Estonianzulu - Manuel survived this one, but he's the Emperor, which means there's no doubt more stuff will come his way...
Chief Ragusa - No doubt of that...
Enewald - Basiliea did try a few things, revealed below...
A visual representation of the extent of the rebellion, and the extent of the bureaucratic hole left in its wake. These are the shields of all of the themes who need new princes as of 1155, and none of the counties who need new comes are represented. They are, starting from the top row, left to right, Aegean Islands, Lykia, Istria, Cyprus, Azerbijian (conquered when Georgia fell at Lake Van), Varna, Vidin, Wallachia, Cyrenaica, Chaldea-Coloneia, Calabria, Butrinto, Aswan, Ascalon, Apulia and Al Jazira.
August 6th, 1155
Basilieos shot straight upright in bed, his hand grasping the large metal candlestick holder that sat on an endtable within reach.
In the moonlight, his tall, thin form didn't shiver, didn't shake, and his eyes were wide. Like a cat, he held still, immensely still - Halfdan had taught him that at night, one sees movement far better than anything. Despite the haziness of everything around him, Basilieos kept his eyes alert. He waited, holding his breath.
For several minutes, he'd been alarmed by something unseen, unknown, even as he lay under his covers. At first, the ten year old prince had cowered lower, but the prinkly, the unease, had only grown worse. He'd sliped out from under his covers, and that was when he caught the first movement. Something slight. So the prince had slid carefully to the side of his bed that was covered in darkness, and closest to the heavy candlestick now in his hand. Slowly, ever so slowly, the prince raised the candlestick above his head, as the movement drew closer.
In the moonlight Basilieos made out the fuzzy shape of a short, squat man, with ugly lips and eyes that glinted. He edged close to the bed, and the sharp brightness of a dagger in the moonlight caught Basilieos' eyes.
Halfdan Crovan had trained the prince well. Basilieos waited until the man was very very close, almost leaning over him, still not seeing the prince's face or ready hand in the dark. Then, with all the power his young form could muster, Basilieos brought the metal slashing down on the man's head.
The blow was true, and Basilieos' ears were rewarded with the dull crack of metal breaking bone, and wetness suddenly covered his hand. The man crumpled beside the prince's bed with a dull thump, and to be sure, Basilieos smashed him several more times. Some part of Basilieos' mind registered the dull, wet smacks were not the noise he'd expected when killing a man, but he finished the work, before dropping the candlestick to the floor. His heart racing, he dashed over to the doorway, and peeked out.
Both guards on either side of the door were dead, their necks split open. The Prince knew what he had to do. He dashed down the hall, peering around every corridor, until he made it to the cell of the priest von Kranke.
From the moment they'd arrived in Taranto, Basilieos had not trusted his cousin Zeno. The man said too little, and looked around too much. After the brothers he had the most legitimate claim to the Imperial throne, and von Kranke had cautioned the prince to be careful. The priest had said should Zeno ever attempt any harm on him the priest would make sure the young prince had asylum in Rome. There, the Pope guaranteed that the young prince would remain safe, no matter what happened to his mother.
Basilieos, naturally, had kept up to date on the war. Every traveller that came through was instantly peppered with questions from the young prince on what they knew. Every merchant that came to the villa to tell the Prince how the war progressed was given a gift of a hundred silver
solidii. From all of this information, Basilieos had already pieced together what was happening - his mother was beaten on all fronts, her armies and fleets retreating. Taranto would shortly be under seige - and now this.
Zeno had struck.
The prince raced down the empty corridors, until finally he reached the small chambers of Helmuth von Kranke. He pounded insistently on the door. Finally it opened, revealing a tired Kranke only dressed in his sleeping shift.
"What is this racket?" the priest complained. His hand was rummaging through his hair.
The prince, without thinking, blurted out a description of what happened. How he'd been attacked in his room, how the man was dead, and how he'd run straight to the priest's quarters, as planned.
"What should I do?"
"Come in from the doorway first!" the priest grabbed the prince and pulled him into the room before quickly shutting and bolting the door. Then, he focused his attention on Basilieos, and his hand. "Are you hurt?"
For the first time, Basilieos noticed his own right hand, covered in blood and bits of gore. He started to squeal, desperately trying to brush the bits off with his other hand. He only succeeded in spreading the gore. A split second after he shrieked, von Kranke's hand was over his mouth.
"Hush child! Do you want to be caught?" the priest hissed.
"My hands..." Basilieos cried into the priest's hands. He'd never killed anyone before. And the blood wouldn't come off... it wouldn't come off... Basilieos whimpered, and started to sob quietly. He felt the priest's enveloping grasp clasp him close.
"Hush child... all will be well..." Kranke whispered quietly. "I'll take you to Rome. There you will be safe from all harm."
"And what of my friends?" Basilieos asked quietly. He looked up and saw Kranke's face twist painfully - the old priest's lessons had drilled into the young prince's mind that a man's word was his bond, and that friendship and fellowship were to be cherished. For him to abandon his friends in an hour of woe...
"I'll see what I can do," the priest said quietly.
"And my brother?" Basilieos muttered, sobs still coming strong.
The priest looked off in the distance for a moment, a silent sadness on his face. "He'll meet us in the Eternal City," the von Kranke said. In the darkness, the prince couldn't see the priest's saddened face, or the nervous eye twitch that came whenever the Cardinal lied. "Now come! We shouldn't delay any longer. If your cousin has designs on your life we must leave quickly." The priest pointed sharply to the shadows underneath his own bed. "Hide there, and stay quiet. I shall go make arrangements!"
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August 11th, 1155
"So this is what the end feels like."
Basiliea turned away from the windows of the Taranto Palace and pointed towards the door. Her maids bowed, and one by one filed out, leaving her alone to confront the mess she'd made. The plan that wasn't supposed to fail had - spectacularly.Manuel had survived her poisoning attempt, and marched back to restore order in the capital. Kappadokia and Samos had not united their armies in time, and were destroyed by the Emperor piecemeal. The list of blunders by the
dynatoi was long, but Basiliea had already uttered a curse for each and every one of them over the last few weeks.
In the distance she could see the walls of Taranto, and beyond that, her ex-husband's great host. She'd heard his bigamous marriage had netted him two sons already - Theodoros and Romanos. Both were bastards in Basiliea's eyes. No church council had decided their marriage was invalid - only the Ecumenical Patriarch, a known stooge of Manuel's designs.
She uttered a curse for him as well.
Basiliea closed her eyes, tears starting to flow as she looped her last request from her maidservants around a rafter high above. She climbed onto the stool they had left for her, and checked the knot while her mind raced over what could have been.
She'd then made arrangements with the Franks and the Venetians in March of 1154 - the Franks were to provide an army to march into Greece, and the Venetians were to provide a fleet. From what she'd gathered, an enormous Frankish host, her sources stating over 60,000 strong, had gathered in the fields of Vermandois when the Regent Hugh was suddenly taken ill and died from the flux.
Basiliea knew her husband's fingerprint when she saw it. Hugh had been a vivacious and strong young man - there was no way the bloody flux could have struck him down unless some potent herbs had assisted the spread of the disease. Yet the deed was done, and the regency passed to his younger brother Drogo, who dismissed the army on account of expense and pocketed the money sent by the Empress. The new Regent immediately used the money to crush all opposition to his rule, and promptly adopted the son of his dead brother as his own. England and France would be unified - without interposing themselves in the succession rebellion of the Greeks. Outmanuevered again.
Only the Venetians had come.
Even this seemed like it could be enough. That damnable Kosmas and the irascible
Megos Domestikos had launched an island campaign, seizing Famagusta from the Prince of Cyprus - only to have their glories utterly demolished by the Venetian fleet of 44 galleys at Rhodes. Kosmas had wanted to sail north of the island to land, Demetrios south, and the two had split their fleet, letting the Venetians take it piecemeal. Manuel had taken the East, but if Basiliea pressed, and pressed quickly, she could take the West. So she pressed Prince Robert to do the thing she and her father had wanted to avoid.
She pressed him to war.
On August 8th, 1154, Robert de Hauteville, in concert with his cousin William, declared war on the Emperor, and marshaled their armies - 18,000 Normans, a healthy force. Coupled with the several thousand in Istria and Butrinto, it would have made a formidable force. As long as the Venetians held the sea, the Emperor would have to march many months from Egypt to get back to Konstantinopolis, while her fleet could transport her army across the Adriatic and be in Konstantinopolis months before her husband...
But the Venetians did not hold the sea.
In in the choppy waters of a December night, a second Imperial fleet, led by the same two warriors as before, silently moved into position outside the harbor of Rhodes. They set upon the Venetians with fireships while the latter peaceably rode at anchor, decimating the Venetian force. What galleys survived were boxed in and compelled to surrender the next day. December 19th, 1154 would be marked, by later historians as the beginning of the end of the rebellion.
But Basiliea did not concern herself with this. Without a fleet, it was she who found her troops taken apart by piecemeal. Prince Michael of Bosnia took Istria, while Kosmas launched a lightning campaign across the Aegean islands and to Corfu. Slowing a storm had been gathering, and as the Empress looked out the window of her quarters one last time, she could see it breaking.
It was now August 11th, 1155, and Basiliea knew the end when she saw it.
The smell of smoke hung in the air, from the thousands of campfires that surrounded the battered city walls. Taranto had still not recovered from the last siege, ten years before - sections of the wall were still weak, and many of the towers remained unmanned. Since Roger's humiliating and disastrous defeat near Lecce the month before, there was no longer any doubt of what
would happen - no doubt at all.
Carefully Basiliea tugged on the rope, and found it was securely tied to the rafters.
Zeno Komnenos had disappeared - Basiliea had no doubt the
domestikos, carefully silent even while Robert went to war with his master, had now gone to his cousin's camp, laden with plans and promises of assistance. Niketas... tiny little Niketas... that had undoutedly been his doing as well. They'd found an assassin dead in Basilieos' room, a bloody candlestick beside his crushed skull. The Prince was gone, but Basiliea had no doubt.
Her eldest son lived.
Rimini had disappeared as well - Basilieos was in Rome. So be it. Let Manuel sire as many children as he could with that whore Ermisinde. Basilieos was the more legitimate heir - older, stronger, and more keen. He would survive her, and he would thrive. And he would make sure those bastards from that Greek woman never touched the throne. Ever.
She looked out the window one last time, and inhaled deeply. Smoke stung her lungs, but she clung to the feeling. A million things went through her mind - how could she have done things better? How could she have turned Papal support and massive
dynatoi backing into a victory? Her mind settled on one thing - the Franks. If they'd provided their legions, have been sitting in Konstantinopolis, not...
She sighed, and looked at the noose one last time. It was well tied. It would hold. Gently she put it around her neck, and gave it one last tightening. There would be no Empress for them to parade before the crowds of burnt out Konstantinopolis - no prisoner to be tried and shackled and executed in shame. Only a body.
She kicked the stool out from under her.
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August 15th, 1155
Manuel Komnenos looked around the ruins of the Taranto palace, and sighed. Normally the great hall would have been covered in tapestries, banners from campaigns, gold and silver that remained after the original sack of the city - gifts from Manuel to then young Robert. Today, three days after the army entered the city, it was anything but glorious - tapestries were shredded, urns and expensive vases overturned, the smell of smoke heavy in the air. To teach all of Apulia a lesson, Manuel had allowed his army to run amok in Taranto for three days, and three days only. Now, on the fourth, he surveyed the ruins.
Flanking him were the two Komnenos twins from Antioch, Kosmas and Theodoros, both of whom had proven instrumental to the Emperor's victory. Despite being fraternal twins, the two looked very different. Theodoros was shorter, with long locks of dark hair and piercing brown eyes. A consumate politician, it was he who had decided to march his army south to Jerusalem to
surprise the Patriarch's allies at Hattin, and seize the old priest and, in effect, sell him to the highest bidder. Manuel immediately recognized a man after his own heart, and using the reasoning that a close enemy is a known enemy, had kept him involved in the war effort since, even after his expedition to Egypt met with disaster at Joshua's Ford.
Kosmas, on the other hand, was taller, broader, and not nearly as handsome. His hair was cut short, and his manners and speech were as harsh as his looks. The consumate military man, it was Kosmas who commanded the brilliant ambush at Hattin, and who managed to save most of Antioch's army at Joshua's Ford. He also had an uncanny ability at sea, commanding brilliant imperial naval victories at Rhodes, Euboeia and Corfu.
Both had earned rewards for their service. Theodoros had been awarded hereditary status to his title as Prince of Antioch, guaranteeing that it would remain in his family in perpetuity. Kosmas was shortly to be awarded the position of
Megas Doux and commander in chief of the Imperial Navy, for his brilliant plan at Rhodes which destroyed the Venetian fleet hired by the rebels. Theirs were rising stars, and the Emperor reasoned keeping them in Konstantinopolis after the war was over would mean he could keep a close eye on them, rather than having them plot in the provinces.
Kosmas and Theodoros in the midst of their march on Jerusalem. Kosmas wears the red cloak according to all domestikos
within the Empire, while Theodoros wears the purple cloak allowed only to members of the extended imperial family.
"What a waste," Manuel said quietly, looking at his two distant cousins. "I handed this to Robert, and..." The Emperor shrugged, before giving an already rickety remnant of a table a good kick. It tumbled to the floor, to his satisfaction.
"Who will get Apulia?" Theodoros asked. Manuel made a note - the politician was already testy, and blood was still drying.
"I'm thinking of handing Apulia to Basilieos," Manuel muttered. "He's ten, he'll be malleable, and he
won't be a Norman," the Emperor grumbled. "Niketas will get Kappadokia, Ismail will get Cyrenaica, and I'm holding Damietta, Mesopotamia, Galilee, etc. etc. in reserve. I'm going to hand them to my children by Ermisinde - family won't attack family, right Theodoros?" the Emperor asked pointedly. To Manuel's pleasure, the young Prince's face blanched.
"Yes, of course Majesty," Theodors nodded.
"For your service, I'm thinking of adding Baalbek to Antioch's holdings," Manuel answered Theodoros' actual unspoken question. "And Kosmas, on your retirement from
Megas Doux I should hand you Al Jazira."
"Thank you, Majesty," the normally taciturn Kosmas bowed.
"And I need to reward Zeno - surrendering the city and castle so quickly," Manuel smiled grimly. He'd fully expected to have to lay siege to the city once again to get Basiliea and his sons. Instead he found a flag of truce, a pliant city garrison and a humble Zeno explaining that Robert had declared for the rebellion, so Zeno had taken it upon himself to arrest him, along with the Empress, who was now detained in her own quarters. Soldiers were already on their way to check. "Maybe he shall get Mesopotamia..."
The Emperor's words died away as the sound of nailed boots on marble echoed up and down the corridors of the palace. Manuel turned in time to see the
Megos Domestikos come out of one of the side corridors leading a squad of men, his face grimmer than that of death itself.
"Majesty," Demetrios started to say. Manuel raised his eyebrow - his brother never used the formal 'Majesty' around Manuel unless he was about to deliver bad news.
"What of that witch and my sons?" Manuel asked, keeping his voice even keel - something was wrong, the Emperor knew it.
"Emp... I mean, Lady Basiliea was found in her quarters only twenty minutes ago. She'd hung herself, and her body has already been stripped," Demetrios said quietly. The Emperor could see his brother's hands were shaking slightly.
"And?" Manuel braced himself. If Demetrios was upset after finding Basiliea dead, something was terribly wrong.
"We found your son Niketas," Demetrios said, before stopping to collect himself. After a moment, the
Megos Domestikos went on. "He was dead, lying in a pool of his own blood. His throat was slit, from ear to ear..."
Manuel started to open his mouth, but nothing came out. Suspects ran through his mind, and immediately his mind settled on one. So - since she was defeated, she decided to deprive Manuel of the one thing he had from her - two strong, healthy, wholly legitimate children, something neither of his two sons from Ermisinde would ever be.
"And Basilieos?" the Emperor asked, clenching and unclenching his fists in order to not strike anything or anyone. Manuel was amazed to hear his voice sound deadpan, almost calm... he could tell it was frightening his brother.
"We... we do not know..."
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So Manuel has cowed the rebellion, but the bureaucracy of the Empire is in tatters. Basilieos was taken to Rome, and evaded Zeno's clutches - as well as killed a man for the first time. Will the Emperor discover Zeno's actions? Will Basilieos make it back to Konstantinopolis? And with the weakened state of the Empire, will any of her neighbors take notice? More will be revealed next time on Rome AARisen!
As a side note on the rebellion - no, they did not happen all at once. Narration wise, and given what is about to come, pasting them together into one large revolt will make sense, and considering Basiliea committed suicide, the story idea came together.
It was also about this point in gameplay that I realized I wanted to do an AAR of the game and began RPing more instead of just conquering things - which will also make what is about to happen make more sense. Next update will see us in two places far removed from Constantinople, where decisions are made that will have an immense effect on the future of the Empire...