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charlie-rulerofhell · 2 months ago

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Sed Proditionem || chapter 6

Non Nobis Solum Nati Sumus

A month after parting in Prague, Hans is still thinking about the pack, the time they had shared and the promise of a new joined adventure. He knows that it would be madness to leave family and duty behind for the prospect of war. But sometimes madness is just what it takes when things become so suffocatingly stale. At least he quickly learns that he won't have to face this battle alone. Not alone at all.

{read it below or here on AO3}

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“Thank you,” Hans said, not to Vyenka but to Rudolf, and he reached out an arm for Hedwig to pull herself up by as she climbed him like a tree.

Two or three weeks, if they did not get stopped by the Order before that. And from Rattay? Hundreds of miles to the Prussian border, and on unknown streets, that was. But they would be way quicker than Jagiełło's army was, only had to look after themselves and their two horses. Henry would dare to try. He would not even think twice about it. But what would that make of Hans? A lord following his whims more than the needs of his people, and what was more, in a time of need. A traitor to Wenceslas.

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I can't let go when something's broken. It's all I know and it's all I want now.

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The sun burned down into Hans's neck as if God tried to punish him for his sins by branding. Or at least this was what he imagined it must have felt like, he had never been branded in his life, and had no intention of changing that. The end of May had brought thunderstorms and heavy rain for a few days, cooling the land not nearly enough and instead flooding the dry ground. Streets had quickly turned into rivers, and the rivers had burst their banks. Henry had spent almost a whole week down at the mill, helping miller Peshek and his niece with reparations, as the water had torn down not only the wheel but also parts of the house. Meanwhile, Hans had tried his best to navigate aid both through financial and human resources, hoping to support everyone whose goods and crops had been affected by draught and flood. Then June had come. Full of hope, at first, because the rain had ceased, the air grew colder, the ground tried to recover as good as possible. Until Hans had woken up one morning at the first rays of sunshine with his skin and hair completely drenched. The roof must have broken, he had thought in shock. Pirkstein has fallen! But the roof was intact, the walls were still standing, and the wetness he felt all over his glowing body didn't stem from rain and not even from blood, but only from sweat.

Now, by the end of June, it seemed as if the apostle John's revelation had finally come to life. Only that God had decided there was no judgement needed, good or evil, fuck it all, just bring Hell upon this whole world and every soul upon it.

The usual suspects who were to blame for this heavenly punishment were soon found. The reformists in Prague. The Jews. The pope, or the antipope, or the anti-antipope perhaps. King Wenceslas, but people only whispered that to each other in secret. Sigismund of Hungary, and they whispered that in secret too, because who knew when the ginger fox would return. Though it seemed that right now at least he was busy elsewhere. With this elsewhere being exactly what concerned Hans the most.

He stopped for a moment in the sparse shadow that one of the houses threw, and watched the empty market square. Where the farmers, craftsmen, and tradesmen in Prague had defied the heat and taken their goods out to the streets anyway, only for them to shrivel and break and rot, the people of Rattay had long abandoned that idea. Some of them would use the evenings for selling their goods, others wouldn't come at all and rather referred to the old tradition of door sales whenever they needed anything. Only three stands were erected today, the one of potter Milena, the one of saddler Jachym, and that of one very brave fruit seller who was either too desperate or whose head had long been too scorched for him to care. And in the middle of the square, just next to the wooden platform, with no protection from the sun whatsoever, stood Rudolf. Rudolf did not give a fuck. Rudolf was paid too well to care. Hans knew that because he was the one paying him.

Rudolf's outstretched lanky arms were salmon red. The golden hair on his head was curlier than ever and shining from how soaked with sweat it was. His scratchy voice was weak, Hans had to leave the salvation of the house's shadow and get closer to understand him. “So Jobst of Moravia has not put down his claim to the Roman throne, but neither has Sigismund of Hungary. But neither of the three, it seems, has so far managed to gather sufficient support from the princepes elector imperii.” He stopped in his shouting, that no one listened to anyway, as he noticed Hans approaching him, and quickly greeted him with a bow so deep that it was a miracle he did not topple over. “My Lord.”

“Rise, Rudolf. Slower, please, we don't want the heat to get to your head.” Hans released an anxious breath of air that felt almost as cold as ice on his lips. He had asked the town crier this one specific question before, but every other time made the fear in his chest grow. The fear to be eventually brought bad news. “You've been to Prague again, I reckon.”

“I have, my Lord. And I talked to my German contacts there, as good and as numerous as I could.”

“And?” Hans's voice broke. He swallowed it down, but it seemed the sun had burned all the saliva on his tongue and it only hurt in his throat.

“They have marched to Czerwińsk, my Lord, to cross the Vistula river there. With any luck, they might have already done so, but of course they wouldn't want the Teutonic Order to know, so it's almost impossible for me to know either.”

“How many men have they gathered?”

“Dozens of thousands, my Lord.”

Hans nodded, and suddenly felt as if his skull had been emptied out and filled with wool instead. He tried to picture the force of the hundred men that he had fought with and against in front of Talmberg. He tried to remember the sound of hooves and rattling armour as a few hundred mounted soldiers had come with Henry and Jobst to break the siege of Suchdol. To have an army twenty, thirty, maybe forty times this strong. And only on one side. The noise, the chaos, the bloodbath. With Žižka, Janosh and Kubyenka, hell, even with Katherine right in the middle of it all. “How many men does the Order have?”

“I'm not certain they gathered all their men for one big battle yet, my Lord.” Rudolf wiped the sweat from his large forehead. “If God wills it, they are still fortifying Schwetz and the surrounding castles as they fight the troops King Władysław Jagiełło and Grand Duke Vytautas are sending there as distraction. But if they found out already, who knows. At least a few hundred Hungarians that Sigismund sent to their aid, a few thousand more mercenaries from Bohemia and Silesia and from all over Germany. And the knights themselves, my Lord. They are as trained for battle as men can only be.”

Hans nodded. He felt dizzy again. “Their destination is still Marienburg, is it not?”

“It is, my Lord.”

“And …” He hesitated. There were footsteps behind him, running down the street, way too quickly for any man, way too light. “When will they have reached it?”

Rudolf's eyes darted past Hans as he regarded the little beast that was approaching them, and the nurse following her closely, though much slower and with all the exhausted panting a woman of her age running in such a heat had to produce. “Two or three more weeks certainly. If they reach it, my Lord.”

“Pa!” Hedwig flung her little arms around his legs.

I thought I had more time. “How are the roads?” He got startled by his own words, had not expected to utter them, to ever even think it, but Hedwig would not grasp their meaning yet, and Vjenka was still too far gone, and Rudolf wouldn't question him, he couldn't, Hans paid him too much for that. “The roads to Prussia, I mean. Are they safe?”

“Heinrich does not want me to have his sword!” Hedwig whined. “But I don't care. I will make my own one, you'll see!”

Rudolf didn't question him. But his eyes narrowed and there was something in his expression that reminded Hans of the disappointed look Hanush had so often given him, that even now he still dared to regard him with. “My Lord …”

“And a shield too! My own one! With a cornflower, I love cornflowers.”

“Forgive me, my Lord!” Vyenka was breathing as heavily as an ox on a harvest day. “I tried to stop her, but that girl is like a bolt, you cannot catch her with bare hands, reminds me all too much of you at that age. Oh, how rosy your cheeks were, and how you stumbled on those short legs, and you still managed to slip from my grasp at every given chance, your uncle would get furious with me, ha, but I was younger then, what is all that shouting to a young lass, eh?”

“Thank you,” Hans said, not to Vyenka but to Rudolf, and he reached out an arm for Hedwig to pull herself up by as she climbed him like a tree. Two or three weeks, if they did not get stopped by the Order before that. And from Rattay? Hundreds of miles to the Prussian border, and on unknown streets, that was. But they would be way quicker than Jagiełło's army was, only had to look after themselves and their two horses. Henry would dare to try. He would not even think twice about it. But what would that make of Hans? A lord following his whims more than the needs of his people, and what was more, in a time of need. A traitor to Wenceslas.

He pondered it over during the council meeting, that dragged on for way too long. He considered all possibilities in silence as he absent-mindedly shovelled food into his mouth during supper. He still couldn't forget about it when him and Jitka and the children came together in the church for the evening prayer, and Henry wouldn't join them, despite Hans's explicit invitation. Because Henry hadn't joined them in a while. Because Henry, it seemed, had long made his decision, even when his body could not follow it through.

It was only when he was sitting down on a camp stool next to the archery stand, watching Heinrich train and fail as he usually would, that the idea hit him like Heinrich's arrows would hit anyone and anything in close proximity. It hit him, in fact, when Jitka appeared on the training ground, with little Hedwig on her arms, and specifically when he saw the two pieces of wood that his daughter held in her arms. A long stick with a broken tip and a round plate on which she had painted some unrecognisable shapes in blue and green, portraying a cornflower and a flower chafer, as she declared proudly, since they were pretty. “She insisted on showing it to you,” Jitka explained apologetically. “You know how stubborn she can be. Just like her brother. And just like her father too.”

Hans did not waste another second. He jumped up, congratulated Hedwig on her brilliant work, and then he was already running out, looking left to the sword training ground but finding it empty, and turning right instead to make his way for the smithy.

Henry had his back turned to him, and seemed so lost in his work that he did not even notice him, and so Hans watched for a while without making himself known. In part, because Henry had decided to take off the shirt underneath his apron, and that was a sight Hans would never refuse to admire, but in part too, because he needed a moment to consider his words. It is foolish, the lord, the husband, the father, the man tied into responsibilities in him said. It is the right thing to do, the unconcerned boy that he had silenced for too long and that he craved for with all his heart replied.

“You still have those pigments that this painter friend of yours gave you, right?”

Henry jumped at the sudden voice, and when he spun around, he had both the tong with the glowing piece of iron and the hammer raised as if he wanted to throw them. “Hans!”

“Because I need them. Or rather, I would need you to need them.” He gave Henry an uncertain smile. “And a shield. A blank one.”

“What?”

“Or maybe you can just paint one over.”

“Hans, what are you talking about?”

He took a deep breath. The moment of truth, not so much for Henry as for him. The moment where he could prove to himself that, at least sometimes, the boy had the ability to be louder than the man. “I need a new crest, and a new name.” Another sharp inhale of breath, and then he raised both hands and reached out his flat palms as if he wanted to present Henry the invisible trophies of his thoughts' hunting trip on two plates. “We're going to Prussia!”

Henry's face reflected all the different moods of last month's weather in just a single heartbeat. “We?”

“Well, you and me, of course, but you can stay as you are, I don't think anyone would care.”

“Are you mad? Has the sun melted your senses?”

“Henry.” He dropped the plates, put his hands to his hips instead. The nervousness he had felt before turned into a faint annoyance, and it was the most affirming feeling he could have had. “Do you really believe I would joke about such a serious affair?”

“Not joke perhaps, but I'm honestly concerned for your health.”

“I'm fine.” And then Hans laughed, and he felt tears in his eyes as the full realisation of what he was actually proposing overcame him. “In fact, I believe I haven't been better in a very long time.”

Henry stared at him bewildered for a while, until he finally put the hammer down on the anvil, drowned the iron in a bucket of water. Steam shot up with a threatening hiss, the air got even hotter than it had already been, made it hard to breathe for a few moments. Then Henry stopped moving, his eyes were fixed on the tong in his hand, even as the hissing and steaming had long stopped. His brow was deeply furrowed, his lips stood open just the tiniest bit, teeth pressed together, as he pondered. Hans felt like his heart failed him just from watching, from waiting. “How do you think this works?” Henry said finally, with his gaze still resting on the tong and the iron and the water bucket. “You cannot just go to war, the King has given his support to the Teutonic Order, he would not …”

“The King can suck my noble balls, for all I care.” The words had slipped from his mouth quicker than his thoughts could follow, and Hans threw an anxious look over his shoulder to see if anyone might have heard him, but there was nobody close, not when the sun was already setting, not on a day like this. Those who hadn't retreated to the shelter of their homes, had probably long sought out the invigorating coolness of beer and wine in one of the taverns. He still stepped closer to Henry when he continued, lowering his voice. “He won't find out. Because I'm not going to battle as Lord Hans Capon of Leipa, Lord of Pirkstein. Instead, I will be …” He stopped again, realised that he hadn't thought this specific part of his plan through enough, and so he just snapped his finger. “Come on, Henry, give me a name.”

Henry looked up from the bucket. A smile was tugging on the left corner of his mouth, but his eyes were still narrowed in confusion. “What?”

“I need a name!” Hans replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, which it were when you thought about it. “Come on, first name will do.”

“Ignatius.”

“Ign–” He leaned his head to the side. “Why in God's name is that nonsense the first thing you can come up with?”

Henry shrugged his shoulders. He still didn't seem convinced, but his mood was brighting up with every other word Hans spoke, and Hans felt the tenseness in his own chest falter at the sight. “Oh, I don't know. I just met someone once who went by that name, and he reminded me of you. A lot.”

“Alright then, Ignatius it is. Ignatius …” his eyes wandered away from Henry to the anvil, to the forge, to the buttercups at the foot of the wooden column that supported the porch roof, “of the Cornflower! I'm lowborn, but I learned how to fight and had the opportunity to prove my fighting skills in many a tourney. Now I am on the search for something bigger, something were I can really put my skills to the test and earn honour for my deeds. A proper war, in which I will serve as a mercenary for the Polish king!”

“And this mysterious knight of the Cornflower,” the words stumbled out of him in a chuckle, “comes around the very moment that Lord Hans Capon of Leipa disappears into thin air under unexplainable circumstances?”

“Not unexplainable at all. I simply went to Podiebrad for a while to look after some family affair.”

“And of course no one in Podiebrad will notice that you never arrive.”

“Ah, Henry, use your imagination for once,” Hans said as if he wasn't making everything up on the spot too. “There won't be anything for them notice, because they will be informed about it. That I grew restless and went to do what every married nobleman does at one moment of his life. Fuck around. At least that's what Jitka will tell them.”

“To ruin your reputation with Lord Botschek?”

“Come now, Botschek was once young too, he will understand.”

“And Jitka?”

“Will hear about my true whereabouts, do not worry. I will even grant her control over Rattay during my absence, what objections could she possibly have? Besides,” Hans stepped even closer now, until he could lay his hands on the anvil, and his excitement made him ignore the heat it had garnered from the iron before and from the day's sun, “I believe she has something going on with Ottersburg.”

“Hans …” Henry shook his head, and Hans could see that he wanted to protest further, but all he did was laugh. “This is madness!”

“I know!” He was laughing too. Christ, his cheeks were already starting to ache from the wide grin he could not possibly hide, when had he last felt this happy, this free? “But we have both been mad once, haven't we? Only that I grew up, and had to bury all this madness in a coffin at the bottom of the Sasau, but I feel like this, this is worth digging at least some parts of that madness back up.”

Henry looked as if he wanted to say something, but couldn't find the words for it, and so he just stared at Hans. The sun had disappeared a while ago, leaving behind a carpet of vibrant colours on the sky, orange and purple and the darkest blue, and it all reflected in Henry's eyes, painted his skin, soaked his lips. Then he stepped forward. His hands grabbed the collar of Hans's shirt, and suddenly he found himself being pulled into the corner between city wall and woodshed, pressed down onto a pile of logs, with Henry's mouth on his. Their kiss was hungry, longing, desperate. Two beggars being handed a drop of water in this draught, and just like these beggars, Hans wanted more. His fingertips clawed into the naked skin on Henry's back, losing their grip on his sweat. His leg reached forward, wrapping around Henry's thighs, pulling him closer, to feel every muscle of Henry's body on his own. Salt and smoke and wine on his tongue, the smell of leather and charcoal, their breathing and gasping and moaning so loud it must have been heard even in Prague, God's wounds, in Marienburg much likely! Hans couldn't have cared less, no, he wanted to scream it even louder, wanted to sing praise to this feeling that had forsaken him for so long, he had almost forgot what it felt like. To be this close that his own self melted into Henry's, to be this loved that all the loneliness he had ever held in his heart became futile. si wurden ein und einvalt, die zwei und zwîvalt wâren ê, a lover and a lover, a man and a man, Henry and Hans, Hans and Henry, and just like Tristan's world must have trembled and turned from the magic of the love potion, Hans felt his own vision grow bright and hazy as if drenched in milk when Henry's lips and teeth and beard wandered down his chin and neck to his collarbone, and when the hell had his beard grown so fucking long?

Then Henry stopped. The loss made Hans inhale sharply, but Henry's left hand was still on his shoulder, his right hand still on his lower back, and then he leaned in and brought their foreheads together, and that was all Hans needed to be sure that this hadn't been a dream, or even worse, the last bliss before another, final goodbye. “Hans?” Just his name breathed out, tingling on the bridge of his nose, the fear in Henry's voice stinging his heart.

“What is it?”

“You're not only doing this for me, are you?”

Henry had his eyes lowered, but Hans still looked up at him, put all the weight he could afford into his stare in the hopes that Henry would feel it. “I am doing this for you. But I'm also doing it for myself, trust me. You're not the only one who has grown tired. I need this. We need this.”

“We do.” Henry nodded, and the movement flowed over to Hans from the way their heads were still pressed together, and so he nodded along with him. Then Henry leaned forward and pressed another kiss to his top lip, only a light one this time, before he added with a smirk: “But it better be the truth, because I swear, if I find out you're only taking this risk for my sake, I'm gonna kick your arse to Hell and back.”

Hans pressed his cheek so close to Henry's, that he could feel his skin underneath both their beards, and it was cool from sweat. “Are you trying to scare me off,” he whispered into Henry's ear, “or do you want to encourage me?”

“You bastard.”

“No, that is your profession.”

He leaned back a little further, to raise his legs and wrap them around Henry. A frightening sound cut through the air. The crunching of grains of sand on the ground below, the cracking of wood and bark. Something broke. Then the logs on which he was sitting fell apart, and for the shortest moment, his arse was hanging freely in the air, his body only held by Henry's arms twined around him, before Henry's strength left him too, and so Hans fell, right on top of the crumbled pile of wood, and dragged Henry along with him. They laughed. Laughed like nothing mattered, laughed like they were twenty again, out in the taverns of the town, sharing an ale, and a talk, and afterwards a bath, and then the guard Gottfried peaked his head out between the parapet of the wall walk right above Henry's head, and Hans had to laugh even more.

Oh, to feel this light again. This careless and free.

* * *

The feeling was only short-lived, as it proved much harder to convince Jitka of their plans than it had been to convince Henry, but that was to be expected. “It will only be for a few weeks,” Hans assured her. “I will grant you the full power of decision, and my uncle will be here to help you.”

Jitka only snorted at that. “As if it wasn't hard enough to save us from his hegemonic fantasies as it is.”

“Johannes Ottersburg will be with you. And if anything dire happens, you can always go to Sir Divish for help. He knows about the trouble that my uncle is causing, he will assist you as good as I would.”

“What if you die?”

“Then I wish you and Ottersburg all the happiness in the world.”

“Hans, I mean it.”

She had looked at him for a long time, half in worry, half in anger, and finally Hans had broken it off by taking her hand into his. Not as a lover, he had never been that to her, and neither had she, but as the friend he always hoped to be. “I won't.”

“You can't promise that.”

“I can.” He had bowed down to give Mirka a pat on the head, and the little bugger had grinned and squeezed out mushy carrots through her barely visible teeth, together with a perfectly synchronised farting sound out of her upper and lower body orifices. “If anyone can succeed in introducing this hell-spawn to the civilised world of reading and writing, it's me. You don't think I will have that be taken from me, now, do you? No, it's fate that she will read Chrétien de Troyes on my lap!”

Jitka had only shaken her head. “Your tempting of God's will is going to cost you greatly one day, Hans, and I can only pray that it will be rather later than soon.”

With that, she had led them go. There was nothing she could have said or done anyway.

They left Aethon and Pebbles behind, and even Mutt, after some long discussions, and Hans explaining to Henry that the dog was slowly becoming too old for a full-scale battle. Henry eventually understood, and then he proclaimed that Mutt would be his bargain, just as the children were for Hans, his promise to himself that he had to make it back home in one piece. The horses, on the other hand, were left behind because they were planning on trading them in every other day anyway. Hundreds of miles to Prussia. An impossible feat for one single horse, but when they regularly exchanged them against fresh ones? Now, on that way they might even get there within a fortnight.

They had spent the whole night preparing for their travel, packing, painting the shield and searching for armour that was as practical and still as little noble as it could possibly get. Excitement kept them both awake, and it was just that same excitement that made Hans feel as spirited as a little boy the next morning, despite not having slept a wink.

They left with the first rays of sunshine, and rode for a few hours with little breaks. It was warm still, but not overly hot for a change, and the wind of their quick pace felt good on their skin. It was close to noon when they reached Charles' square in Kolín, where they wanted to stop for the first time to get a cold drink and a bite to eat, but then Henry slowed his horse all of a sudden, until he came to a complete halt. His look wandered over to the left, into the narrow streets between half-timbered houses in the brightest colours. Hans had never been there before, had always left Henry here on his own when he would travel further to Podiebrad, but he knew enough about the town and about the six-pointed star carved into one of the facades, to recognise the quarter.

“We should,” Henry started, before he cut himself off, shaking his head. “But perhaps …”

“Well, we could ask at least.”

They left their horses by the wooden outer gate, walking through the quarter by foot, and it gave Hans more time to let his eyes travel around. The Jewish streets were different than the rest of the city, and Hans was taken aback by how much it surprised him. The houses looked different. Not at first glance, just the same stone and wood and paint as all the rest of the city, but upon further inspection, he could see decorations he had never noticed on a Christian house, ornaments of birds and flowers and some fruit that reminded him of very red apples, and there were little metal cases next to the doors that he could not make sense of. The smell was different too. Less stench, more the clear, intoxicating scent of food, and what a sweet scent that was. “Is there a celebration today?” Hans asked, and as he noticed Henry's questioning look, he raised his hand and gestured into the air. “Or a special Sunday worship perhaps?”

“No.” Henry laughed as if Hans's question had been as ridiculous as if asking whether water was wet. “Shabbat is on Saturday, not Sunday.”

“Ah. I just thought, because of the smell, you know? Certainly it doesn't smell this delicious here everyday!”

“That might be the challah. It has a very distinctive scent, hard to get out of these narrow streets here in just one night. And why would someone want that anyway!”

“The ha– The what?”

Henry pulled his brows together as if he was truly questioning Hans's sanity now. “You really haven't been here often, have you?”

He scratched his neck that started to feel hotter now from embarrassment than from the sun before. “To be honest with you, I've never been here.” Not to Kolín, not to Kuttenberg before it had been raided by Erik and his group of thugs, and not even to Prague, as he always had more pressing matters to tend to when he went there. More pressing matters, he thought to himself bitterly. More pressing than what? Caring for his family? Caring for a part of the people of which he dared to call himself lord?

Henry did not seem to be as hard on Hans as he was on himself, since the broad and kind smile had not vanished from his face yet. “It's a shame, you know? You would like it here, especially the food. You may not want to hear it, but when it comes to your love of sweet pastries, you and Sam are not so unlike each other.”

They turned around a corner to the left, and Hans was surprised to see Henry greet a group of people that they met, resulting in a short conversation about each other's well-being, while Hans could do nothing but stand and watch. A part of Henry's life he had never cared to share, had never even thought about. Had Henry expected him to? Had he hoped and waited for him to ask at least, for Hans to offer that he would come here with him every once in a while?

Henry guided them to a house on their right side, painted in the colour of mustard, and carefully knocked on the door before he entered. Another sweet smell, different from the one that had been lingering outside, but it was warm and fresh, and it came right out of a room to their left in which Hans could see a stove burning, with two women standing next to it, bent over a table.

“Neyn, meydl,” the one in a white hood scolded. “You have to fold the dough like this, you see, like a triangle. Vart, ikh vel dir veyzn.”

“Sara.”

The woman shot up and twirled around, a hand pressed to her heart that was likely beating as heavy as a drum. “Oy gevalt! Yingele, why do you scare me like this?”

Henry smiled his sweetest smile as an apology. “Forgive me, that wasn't my intention. Especially not since you look as flourishing as a meadow in spring again, and at least just as pretty.”

“Oy, don't be narish,” it seemed like she wanted to make her words sound strict, but they were betrayed by the blush on her cheeks. “And I would not look nearly as healthy if it weren't for my sweet Samuel. I cannot thank God enough for all he has done for me.”

“He has found a remedy then?”

“Ah, you see, Henry, the headache comes and goes, but at least I know now what to do so that the pain can not rip me apart.”

“Well, that is wonderful to hear.” Henry was smiling still, but it was clear that he wanted to get to Sam as quickly as possible. Perhaps he was scared to spend too much time here. Scared that his conversations with Samuel's friends and family could remind him of his duties again, of responsibility. “Speaking of Sam, we were actually hoping to find him here. You don't happen to know where he is?”

“Of course. He is in his apothecary in the backyard.”

“Thank you.”

“But,” Henry had already turned to leave, when Sara raised her voice again, “don't you want to introduce us first? Although I do have an idea about who you have brought with you today.” She looked at Hans now, and her eyes were warm and kind, much kinder than he would ever think Sam capable of, or perhaps the same kindness was hidden somewhere inside of him, underneath all the harshness and anger.

The kindness seemed to convince Henry too, because he stopped once more and turned back around “Ah, you're right, forgive me. I've just known you for so long now that I keep forgetting you truly never met. Hans, this is Sara, Samuel's mother. And Sara, this is Hans Capon of Leipa, the Lord of Pirkstein, and …” He paused, contemplated, and then Hans suddenly felt Henry's hand on his shoulder, pulling him closer. “My better half.”

Hans laughed. A nervous laugh, one that made his cheeks burn, one that had to be turned into a joke immediately. “See now, Sara, there's no reason to chastise him for his foolishness from before, Henry just pours this flattery onto everyone!”

Sara nodded knowingly. As if Hans had said anything that would have required her confirmation. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Hans. I have heard many stories about you, not only from Henry.”

“Ha. I'm not sure I want to know the stories that Sam has to tell about me.”

“Do not worry.” She still gave him that look, and Hans wanted to return to his horse right away, or better yet, dig a hole into the ground beneath his feet, and hide there for the rest of his days. “If there is anything ill to say about you, Samuel has not told me yet.” Then Sara turned to the side, towards the woman next to her that was still facing the table, kneading dough into the most adventurous shapes. “I am sure, neither has he told you any different, has he?”

“If he has,” the woman spoke softly, and with a tone that was way too familiar, “at least I do not remember.”

“Ah, where are my manners! I did not introduce you yet, how could I forget! Or have your perhaps met before?”

The woman stopped the kneading finally, straightened her back. Black hair, braided neatly into a wreath around her head, but one strand had come loose, and it fell down next to her ear, as twisted as a spindle. She turned, and Hans felt his breathing stop for a moment.

“Mirtl,” Henry said, because apparently his breathing had not failed him yet, or perhaps he had just wasted his last bit of air on that cursed name.

“So you have met!”

Henry did not answer. Hans still felt like the fire of the hearth had suddenly drained all life out of the room. Mirtl looked at them both with a blank expression. Not threatening, not proud either, not even with feigned kindness. She just looked, and it was the most unsettling thing Hans could have imagined.

“The apothecary, you said?” Henry asked, and his voice broke from how much effort it took him to keep his emotions under control.

“Yes, he wanted to work on new medicine, ah, an ointment.” Sara's brows twisted in confusion. She noticed something, but did not understand it enough to ask any questions. “His friend Blasius has brought him plants from his travels in the east. You know Blasius, do you not, Henry?”

“Blasius?” Henry laughed, and it was as bitter as these miraculous plants from the east could possibly be. “Oh yes, we've met too. What a surprise, isn't it? So many well-known names and faces.”

Henry turned and stormed out into the hallway, and Hans followed him without another word to Sara or Mirtl, because he neither knew what to say nor what to feel. Confusion, that most of all, but even more so anger and disappointment. When Henry had, after a few days of returning to Rattay, finally confided in him about the events in Prague, Hans had been furious. Not surprised, they should have expected that the woman who had known about Rosenberg's henchmen and plans and had told them so willingly, only moments before risking her neck even more to save their arses, had been playing them all this time like a fiddle. And it wasn't even the fact that she had betrayed them, which had made Hans want to tear down the walls of their bedchamber. It was the thought that Henry had suffered because of her, that the wound he had carefully laid his finger on, as Henry had spoken about the alleyway and the blood spilled and Erik coming at him like a wild dog, had been caused by her actions. And in a time when Hans had not been there to help him. When he had been in Rattay, listening to his uncle's excuses, pondering when his life had become so uneventful, so stale, unaware that somewhere in Prague Henry had almost bled to death on the street.

And if he was honest with himself, it had been one of the reasons for the madness he currently found himself in. For his decision to leave it all behind and go to Prussia to die on a foreign battlefield with a crest on the shield in his hand that no one knew, called by a name no one had heard of before and that no one would remember when he died there. Because it had not only been him, the little bird, that the walls of Rattay had caged him. Sooner or later, Henry would have left on his own, Hans could not have stopped him, and the thought of him fighting alone, losing his life without Hans to defend it for him, without Hans there to die by his side, had been unbearable.

Henry pushed the backdoor open with way too much force, and the sound of wood hitting on stone dragged Hans right out of the memories and nightmares, and back into his anger. “Mirtl?” he asked Henry, as if there was still any doubt, as if he hadn't recognised her name, her way too beautiful face at once, way too pretty and cold like the serpent of Eden, the face that a repressed man like Samuel obviously had to fall for! “The one who lied to us, who wanted eggface and Erik to tear you to shreds? The one you told me Sam had taken care of?”

“Look, it's not like I imagined it.” Henry was furious too, his hands were clenched to fists and shaking, as he stomped through the flower beds of herbs and spices that lined the backyard, over to a shed in the opposite corner. “You should have seen his face when he returned to the university! He looked completely broken! That fucker.”

He grabbed the handle of the door, pulled it open.

A sweet, but pungent smell hit them with the force of a lance in a joust, carried on a cloud of mist that made Hans's eyes burn, and in the middle of it stood Sam, looking up from his alchemical equipment and whipping around to them like a hare that had sensed the hunter. The hare turned into a wolf within in the blink of an eye as he noticed the expression on his brother's face, and then into an obstinate donkey as he seemed to understand.

“I thought you had killed her,” Henry burst out without any word of greeting or explanation.

Sam did not seem to need an explanation. Instead, he looked as if he had expected, had waited for this for a long time. “I said that I had taken care of our problem.”

“Which was her.” Hans could not recall when he had last seen Henry this furious, and it made him shudder in unease too, despite not being the target of his anger and having felt a similar rage just moments ago.

“That is debatable.”

“You made us believe that you had killed her, you acted as if you were utterly devastated, can you imagine how sorry I felt for you?”

“Do you think that my decision was an easy one to make? It was not.” There were flames gleaming in Sam's eyes now, and Hans could not tell whether it was the reflection of the fireplace behind him, or a mirror of the anger that Henry felt. How similar they were, Hans thought. How threatening when colliding, like two cloud banks clashing to form a destructive tempest. “But then Žižka made his decision, and I went back to her.”

“To do what? Are you two …”

“That is not your gesheft, bruder.”

“She is in your kitchen making hamantaschen with your mother! The very woman who has betrayed you, this is madness, Sam!”

“Madness? You dare to chastise me about madness?” Sam crossed his arms, his gaze left Henry and rested on Hans instead, and Hans was certain that it must truly be fire in his eyes, because he found himself set alight by his gaze. “My shvoger is carrying with him a shield that is not bearing the coat of arms of Leipa, while he is dressed like a common mercenary, and yet it is me that you call mad.”

Henry laughed in disbelief. Sam looked as if he had made a point that he was all too proud of.

Hans, to his own surprise, found that he could not blame him. Hadn't Henry accused him of madness too, just a day ago, and hadn't Hans convinced him that it was time to dig the carelessness, the daring back out of the river bed he had buried it in? Who was he to follow his own craving of foolishness and not show understanding for Sam's? “We are on our way to Prussia. We will join the Polish-Lithuanian joined forces there. Send those Germans back to where they came from. Fight side by side with Žižka and the rest.”

Sam's expression softened, then he lowered his eyes.

“We wanted to ask you to come with us. But perhaps you are too busy with your own … gesheft.”

The corner of Sam's mouth pulled up under the puff of a laugh. He shook his head. Pressed his full lips together, took a deep breath, opened them again in a long sigh. The wood of the fire exploded into little clouds of sparks, scattering all through the shed. The mist had become just a little bit less cutting, as it had gladly taken its leave through the opened door to torment the herb plants outside in the yard's garden. “Kurva,” Sam said. “Give me one hour.”

* * *

They had taken the two fastest horses Sam was able to find in his hurry, and compared to the ones Hans and Henry were riding, both were dreadfully slow. It was for the better perhaps, because their slow pace spent in awkward silence gave Hans enough time to think. About the strangeness of seeing the woman that had just made him shake with hatred, now ride along him like an old friend, dressed in a plain tunic and old leather hoses that Sam had declared were too small for him anyway, and that only clung to her slim body with much effort and multiple belts that she had pulled tight around her chest and waist. He thought about the ease with which he had managed to convince Sam of coming with him. The sympathy he had shown for their plan, the faint delight, bordering on relief, that his words had carried, as if he had only prayed for an offer like this. Hans also thought about the hamantaschen in their pockets, and how they might taste, and that, even if he liked them, he would never admit to it, because how embarrassing would that be to prove Henry right in his cruel insinuation that he shared any bit of taste with Sam!

Then they rode out through the northern city gate of Kolín, and Hans saw the open road ahead of them, felt the weight of his shield on his back, the sword by his side, and he breathed in the smell of scorched grass and heated soil and excitement and adventure, when Sam suddenly brought his horse to a halt. “No.”

Hans pulled on the reins, made his horse dance around. It let out a neigh of protest, that expressed exactly what Hans was feeling. “No?”

“We cannot leave like this.”

“Like what?”

“Without him. You know how much he longed for this too.” He looked over to Henry now, nodded. “We must at least offer him to come with us.”

“Who?”

“Štěpán,” Sam said, as if that name explained everything. He could have just as well said the Fürst of Haching, it would have meant just as little to Hans.

“Štěpán cannot possibly leave,” Henry argued. “He has duties to fulfil.”

“Just like Hans then. Just like us.”

Henry shook his head, but his determination was fragile. “You know that he went back to Zlenice.” His eyes wandered to the east, where nothing but barren fields and yellow-tinted trees lay, no village for many more miles, and certainly no Zlenice. “That is another half day's ride away.”

“A sacrifice that will be worth it. That little nuisance would never forgive us if we left without asking him.”

The mention of Zlenice and that little nuisance, at least, was enough for Hans to understand whom they were talking about, and while they turned their horses around and spurred them to ride faster, or at least as fast as Sam's and Mirtl's horses would allow it, Henry let him in on everything that he knew about Sir Ondřej's ward. Which wasn't much, given that they had merely spent one day with each other, but apparently that time had been enough for both Henry and Sam to pronounce him an official member of the pack. Or rather, for the boy to pronounce himself such.

It did not take long for Hans to see why Henry and Sam, and even Mirtl, that treacherous succubus, liked Štěpán so much, as he seemed to be everything Hans was. Brave and smart and incredibly good-looking. Sam told him about the drink and the conversations they had shared on that fateful night when Žižka had made his decision to leave for Poland, and Henry told him about Štěpán using his wits and charm to convince a few dozen gathered folks on the Horse Market of the barker's fraud, and Hans grinned happily, certain that taking this boy along for their journey was a wise decision.

Which was why, when they finally reached Zlenice and rode up the mountain to the castle with the setting sun in their backs and the evening laying down heavily on the land in the form of a thick, swirling carpet of mist above the Sasau to their right, he was in the most wonderful mood, despite the exhausting ride that was behind them and the frustrating detour they had had to take. It might as well have been the general nature of their trip that had cheered him up, the fresh air he had breathed, Henry being so pleased that he started singing quietly mid-way and then louder the further they got, Sam slowly getting so annoyed by it, that he scolded his brother for it, and then cursed at him in this Jewish language of his, and Mirtl trying to lift his spirit by feeding him the pastry she had made, which wasn't nearly as delicious as Henry had promised, or perhaps Mirtl was even more miserable at baking than she was at honesty. It might have also just been the fact that, upon crossing the first draw bridge to Zlenice castle, Hans hadn't had to listen to his uncle's provocations for a whole day, and that truly was the greatest gift of this endeavour.

They were greeted by two guards at the outer walls, stepping in their way and pointing shiny lances at them. “Jesus Christ be praised.”

“Forever and ever,” Henry and Hans replied in unison.

The older guard, a short man with a nearly bald head, and full, grey hair on his chin, brows and in his large nostrils, cast a scrutinising glance at Sam and Mirtl, before he first turned to Henry, eyeing the fully packed bag that hang from his saddle, opposite the longsword that was way too skilfully crafted for such a simple man, then he finally looked over to Hans, examining the elegantly curved bow that was attached to his saddle and the shield with the crooked, sloppy painting of the cornflower. “State your business.”

Hans passed the others a proud smile to reassure them that he had everything perfectly under control, and moved his horse a few steps forward. “I am Lord Hans Capon of Leipa, Lord of Pirkstein, good sir. And I demand an audience with your lord, Sir Ondřej of Dubá.”

The guard narrowed his eyes even more as he stared for an uncomfortably long time at Hans's worn clothes and at the tragically dissolving cornflower. Hans could hear Henry snort out a laugh behind him. Reminds you of Trosky too, eh? Hans wanted to ask, but he didn't. He only straightened his back, raised his chin and looked down upon the guard with an expectantly raised brow. He was no child anymore, and if growing up had taught him one thing, it was that it had never been about the clothes one was wearing, it was all about demeanour and the necessary touch of authority.

“The lord hasn't announced any visits from Pirkstein.”

Hans felt himself sink back down in his saddle, and Henry snorted even louder. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sam's horse prancing closer to Henry's, so that Sam could give his brother a nudge against his upper arm. “Not helpful,” he hissed.

“Well, of course he has not announced us,” Hans retorted, with all the bitter sharpness of a ginger root, “as he is not aware that we are coming.”

“Oh. What a happy coincidence.”

Hans took a deep breath, and was only thankful that his beard covered most of the pout that he could not hold back any longer. Behind him, Henry hid his face behind his hands, but his shoulders were still trembling heavier than flutter-wing flies. “In fact, it is merely a matter of politeness that I even ask for a meeting with Lord Dubá, since we are not here on his behalf, but rather for his ward, Štěpán of Tetín.”

The guard looked back at the other one who answered with an uncertain shrug, then he turned back around to Hans, and his nasal hair vibrated from a deep sigh. “What kind of trouble has the young lord got himself into this time?”

At least, the old guard finally did allow them to enter, even though he kept a specifically close look at all of them. He led them into the outer bailey first, where they had to leave their horses. Mirtl nearly stumbled to the ground when she dismounted, as she was apparently not used to riding such a long distance at a time, and Hans was ashamed to admit that he felt impressed by how she had not complained about it even once. Something Sam could really learn a thing or two from. Perhaps that was what connected them both. Sam complained, Mirtl listened. And lied.

Hans shoved the thoughts aside, as the guard urged them to follow him further. Through the inner gate, and then to the left, onto a path of sand and gravel that crunched under their feet. Next to them, the keep with its firm, white walls and the half-timbering on top, towered above the land, and Hans wondered how stunning the view across the land must be from up there. He did not get to find out. The guard did not guide them anywhere close to the castle grounds. Instead their way led to the back of the keep, where the path turned into a broader area that was confined on one side by the massive outer wall of Zlenice castle, and on the other by a herb garden of savory and mint and toadflax. And in between both, on a low stool with a small writing desk placed in front of him, facing away from the setting sun and from his visitors, sat a black-haired boy with black-inked fingers, a book on his lap, a quill in his hand, scribbling on parchment.

And Hans realised that he had been lied to. Oh, how awfully he had been fooled.

“Lord Štěpán?” the guard spoke, and the boy raised his head and turned with round, questioning eyes. “These … guests claimed that they were supposed to meet you.”

Štěpán of Tetín had a face that could have passed as that of a pretty young woman at best, though it rather bore the softness, fullness and smoothness of an immature child. His body was lanky, a beanstalk that had shot up one day, without establishing any fruit yet. For how smart he was praised to be, all he seemed capable of doing was to open his mouth widely and gape at them dumbfounded, as if it had been the archangel Gabriel visiting him, bringing him God's sacred tidings. And his charm? Well, everything Hans had pictured about that was wrecked and torn to pieces the moment the boy finally did manage to get his body into motion, jumping up from his stool, letting the precious book fall to the ground with a pitiful thud, dashing forward and wrapping his arms tight around Henry's neck.

“Hey,” Henry made, just like he would with Heinrich or Hedwig, and placed his hand on the boy's head. “Happy to see you too.”

“So, I assume,” the guard started carefully, “you do know these people then, my Lord?”

“I do, Bedrich.” Štěpán pushed himself off Henry with visible effort and reddened cheeks, while he brought his hand up to quickly wipe across his right eye. “You can leave us alone.”

“As you wish.”

The boy exchanged a way more distanced greeting with Sam in the form of a brief clap on each other's shoulders, then he took a step back. As soon as the guard's steps had disappeared behind the corner of the keep, the initial joy faded, together with the blush on his round face, and the wetness in his eyes. “That is, I know two of you at least. While I've never seen the third one.” His big, brown eyes regarded Hans for a moment, before they finally moved over to Mirtl. “And the fourth … Well, I feel like we've met before, but not in a positive light.”

“Things changed,” Sam mumbled.

Hans could not hold back a dry, mocking laugh. “Apparently!”

“Not only apparently.” The glance that Sam shot in his direction was obliterating. It was clear he had grown tired of having to defend his decision again and again over the course of this day's journey, but Hans was far from done questioning it. “You can be certain that she is in our side.”

“Oh, I am certain that you are certain.” Hans crossed his arms in front of his chest, and looked them both up and down, Sam tight and ready to snap like a bowstring, Mirtl buried in his bulky clothes, making her seem twice as short as she already was. “But that's only because you went for tits rather than wits.”

Henry raised both his eyebrows. “I'm not sure that can be applied in this specific case.”

“Excuse me?” Mirtl whipped around to him, her mouth wide open with indignation.

“I just meant …”

She would not let him finish his excuse. Mirtl was angry now, and somehow it was reassuring seeing her that way, it seemed more honest than the forced friendliness on their ride before. “What are you even accusing me of? Do you really believe I spent a whole month in Kolín, in the Jewish quarter, to pursue some elaborate plan?”

“Well, you must have passed your time there with something that we don't know of,” Hans gave back with a similar sharpness, “since you clearly did not invest it in learning how to bake.”

“Because that's all a woman does all day? Standing in a kitchen baking?”

“Next to ingratiating, conspiring and deceiving, that is.”

Sam's eyes were glistening in the evening sun like grass set on fire by the heat. “I gave Mirtl a chance, and she took it. And she has not given me the slightest reason to doubt her loyalty.”

“And why should I?” Her voice broke, and it wasn't feigned, as far as Hans could tell. “Do you think I could just go back to Rosenberg? You've killed four of his men, another one got heavily injured, and two more had their identities revealed, all because I failed. I'm of no use to him any longer.” Her words that had come all low and smooth before, were now starting to falter, and she trembled as if from cold, wrapped her arms around her body to prevent it from showing. “The chance Samuel gave me was not a chance for redemption, it was a chance to live. He showed me mercy. Something no one has ever done before. And I will be damned if I ever betray the trust that he placed in me.”

Silence followed. A soft breeze whistled in the wood below the castle's roof, made the sparse trees outside the walls rustle, and further down below, the Sasau sang her monotonous, rushing song to it. It made sense, Hans thought, and if he was honest with himself, he could understand it well. Had he not been like that too once? An abandoned street cat, fighting to survive, so utterly alone that he would claw everything and everyone that dared to get close, but Henry had not bothered, Henry had shown patience, had stood up to his whims and had still stayed, and that was all Hans had needed to heal and grow.

“Are we done now?”Sam did not seem to approve at all of the turn this conversation had taken, and Hans could not blame him for it. “Is everyone satisfied enough that we can continue with our actual plan?”

“Oh, I for one would love to continue,” Štěpán burst out, and then he leaned in closer, lowering his voice to a conspirational whisper. “I still don't know why you're even here.”

“You remember that Žižka went to Poland,” Henry started, “to support the Polish King in his dispute with the Teutonic Order?”

“I do remember.”

“And you might also have heard that the Polish have gathered an army and are now moving to Prussia, together with a strong Lithuanian force, to coerce the Germans into a proper battle.”

“I heard rumours about that. It is said that they try to keep their exact proceedings secret, but at least that part seems to be true then.”

“It is,” Hans stated. “I have confirmation:”

“And so we have decided to help him in that matter,” Henry concluded. “Žižka, that is, and by extension, the Polish King.”

“Władysław Jagiełło,” Štěpán breathed out, and his eyes wandered off into the distance dreamily, as if somewhere on the far horizon, an image of the most beautiful woman in all the realm had appeared. “The converted heathen. Who managed to unionise one of the strongest forces this world has ever seen, the only thing that might be able to stop the Crusaders.” He blinked, looked back down to the others, his eyes now almost making up half the space of his whole face. “Will you meet with him?”

“With the King?” Henry shook his head. “Well, I don't think we can. But we might get a glimpse of him from afar.”

The boy sighed like a lover at the height of pleasure.

“And so might you.”

The pleasure faded. His mouth fell open in surprise, then he closed it again, and his previous smile turned upside down.

“We wanted to ask you if you'd like to come with us.”

Štěpán looked like he was in actual pain now. “I wish I could. But ever since Prague, Sir Ondřej barely lets me walk the castle on my own, let alone anything outside of it. When he sends me out to administer justice in his name, he sends half an army of guards with me.”

Hans nodded in sympathy. He could not recall ever having met Sir Ondřej of Dubá, but when he tried to think of him now, he could not help but imagine him with Hanush's features. “Maybe I could speak with him. Sir Ondřej certainly has to let you go, when another nobleman demands it.”

“Brilliant idea,” Henry laughed. “I would love to see that! You know, Štěpán, Hans has already demonstrated his mastery of the art of persuasion once today.”

Štěpán let his fingers encircle each other as he thought about it. “I don't believe it would be of much use anyway. Not when the person trying to persuade him belongs to the very group for whom I stayed away from Zlenice in the first place.”

“One of us could cause a distraction,” Henry offered, “while the others sneak out.”

Sam shook his head at him. “There were two guards at each gate. Your distraction would have to lure them all away at once. So unless you want to start a fire …”

“And if the distractor gets caught,” Mirtl added, “it might cost us precious days.”

“So not through the gate then,” Henry agreed.

Hans let his gaze wander around. Turned it towards a crow sitting on the tall, massive wall in front of him, looking out into the openness of the world. How often he had sat just like this, on the windowsill of his room at Pirkstein, longing for freedom when his uncle had ordered him to stay inside to not cause any more trouble. And how often he had fucked it all. Had gathered all his courage and jumped down to the window below and climbed all the way around to the stables. Hanush had been furious, of course, had screamed at him with spit spraying from his mouth, whether he had some deeply buried wish to follow his parents into their graves, but that had not stopped Hans from doing it again the next time. Nothing had ever happened. Of course not. “Fortuna audentis iuvat,” he mumbled.

Henry raised his brows. “Huh?”

He did not give them any explanation, just stepped forward, took parchment and ink from the desk and placed it on the ground, before he raised the desk itself up and brought it over to the wall. Then he got the stool too, placed it right in front of the desk, and used both to climb up. His hands did not reach far enough yet, but there were a few cracks in the wall that he could squeeze his fingers and toes into, and then he finally managed to grab the upper edge of the wall and pull himself up. The wall was far narrower than Hans had expected, and the abyss on the other side much deeper than he had hoped, and he staggered for the shortest moment, feeling dizzy just from looking down, before he forced himself to stay calm and clear-headed. The wall was slightly slanted, but not enough so they could slide down, especially not with the rocks on the bottom that would worsen the impact. But a few steps to the right, there were bushes on the ground, and even a young, thin birch tree, leaning against the wall. If they were to catch those branches quickly enough on their way down, it should suffice to stop the fall, and continue more cautiously from there on.

“You want to climb?” Henry asked, and there was surprise in his voice, and horror. Hans knew how afraid he was of heights ever since falling from that mountain near Rocktower Pond, even when Henry himself would never admit to it, especially not when his fear would stand in the way of their mission.

“I've done this often as a child.” Hans smiled and tried to sound as confident as he only could. “It's not nearly as hard as it looks.”

“Isn't it quite high?”

Hans looked down the other side again, as if he wanted to assess the situation for him. “Ah, it might even be low enough to jump, which we won't have to.”

“As my zeyde used to say,” Sam commented with a crooked smile, “you will always get down one way or another.”

“I …” Mirtl swallowed as she looked up to Hans. From his position on the wall, she looked just as small as Heinrich, and Hans noticed how even the last bit of his distrust went up in smoke at that thought. “I don't think I can make it. I doubt I can even get up there.”

Hans nodded, because she clearly had a point. Even if they managed to lift and drag her up, she would still have to jump down to that tree, and to make matters worse, she would have to do it in Sam's big, flapping clothes. “That might not be an issue. We can't all climb anyway, we still have to get our horses. I need my shield and my weapons.”

“I have left my sword with my horse as well,” Henry added.

“And my dagger!” Štěpán exclaimed. “The one Kubyenka gave me, it's with Šárka.”

Hans furrowed his brow, as his mind filled with stories about an old tale he had heard as a child. The Maidens' War. A pretty woman tied to a tree, the poor, unsuspecting men of Bohemia falling for her deception. Ridiculous to fall for something like that in the middle of a war. But then again, if it had been Henry tied to that tree, his teeth bared in desperation, the muscles on his arms twitching as he tried to fight against his restraints … Hans shook his head to get rid of the thoughts, that were clearly not helping for the matter at hand. “Who is Šárka?”

“My horse.”

“Ah.” He could not hide his disappointment.

“Then I will get it for you,” Mirtl offered.

Henry nodded. “I will go with you. We will take the horses that Hans and me have rode, and leave the others behind. Then the guards won't become wary. We'll get new horses in the next village, and until then, we'll share them. Ride like brothers Templar.”

“But,” Sam said with one brow raised, “there are five of us.”

“Well, Mirtl doesn't take up that much space.”

“Of course!” Mirtl threw her hands up into the air, but there was the hint of a smile on her lips. “First it's only my tits, now it's all of me.”

“But I would hate to have Hans and Štěpán go alone. If one of them does break an ankle or something, it might be useful to have a third man with them.”

Sam nodded. “Agreed.”

“Once we're down,” Hans said, “we will walk back around the hill to the path that leads up to the front gate. We will meet you by that scorched tree trunk that we passed.”

“The one that got cut in half by a lightning?” Hans confirmed it with a nod, and Henry took a deep breath. “Alright. Take care.”

It only took Sam two tries until he made it up to the wall as well, despite his ridiculously long shoes, and then Štěpán hurried to stuff parchment, inkwell and quill under the tightly cut red-and-blue coat he was wearing, before he climbed onto the desk, from where Sam and Hans could pull him up just fine. “Oh, kurva!” the boy pressed out once he had reached the top and looked down on the other side. Hans had to reach out a hand and hold him, as he began to sway, bending dangerously far over the edge.

“It could be worse.”

“Worse?” Štěpán's voice got way too loud, and Hans glanced back at the castle with its dozen windows, all shrouded in darkness and with a potential witness behind it. “This is like the descent into Hell!”

“Not really,” Sam smirked. “At least I am sure that your God will not count it as suicide when you die here.”

Slowly, carefully placing one foot in front of the other, Hans moved across the wall over to where the birch tree grew, paying close attention to every stone he stepped on, testing its stability before shifting his weight to it. Luckily, the wall seemed newer than he had expected, and thus much less withered than the stones that formed Pirkstein. Hans was still sweating when he finally reached the tree, and his heart pounded in his chest that it hurt. He lifted his face, looked out over the land. Green mountains, deep forests, disturbed only by the Sasau that cut through it all like a wound, the water hidden from his view by thick clouds of fog. In the distance, the sky started to darken. The first stars were visible above them. Once the fog had settled, it would be a clear night. Only yesterday, he had stood on the streets of Rattay, believing that his inability to act would have finally locked him in there forever, had taken Henry from him for good, separated by a distance that could not be bridged by any physical intimacy. Tonight, he would ride on a horse with him into a new adventure, looking up to the stars and the vivid colours on the night sky, feeling closer to him than ever before. What courage did it take to jump? He had jumped last evening when he had rushed into Henry's smithy, he had jumped months ago when he had agreed to meet up with Žižka for this new plan of his, he had jumped back then at Suchdol, years and years back, when he had opened his heart and soul and had pressed his lips onto Henry's in that fateful kiss.

“Take my hand,” he said to Sam, and crouched down until he could sit on the wall. “You have to lower me down a bit. Then I will jump over to the tree, and help you from there.”

The stone was warm from a full day of sunlight, and so rough that it cut through the skin of his palm and the fabric of his hose when he slid down. Sam was strong, and with the way Štěpán almost lay on top of him, offering him additional support, Hans could take his time to adjust both his free hand and his legs, pressing his feet into a spot on the wall that was uneven enough to not slip when he'd push himself off. The birch was small, yes, but not all that far away. He might have even been able to touch it by simply reaching out, but Hans did not dare to try. The evening breeze cooled the sweat on his skin. The crow that had claimed the wall its property before, circled above him across the sky, curious to witness his demise. It was not so different, Hans told himself, from climbing the Pirkstein walls. Not so different from Hedwig climbing her father's body like a tree.

“You got this, shvoger.”

Hans loosened his grasp on Sam's hand and jumped. For an unbearably long moment, he lost all contact to anything firm completely, flying, no, floating through the air, as if he had suddenly grown wings. Then his feet landed on a branch of the birch tree, his left hand grabbed the slim trunk, the birch swayed and groaned, but it held. Hans released the air he had kept in his lungs during the jump, and granted himself the time to send a quick prayer of gratitude to Heaven. “Ave maria, gratia plena …”

“Can you please leave the praying for when we are all on the ground?”

“Sure.” He composed himself, moved his body a bit so that he had more stability on the weak branches and could even wrap one foot around the tree, then he reached out both his hands. “Jump. I will catch you.”

Sam turned around, and lowered himself over the wall, with his hands clasped around its edge. For a while, his legs searched for a secure position on the slanted stone, kicking loose dust and tufts of grass. Then he seemed satisfied, and looked back over his shoulder to Hans, his brows pulled down so far they almost collided with his eyes, his lips pressed together. He jumped. Hans reached blindly for something and got hold of Sam's tunic and his left wrist, then he almost lost his balance when Sam's feet landed on the bent trunk of the tree. Below them, the birch complained loudly with a disgusting cracking sound.

“Come on!” Hans shouted, once Sam seemed like he had found enough purchase to stand on his own. His voice was way too loud, but he felt like that wouldn't matter now anyway. Soon enough, the whole of Zlenice would be looking for them, and below his feet, the tree made a small, trembling jump as it released yet another cracking cry of anger. “You've seen that it worked, you won't fall.”

Štěpán's legs were shaking just as much as the tree, his face had gone all white, he might have just melted down into the wall and become part of it instead, with only his black locks sticking out. “It will break!”

“It's a tree,” Hans shouted back, “don't do it so dirty, you dolt, it has way more stability than you think!”

“Are you mad?”

“Who knows!”

Then the boy jumped. Not from a lowered position like Hans and Sam had, but from right where he stood. “Fuck!” Hans breathed out. “Are you meshuge?” Sam exclaimed. Just as Štěpán flew past him, with his knees hitting Hans right in the chest, almost knocking him over, had Hans's hold on the tree not been as strong as it was. Another crack, then the ground shifted below them. Štěpán screamed. Sam cursed. Hans grabbed the first thing he could find that felt like another human being and held onto it for dear life.

The impact on the ground pressed all air out of his lungs, and for a short moment, both his eyesight and his hearing had vanished completely. The latter returned quickly, together with the shrill sound of a gruesomely played flute, and Hans could hear the boy cough somewhere close to his ear, while a few feet away, Sam still shouted out curses in that funny language of his. Heat, which had gathered down here on the cleared path around the castle, enveloped him like a cloak, and there was the weight of someone else's body pressing down on his. He could not feel any pain yet in any of his limbs, though that might come later. But they were alive. Jesus Christ be praised, they were all alive!

Hans pushed the boy off himself, blinking a few times as his vision slowly returned, then he heaved his body up. Štěpán needed a little longer to recover, and he was bleeding from a cut on his arm, but it seemed like Hans had broken most of the fall for him. Sam was lying to his right. Fighting with the birch tree.

Hans went over to him and helped him free his arms and legs from where they had entangled with the branches on their way down, then he offered Sam a hand and pulled him up to his feet. “Are you alright?”

“I'm better than I should be. We are all better than we should be.” He plucked a few leaves from his hair and glinted at Štěpán, who had finally managed to get up to his knees. “What were you thinking?”

“I …” the boy stammered, “I don't think I was thinking.”

“We need to find the others,” Hans interrupted before Sam could let out all his anger and maul the boy to bits like a wolf. “Our escape made quite the noise, I reckon.”

They limped at first, but quickly found their strength again, so that they could make their away around the Zlenice castle in a stumbling run. It did not take long until they had reached the scorched, hollowed trunk, and not so much longer until they heard the shouting up in the castle. Then two horses galloped down the path, one quick as an arrow, the other one trotting behind on crooked, trembling legs, blowing heavily through his nostrils, just from this slow pace alone. At least it fit Mirtl's size for once. “I could not find your dagger in time,” she said as she reached them, “so I just took the whole horse.”

“Run!” Henry shouted from further down the path, already having bolted past them. “Come on, run!”

They only stopped when the road they had followed through the forest slowly turned too dark for them to properly see. Only then did they stop to gather themselves, and contemplate what hat happened and how to proceed. Mirtl's and Henry's conversation with the guards had been successful at first, but then the questions of what business they had with the young Lord of Tetín had become more probing, and they had slowly got entangled in their own web of lies and excuses. It might have worked, still, until a loud sound had ripped the tight, heated air apart, as loud as if a hole had been torn into the castle itself, and then the guards had fully lost their composure and had demanded Mirtl and Henry to come with them at once. They hadn't wasted another moment.

Since Henry had already taken his father's sword, he had went for Hans's horse instead, to secure his sword and bow and the magnificent shield of Sir Ignatius of the Cornflower. Mirtl had only grabbed that abomination that dared to call itself Šárka, and had followed him suit. So at least they had their weapons. As well as one horse that was actually useful and another that would at least carry one of them at a time, or Hans hoped so. They had lost multiple bags with clothes, drinks, food, and the remaining pastries that Mirtl had made, though that might have been the only achievement of this whole disaster. And the road they had taken in their hurry was not even leading further northwards, but to the west. To Prague.

“Maybe that's a sign,” Henry said with a shrug and a smile, that Hans couldn't see in this darkness, but hear loud and clear. “God's mission for us to bring every member of the pack back together.”

* * *

Godwin was standing in front of a class in a small auditorium of the Karolinum, when the group of five dirty, battered, half-famished vagabonds stumbled into his lecture. He paused in the middle of his sentence, eyes opened in surprise, the hand that he had raised to gesture around with for his explanations, frozen in the middle of the air as if he was waiting for God's holy finger to touch it. In front of him, one student after the other turned around to the door with bewilderment on their faces. A young man with a head as broad as it was high, wrinkled his nose in disgust. “The university is not open for beggars,” he said, while another student with a balding forehead added “And not for no woman neither,” proving with this clever use of a tripled negation that he for one had clearly earned his spot in the Karolinum. Or perhaps he was just Moravian.

As soon as Godwin recovered his wits, he ended the lesson and dismissed his class without any room for further discussions. All questions could be posed to Master Hus in his lecture on a similar topic this coming Wednesday. He did not even refer them to his own next lesson. As if he knew.

Once the door had closed behind the very last student, he looked them up and down again, then shook his head with a disbelieving laugh. “You look like shit.”

They told him about their eventful escape from Zlenice castle, and about their long walk to Prague, how they had taken turns at who was allowed to ride the horses and doze off for a while. They talked about their plan to go north, to Czerwińsk near the Vistula, where the joined army of the Polish king and the Lithuanian duke had last been seen. Mirtl explained once more that she would follow them as an ally, as she had no interest in going back to Rosenberg and putting her life to any more risk than she already had, and this time neither Henry nor Hans objected. Štěpán argued that while he clearly disobeyed Sir Ondřej of Dubá's orders, there was no law to prohibit him from leaving on his own accord, as he was already seventeen years of age, only Dubá's ward, not his bondsman, and had, with his work in the law of the region, already proven his maturity and autonomy, and since none of them knew any better, they also did not utter any objections to that. Then Hans spoke of Sir Ignatius of the Cornflower, and how he had trusted the rule over Rattay into Jitka's hands as long as he was gone, and Henry added that for him, as a nameless bastard, none of that mattered anyway.

Godwin listened. At first, he listened while only standing there, in the middle of the auditorium, like a lonely believer at a sermon. Then he listened while he packed some books and writings, stowing them in a chest that was placed at the opposite side of the room. Finally, he sat down in his dark, long teacher's robe, and listened while looking up at them from his chair out of his warm and kind, but silent eyes. At last, when they had finished with all their stories, their experiences, motivations and reasoning, and a little while after that, when the air between them had already been filled with nothing but the sounds of Prague's awaking streets in the early morning hours, Godwin took off the flat, black teacher's cap, and stroked his bald head as if he wanted to comb back hair. “Why are you telling me all this?”

“Because we need you, Godwin,” Henry replied. “Someone has to anoint us before the battle, right?”

“Or after the battle,” Hans added. “With some good wine, and stories and laughs.”

Godwin ordered them to wash themselves and wait in the room they had all shared during their time in Prague. They might get some sleep there if they wished, and he would leave them some food too, before he went to lead a few necessary conversations.

It was a strange and yet familiar feeling, to be back here again. The same furniture, the same smell of old wood and books and dusty fabric. But so empty without everyone's clothing and weapons lying around, so lifeless without the emptied mugs spread everywhere, the dice on the table, the bedrolls on the ground. Henry went to lie down in the one remaining bed, and immediately fell into a deep slumber like a hibernating bear. Štěpán sat down with crossed legs in the one corner of the room that was illuminated by the morning sun, took out parchment and quill from his coat and a bottle of wine that Godwin had brought them, and started writing something by using the wine as ink. The inkwell he had pocketed at Zlenice had not survived the fall. There was a large, dark spot right above his stomach from where it had burst, but at least the splinters had not caused any injuries.

Sam and Mirtl sat down at the table. Every now and then they exchanged a few words, but both seemed too exhausted for a proper talk, and so Sam spent most of the time tracing the cuts that his own knife had left on the wood a long time ago, while Mirtl had opened her braids and twirled strands of dark curls around her fingers, round and round, and back in the other direction again. Hans was exhausted as well, but his legs were also feeling numb from the long walk, his heart was still racing too fast with excitement, his thoughts would not quiet down, and so he just stood by the window, watched the streets of Prague slowly filling up with life, and then turned back to the others, to observe with a fond smile how Štěpán wrote on the parchment he had spread on his knees, to listen to the sounds of Sam's finger on the table top and Mirtl's finger in her hair, to keep guard over Henry whose mind had long taken him to far away places.

An hour or so must have passed, when the door finally opened and Godwin stepped into the room. Both cap and robe were gone. He had exchanged it for a comfortable looking shirt and a simple pair of hoses fit for a long ride.

Since it was Monday, their first steps led them to the Horse Market, where they sold Henry's horse for a good price and got six fresh ones. A useful investment. Battles had the tendency to be quite profitable for the men fighting in them, at least as long as they were victorious, and if they weren't, well, then Hans wouldn't care too much about the money he spent now anyway. Šárka of course was left in the garden of the Karolinum, much to Stork's dismay, as the professor for medicine was the one Godwin charged with taking care of her. Štěpán almost cried when he bid that ugly, old horse farewell, but, as Sam rightfully stated, it was for the better. If they had brought her to the market too and asked someone there to take her, the buyer might have even demanded compensation for this generosity.

It was already noon when they finally rode out the Prague city gates, but they were in good spirits. The sun was shining, and it was kinder today, allowing the horses to tire much slower too. They still had to halt, eat and rest more often than they would have liked, with the exhaustion now pulling on every fibre of their bodies. As the sun set, they had not quite made it to Jičín yet, where they had hoped to spend the night, and instead had to share a single room in some wayside tavern, as all the other beds were already taken, and only continued on their way early in the morning. At least the food here was good. It brightened everyone's mood even more, so when they left the tavern and rode out the next day, it almost felt as if they were flying with how fast they went now.

The next night was spent in the town Trautenau, where they bought new horses once more, and finally found a place to stay that offered comfortable beds in three individual rooms. The one Hans shared with Henry lay just in the middle of those of the others, and while Sam and Mirtl fell silent almost as soon as they had went to bed, Godwin's and Štěpán's conversations continued until the early morning hours. Hans fell asleep to the muffled sound of their talking and to Henry's peaceful breathing, nestled up to his warm body, as Henry had both arms and legs wrapped tightly around him. An intimacy they hadn't allowed themselves in months that felt like years. An intimacy Hans had craved so much more than he had ever believed, and he only realised it now that his heart finally opened in a sigh of deepest relief.

The road from Trautenau to Schweidnitz led them through a wide, unpopulated region full of rugged cliffs, lakes as clear as glass and mist-covered mountains, in which giants where said to have lived once, and looking across the endless waves of forests and fields, Hans wanted to believe it. Ad midday, they lay down on mossy fields surrounded by fern and blueberries, pine trees and white starflowers, watching the clouds move so closely above them, listening to Štěpán's rumours about this land, because apparently rumours were just his thing, and Hans thought that he could get used to this life. Leave Rattay and all its hardships behind. Take on the name of Sir Ignatius for good. Travel the world with Henry by his side. Abandon Jitka. Abandon the children. His smile died down, a heavy weight pressed onto his chest as he thought of home. Then a hand found his as Henry turned around to him, their fingers entangled, and Hans looked over to him, saw the sadness that had settled in Henry's eyes too. Perhaps Hans was not the only one whose heart would always be trapped between two worlds.

The next day brought them more strength and courage than ever before, so they passed by Breslau in the afternoon and only rested in Oels when the night was already falling above the land. The language caused them more trouble now, but with their joined understanding of at least some Polish, Latin, German and, surprisingly, even a few scraps of Prussian on Mirtl's part, they managed to stock up their provisions and even learned some news about the army that crawled through the north like a very slow, but horribly noisy colony of ants. Beasts of men, an old woman told them, heathens, every single one, speaking in Godforsaken tongues. They had long left the Vistula river behind them, a young merchant told them, had advanced west instead. To Schwetz, he knew that because the people he traded with spoke of nothing but ongoing fighting between the Polish and the Germans in that area. A beggar with missing front teeth who stood close by only shook his head over the merchant's claims. “Buffoon,” he said. “Schwetz is only a distraction. The real battle will take place at the Drewenz river, mark my words.”

They did not mark his words, but they kept them well in mind, and changed the direction of their route, moving north instead. And a few days later, when they had finally reached the Vistula river, crossing it on the east of Dobrzyń Land, to avoid any possible conflict there, they quickly realised that the toothless beggar must have spoken the truth. The army had indeed long moved further north. They could tell because of the swathe of destruction they had left behind.

At first, all they noticed was the wide area of grass that had been trampled down to nothing but barren, dry earth. Trees had been felled here and there along the way, the remaining carcasses of trunks and branches left to lie and rot. But with every mile they followed along the road, they found more remains of the army's presence. Crops at the side of the path burned down, houses with their fences demolished, doors standing wide open, the rooms inside ravaged and plundered. Some villages reeked of smouldering wood, others of blood and death.

“Are we too late?” Štěpán asked. “Has the war already been fought?”

“No,” Henry answered, and Hans knew that he thought about Skalitz and Kuttenberg and Neuhof and the village of Suchdol and every other place that had ever got in the way, “this destruction was only caused by one side alone.”

It was early morning when the road they had followed through a wooded area for a while now, suddenly ended in a fork. Neither of the paths looked more inviting than the other one. Or more vandalised, for that matter.

“I would assume they took the right one,” Hans pondered.

“Why should they?” Sam asked. “If they wanted to cross the river, the right path would only be a diversion.”

Hans let his gaze wander from one side to the other, taking in the sight of the light falling through the treetops, the white and yellow flower beds covering the ground, the small brook playing its peacefully flowing instrument to the birds' song above them, and shrugged his shoulders. “But the right path looks nicer.”

“Nicer.” Sam huffed in a taunt. “Because this army will of course follow the more beautiful road. So they can stop every now and then to pick some flowers along the way.”

“Well, Hans is not wrong.” Henry made his horse move forward, until it stood just in between his brother and Hans. “The right path is nicer because it's broader. That could be of use to an army of many thousand men.”

“Well, we cannot split up,” Godwin said. “With our luck we might never find each other again. So let us make a decision. If we don't come by any traces of them in a few more miles, we can always ride back.”

“Psst!” It was Štěpán who had suddenly raised his hand, causing the others to hush and listen.

At first, Hans noticed nothing but the water of the brook and the birds in the trees. Then it became clearer. Bellowing shouting and high-pitched screams. Cries for help.

“Forward!” Henry ordered, already urging his own horse to rush ahead.

Hans followed him without a second thought. Down the left path, further into the dense forest, until a clearing became visible between the towering trees in front of them, and the screams had grown into screeches of begging and pain. An orange light in the distance. The morning sun? No, the path had not bent at any point, they were still facing north-west. It took the smell of charred wood, and finally, as their horses dashed out onto the open field, the sight of houses set aflame, for Hans to fully realise what it was that they witnessed.

The village was burning. Roofs, fields and even the tower of a small church, all buried underneath blazing tongues of flames and thick, dark clouds of smoke that made breathing almost impossible. The road ahead was covered in bodies. Some lay silent and motionless in growing puddles of blood, reflecting the fire, others were still alive, still twitching, still screaming. A man spit out gurgling blood, lying bent over on his back over a fence like a skewered beetle. Another one had sunken down to his knees, with both hands pressed to his stomach that was neatly cut open, as he tried in vain to keep his intestines from falling out. In front of the church stood a group of soldiers. A dozen of them, maybe more. They had mantles on the backs of their armour, red ones, one showed the white crowned eagle of Kraków.

A woman screamed. One of the soldiers stepped back, dragging her along by her hair. As he pushed her to the ground, two other women became visible behind them, surrounded by the Polish men, who grabbed them and tore at their dresses as if they were nothing but wares on a market stand.

Henry drew his sword, before Hans could even raise his hand to stop him. “Wait! Henry, wait! Those are Polish soldiers!”

“They are on our side?” Štěpán asked in horror.

“Of course,” Sam replied drily. “We always end up siding with the fuckers.”

“The idea,” Mirtl pressed out as cold as a winter storm, “that there is a side without fuckers in a war is an illusion.”

“What do I care?” Henry pressed out, and then he had already raised his sword and spurred his horse. “Hey! You bastards!”

Next to Hans, Godwin made the sign of the cross. “Pater noster, qui es in caelis …”

Ah, fuck it all, Hans thought as he ran his horse forward. Let's dig up the madness, test fortune one more time. And become traitors right on our first day in this war.

There was no time for treason. Hans had barely managed to draw his own sword, when the sound of a horn roared somewhere to their right. The soldiers, who had only just let go off the women as they saw the group of riders coming at them, turned once more to face the open, smouldering field. The dark smoke obscured their vision, and long before Hans could see the source of the horn, he could hear it. Hooves hammering on hardened earth, twenty horses at least from the sound of it. Armour clattering. Heavy armour of steel, rumbling and shrieking as if the earth had torn open, releasing all the Hell's hordes of demons onto this world. Hans grabbed the handle of his sword tighter and prepared for the worst.

Finally, the wall of smoke ripped open and it spat out the devil himself. He sat atop a magnificent black stallion, a cloak rose up behind him that bore the colour of blood spilled on snow. Two other spirits rode close by his side, one with a metal pipe tucked under his armpit, spying out the smoke of hell, the other dressed in a green kaftan.

The devil looked down at Henry and Hans, and at the others, and his eye opened wide. The right one, since the other was pale and dead. "Halt!" yelled commander Jan Žižka of Trotznow.

Next to him, the spirit with the pipe of hell released blood-curdling screams of laughter. "Well, would you look at that! I don't know why I'm even surprised. Wherever it stinks the most, you fellas swarm in like flies to a turd, eh?"

#kingdom come deliverance #kcd #kcd2 spoilers #kcd fanfiction #my writing #KCDsedproditionem #Non Nobis Solum Nati Sumus -- we're not born for ourselves alone. the title says it all.#hans deserved his little (50 pages long) chapter only for him after having been left out of ch 4 completey #and i deserved my little cameo. both in the form of my grandpa's birth town trautenau / trutnov and in the character rudolf #my grandpa's first and my second name. hi it's me your local town crier! but i guess that's just the same as being a writer in a way ...#anyway i know i know i said i'd upload in the morning and now it's laate at night but hey it's not midnight yet! got it done on my birthday #as i wanted. phew. biggest birthday present for me.#now i can finally rest peacefully....#(proofread some of this while being veeery sleep-deprived and inbetween celebrations. hope that won't be too noticeable welll)#much love and have fun! i'ma sign off to bed now ......

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