Some general reply notes (as I'm sure everyone is eager to see the update below!
)
On the subject of a wiki - I've wondered about this, but if it's something people want, I simply don't have time to go it alone. If several people were willing to help out, I could
start work on a wiki of some kind. I'd only do it if there's enough interest, and if it doesn't interfere with the regular updates of the story (I'm assuming people want to know what's going to happen next too lol).
On the subject of EU3 being Narrative versus Historical - To be honest, it's about six months to a year away at the earliest. Right now I'm focused on finishing
this section.
If I go mostly historical, there'd definitely be some narrative intermixed, but like I said, it probably won't be a single coherent narrative like this one. If I do narrative, it'll likely be more single-update 'flash stories' around an event in game, or maybe a few short story arcs spanning a few updates to a chapter-length. Nothing as 'grand story arc' as this behemoth in all likelihood. I'm planning on going with the flow of things once I get there. We'll just have to see what happens!
Enough of me talking. Back to the story!
"Όντες θέλει να χαλάσει ο θεός το μέρμυγκα, του βάνει φτερά και πετάει."
-"When God wants to destroy the ant, he puts wings on him and it flies to its destruction." – Roman proverb
A small army was moving through the palace.
Like the days of yore, the Emperor was at its head, clad in fine white silks and all the crown jewels his aging frame could bear. Behind him streamed a legion of servants armed with food and drink, a tagma of scribes wielding the sharpest quills, and a host of clerks, ink-bearers,
logothetes and all manner of people necessary to create and send any dispatch to any person at a moment’s notice. The horde moved more slowly these days, however—the quick step of an Emperor in a hurry had long ago been replaced by the thump and slide of an Emperor bound to a cane, his menagerie bound to his slow gait.
Andronikos at the moment had no use for the horde—while he was in Ikonion they followed him, allowing him control as if he was in his palace in Konstantinopolis. But the business of state—arbitrating disputes amongst the
dynatoi and Franks, appointing this official or removing that one—that was all for later today.
Right now, Andronikos Komnenos was intent on a mere visit.
Officially this visit was a merry one—it wasn’t often that anyone had the joy of seeing their godson married to their daughter. Andronikos had planned the match, as an ultimate reward to his life-long friend who’d been struck so low. It’d helped that his daughter Anna had taken a liking to the striking young Theophilos Angelos, and the future Prince of Ikonion seemed smitten by the Emperor’s daughter as well. The match would seal the lifelong alliance of friendship, ensuring that for time immemorial, the Komnenoi and Angeloi would be linked by a bond of blood.
But there was another reason to come to Ikonion—Andronikos wanted to see his lifelong friend, the one man who’d been loyal to him since their days as children. Ioannis Angelos had not been in the city for years, and the Emperor missed him, and his advice, dearly.
It’d all began some sixteen years before, when Angelos complained of a fiery pain when he used the latrine. The apothecaries and medics proscribed poultices to put on his netherflesh, cures in this bath or that river, as well as prayers to God in the name of an adulterer (which Andronikos was sure Ioannis never prayed). Despite their words, the pains grew worse. Andronikos told his friend of his own poultices—he’d dabbled in reading medicine for decades since his poisoning long ago, and he proudly could say his own concoction of bloody calf livers, cream, poppy and other ingredients had lessened his own gout. Despite even imperial medical advice, the conditions worsened—the Prince of Ikonion’s face grew jaundiced, and lesions began appearing on his body. In 1285, the chirugeons proscribed a treatment in the waters of a spring just outside Ikonion. It was supposed to be a simple, short vacation from The City, a chance to heal the venereal disease that was eating away at the second most powerful man in the empire.
The bath waters relieved his pain, but only for a few days at most, so the Prince sent a letter to his Emperor, asking to be relieved of his duties until his condition improved. It was a reasonable request, and Andronikos knew Angelos likely never expected the cures to take longer than a few months at most.
Angelos never returned to Konstantinopolis.
He seemed well on his way some six months later, until a sudden fever took him nearly to death’s door. When that had passed, boils broke out across his nethers, then after
those cleared—it was a cycle of sickness that kept spiraling downward. The chirugeons were puzzled, even the best medicus in the realm was befuddled.
The priests, as always, claimed it was God’s punishment for some sin or other—the same silliness they uttered about Andronikos’ feet.
As the servants led onward, Andronikos laughed. Truth be told, Andronikos’ health had improved, not declined. His poultice, as well as pills he’d ordered from ground willow and liver had done wonders for the pain of his gout. He needed his cane nowadays more to combat the limp from his hunting injury and the poisoning than ‘rich man’s disease.’ For the first time in years, there was no medicus hovering around him all hours of the day. His mind clear, the Emperor had taken to his duties with renewed vigor—at 49, Andronikos slept barely four hours a night, his days occupied with state meetings or paperwork. Not even Albrecht, Andronikos could tell himself, had been so attentive to the government!
Finally, they reached a simple wooden door, far more modest than any of the ornate cherry or oak elsewhere in the palace. The chamberlain imperiously knocked on the door with his staff, and the Emperor heard a voice inside say, “enter.” The man turned to the Lord of the Two Seas, then opened the door.
“His Imperial Majesty…”
“No need for formalities,” Andronikos raised his hand quietly and shuffled past the chamberlain into the bedroom. Immediately the putrid smell of sickness struck the Emperor’s nose. A servant handed him a cloth to put over his face, but Andronikos waved it away—he didn’t don a cloth when he was around his leprous son, and he wouldn’t when he visited his best friend.
“You need a cloth,” Ioannis Angelos rasped, his voice wet and heavy. The Prince of Ikonion had been a large, powerful man. Even now, the frame remained, but a shadow seemed to be slowly eating it away. A single sickly gold eye on a face covered in lesions squinted at the Emperor, the other hiding behind Angelos’ perpetual eyepatch. “Bah. You were always stubborn,” Angelos sighed, rapping his long, yellowish nails on the sheets before waving his servants off.
“I recall a certain someone was often more stubborn than I, especially with Master Bacon,” Andronikos smiled, making his way over to a chair next to the bed. “I believe he once called you ‘incorrigible and unteachable?’” the Emperor added, before sitting down.
“Yes, he did,” Ioannis smiled. A thin line of blood showed around the bottom of his teeth. “I took that as a badge of pride.”
“Ha! I see being struck by God’s vengeance hasn’t silenced your tongue any!”
“It’s only made it sharper. Someone has to tell the Almighty when he makes mistakes,” Angelos said in mock gravity, before the smile returned and he took Andronikos’ hand. “It’s good to see you, Andie. Was the ceremony good? Everything set as I’d planned?”
“Everything,” Andronikos nodded. It
had been a beautiful service in the greatest church in the city—the Patriarch himself officiated, the service perfect, the couple in love. Nothing, in Andronikos’ eyes, could have been better. “Beautiful and immaculate are the only words I have, Ioannis.”
The Prince of Ikonion nodded. “Beautiful and immaculate,” he said quietly, glancing at one of his lesion covered arms for a moment. “Good. I wish I could have made it, but the chirugeons…”
“The chirugeons are always filled with gloom and doom,” Andronikos nodded to his cane, “So I want to ask
you how
you are doing? I thought you would know your own body far better than they would,” he winked.
“Ah, well alas, my current condition means I haven’t rogered anything in a good year or so!” Angelos laughed, a harsh croak that was cut off by a spate of coughing. “I’m not doing well at all,” Angelos confessed once the coughing fit subsided. “I think the chirugeons are being generous when they say I have six months left in this world.”
“Oh,” Andronikos said quickly, blinking. Six months? No, they couldn’t be right. Ioannis had always been like a tree! Yes, he’d been sick for years on, but he’d surely recover! Didn’t the
Megas survive poisoning to rule another thirty years? Hadn’t Andronikos survived the same? Surely no venereal disease could best the great Ioannis Angelos!
“Surely they’ll be wrong,” the Emperor added after a moment, “and we both can laugh at them. Back in Konstantinopolis.” He paused a moment, thinking about whether he should finish. “Where you belong,” he added at the end in haste.
“Where I belong?” Ioannis croaked. The Prince chuckled heavily. “Is that why you’re really here?”
“It… is,” Andronikos sighed. “To be blunt, I’m missing my right arm.”
Andronikos thought he could get along without Angelos—it’s why he’d allowed his friend to leave for Ikonion in the first place. But the war, then the brewing crisis, they made Andronikos realize
he needed Ioannis Angelos. He’d seen the look in Alexandros’ eyes as he rode around the Hippodrome, soaking up the applause and love of the mindless mob. He’d seen Alexios riding alongside his new father-in-law, the Exarch smiling and waving even as he mouthed likely treasons into the boy’s ear.
The succession was in crisis.
“The
dynatoi don’t quake when Syrenios enters the room,” Andronikos continued.
The nobility viewed Syrenios as a bureaucrat with blood on his hands. They viewed the powerful Prince of Ikonion as a mortal threat, someone who had killed men with his bare hands for trifling matters. Andronikos swore whenever Angelos’ name was spoken in Council, even now that ten years had passed since he last sat with them, there was a quiet hush.
“Syrenios does not suffer from boils as I do,” Angelos replied. “The chirugeons have been explicit—I must take water from the baths in Ikonion every day to relieve the pain,” Angelos said simply. He gestured forlornly to his weakened frame. “How would I get to Konstantinopolis, anyway?”
“I’ll have them cart barrels of it to The City, and send for a litter to carry you there!”
“Andronikos,” the Prince of Ikonion sighed, a noise as wet as the weeping lesions on his face, “I know I don’t have much long to live. You need…to stand on your own, as best,” Angelos nodded towards his friend’s cane, “you can.”
The Emperor of the Known World grunted, and for a moment silence hung in the air between the two friends. “If you can’t come back to Konstantinopolis,” he finally admitted, “at least lend me your ear.”
“That,” the Prince sat up slightly, “I can do with ease.”
“I sent a letter via the Blue Horde to Sultan Selim of the Turks,” the Emperor began, “congratulating him on taking Lahore.”
“A feat,” Angelos nodded, “but not one worthy of an Imperial letter. What’s the game?”
Andronikos smiled. Old Ioannis—to the point as always. “I also sent a gift of thanks for taking down a Mongol Khanate, as well as a promise that should the Persians move west, he’d have the full support of Romanion to move west also.” The Emperor chuckled darkly. “
That should keep dear little Alexandros quiet once I am gone.”
“You hope,” Angelos added.
“What does that mean?” Andronikos heard the sharpness in his voice. A moment before he’d smiled at Ioannis Angelos’ honesty. Now, it stung.
“Why would the Turk revoke their long treaty with Persia, when India is for the taking?” Angelos shook his head slowly. “You need to name a strong
Kaisar who will be co-Emperor with Nikephoros when you are gone, not a treaty the Turks will ignore. Someone that will inspire and cow the
dynatoi, have the loyalty of the army, and be able to hold back Alexandros. The Turks menacing his east will not stop him.” Angelos smiled, thin lines of blood surrounding the base of his teeth. “I’ve not been cut off while I’ve been laid up. The man is reckless to no end. Sisak?”
“He faced nothing more than a horde of Germans there,” Andronikos huffed, looking down, “not the full might of the
Anatolikon and
Basilikon.” Even as the words came out of his mouth, Andronikos felt how hollow they were. Yes, the Turks would make Alexandros leave half or more of his army behind, but he had a vast host in Persia. If he came into Romanion with even 40,000 men...
“Yes, but could you afford to move the
Basilikon with the Balkan nobles flush with cash and in Alexandros’ debt?” Ioannis rejoined. “The
Anatolikon alone wouldn’t be enough, and I heard about his reception in the city. You need a powerful co-Emperor. Certainly not Theodoros.”
“How much do you hear?” Andronikos asked, hoping Angelos was merely angling, not knowing the truth of the latest scandal in The City.
“I’m a man who struggles out of bed. I need stories to entertain me,” Ioannis smiled thinly. “Your son making a fool of himself was one.”
“Bah! There’s a reason I shipped that lackluster excuse for a son to Leptis Magna!” Andronikos sighed. Theodoros’ name might have meant “Love of God,” but the boy had already earned the ire of Patriarch Thomas. Skepticism was something Andronikos could understand, but to publically call the Patriarch a fool during a sermon that covered sexual indecency? Leptis Magna’s princely seat had conveniently regressed to the crown, just in time for Andronikos’ sanity.
“I wish I could’ve seen old Aquino erupt! I’m sure it was a sight to see!” Angelos chuckled.
“Not when your son provoked it,” Andronikos started to sigh again, before a laugh broke through. In retrospect, the man had it coming with his pompous talk—Andronikos had enough sense to keep those dark thoughts
to himself, however…
“So who will you name?” Angelos pressed. “Demetrios? The lecher extraordinaire?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“It’s more than…”
“
I’ve had issues with the weight of my trousers, Andronikos!” Angelos rasped onwards, “For God’s sake, look at me!” he gestured weakly to those yellowish eyes. “I’ve had far too much enjoyment in my bedchambers, and I’ve not been a lackluster lord as a result! I might be bedridden, but Ikonion is still wealthy and ruled well…”
“The boy’s a fool,” Andronikos harrumphed.
“He’s been a man…”
“He’s a boy where it counts!” the
Megas Komnenos tapped a finger against his head. “He reaches for the sword every time a problem confronts him. During my 38 years on the throne, we’ve had war for only 11 years. Only 11, Ioannis!” Andronikos thumped his cane on the floor. “Only four years did war reach the Empire itself! Segeo and Gabriel’s invasion! We do not need war! We need peace!” The Emperor sighed, and looked out the window. Ikonion, he decided, was more beautiful than the descriptions allowed. The towers and domes held his gaze for a moment, reminding him of what he’d worked for, what he’d done. He tore his eyes away, and looked back at Angelos. “All that idiot boy would give us is
tagmata marching to India simply because he was bored,” Andronikos finished.
[Demetrios]
“True,” Angelos grunted, “but he’ll rise in rebellion if he’s not named.”
“And he’ll be crushed if he’s that foolish,” Andronikos said quickly.
“And who’ll do the crushing?” Ioannis pressed. “Nikephoros in a few years might not be able to lift a blade, if he’s alive. Your
Megas Domestikos is older than you. So who’ll break him?”
“I’m putting Godwinson up for
Megas when Romanos decides to retire.”
“You want my advice? You’ll need more than the Varangian. He’s
still older than you,” Angelos said. “You’ll have Demetrios starting things in Italy, and Alexandros coming from Persia. You won’t like it, but you need Spain. You need the Exarch.”
“No!” Andronikos snapped. In his fury, it wasn’t until after he was on his feet that Andronikos realized he’d leapt from his chair without his cane. For a moment, he hung awkwardly, before half-sitting, half-falling back into his seat.
“No,” Andronikos sighed at the ghost of Albrecht von Franken, dancing in the shadows of his mind, “no. No successor of mine will have an all-powerful kingmaker hovering behind him. Makrinokomnenos would shove Nikephoros aside at the first instant. He means to become another Albrecht!” the
Megas Komnenos growled. “Besides, I hate the Exarch. The man is a cancer on the empire. His death can’t come too soon!” Andronikos growled in frustration. He’d
ordered the
Oikoi to rid him of the man, but the deed had not, and probably would not, be done. The chances to do the deed quietly always seemed to fade before the
Oikoi could act, and the shrewd Exarch was too popular to be publically taken down.
“You mean,” Angelos said quietly, “you hate the fact that he’s outplayed you so far?”
“He’s not outplayed me!” Andronikos growled. “The damn bastard’s been lucky, that’s all! Sheer blind luck has kept him out of the snares of the
Oikoi! Your man, Syrenios, plans each of the plots against him personally! Tell me Syrenios…”
“Could have been bought out?” Ioannis shrugged. “Andronikos, it was my business for decades to be suspicious. I know…” Angelos stopped, as coughing robbed him of his voice for a moment, “I know the Antemios Syrenios I brought in thirty years ago. The man was intelligent then. And any intelligent man is going to be planning on what to do…”
“…when I’m dead,” Andronikos nodded reluctantly.
Angelos nodded as well. “If you bring in Alexios, you’d get the Exarch. What you can’t fight,” the Prince wheezed out another laugh, “co-opt to your needs. You’d get the Exarch’s popularity, you’d get his armies. Would he topple Nikephoros? He might… but if you
don’t pick Alexios, at least Demetrios and Alexandros will rip the crown from your son’s head! If Alexios has a mind the size of a mustard seed, he’ll join the fray too!”
“I know,” Andronikos sank further into the chair. The very thought had been a specter, hovering in the recesses of his mind since the triumph four years before. Four men claiming to be Emperor, a crisis the Empire had not seen in centuries.
“Normally,” Ioannis said, “this is the part where you would agree to my counsel. You’re still thinking?”
“I am,” Andronikos grunted. The crisis loomed, but any crisis could be averted. That’s what the throne had taught Andronikos. He’d suffered setbacks before, but Andronikos Komnenos always emerged on top, always emerged victorious. The only difference between now and Nikaea or the fight against Arghun was that he was a little older, and a little wiser, cane-bound he might be.
But who to pick? Alexios risked Nikephoros being shuffled off or worse. Demetrios was out of the question.
“What about…”
“Manuel? You legitimized him by fiat!” Angelos shook his head. “That won’t be enough when you’re gone. Is he still loyal to Nikephoros?”
Andronikos nodded.
“Good. Make him
Archeoikos if you can,” Ioannis said. “From what I have heard of him…” Angelos smiled slightly, “the boy is ready.”
Andronikos echoed the weak smile. “He had a great tutor.”
“I did what I could,” the Prince said matter of factly, before his face grew serious again. “Then there’s Antemios. A Syrenios thinking about his future…”
Andronikos nodded again. “I was thinking of making him
Hypatos in France. It’d be a ‘promotion for years of service’ that forces him away from the webs of power. Perhaps he can maintain my holdings in France. If he can’t…” the Emperor shrugged. The feudal mess that was France, with its inept administration and vicious nobility would be no great loss. The Capetians were out—that was all Andronikos cared for.
“I’m glad to see you haven’t lost track of common sense in The City,” Angelos smiled weakly.
Andronikos frowned. He knew what words were coming next. He knew they would be sensible, even convenient.
Logic, however, wouldn’t make them right—at least not in Andronikos’ own conscience. He’d made an oath—one of Cecilia’s sons would wear the diadem, and as he was sure Demetrios would become a warmonger, it had to be Nikephoros. Alexios meant Makrinokomnenos, and the Exarch meant Nikephoros being swept aside. Makrinokomnenos thought himself another von Franken…
“Next, set pride aside and announce Alexios as…”
“No,” Andronikos cut off his friend.
“No?” Angelos raised an eyebrow.
“A weak boy and that rat bastard won’t rule over
my empire.” It took Andronikos a second to realize the dark, deadly voice was his own. He looked over at his lifelong friend—Angelos’ eyebrows were still raised. The Prince of Ikonion coughed.
“Your empire? Andronikos, you know you can’t simply force…” Ioannis began quietly.
The Emperor wasn’t sure what made him explode. Ioannis’ tone was quiet, respectful, and his words calm, reasonable. But by God,
Andronikos was the one who daily played the part of the benevolent ruler,
Andronikos was the one who gave the whole of his time and care to the needs of state,
Andronikos was the one who read mountains of papers day in, day out, rain or shine! As Angelos quietly spoke of the loyal
Oikoi who looked to him, the
strategoi that needed appeasing, the
dynatoi rumbling at the gates, Andronikos’ anger grew and grew, until finally…
“It
is my empire!
My empire!
I made this empire!
My sweat,
my work, was what made
Romanion what it is!” Andronikos snarled, shoving himself to his feet with his cane. “Do you forget what the realm was like when I took over? Spain in revolt? The Persians on the march, with French and Danes and Konstantinos all waiting with baited breath for the crown to tumble from my head?! It’s because of
me that Spain now sends her taxes to Konstantinopolis, it’s because of
me the French are toothless and the Germans cowed, it’s because of
me that men from the Pillars to Central Asia kneel before the
Megas Komnenos! By God, it’s
my empire, and it will go to the heir
I want! And if anyone doesn’t like it, the cockups can…”
“…act like a Vlach and ‘play’ with some sheep?” Ioannis politely finished his friend’s vulgar phrase. The words brought the Emperor’s rant to a stuttering halt. Angelos smiled grimly. “For all that bluster, you didn’t do it all alone. I remember someone at Nikaea needed help drawing their sword…”
Andronikos glared, the memory of that moment long ago coming fresh to his mind. The terror, the shame, the helplessness and fear. As quickly as his anger came, it faded into the misty memory of a past long gone.
“You needed me back then,” Angelos pressed on softly, resolutely. “You’ll need Makrinokomnenos now.”
Andronikos felt his hands clench around the tip of his cane.
No more Albrechts.
“No,” Andronikos shook his head slowly. “I’m going to name Leo.”
“Leo? The boy’s 19…” Angelos croaked in surprise.
“…and untested, yes I know,” Andronikos looked down at his friend. “But he’s very intelligent, he’s loyal to his brother, and he has the potential to be something great.”
“Potential cannot rule an empire,” Angelos warned.
“I know,” Andronikos looked down for a moment. He’d pondered this, long and hard—it would be fine, he told himself. He was Andronikos, he’d thought of worse solutions to tougher situations, and all had turned out well! “I’m going to name him
Hypatos of Sicily, as well as give him some duties with the Western Fleet,” the Emperor said. “He’ll get some administrative experience, and a chance to woo some of the
Skazoi and
Discouroi that are leaning Demetrios’ way. The fleet links he builds can pin Alexios in Spain while he deals with Alexandros.” Andronikos tapped his cane lightly on the floor and grinned. “I’ve got it all planned out!” He looked over expectantly towards Ioannis, expecting his friend to nod, to smile, to say the plan was excellent.
Instead, there was only silence. Andronikos’ smile drooped, then finally fell into a scowl of annoyance.
“What?” he complained, sitting back down.
“Are you sure you’re trying to persuade me,” Angelos finally wheezed, “or are you trying to persuade yourself?”
Andronikos glared again. “It will work! Leo needs five years, that’s all!” The Emperor pushed himself up with his cane to prove his point, “I’ve got more than that in my bones, my good man! No gout!” he tapped his foot.
“More than gout kills men,” Ioannis pointed at himself. “If he has the time to grow, yes, Leo would be the best by far. But most of us don’t know how much time we have left.”
“I have more than a few years,” Andronikos said sourly.
A sickly Ioannis Angelos folded his hands over his lap. “Who knows about this? If Makrinokomnenos finds out…”
“You,” the emperor of an even more sickly empire said grimly, before looking over at his friend. “I intend to keep it that way, until Leo is ready, and I’ve brought in the army and the fleets to back him.”
Angelos slowly shook his head. “For your sake, Andronikos, I hope you are right…”
“I do too,” Andronikos said under his breath.
So the Angelids are now fully tied to the Komnenoi imperial line, and Andronikos ignores good advice from his dying friend. Was it pride? Fear of another Albrecht? Andronikos demanding his empire to continue the way he wants? The wheels continue to turn as we approach the end of an era, next Rome AARisen!