"The road to hell is paved by good intentions"
The Palaelogus dynasty, a Macchiavellian tale
Prologue: The child of Palaelogus.
Georgios was not the true son of Nikephoros, neither was he a bastard. Nikephoros was unmarried, and had no sleeping companion except for his sword.
As a loyal servant of the imperial crown, he had done his duty without complaints, regrets or enthusiasm. He had fought in Sicily, in Asia Minor, and on the frozen rivers of Danube in that fateful year of 4812, when the Pecheneg pagans ravaged the countryside all the way down to Thrace, pillaging the roadside and driving hordes of Bulgarian, Macedonian and Thracian refugees into the walls of Constantinople.
During that year, Nikephoros had been a member of the elite guard of Andronicos Seleucos, the prince of Epirus and Butrinto, and he had been dispatched with a company of 50 cavalrymen deep inside the ravaged countryside of Northern Thrace. The mission was scouting, since a large force of Pecheneg warriors was thought to be hiding in that area.
During that time, the provinces which followed the southern part of Danube were in open defiance towards the Basileus, as the Slavonic principalities of Bulgaria and Serbia had been established. There was chaos, and several small band of rebels had been in action for during a century, attacking imperial forces in the rear, and a mood of despair was in rule in Constantinople.
One autumn eve in that year, Nikephoros approached an abandoned Bulgarian village, which was surprisingly well kept, probably since the rumours of the Pecheneg presence [or the presence of the Imperial army] had frightened the inhabitants to seek their luck elsewhere. The village had it's fence intact, and was partly covered with a green sheet of leaf trees.
As Nikephoros dismounted his horse, he ordered his veteran companions Ioannes and Constantinos to secure the village with two detachments. They obeyed without hesitation, and as Nikephoros made his headquarters at an abandoned stable, they scouted the village. One hour later, they returned holding burning torches. They were arguing.
Ioannes: "It is my staunch belief, that this village ought to be burned down to the ground. It has disobeyed the "Marshal act", and if we don't put an example, other villages would surely follow, paving up the road Eis Tan Bol for the enemy."
Konstantinos: "Totally unnecessary, what are you going to do? Turn a group of law obedient subjects into robbers, rebels or defectors? I have served in eastern Armenia, and it was the violence brought upon private property which finally made the Segeropouloses to defect to their Turkish master."
Ioannes: "Are you commiting high treason?"
Konstantinos: "As much as your are."
Ioannes: "This village lies in a rich valley, a natural sweet spot for resting Steppe horses and foul backs of barbarian invaders. The people of these lands themselves are barbarians, Slavs.", he spitted the last word. "They deserve nothing more".
During the last 20 years, tensions had been intense between the Trachian natives and the Slavonic second-generation immigrants, and several villages had been ethnically cleanshed.
Konstantinos: "This rich valley could be used by our own imperial forces as well. The Ducases are mobilising for support in the City, and the princes from Asia are on the other side of the Bosphorus. They will soon join us, with their cataphracts, and drive the enemy tho pieces. And stop the xenophobia thing. They are not Hellenes, no, but they were once loyal subjects to the empire."
Ioannes: "Well, for certain, I do know why you, my beloved brother, are defending that scum. Does it have to do with that experience in Vidin a couple of years ago you remember..."
"ENOUGH!!!!", Nikephoros roamed. "We are going to leave this village unmolested, yes we are going to leave it without taking anything at all with us, since that would make us heavier and more vulnerable. The Pechenegs won't attack the City itself. They will move to the south-west, to Thessalonika and our own Epeiros. Those lands are rich, and weakly guarded. We will close the gates behind them, and force them into a battle where we will slaughter their horde for defiling Roman lands."
"My commander", Ioannes replied, "It is unclear if the princes of Asia would arrive in Europe with their host. Pechenegistan is growing, and devouring all of Europe. Let leave them ruins, and we will smash them. Do my commander not believe that would be the wisest thing to do?"
Nikephoros answered: "To unify the Pechenegs and Slavs is not wise, since that would mean the end of the Empire in it's current form. It is feeble to see you, a mere veteran sergeant, speculate about high politics and the fate of the empire. Even if we were storming hell itself, it would be our duty to do that without hesitating.", and then he continued with a more low voice, "I have met Constantine Ducas, in Sicily during the war with the Normans. His negotiations won't fail, he has already made a pact with the knyaz of the Serbs, Michael, a pact where 10.000 Serbs are going to be placed under imperial command. That is of course secret by the way."
"Mihailo fought the emperor in Tyrnovo only seven years ago!"
"Ioannes, please keep quiet. Michael is sly, but he is a realist. To be the enemy of a specific emperor does not make a man an enemy of the Empire. We have outlived several emperors. Constantine would solve this."
The three men made a small fire inside the round stable, and ate their dinner, for about an hour. It was already a dark night when Nikephoros decided to pay a visit to the local church, a horrid building where the Bulgarians practised their detached view of christianity [according to Ioannes who was a Hellenic supremacist].
The church were dark, and all of it's belongings had been stripped. Nikephoros covered his sword by the purple mantle, and kneeled before the icon of the Savior. It was then he saw the movement. A shadow, among the shadows, behind Nikephoros' back.
He turned around, whispering an apology to the Lord for the interruption of the prayer.
"They're gone?" - mumbled the weak voice. It was an old priest, a hunchback.
His Hellenic was crude, and he spoke with a brash Slavic accent. "They're gone? The Rumani?"
"Rumani? This village has been abandoned for days, judging from the reports of my men."
"Oh, Slava Basileus.", the old man closed in, on his knees "You has save us, save us from Pecheneg scum, from Devil's arse!" Another shadow appeared from behind the bench, a smaller. It was a child, approximately 1,5-3 years old. It sucked on it's thumb, and standed there with terrified eyes.
"Me and child, great danger, Rumani! Rumani!", as Nikephoros did an attempt to reason with the man, and put his right hand on the hunchback's shoulder, the Bulgarian priest quicky draw a hooked knife and plunged it into the shoulder of Nikephoros, between the scarves in leather armor... "Slava Bolgar! "
Nikephoros had the taste of blood in his mouth, and the wound made by the old man burned. He released the sack-like, nailed corpse of the hermit from his sword, and moved back in agony, and stumbled on his back, screaming. He had defiled the body of Christ, and killed a priest. His soul was condemned...
The next day, he avoke at the headquarters at the Bolgar stable by a bright finger of the sun caressing his face. He was lying in a shirt, which had been drowned in sweat. The child which he had encountered in the church sat on the ground and played with a straw of wheat. He did not bother the kid anyway. He could not recognise if it was a boy or a girl.
He turned around, and saw Konstantinos sitting with a relieved expression in his face. "My dear commander and lord, you have been brought back from the dead. Your colour is back. We've thought you had been cursed by a daemon, miracles do sometimes happen in churches. You have had luck."
"Have you taken care of the wound?", Nikephoros said with a weak - but yet not so weak - voice.
"What wound?", Konstantinos did reply.
"The old man plunged a knife into my shoulder. Certainly, there must have been"... nothing... Nikephoros felt nothing there, only skin. What had happened.
He prayed to the Lord for forgiveness on behalf of the priest, and kept the sudden healing to himself. Certainly, the lord had put him on trial. And the trial was'nt over. To kill a priest, was an unholy deed worthy of a Turkish devil.
In silence, he put on his uniform, and saw the hole in the leather armor. So he had'nt dreamt after all? The child looked at him with deep grey eyes, observed him as he ate the breakfast. In silence, both the man and the child.
"What it is about the child?", he asked Konstantinos.
"It is a boychild, and it is mute, traumatized. What should we do with it?"
"If we meet his parents, we should retrieve him to them. Otherwise, we should leave him to the nearest Hellenic couple who are willing to raise him."
Ioannes appeared, riding on his horse. His sword was drown in blood. "Those devils!", he sweared. "They staked an ambush against us at the wheat fields, three of our men are wounded."
"Pechenegs?", Nikephoros asked. If Ioannes was surprised by the sudden healing of his commander, he kept it to himself.
"No! SLAVONIANS! Both Serbs, Bulgarians and I do not know what! Pitchforks and bows!! Women, men and children. Tens of them! But we killed most of them, and are in the process of interrogating and judging the survivors. Crosses are already being constructed."
One hour later, Nikephoros arrived at the barn outside of the village where the two rebels were interrogated. He had brought the child with him, but gently put him down on the ground, but did it specifically clear that the boy was not to follow him to the interrogation. Konstantinos ensured that.
The two Bulgarian women had the remnants of their blonde hair stripped into bloody, fleshy particles on their heads, and their dresses were in disarray. The soldiers had gently put them back together, for the sake of decency [or maybe for not being punished for a gang-rape]. The womens faces were covered in blood. Nikephoros noted that their fingernails had been put out.
On broken Slavonic, he asked them; "From this village? Another village?"
The closest of the women spat on his foot with blood. They were probably dying.
He encountered the nearest soldier, a man with dark eyes named Alexandros, and ordered him to slit their throats. Then, he viewed his men with a tired gaze, and ordered Konstantinos to begin to dismount the camp. "We are leaving this afternoon."
He walked out on the field. It was covered with flowers. The boy-child sat in silence, watching a butterfly streaming through the air, without disturbing it. The hot sun and the cold autumn air washed the field with a sense of majesty. Then, he realised why the lord had spared him.
One year later, in the waters of Danube, after the victory in the war when Constantine Ducas together with Michael Voislav had just signed an uneasy truce with the Pecheneg warlord, an orthodox priest baptised the child after his adoptive father. The boy was baptised into Georgios, after the saint of Egypt. He was baptised Georgios Palaelogus, after his adoptive father Nikephoros Palaelogus. The ceremony was witnessed by Nikephoros, Ioannes and Konstantinos.
They all knew the secret. Out of the three wounded men on the field, all had been mysteriously healed that day when Georgios played in the flower field...
To be continued.
The Palaelogus dynasty, a Macchiavellian tale
Prologue: The child of Palaelogus.
Georgios was not the true son of Nikephoros, neither was he a bastard. Nikephoros was unmarried, and had no sleeping companion except for his sword.
As a loyal servant of the imperial crown, he had done his duty without complaints, regrets or enthusiasm. He had fought in Sicily, in Asia Minor, and on the frozen rivers of Danube in that fateful year of 4812, when the Pecheneg pagans ravaged the countryside all the way down to Thrace, pillaging the roadside and driving hordes of Bulgarian, Macedonian and Thracian refugees into the walls of Constantinople.
During that year, Nikephoros had been a member of the elite guard of Andronicos Seleucos, the prince of Epirus and Butrinto, and he had been dispatched with a company of 50 cavalrymen deep inside the ravaged countryside of Northern Thrace. The mission was scouting, since a large force of Pecheneg warriors was thought to be hiding in that area.
During that time, the provinces which followed the southern part of Danube were in open defiance towards the Basileus, as the Slavonic principalities of Bulgaria and Serbia had been established. There was chaos, and several small band of rebels had been in action for during a century, attacking imperial forces in the rear, and a mood of despair was in rule in Constantinople.
One autumn eve in that year, Nikephoros approached an abandoned Bulgarian village, which was surprisingly well kept, probably since the rumours of the Pecheneg presence [or the presence of the Imperial army] had frightened the inhabitants to seek their luck elsewhere. The village had it's fence intact, and was partly covered with a green sheet of leaf trees.
As Nikephoros dismounted his horse, he ordered his veteran companions Ioannes and Constantinos to secure the village with two detachments. They obeyed without hesitation, and as Nikephoros made his headquarters at an abandoned stable, they scouted the village. One hour later, they returned holding burning torches. They were arguing.
Ioannes: "It is my staunch belief, that this village ought to be burned down to the ground. It has disobeyed the "Marshal act", and if we don't put an example, other villages would surely follow, paving up the road Eis Tan Bol for the enemy."
Konstantinos: "Totally unnecessary, what are you going to do? Turn a group of law obedient subjects into robbers, rebels or defectors? I have served in eastern Armenia, and it was the violence brought upon private property which finally made the Segeropouloses to defect to their Turkish master."
Ioannes: "Are you commiting high treason?"
Konstantinos: "As much as your are."
Ioannes: "This village lies in a rich valley, a natural sweet spot for resting Steppe horses and foul backs of barbarian invaders. The people of these lands themselves are barbarians, Slavs.", he spitted the last word. "They deserve nothing more".
During the last 20 years, tensions had been intense between the Trachian natives and the Slavonic second-generation immigrants, and several villages had been ethnically cleanshed.
Konstantinos: "This rich valley could be used by our own imperial forces as well. The Ducases are mobilising for support in the City, and the princes from Asia are on the other side of the Bosphorus. They will soon join us, with their cataphracts, and drive the enemy tho pieces. And stop the xenophobia thing. They are not Hellenes, no, but they were once loyal subjects to the empire."
Ioannes: "Well, for certain, I do know why you, my beloved brother, are defending that scum. Does it have to do with that experience in Vidin a couple of years ago you remember..."
"ENOUGH!!!!", Nikephoros roamed. "We are going to leave this village unmolested, yes we are going to leave it without taking anything at all with us, since that would make us heavier and more vulnerable. The Pechenegs won't attack the City itself. They will move to the south-west, to Thessalonika and our own Epeiros. Those lands are rich, and weakly guarded. We will close the gates behind them, and force them into a battle where we will slaughter their horde for defiling Roman lands."
"My commander", Ioannes replied, "It is unclear if the princes of Asia would arrive in Europe with their host. Pechenegistan is growing, and devouring all of Europe. Let leave them ruins, and we will smash them. Do my commander not believe that would be the wisest thing to do?"
Nikephoros answered: "To unify the Pechenegs and Slavs is not wise, since that would mean the end of the Empire in it's current form. It is feeble to see you, a mere veteran sergeant, speculate about high politics and the fate of the empire. Even if we were storming hell itself, it would be our duty to do that without hesitating.", and then he continued with a more low voice, "I have met Constantine Ducas, in Sicily during the war with the Normans. His negotiations won't fail, he has already made a pact with the knyaz of the Serbs, Michael, a pact where 10.000 Serbs are going to be placed under imperial command. That is of course secret by the way."
"Mihailo fought the emperor in Tyrnovo only seven years ago!"
"Ioannes, please keep quiet. Michael is sly, but he is a realist. To be the enemy of a specific emperor does not make a man an enemy of the Empire. We have outlived several emperors. Constantine would solve this."
The three men made a small fire inside the round stable, and ate their dinner, for about an hour. It was already a dark night when Nikephoros decided to pay a visit to the local church, a horrid building where the Bulgarians practised their detached view of christianity [according to Ioannes who was a Hellenic supremacist].
The church were dark, and all of it's belongings had been stripped. Nikephoros covered his sword by the purple mantle, and kneeled before the icon of the Savior. It was then he saw the movement. A shadow, among the shadows, behind Nikephoros' back.
He turned around, whispering an apology to the Lord for the interruption of the prayer.
"They're gone?" - mumbled the weak voice. It was an old priest, a hunchback.
His Hellenic was crude, and he spoke with a brash Slavic accent. "They're gone? The Rumani?"
"Rumani? This village has been abandoned for days, judging from the reports of my men."
"Oh, Slava Basileus.", the old man closed in, on his knees "You has save us, save us from Pecheneg scum, from Devil's arse!" Another shadow appeared from behind the bench, a smaller. It was a child, approximately 1,5-3 years old. It sucked on it's thumb, and standed there with terrified eyes.
"Me and child, great danger, Rumani! Rumani!", as Nikephoros did an attempt to reason with the man, and put his right hand on the hunchback's shoulder, the Bulgarian priest quicky draw a hooked knife and plunged it into the shoulder of Nikephoros, between the scarves in leather armor... "Slava Bolgar! "
Nikephoros had the taste of blood in his mouth, and the wound made by the old man burned. He released the sack-like, nailed corpse of the hermit from his sword, and moved back in agony, and stumbled on his back, screaming. He had defiled the body of Christ, and killed a priest. His soul was condemned...
The next day, he avoke at the headquarters at the Bolgar stable by a bright finger of the sun caressing his face. He was lying in a shirt, which had been drowned in sweat. The child which he had encountered in the church sat on the ground and played with a straw of wheat. He did not bother the kid anyway. He could not recognise if it was a boy or a girl.
He turned around, and saw Konstantinos sitting with a relieved expression in his face. "My dear commander and lord, you have been brought back from the dead. Your colour is back. We've thought you had been cursed by a daemon, miracles do sometimes happen in churches. You have had luck."
"Have you taken care of the wound?", Nikephoros said with a weak - but yet not so weak - voice.
"What wound?", Konstantinos did reply.
"The old man plunged a knife into my shoulder. Certainly, there must have been"... nothing... Nikephoros felt nothing there, only skin. What had happened.
He prayed to the Lord for forgiveness on behalf of the priest, and kept the sudden healing to himself. Certainly, the lord had put him on trial. And the trial was'nt over. To kill a priest, was an unholy deed worthy of a Turkish devil.
In silence, he put on his uniform, and saw the hole in the leather armor. So he had'nt dreamt after all? The child looked at him with deep grey eyes, observed him as he ate the breakfast. In silence, both the man and the child.
"What it is about the child?", he asked Konstantinos.
"It is a boychild, and it is mute, traumatized. What should we do with it?"
"If we meet his parents, we should retrieve him to them. Otherwise, we should leave him to the nearest Hellenic couple who are willing to raise him."
Ioannes appeared, riding on his horse. His sword was drown in blood. "Those devils!", he sweared. "They staked an ambush against us at the wheat fields, three of our men are wounded."
"Pechenegs?", Nikephoros asked. If Ioannes was surprised by the sudden healing of his commander, he kept it to himself.
"No! SLAVONIANS! Both Serbs, Bulgarians and I do not know what! Pitchforks and bows!! Women, men and children. Tens of them! But we killed most of them, and are in the process of interrogating and judging the survivors. Crosses are already being constructed."
One hour later, Nikephoros arrived at the barn outside of the village where the two rebels were interrogated. He had brought the child with him, but gently put him down on the ground, but did it specifically clear that the boy was not to follow him to the interrogation. Konstantinos ensured that.
The two Bulgarian women had the remnants of their blonde hair stripped into bloody, fleshy particles on their heads, and their dresses were in disarray. The soldiers had gently put them back together, for the sake of decency [or maybe for not being punished for a gang-rape]. The womens faces were covered in blood. Nikephoros noted that their fingernails had been put out.
On broken Slavonic, he asked them; "From this village? Another village?"
The closest of the women spat on his foot with blood. They were probably dying.
He encountered the nearest soldier, a man with dark eyes named Alexandros, and ordered him to slit their throats. Then, he viewed his men with a tired gaze, and ordered Konstantinos to begin to dismount the camp. "We are leaving this afternoon."
He walked out on the field. It was covered with flowers. The boy-child sat in silence, watching a butterfly streaming through the air, without disturbing it. The hot sun and the cold autumn air washed the field with a sense of majesty. Then, he realised why the lord had spared him.
One year later, in the waters of Danube, after the victory in the war when Constantine Ducas together with Michael Voislav had just signed an uneasy truce with the Pecheneg warlord, an orthodox priest baptised the child after his adoptive father. The boy was baptised into Georgios, after the saint of Egypt. He was baptised Georgios Palaelogus, after his adoptive father Nikephoros Palaelogus. The ceremony was witnessed by Nikephoros, Ioannes and Konstantinos.
They all knew the secret. Out of the three wounded men on the field, all had been mysteriously healed that day when Georgios played in the flower field...
To be continued.
