessarion sent me this?’ he said. ‘Why do you only bring it to me now?’

  Swan had feared that question. He had no idea why, in fact, beyond a little personal rapaciousness. He wanted the ring for himself. But he had never lacked answers. ‘My lord, I was to treat with the Sultan if that was required instead of fighting. Bessarion thought the ring might buy … peace.’

  ‘The Sultan wants it that much?’ Hunyadi asked.

  Swan shrugged. Shrugging while on your knees is a special talent, but one Swan had mastered.

  ‘You were authorised to treat with him?’ Hunyadi asked. ‘I have heard a rumour that Omar Reis, who holds high rank in that army, is not your friend.’

  Swan bowed his head again.

  ‘And what would Bessarion have me do with this ring?’ Hunyadi asked.

  Swan could not exactly say, ‘You were about to summon your sons and ride away and leave Belgrade to fall. I’m buying your continued interest in the siege.’ That would be crass – foolish, and counterproductive.

  ‘Beat the Sultan, destroy his army, and ride to glory,’ Swan said. And perhaps end up as King of Hungary and the Pope’s ally, he left unsaid.

  ‘And I will accomplish all of this by wearing a ring?’ Hunyadi asked. ‘I confess that I love it well, for its history as well as its beauty. And it fits my hand. But a good swordsman does not wear rings.’

  Swan bowed his head. Even at his relatively young age, he knew when a mark was convincing himself. He needed add no further arguments.

  Hunyadi held the ring aloft, basking in the dazzling display of light flashing around the inside of the tent – very like a small boy. Mattias entered with László.

  Both stopped as they encountered the swirling lights. ‘Oh my God,’ László said.

  Hunyadi looked at his sons. ‘Rise, Ser Suane,’ he said. He laid his beringed hand on his knee, and leaned forward. ‘László, I want you to lead the assault on the enemy ships.’

  ‘But you …’ László was delighted, but puzzled.

  Hunyadi smiled grimly. ‘Ser Suane has changed my mind,’ he said. ‘We will try breaking the blockade of boats. If we succeed, we will take council. And tell the friar to move all his crusaders down the west bank from Slankamen. It is time we stopped cowering in our fortifications and took the fight to the Turks.’

  Riding north towards Slankamen, László was elated. ‘I knew you would convince my father,’ he said.

  Swan sighed, suspecting that he had just acted very much against his principles – and his mother’s. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Well, your father did not want to leave, I think. My arguments …’

  László laughed for the first time in days. ‘Suddenly it is you who are dour – did you trade with my father? Come, let us ride!’

  They returned to their palisaded fortress – which grew every day – to find a small miracle had occurred. Not one but two German crusaders had reached the camp – both arriving in ships. Like some of the Turkish river galleys, these were small ships, smaller than their ocean-going cousins, but they were fully rigged, and had heavy bulwarks and high castles fore and aft, almost like the latest Portuguese and Venetian cogs.

  Swan and Hunyadi went and met with the German crusaders. Swan sent for Von Nymandus, and in an hour the crusaders were enthusiastic members of the Christian flotilla. Swan set his best carpenters to reinforcing the bows and emplacing his two heaviest guns on the German river ships. The German knights excused themselves from participating in carpentry.

  Swan looked at the ships while the sun settled in the west. The sound of hammers filled the earthwork fortress; while behind him, men and women sang hymns and a pair of Dominicans said mass. Šárka came up from the river, where her work party had finished the slipways. She wore an odd look, which Swan ignored, as she was wearing nothing but a shift and her body showed through with the sun behind her.

  He took her hand and led her into his pavilion, and they made love while the sounds of mass drifted in.

  ‘This is blasphemy,’ she said. She didn’t smile.

  Swan laughed. ‘Šárka.’ He said, ‘If God did not mean men and women to do this, why did he make us so attractive?’ He ran a hand over her hip and over her flat, muscled belly and up to her breasts.

  She sighed – a long sigh.

  Somewhere outside a priest began the long Latin recitative that would culminate in the consecration of the Eucharist.

  Quam oblationem tu, Deus, in omnibus, quaesumus, benedictam, adscriptam, ratam, rationabilem, acceptabilemque facere digneris: ut nobis Corpus et Sanguis fiat dilectissimi Filii tui, Domini nostri Iesu Christi.

  Swan laughed. But Šárka did not – even when they made love a second time, and a third.

  In the morning, she was there when he awoke, fully dressed, looking at him.

  He reached for her, and she shook her head.

  ‘I have stayed because I have something I must say,’ she said.

  He drank some sour wine and spat it, and began to don his arming clothes.

  ‘Will you listen?’ she asked.

  He smiled and sat on a stool. ‘I will listen,’ he said.

  She nodded. ‘Listen, then. I am leaving you.’

  He had known. It had been in her lovemaking. Sad. Not detached, not unwilling – except when the priest said mass.

  He nodded.

  She shrugged. ‘I liked you. More than any man I have known in a long time. And you have helped me see … things.’ She smiled, and for a moment her eyes danced, and he wondered whether she’d been that way as a girl, before whatever hell had been unleashed on her and her dead-eyed brother. ‘But you are what you are. A soldier.’

  ‘I am no soldier,’ he protested.

  She shrugged. ‘A soldier,’ she said. ‘I am going to Belgrade,’ she went on. ‘With Capistrano. He preaches to us. He will save our souls. I am taking all the women, and we leave your company. We will be whores no more.’

  Swan frowned. Anger was creeping into him. ‘Capistrano is a fool,’ he said. ‘A vainglorious, sanctimonious fool who believes—’

  She put a finger on his mouth. ‘He is a living saint,’ she said. ‘He has promised us the redemption of our sins, Thomas. Even such as I. Listen – you would fuck while a priest says mass. You would kill for money. You, who wear the cross of Christ and serve the religious knights – you have no religion. But I do. I have found something – sweeter than making love. Better than living in an army camp until my looks rot away. Working for men who hold me in contempt. God does not hold me in contempt.’

  ‘Christ!’ Swan swore, and rose to his feet. ‘Capistrano burns Jews and men who lie with men; he kills anyone he thinks is a heretic. He is no friend of anyone, and no sane God would act through him.’ He was not getting through to her. ‘He hates Hussites more than he hates Jews and Moslems, for the love of God!’

  Šárka shook her head. ‘You think that this is a contest between you and Capistrano,’ she said sadly. ‘I wish you to be happy for me. I go to be clean, and free of sin.’ She put a hand on his. ‘And I would wish that you, too, might find what I have found. You may die – indeed, I fear your death every hour. Confess your sins and prepare for death, Thomas.’

  Swan swallowed his indignation – more because he thought it was bad manners to cas
tigate a woman who was leaving him than because he believed a word she said. ‘If this is your decision,’ he said, bowing low, ‘I honour it.’ He kissed her hand.

  She smiled again – a moment’s happiness. ‘It is you who is to blame,’ she said. ‘You treated me as a person from the hour you met me. You raised my hopes.’

  Swan sighed. ‘I pray we both survive the siege.’

  ‘Please pray,’ she said, and she slipped through the door of the tent, paused to adjust her sword, and was gone.

  An hour later, the vast host of Capistrano’s ‘crusade’, twenty thousand men and women, who included among them many of the very homosexuals, heretics and apostate Jews that Capistrano had persecuted for five years – marched away singing, their weapons and farm implements shouldered, women marching alongside men.

  None of the men and women who had been working on the boats wanted to stay. Capistrano had preached a last sermon – against Jews – and had denounced every form of excess from playing cards to wine, from fine armour to fine clothes, insisting that the only armour a Christian needed was faith, and the only printed cards, pictures of the saints.

  The crusaders marched away. Swan saw Šárka and her wagon go, surrounded by almost twenty women, all wearing swords.

  Then he went down to the river, and led the men-at-arms and crusaders in learning to row.

  Learning to row offered more comedy than crisis. No boats were sunk, but in two days of practice, many men had got wet, and a three-pounder falconet was lost in the river and had to be recovered by divers and buoys. Ladislav the Bohemian didn’t speak to Swan for two days – and on the third, went back to his place as a gunner on one of the German ships without comment.

  Swan couldn’t think of anything to say, either. The man had lost his sister.

  The two of them – children of war, who had lived lives so hard that Swan’s own seemed a bed of ease – caused Swan to lie awake on the night of July the ninth, wondering what effect wars truly had. But he had been in enough fights at his age to know that this lack of spirit was mostly fear. He was afraid, and he lay in his camp bed, alone, and wondered how his thirty gunboats and two ships could face an Ottoman fleet. He no longer had the ring.