Chapter 2: One Man Army

All horses were brought to a halt when Henry raised his arm.

“We are still at least a mile from the camp,” Heinrich of Rosenberg remarked.

“Indeed,” Henry answered. “But the lot of you and your shiny armour make a ruckus like a waggon load of tin plates. If we go any nearer, they’ll hear us coming. And if I may offer some advice your grace, if you want to sneak up to a bandit camp, sitting on a bright white horse on a sunny day isn’t going to work awfully well.”

Hans was glad he was wearing his full face helmet, lest someone saw him grin at Henry’s dry delivery. Boy, that man seriously had no time for nobility. Henry got off his horse and Hans watched him take his massive sinew bow from where it was fastened to the horse’s saddle. The garrison Henry had built in Pribyslavitz was the only one in the province that could produce this monster. Henry had once offered him to try and shoot with it on the Rattay shooting range and he had nearly torn a muscle in his arm.

“How will we know that you are finished?” Rosenberg asked.

“When my horse trots off, follow it,” Henry said. “If it hasn’t done so an hour from now, go back and presume me dead.”

With that, Henry literally disappeared into the woods. He had barely gone into the bushes and he had become invisible.

“You are not going to join him?” Rosenberg asked Hans.

“No need to,” he answered. “He has taken out dozens of bandit and Cuman camps all on his own. We’d be more of a hindrance than a help.”

Nightingale exhaled a breath he didn’t know he had been holding when a faint whistle had rattled them out of the boredom of waiting. Henry’s horse trundled off in a lazy trot and they all followed it, as instructed.

Once Podagros, Henry’s trusty steed, had stopped, they all got off their horses and slowly advanced into the woods, their weapons unsheathed for good measure. He gasped when they reached the site of the camp. Whatever had happened, it must have been a vicious fight.

No less than eight Cumans were lying dead on the ground and Henry was sitting on a tree stump with his left leg bandaged. He had definitely not gone unscratched in the encounter. Five of the Cumans had arrows stuck in their heads, so the actual battle had been a three vs one brawl.

“God almighty,” Rosenberg said, and made the cross motion over his chest. “Remind me never to get on the wrong side of you, young man.”

“You wanted a demonstration, you got one, your grace,” Henry said, and Nightingale could tell that he sounded tired. A vicious fight in the mid day sun wasn’t everyone’s idea of a relaxing afternoon.

“Indeed, young Henry. I think we have much to discuss,” Heinrich of Rosenberg agreed. “But I would suggest you get some rest first. We will commence our consultations tomorrow.”

And he had indeed been exhausted, Hans thought as he made his way to Henry’s guest chamber the next morning. He had basically slept twelve hours, a sign that the fight had been a lot more viscous than the aftermath had made it look.

When he entered, he saw Henry rub some potion onto his injured leg. The small wound was the unmistakable sign that he had taken an arrow to the thigh.

“One of your blacksmith’s potions?” he asked and pointed at the clay vial in Henry’s hand.

“Marigold potion,” Henry answered with a nod. “It’s good for cleaning wounds and cooling burns. It’s the very first one you learn about as an apprentice.”

“So, what happened in the fight? You don’t usually look that exhausted after killing a bunch of bandits.”

“Cumans in our neck of the woods usually get a regular visit from me or one of the garrisons,” Henry explained. “They don’t have much time and opportunity to rearm themselves, so they’re often wearing ragged armour and weak weapons. These guys yesterday were armed to their yellow teeth. They had done their fair share of raids, because nobody had bothered them for a long time.”

Hans helped Henry don his armour after he was done cleaning and bandaging his wounded leg.

“You really scare me, man,” he admitted. “You are the best fighter we have, an apothecary, you can bandage your own wounds...”

“Don’t take it personal, Hans, but I wasn’t pampered all my life. I didn’t learn all that to impress the wenches, I did because I had to, just to survive.”

Hans snorted with amusement. “As if you would need to impress any wenches. Your lovely mill wench is the big prize man, hold on to her. Hell, even your father is completely smitten with her.”

“Her name is Theresa,” Henry admonished him good-naturedly. “And Radzig better accept her, because Lord, half-Lord or whatnot, she’s the one I’ll spend the rest of my life with. And if that doesn’t fit his views, he can do one.”

“You’re never going to call him father, are you?”

Henry shook his head. “When we talk to each other, I do, but mostly because calling him ‘your grace’ would be even more ridiculous. He knew he forfeited his fatherhood when he tasked Martin with raising me. He accepts that in my heart Martin is my father, not he.”

“Must be awkward,” Hans guessed as he helped Henry close the straps on his pauldrons.

“We’ll get over it,” Henry said, and chuckled, presenting himself and his armour to Hans’ scrutiny.

“Where did you nick that?” Hans asked. “I’ve never seen that armour in my life.”

“I literally found it. I got my hands on 5 treasure maps. It was why I learned to read in the first place. Treasure maps aren’t worth a lot if you can’t read them. It’s called a ‘warhorse armour’. There is better kit for an actual fight, but it comes in handy for representative purposes.”

“Well, you certainly look the part,” Hans admitted with an appreciative nod. “So these stories about treasures around the land are a little more than old wives tales I suspect.”

“Treasure is perhaps a bit too romantic,” Henry said with a chuckle. “Mostly it’s stuff buried by bandits or minor nobility who fled from conflict. But yes, I found quite a few of those stashes. Thirty or so in total. And I’m sure there’s a few I’ve missed, because the maps no longer exist.”

“I guess, there’s no point in anyone of us looking for buried riches,” Hans replied with a pat on Henries back. “You’ve cleaned up already. Let’s go, Rosenberg is waiting.”

“It was an impressive demonstration, young Henry, I have to admit that,” Heinrich of Rosenberg opened the talks. “But unless we keep you here, I’m not sure this was enough to convince me that turning against King Sigismund would not lead to retaliation.”

“Your allegiance to Sigismund will lead to nothing,” Henry answered. “Right now he’s back in Hungary where he has to deal with revolts from nobles in his own realm, and the Cumans he left behind are essentially bandits now. He doesn’t pay them, so they plunder and pillage to make up for it.

The Cumans I fought yesterday were unusually well armed, which means they’ve already helped themselves to the contents of an armoury somewhere. Don’t hold your breath waiting on Sigismund to tell them to stop. He won’t.”

“What would your suggestion be?” von Rosenberg probed further. “How would siding with the Bohemian Lords change our position?”

“As a start, it would stop us from eyeing each other with suspicion,” Hans chipped in and Henry nodded towards him to offer his opinion. “As it is we have been divided and skirmishes between Moravia and Bohemia have only helped one side – Sigismund’s. It is this very division that he has stoked further to keep both sides under his control.

Look at the forged Groschen, your grace. It is the best example. Both you and Sir Radzig sent someone to investigate, but instead of working together, they ended up fighting each other. The winner was Sigismund, because his gang could work for several more days until Henry took them down on his own.”

Henry watched von Rosenberg, who had stood up and looked out of the window. It seemed some of what Hans had said, had gotten through to him.

“Would it have made a difference, if Ulrich had not attacked you? What happened?” he was asked by a grizzled watchman, which he took to be Rosenberg’s equivalent of Captain Bernard or Captain Robard.

“Most certainly, sir,” Henry acknowledged. “I had followed the trail of the forged money to a woodcutters camp, where I managed to interrogate the only survivor of an attack on the waggon that collected the fake coins. During that interrogation your knight showed up, beat up one of the charcoal burners and fled when I confronted him.

From an earlier interrogation of a bandit, who had a letter with him, I knew that some knight had shown up in the area and was staying in an inn in Sasau. He wasn’t hard to track down. So, by that time he had already killed all but one of the merchant crew and beaten up a civilian. I hope you’ll understand, your grace, that at that point any safe conduct documents weren’t worth the paper they were written on any more.”