The Tower of Fools

by Andrzej Sapkowski

  “Attack!” bellowed someone in the crowd of soldiers. “Deeeaath!”

  “For behold, the day is coming,” roared Ambrož, “burning like a furnace; and all the arrogant and every evildoer will be chaff; and the day that is coming will set them ablaze so that it will leave them neither root nor branch!”

  “Buuuurn them! Deeeaath! Have at him! Kill! Have at them!”

  Ambrož raised both arms and the crowd immediately fell silent.

  “God’s work is awaiting you,” he called. “A task we must undertake with a pure heart, after prayers! On your knees, faithful Christians! Let us pray!”

  With a clanging and a grating, the army knelt behind the pavises and wooden barricades.

  “Otče náš,” Ambrož began to thunder, “who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name…”

  “Přijď tvé království!” the kneeling army boomed in a single voice. “Thy will be done! On Earth as it is in Heaven!”

  Ambrož didn’t put his hands together in prayer or lower his head. He looked at the walls of Bardo and hatred burned in his eyes. His teeth were bared like a wolf’s and there was foam on his lips.

  “And forgive us our trespasses,” he screamed, “as we forgive those…”

  One of the men kneeling in the front row, rather than forgiving, fired a handgonne. Shots were returned from the walls, a hail of bullets and bolts whistling through a burst of smoke from the battlements and striking the pavises.

  “And lead us not into temptation!” The roar of the Hussites rose above the roar of the shots.

  “But deliver us from evil!”

  “Amen!” bellowed Ambrož. “Amen! And now forward, faithful Czechs! Vpřed, boží bojovnicí! Death to the Antichrist’s lackeys! Kill the papists!”

  “Have at them!”

  Cannons and trestle guns spat fire and lead, harquebuses and hand cannons roared, crossbow bolts hissed, and a hail of lethal missiles swept the defenders from the wall. A second salvo, this time of burning projectiles, fell on the roofs of homesteads like fiery birds. A bombard spat fire from behind the raised wooden planking, enveloping the entire area in front of the gate in dense, stinking smoke. The gate couldn’t withstand the fifty-pound stone ball and was reduced to matchwood. The attackers charged into the breach. Others climbed like ants up the spiked logs onto the wall. Bardo had been condemned to death, and the sentence was about to be carried out.

  “Have at them! Kiiiilll!”

  Wild, hair-raising shouts, moaning and yells.

  Bardo was dying to the tolling of its bells. Mere moments after raising the alarm and issuing a call to arms, the bells now sounded like a desperate cry for help, which gradually became the fitful, quavering moaning of a dying man choking in his death throes. Finally, the bells fell silent, and almost at once, both bell towers were enveloped in black smoke as flames shot up into the sky like the soul of the dead town.

  Because the town of Bardo had died. The raging conflagration was now a funeral pyre, and the screaming of the dying an epitaph.

  Soon after, a column of fugitives began to file from the town: women, children and men whom the Hussites had permitted to leave. The fugitives were scrutinised by the peasant informers. Every so often, somebody was recognised, hauled out and slaughtered.

  Before Reynevan’s eyes, a peasant woman in a mantle indicated a young man to the Hussites. He was dragged from the line and when the hood was removed, his fashionably cut hair betrayed him as a knight. The peasant woman said something to Ambrož and Hlušička. Hlušička issued a short command. Flails rose and fell. The knight slumped to the ground, where he was stabbed with pitchforks and voulges.

  The peasant woman removed her hood to reveal a thick, fair plait and walked away. Limping. Distinctively enough for Reynevan to diagnose a congenital dislocation of the hip. On parting, she sent him a knowing glance. She had recognised him, too.

  Spoils were carried out from Bardo, a procession of Czechs loaded down with a variety of goods that had survived the hell of the fire and the clouds of smoke. The spoils were loaded onto wagons as cows and horses were driven out of the town.

  At the very end of the procession Samson emerged from the burning town. He was black with soot, scorched in places, devoid of eyebrows and eyelashes. He was carrying a young cat, a creature with large, wild, terrified eyes, its black and white fur bristling. The cat was gripping Samson’s sleeve tightly with its claws and opening its mouth silently every now and again.

  Ambrož’s face was set. Reynevan and Scharley said nothing. Samson came closer and stopped.

  “I was thinking about saving the world yesterday evening,” he said very softly, “and about saving humankind this morning. Ah well, one must cut one’s cloth according to one’s means and save what one can.”

  After sacking Bardo, Ambrož’s army returned to the west, towards Broumov, leaving a broad black track in the fresh white snow.

  The cavalry was divided up. Some men rode at the head under Brázda of Klinštejn’s command, as the předvoj or advance guard. The rest, numbering thirty horse, came under the command of Oldřich Halada and formed the rearguard. Reynevan, Scharley and Samson ended up there.

  Scharley whistled, Samson was quiet. Reynevan, riding alongside Halada, listened to his instructions, acquiring good habits and ridding himself of bad ones. The latter, Halada instructed quite sternly, included using the name “Hussites,” for only their enemies, papists and unfriendly people in general said that. One should instead say the “true faithful,” “good Czechs” or “Warriors of God.”

  Reynevan nodded a little sleepily in the saddle and from time to time said he understood, which was not true. Snow was falling again and it was quickly becoming a blizzard.

  Beyond the forest, at the crossroads near the ashes of Wojbórz, stood a stone penitential cross, one of Silesia’s numerous reminders of crimes past and belated contrition. The day before, when Wojbórz was being put to the torch, Reynevan hadn’t noticed the cross. But it had been evening, and snow was falling. Many things couldn’t be noticed.

  The arms of the cross were clover-shaped. Beside it stood two wagons, not war wagons but carts used for transporting goods. One was leaning far over to one side, resting on the hub of a wheel with a broken rim. Four men were trying in vain to lift the wagon up, so that two others could remove the broken wheel and put on the spare one.

  “Help us!” called one. “Brothers!”

  “Empty the wagon!” yelled Halada. “Make it lighter!”

  “It isn’t just the wheel,” shouted back the waggoner. “We’ve broken the swingletree, we can’t drive on! Someone must ride ahead and come back with a wagon! Then we’ll transfer the goods—”

  “To hell with the goods. Can’t you see the snow falling? Do you want to be stuck here?”

  “I’ll lose the goods!”

  “What about your life? Perhaps we’re being followed—”

  Halada’s voice caught in his throat. Because he had spoken those words at a very bad time.

  Horses snorted and a row of knights in full armour emerged from the forest. There were around thirty of them, most of them Knights Hospitaller.

  They rode slowly, evenly, disciplined, none of the horses’ muzzles breaking rank.

  Another troop, just as strong, rode out from among the trees on the other side of the highway under the banner of the Haugwitzes’ ram’s head. Riding up en masse, the knights skilfully cut off the Orphans’ escape route.

  “We’ll force our way through!” yelled one of the younger horsemen. “Brother Oldřich! We’ll force our way through!”

  “How?” rasped Halada. “Through lances? They’ll stick us like pigs. Dismount and get behind the wagons! We’ll sell our lives dearly!”

  There was no time to lose. The knighthood surrounding them urged their horses to a trot, clanging shut the visors of their armets and lowering their lances. The Hussites dismounted and hid behind and beneath the wagons. Those who were left without a hiding place knelt with d
rawn crossbows. It turned out by a fortunate coincidence that in addition to stolen liturgical vessels, there were also weapons on the wagons, mainly pole arms. In no time at all, the Czechs had shared out halberds, partisans and gisarmes among themselves. Somebody shoved a pike with a blade as long and thin as an awl into Reynevan’s hands.

  “Make ready!” roared Halada. “They are coming!”

  “We’re up to our necks in shit,” said Scharley, tightening and loading a crossbow. “And I had so pinned my hopes on Hungary. I’d worked up a proper fucking appetite for some real bográcsgulyás.”

  “For God and Saint George!”

  The Knights Hospitaller and Haugwitzes spurred their horses to attack, charging the wagons with a roar.

  “Now!” yelled Halada. “Now! Fire! Have at them!”

  Bowstrings twanged and a hail of bolts banged against shield and armour. Several horses tumbled; several riders fell. The others descended on the defenders. Long lances hit their targets and the crack of broken pikestaffs and cries of men being stabbed rose heavenwards. Reynevan was splashed with blood as one of the waggoners right beside him was run through, jerking convulsively. Close by, he saw one of Halada’s dismounted riders struggling with a lance blade stuck into his chest, and watched a huge knight with the pike pole of the Oppelns on his shield lift another up on his lance and toss him, bleeding, onto the snow. He saw Scharley fire a crossbow, sending a bolt from close range into a lancer’s throat, saw Halada destroy the helmet and head of another with a bardiche, and a third lancer, stabbed by two gisarmes, fall between the wagons and die, hacked and stabbed. A horse’s head, muzzle foaming and teeth bared, loomed just above him. He saw the flash of a sword and instinctively lunged with the pike, puncturing something. Reynevan almost fell under the weight of the Knight Hospitaller he had stabbed as he swayed in the saddle. He pushed on the pikestaff and the knight arched backwards, calling on the saints in a high voice. But he didn’t fall, supported by the high cantle. One of the Orphans helped Reynevan by striking the Knight Hospitaller with a halberd, flinging the knight from the saddle. Almost at the same moment, the Czech was struck in the head by a mace. The blow slammed the kettle hat into his throat and blood gushed from beneath it. Reynevan stabbed the attacker and, roaring curses, knocked him from the saddle. Beside him, another one fell from his horse, shot by Scharley. A third, slashed by a two-handed sword, slumped forward onto his horse’s mane and splashed it with blood. There was suddenly more room around the wagons. The armoured men were falling back, fighting to control their panicked horses.

  “Well done!” roared Oldřich Halada. “Well done, Brothers! We gave them what for! Keep it up!”

  They stood among blood and corpses. Reynevan noted with horror that at most fifteen men were still alive, of whom only about ten remained upright. Most of those able to stand were bleeding from multiple wounds. He understood that they were only alive because the charging lancers had impeded each other and not all of them could reach the wagons, while those that had managed to approach had paid for the privilege, and dearly. The wagons were surrounded by a circle of corpses and wheezing, lacerated horses.

  “Ready yourself,” rasped Halada. “They will soon strike again…”

  “Scharley?”

  “I am alive.”

  “Samson?”

  The giant cleared his throat, wiping blood from his eyebrows that was oozing from a wound to his forehead. He was armed with a mace bristling with spikes and a pavise decorated by some self-taught artist with a lamb, a Host with diverging rays and the words: THE LORD OUR GOD.

  “Ready yourself! They’re coming!”

  “We don’t have a chance of surviving this,” said Scharley through his teeth.

  “Lasciate ogni speranza,” agreed Samson calmly. “It’s fortunate, indeed, that I didn’t bring that cat with me.”

  Somebody handed Reynevan a harquebus—a brief pause had allowed the Orphans to load a few. He rested the barrel on the wagon, fastened the hook on the side and brought the hot fuse to the touch hole.

  “Saiiint Geeeeorge!”

  “Gott mit uns!”

  The next charge came from all sides with a thudding of hooves. Harquebuses and handgonnes boomed and a crossbow salvo hissed through the air. And a moment later came long lances, spurting blood and the frenzied screams of men being stabbed. Samson saved Reynevan by shielding him with the pavise painted with the Host and the lamb. A moment later, the pavise saved Scharley’s life—the giant swung the enormous shield in one hand like a buckler, brushing away lance thrusts like dandelion fluff.

  The Knights Hospitaller and Haugwitz knights forced their way between the wagons, standing up in their stirrups and hacking with swords and battleaxes, smiting with maces, amid yelling and clanging. The Hussites were falling. They were dying one after the other, shooting the lancers straight in the face with crossbows and handgonnes, thrusting and slicing with gisarmes and halberds, striking with maces and stabbing with pikes. The wounded crawled under the wagons and slashed the horses’ lower legs, intensifying the confusion, chaos and commotion.

  Halada jumped onto a wagon, sweeping a Knight Hospitaller from the saddle with a blow of a bardiche, then bent over double, stabbed by a thrust. Reynevan seized him and pulled him down. Two heavily armed men hovered over them, raising their swords. His life was saved again by Samson and his pavise. One of the knights, a Zedlitz, judging from the buckle on his shield, tumbled over with his horse, legs had been slashed. Scharley smote another, sitting on an armoured grey, with the bardiche dropped by Halada. His helmet split open and the knight bent forward, spattering his criniere with blood. At the same moment, somebody rode into Scharley and knocked him down with his horse. Reynevan stabbed the horseman hard with his pike, the point jamming in his plate armour. Reynevan released the shaft, turned around and cowered. There were knights everywhere, all around him a chaos of ghastly pointed hounskulls, a kaleidoscope of crosses and coats of arms on shields, a hurricane of flashing swords, a maelstrom of horses’ teeth, chests and hooves. The Narrenturm, he thought feverishly, it’s still the Narrenturm, madness, lunacy and insanity.

  He slipped in the blood and fell over. Onto Scharley. Scharley was holding a crossbow. He looked at Reynevan and winked. And fired upwards. Straight into the belly of a horse towering over them. The horse squealed and kicked Reynevan in the side of the head. It’s over, he thought.

  “God heeeelp us!” he heard mutedly, paralysed by pain and weakness. “Reeeeinforcements! Reeeeinforcements!”

  “Rescue, Reinmar!” screamed Scharley, tugging him. “Rescue! We’re saved!”

  Reynevan got up onto his hands and knees. The world continued to dance and float in front of his eyes, but the fact they were still alive couldn’t be ignored. He blinked.

  From the battlefield came a yelling and a clanging, where the Knights Hospitaller and Haugwitz knights had joined battle with the reinforcements, soldiers in full plate armour. The battle was short-lived—the highway to the west was already thundering with Brázda’s galloping cavalry, yelling at the top of their voices, followed by Hussite infantry with upraised flails yelling even louder. On seeing them, the Knights Hospitaller and the Haugwitz forces fled, taking flight towards the trees individually and in small groups. The reinforcements were hot on their heels, slashing and hacking mercilessly, so loudly it echoed through the hills.

  Reynevan sat down. Felt his head and sides. He was covered in blood, but not, it appeared, his own. Nearby, Samson, head bloodied, was resting against a wagon, still holding the pavise. Thick drops of blood were dripping from his ear onto his shoulder. Several Hussites were dragging themselves up from the ground. One was weeping. Another vomiting. One, pulling a strap with his teeth, was trying to staunch the blood gushing from the stump of a hacked-off arm.

  “We’re alive,” repeated Scharley. “We’re alive! Hi, Halada, do you—”

  He broke off. Halada couldn’t hear anything any more.

  Brázda of Klinštejn rode o
ver to the wagon, accompanied by the reinforcements. Although yelling and enlivened from the battle, they fell silent as the bloody mud began to squelch beneath their horses’ hooves. Brázda took in the massacre and glanced at Halada’s glazed eyes, but said nothing.

  The commander of the reinforcements observed Reynevan, squinting. He was evidently trying to recall where he’d seen him before. Reynevan recognised him at once and not just by the rose in his coat of arms—it was the Raubritter from Kromolin, the protector of Tybald Raabe, a Pole, Błażej Poraj Jakubowski.

  The Czech who had been weeping lowered his head on his chest and died. In silence.

  “I am astounded,” Jakubowski said finally. “Look at these three. Hardly scratched. You’re bloody lucky! Or some demon is watching over you!”

  He didn’t recognise them. It was actually no small wonder.

  Although barely able to remain upright, Reynevan immediately set about tending to the wounded. Meanwhile, the Hussite infantry were finishing off and stripping the armour from the Knights Hospitaller and the Haugwitz lancers. As the dead were pulled from their armour, fist fights broke out over the spoils.

  One of the knights lying beneath a wagon, seemingly as dead as the others, suddenly moved, his armour grating as he groaned from deep within his helmet. Reynevan approached, knelt down and lifted up the visor. They looked each other in the eyes for a long while.

  “Go on…” rasped the knight. “Finish me off, heretic. You killed my brother, now kill me. And may the Devil take you…”

  “Wolfher of Stercza.”

  “I hope you die, Reinmar of Bielawa.”

  Two Hussites approached with bloody knives. Samson stood up and barred their way, and something in his eyes made them step back smartly.

  “Finish me off,” repeated Wolfher of Stercza. “Devil’s spawn! What are you waiting for?”

  “I didn’t kill Nicolaus,” said Reynevan, “as well you know. I am still not certain what role you played in Peterlin’s murder. But know this, Stercza: I shall be back. And I shall get even with the guilty. Know it and tell the others. Reinmar of Bielawa will return to Silesia and demand that scores be settled. For everything.”