Chapter 13

Our first group of homing pigeons was finally ready to test. We’d raised hundreds in each capital and cities along the routes to other capitals and then transferred groups to different cities. They’d make their way home to where they were born and raised when released, taking our messages with them. The initial messages asked what time of day the pigeons arrived at each relay station (early morning, mid-morning, noon, etc.), and then each capital.

Clovis’s first message, talking about the rifles, was, “An absolutely terrifying and remarkable new weapon.”

There were relay stations every hundred miles or so where we switched the message to another bird to continue the journey. One bird could make the entire trip, but it would take days.

Since one of those relay stations was in Toulouse, Ragnachildis sent a second message asking about the new weapon. My reply was an invitation to come here with a hundred troops, several blacksmiths, a couple of brass smiths, and two wood carvers. We would train them how to make and use the new weapon. She replied that she’d arrive in about four weeks.

That gave me two weeks to finish my next project, test it, and again become semi-proficient with it.

Fortunately, I hadn’t ignored the special pieces of wood I had prepared earlier. They had been cut, shaped, cured, treated with several different minerals, dried, and varnished. Now it was time to assemble them. I was almost as excited about this as I’d been about completing the rifle. Theoretically, it should work. I’d done this before and liked the results.

I’d created a frame to hold everything in place while the glue dried, so I applied the last of the screw clamps, and sighed, hoping my efforts would pay off. I’d seriously missed this particular item since getting here. My parents knew how much I used it, I’d made it myself, and I couldn’t understand why it hadn’t arrived with me.

I let it dry for a week, even knowing it would be dry sooner. Then it was time for the final touch.

While it was drying, I’d finished making the strings for my new guitar, all twelve of them. I can’t advertise that no animals were hurt in the process, but we’d butchered and eaten the sheep months ago. The sheep intestines had to be cleaned, scraped, and processed well in advance. I used the catgut (don’t ask me why sheep intestines used for musical instruments are called catgut) by itself for the treble strings, and wound silk thread around it for the bass strings. Like the first time I did this, it took considerable trial and effort to find the right thickness for the strings. Then I needed to get the right combination of strings and had to pray that I could still tune each string by ear. I got frustrated enough that I almost wished that I’d gone with a normal, six-string guitar instead of a twelve. I knew, however, that I would never be satisfied with a six-string after experiencing the rich sound of the twelve, even if it had been harder to learn to play it.

Finally, twenty days after I began gluing the parts together, I was ready. I got up from the dinner table and went out through the dining room door to accept the guitar from the servant who had sneaked it in from my workshop while we ate. He grinned, having heard me practicing. It would be a surprise for everyone else, though.

As curious as they were, my wives had long ago given up trying to see and understand each different project I was working on. They understood that each project helped us. Some helped our craftsmen make new and wonderful items that made life safer, easier, or more enjoyable. Some made our troops more formidable and kept them and us safer. The ships made trade faster, safer, and more profitable.

Just beyond the doorway and out of sight of my wives, I started strumming the guitar, playing a well-known romantic song from my original time. Unfortunately, the English words didn’t translate well into Frankish, and I’d had to rewrite the song a bit. Still, I sang a couple lines of “Love Me Tender” directly to each of my wives, even knowing that it would be a very long night before they allowed me to sleep! I don’t mean to imply that I could sing professionally in either this life or my previous life. I knew that I had a limited vocal range. Still, my singing didn’t set the dogs to howling, and serenading the women in my life with a new (to them) instrument and love song made me a singing superstar in their eyes.

By the time Ragnachildis arrived, I had four love songs in my repertoire. After that, I started rewriting lyrics to rock songs I liked, and performed my “concerts” for a larger audience. I knew I was a hit when Clovis homing-pigeoned me: “A minstrel, too?” Evidently, someone passing through liked one of the songs enough to start singing it, accompanied by his lyre, and sang it for Clovis while he was in Paris. At least he gave me credit for (re)writing the song.

-----.-----

Nearly six years of peace had allowed us to consolidate our territorial gains. More than a hundred new mines in the former Eastern Roman Empire’s territory are producing, new vineyards and orchards are in full production, and cotton production has finally surpassed our growing demand.

Silk production has become very profitable, and we have more demand for silk cocoons than we have cocoons; a shortage we should rectify with the next growth cycle for the silkworms. We have almost two hundred silkworm warehouses scattered between Valencia and the other Iberian cities where we have large interests. Half of those warehouses are new and ready for silkworms. All we have to do is provide the silkworms. An adequate number of trees are mature enough in each city to support the burgeoning silkworm population. Most of the cities already have at least one silkworm warehouse and will allow as many cocoons as necessary to hatch this next cycle and let the caterpillars mature so the moths lay eggs to produce the caterpillars we need to fill the new, empty trays in the new, empty warehouses.

Valencia will send some to the cities that didn’t already have a functioning silkworm warehouse. Jayanti has trained thousands of people in every aspect of caring for the silkworms. It was a proud moment when she proclaimed that our facilities and production were even better than those in her home country. She has been well rewarded for her efforts and now owns a very large plantation of her own with six silkworm warehouses and a hill covered with mulberry trees. With what I gave her for her efforts and what she makes each year selling her silk, she brought more than forty relatives to Valencia from India. They live on her estate and help with the silk production.

With the profit I make on everything, I keep forty thousand men under arms and have another sixty thousand trained reserves that I can call up.

After seeing how the Angles and Saxons quickly began to prosper, the rest of what was Great Britain in my original time joined the Frankish Empire. The Geats, Swedes, and Norse noticed a similar prosperity among the Jutes, Danes, and Angles in the north. Seeing the defeated Saxons eagerly leading a movement to try to convince other tribes to join the Frankish Empire, one they had originally attacked, finally convinced them. The other countries were especially surprised that there had been no retaliation against, nor heavy-handed subjugation of, the Saxons. If anything, the Saxons were far more prosperous now, with stories of dozens of rich mines being opened by the Franks, and sawmills that could cut twenty or more trees into boards each day instead of a full day to cut up one tree by hand.

Other tribes east of Saxony joined, too. It was like a slow-motion string of dominoes toppling. From the day the Polabian Slavs joined, it was three years and a couple of weeks until most of the eastern Slavic tribes joined. Even the Estonians, who were a Finnish tribe, not a Slavic tribe, joined the Frankish Empire, extending the Frankish border eastward and northward.

When the borders of the Empire reached the border with the Alans who settled on the Pannonia Plain after running from the Huns, the Alans saw a hope of enough strength to protect them from another possible attack by the three tribes of Huns who had them nearly surrounded. Once the Alans joined, the Sklaveni were encouraged and joined, leaving one group of Huns surrounded by the Frankish Empire. Those Huns had previously offered their services to the Eastern Roman Empire after the bulk of the Hun armies returned to their homeland on the Scythian Plains. The Eastern Roman Empire had granted them farmland in Thrace. They were still proud of their heritage, but also wanted peace, and asked to join the Frankish Empire after other former-monarchs-now-turned-governors convinced them.

By then, the Frankish Empire stretched to the Daugava River (between modern Latvia and Lithuania) in Northeastern Europe and to the Dniester River (along the western border of modern Ukraine) in Southeast Europe. Trade had a lot to do with the ease with which so many tribes and nations joined us. The Huns and the Alans had traded with our ships and merchants since our first foray into the Black Sea, the trip that had pissed off the Eastern Roman Emperor in Constantinople. Having seen our ships, they had little trouble believing the fantastic stories about other technologies and weapons we possessed. It was easy for them to believe that the Romans were the aggressors when we attacked Constantinople, since they’d traded with us without incident that first time and had continued to do so ever since.

After six years of peace, a homing pigeon showed up. Some years ago, wealthy Sassanid families and merchants had moved from their homelands into the Eastern Roman Empire when Sassanid King Kavadh insisted that they divide their wealth and wives with the poor. Those Sassanids were even happier under Frankish rule than Eastern Roman Empire rule as they conducted their lives and business without constant government interference. Besides, we offered fantastic new ideas and opportunities. The merchants stayed in the Frankish Empire, even when King Kavadh was replaced.

I knew it had been too good to be true.

For three months, we had been receiving reports that King Kavadh had been reinstated on the Sassanid throne with the aid of a large army of Hephthalite soldiers. This latest message warned that King Kavadh was raising troops of his own, and more troops from his ally, the Hephthalite Empire, were due soon. They were planning to attack and take away as much of our land as they could. The message originated in Damascus, and leapfrogged its way to Rome, and then to Massalia. From there, pigeons carried it to Paris, Valencia, and Toulouse. Paris would continue the relay, sending word out to the sub-capitals, calling on them to send the troops Clovis had warned them two months ago to prepare.

By now there were numerous Clovis Class ships besides mine plying the waters of the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, the Atlantic, and the Mediterranean. We kept a fleet of fifteen Capital Class ships, five Clovis Class ships, and a growing number of Duchess Class ships in the Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea, and Western Pacific Ocean. The Clovis Class ships usually picked up cargo from or delivered cargo to our Capital Class ships that then plied inland waterways from the Cape of Good Hope to China, or to the Duchess Class ships that visited smaller ocean ports. Clovis tasked each Governor with getting their own troops to their assigned section of the border with the Sassanid Empire.

My troops sailed three days later. Eight thousand riflemen and two hundred mortar crews each went to Cairo, Jerusalem, Damascus, Palmyra, and Edessa. Each garrison had enough ammunition and mortar shells to devastate an enemy five hundred thousand strong. Half of the troops sent to each location were our regular troops and half were auxiliary troops called up for duty. Forty thousand more troops sailed for Madagascar once enough of our Capital Class ships returned to Valencia.

Right before we left, my wives cornered me. “Your time is too valuable to spend fighting wars your troops can easily fight without you. Nobody in the Frankish Empire doubts that you could walk into Ctesiphon and subdue the city by yourself, but that’s why you have soldiers and officers. Do you go to every farm, vineyard, and orchard to oversee the planting and harvesting of each crop? Do you supervise every mine, sawmill, shipyard, or smithy to make sure they are producing their goods properly? Your troops are the best trained in the world, and outside of the rest of the Frankish Empire, are by far the best armed. Any of your wives could lead them successfully into battle. Again!” Audoflede added emphatically as a reminder that they’d done just that already in the defense of Valencia. “Your officers are eminently more qualified to lead your troops than your wives, so why not let them?” she queried.

So, I broke the news to Captain Drogo, putting him in overall command of our troops. I reminded him that the Huns had composite bows, too, although not quite as good as ours were. Still, I suggested starting with the rifles. Just one thousand troops could rapidly give a shitload of enemy troops a serious case of lead poisoning!

-----.-----

Our ships had been sailing around the horn of Africa for five years now. On the first trip, we negotiated with the natives in Madagascar to purchase the island from them. We let them continue living where they were and they still had access to the resources of the island: mainly water, wood, game, and fish.

On the next trip, we founded Port Joelle in the northernmost part of Antongila Bay. We included a facility to repair ships, but none to build them, due to the frequency of typhoons in the area. The wall built around Port Joelle was designed to keep Mother Nature at bay, as well as two-legged enemies. Floodwaters from inland and storm driven ocean waves pounded ineffectively against the fifty-foot high and twenty-five-foot-thick walls. Storm drains channeled the rainwater from inside the walls into large underground cisterns that were emptied with brass pumps. Normally, this was accomplished via windmill power. During typhoons, however, the windmills were lowered and tied down as securely as possible. Then they employed manual power to pump the water.

The port and our plantations and mines on the island are largely populated by slaves we purchased in Mogadishu and other African ports. The island now has massive groves of clove trees, cinnamon trees, and nutmeg trees. Other plantations on the island are growing black pepper and vanilla. Rice paddies are everywhere to help feed the burgeoning population of the island. We converted three small merchant ships (similar to those Odoacer donated, but ones we built) to fishing vessels that ply the waters around the island.

The seeds for the cinnamon and clove trees cost nearly a gold aureus each, a price paid in rum. I don’t think gold would have been accepted, but the supervisor who sold us the seeds loved rum. We continue to get a break on the price of spices we buy by lubricating the sellers with rum first, and including a firkin or two as a gift to the spice sellers we deal with frequently. Our pepper and cinnamon began producing this year. Next year’s crop should be much heavier. The vanilla produced a heavy crop last year. Since the plantings for each crop increase every year, production should increase rapidly.

Mines dot the island, including iron, coal, copper, nickel, lead, Columbite (used to make our steel swords and plows even stronger), and even aquamarines and emeralds. With the mines and spice plantations, not to mention the port where our ships can resupply, the island is as valuable as a handful of gold mines. I keep two thousand troops housed there in case anyone else figures out how valuable it is and tries to take it away from us.

The biggest problem we seem to have is illegal immigration. Fishing boats from the mainland show up periodically requesting permission to bring their families over. Others just move, hoping we won’t notice, but when the native population quadruples, it’s hard not to notice! Fortunately, the immigrants are eager to work for us, reducing the number of slaves we need to buy. Apparently, some of the native fishermen living on the island love to brag about the plentiful and varied supply of food, the stone homes, and the sturdy rock walls to protect them from the elements. There are at least thirty native fishing boats, formerly from the mainland, that now operate from a new fishing port under construction on the west side of the island.

The warehouses of Port Joelle are full of the goods our ships buy for us, everywhere from China and Korea to the east coast of Africa. The Capital Class and Duchess Class ships have explored every major river and minor port between the Cape of Good Hope and Thailand, and trade with hundreds of villages and cities along the coasts and up the rivers.

-----.-----

One of the cities we traded with was Ctesiphon (On the Tigris River near present day Salman Pak, about twenty miles south of Baghdad), the capital of the Sassanid Empire. While they had seen our smaller ships, they hadn’t seen our mortars or rifles in action. The soldiers aboard our ships generally stood guard using the long Mongol bows unless the rifles were warranted. I’m sure the Sassanids had heard stories about our weapons, though. Perhaps, like the Saxons, they felt the stories were exaggerations.

Captain Drogo took the invasion fleet to Port Tizemt for food and fresh water, stopping again in Madagascar at Port Joelle after three weeks at sea for more of the same. A week later, they entered the Tigris River. Sailing all day and while the moon was up at night, they came in sight of Ctesiphon just four days later.

The people of Ctesiphon were used to seeing our ships dock there. Seeing a small armada arrive less than a month after their King led an army against us was entirely different. Their remaining troops hastily assembled to meet the threat. Under a flag of truce, Drogo offered to let them surrender, warning that standing against us meant certain death. Their commander laughed until several mortars fired.

Even seeing the destruction caused by the mortars, the commander was sure his troops could defeat us. The delay while he spoke with Drogo gave more of his men time to don their armor. Once the Sassanid commander returned to his lines, Drogo gave the order to commence firing with the rifles. Less than five minutes later, any Sassanid soldiers who weren’t dead, were severely wounded or hiding. Drogo’s troops quickly secured the walls. Mortar rounds had been used periodically to encourage the citizens of Ctesiphon and its sister city on the opposite side of the river, Seleucia, to stay inside the walls and away from the gates leading out of the city.

Once the walls were secured, the cities surrendered, and it was a simple matter to secure and loot the cities. The rest of our soldiers debarked and confiscated every horse and camel that was fit to ride. They rounded up the wives and children of King Kavadh, along with any other royal relatives they could identify. The family and relatives were put aboard the first ship bound for Valencia. For weeks, the soldiers searched the city, taking coins, jewels, statues, and everything else of any value. They even searched the palace that was still under construction, leaving enough furnishings that the new Frankish governor would still have a lavish place to live when he arrived.

Each shipload of booty going to Valencia also took captured families of craftsmen and several hundred young, single women the troops claimed as wives. First, though, Drogo and the men chose, by consensus, the two most beautiful women and sent them for my perusal. By the time my wives allowed me to peruse them, they had already been intimately welcomed into the family. Drogo got the third choice, then his officers, and so on. Gratefully, quite a few people in Port Joelle were reasonably fluent in Pahlavi after trading with the Sassanid Empire for several years. They acted as interpreters in Ctesiphon and Seleucia, and one sailed aboard every ship bound for Valencia which carried prisoners.

When King Kavadh ran afoul of a mere twenty thousand Frankish soldiers, he learned that what he considered his invincible heavy cavalry and elephant cavalry weren’t invincible against rifles and mortars. Also, by then, his capital was already in our hands. When I later heard about the battle, I was grateful that the elephants were smart enough to turn tail and run when it started raining high explosive mortar shells. The ninety thousand Sassanid and Hephthalite troops weren’t as smart, or as lucky.

Bodies of nearly half the Sassanid and Hephthalite troops and half of their thirty thousand warhorses littered the area where the mountain pass widened into a fertile plain around the city of Erzurum. With all those bodies buried there now, the plain should continue to be fertile for many decades to come. With the execution of King Kavadh by Clovis, the vexilloid of the Sassanid Empire was permanently retired, and was replaced by the flag of the Frankish Empire.

A corner tassel of the vexilloid was purposely dipped in the blood of the last Sassanid King, and would later adorn a wall in Clovis’ throne room, next to the slightly singed vexillum of the Eastern Roman Empire which had been salvaged from the ruins of the Emperor’s Palace in Constantinople while it was being looted by our troops.

By the time word reached Clovis that the former capital of the Sassanid Empire had fallen, my troops had already looted a dozen Sassanid cities. The few able-bodied Sassanid troops surviving the attack on Ctesiphon entered each city ahead of us and warned the people of the consequences should they oppose us. Our looting would be painful, but not nearly what it would be if we had to capture the city. The looting was reasonably peaceful as far up both the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers as our ships could sail, and back downriver to the sea.