The Albanian Dragon
Chapter 2, part 1
Afrim Kastrioti
In Ottoman Service, The Serbian War
When we ”graduated” from the Academy at Edirne Gjergj was given the name Iskander, a name that would soon be known in the entire Sultanate and thus he would be granted the title of Arnavutlu İskender Bey,
Lord Alexander the Albanian. I will refer to my brother as Gjergj during this tale at all times, unless circumstances force me to use one of his many cognomens, though.
Both of us, together with 6 other Albanian boys (two of the boys had died at the Academy due to hypothermia after being lost on a patrol exercise), took an oath to serve the Sultan to our deaths and embraced Islam. We were still Christian in our hearts, servants of God, however.
Both of us were assigned to the Ceemat, frontier troops, in the 21st orta, regiment.
A mounted regiment specified for those who are extremely good on a horseback. I'm proud to say that I was an even better rider than my brother, I was even one of the best at the entire Academy and possibly the whole army. That is not saying that Gjergj wasn't good either, in fact he was brilliant, but I do hold pride in the fact that there was one thing I could beat him in.
We were stationed at the Serbian border in the 1st army, directly under the command of Sultan Murad II, 20 and 21 years of age respectively.
Murad was a man to admire and my brother learned much from him, as did I.
He was planning to conquer Serbia, but the Hungarians had proclaimed a guarantee for the indepence of this small kingdom. So the Sultan hesitated, and what a fortune that was for him.
For in 1426 the Hussites in Bohemia were at the peak of their power and conquest. The romanist Bohemia was on their heels, the Arcduke of Austria was beaten and had converted to the heretic faith of the Hussitetes. As Emperor of the Holy Roman Kingdom, King Sigismund of Hungary and Bohemia had to divert all of his focus and military might towards this major threat.
So Murad II attacked with 30000 men.
He moved on Ras, the biggest city of Kosovo, a province under Serbian domain and laid siege to the city. The Serbian army had vanished however. Frustrated, as he wanted to end the war swiftly with a single major battle that would surely break all Serbian resistance, he ordered parts of the 21st orta, 40 men in total, to locate the Serbian army. My brothers was given command of the contignent as he had received great recommendations from another Murad, the aforementioned leader of the Military Academy.
He split the contingent in two groups of 20 men, the other being led by a 26 year old Greek named Agapetos. The orders were to return after 6 days to report to the Sultan.
We rode the hillsides for 4 days without seeing anything that resembled anything of an inhabited nation. The country had been abandoned. Several villages we crossed, all were burning or had already been burned.
As we could tell from the traces in the ground, the Serbian army had sweeped the area and driven their own population out of their homes. The Turkish invaders would receive no help from the local population, and even if I felt sympatic for the Serbians as they had done nothing other than being in the way, I could not help but feel sorry for the people. It wasn't their fault that we had invaded, why would the Serbian king punish them like this I asked my brother.
He told me it was deliberate and that the population did it voluntarily. They loved their homes too much to let it be used by the Turks. They would rather burn them and return afterwards than provide us with any shelter.
He said to me, ”brother, I fear this will be a long war with many casualties. They will harass the main army and avoid greater confrontations. The loss of life will be plentiful for the Sultan is no merciful man, and he will try to anger the Serbs so immensely to make them throw themselves into a battle that they will lose no matter what. The Serbs are doomed my friend. Let us spare the populace from much suffering and locate this damn army of theirs, the outcome is certain anyways and we are soldiers of the Sultan.”
He silently rode passed me and I followed in right behind him. I knew my brother was right, but it was hard to hear the facts from another persons mouth.
The next morning was beautiful. The sky was blue in all of its entity and there were trees as far as we could see and the mountains rose majestically around us. Even though I had been taken young, the area reminded me of Albania, my homeland.
How easy would it not have been to have turned the horse in that moment and turned home? But something kept me, I still don't know what till this day, and I think of the morning every night. What kept me there? A lust for blood perhaps, a lust to be part of something greater than me, even if I didn't agree with the cause. Fear, perhaps. Fear of Murad's revenge.
But the story must go on, for after a few hours we spotted a trail that had recently been used by a large number of men who had obviously marched in formation. There were no signs of carts, either, so we were sure that parts of the Serbian army had moved through here. And how right we were.
We all heard it. The sounds of hooves trampling on a mountain side. Gjergj ordered us to stop, but none of us had any idea where it came from. My heart pounded, were we being watched? Was doom awaiting us the very next moment?
Gjergj dropped of his horse and walked to the side of the mountain, he put his ear on the ground and all of the group were silently watching him. He peeked over the side and waved me over. I sneaked, as I had done that day at the Academy and looked over the side.
100 meters below us, almost vertically, a group of Serbian riders, numbering 15 men, were resting while the horses grassed nearby them.
There was no way we could get down the slope with the horses, so Gjergj ordered us to tie the horses to some tries further down the trail we had been following. We removed our breastplates and the rest of our armour, We would have to be silent if we were to surprise the Serbians.
He said to the group in low tone, ”Afrim, you will take nine men” and he pointed at the nine he wanted to follow me, ”down here to the left. Make sure you are unnoticed, fall in on them from behind their horses, they should be able to cover you the last part of the way. Attack when my group has engaged the enemy. The rest of you will follow me directly down above them. Spread out and follow me when I order the charge. We outnumber them, so even if they discover us our chances are good. And remember, try and capture one alive I want a prisoner that I can interrogate, but only do it if the chance is there. I don't want you to be killed because you do finish off one of them. Now let's go!”
I rushed silently to the point where Gjergj had ordered me and my small group. We climbed down the steep mountain side and the adrenaline rushed through my veins. I thought we would be discovered as my heart seemed to pound harder than a pair of marching drums.
We were not discovered however, and soon we were down at the small water stream where the horses were drinking. They did not take much notice of us and we were able to come very close. I peeked over one of them and saw my brother walking, almost flying as a ghost, down the slope. He held his hand up and ordered the group to stop and then he looked towards my position. He spotted me and I could see his white teeth as he smiled to me.
With a thundering voice, that even shook the horses, he screamed: ”charge!”
The small Serbian camp was quickly chaos as soldiers ran around in an effort to gather their weapons and array themselves in something that could look like a fighting formation. I decided to charge now, even though my brother had told me to wait until they were in full contact.
The effect was immense, a couple of the Serbs who had turned their tails and ran for the horses were shocked to see this new threat from their flank. We were over them in a second, cutting down the 4 that had tried to rout. I continued forward and plunged my sword into the side of a shocked and confusing Serbian. He screamed and slashed me across the face with his shield. I felt no pain from it, however, and stabbed him in his thigh and in his heart. I continued forward but the fighting had already stopped, 4 Serbians were begging for mercy and Gjergj, who was covered in blood from 3 enemies he had killed, ordered them tied up.
The Serbian horses were shocked and disturbed by this sudden chaos and were stamping in the ground and blowing the air hard out of their nostrils.
Gjergj send two men further down the new trail, and 30 minutes later they stood right over us yelling that the two trails met further ahead.
We spent the next 3 hours digging 12 graves, one of them meant for our only casualty, an Albanian named Albin who was on his first mission. The last 11 for our slain enemies, whom we perhaps were at war with, but still managed to show this last respect.
Gjergj held a short speech, complementing their courage and asking for their forgiveness before God.
2 days later we were back at camp with 15 new horses, a multitude of weapons and other various spoils of war. The money the Serbians had carried were equally shared among the 19 men group.
Gjergj was called to the command tent of the 21st orta as the commander, an old major named Özer, wanted to know what had happened to the rest of the group. Gjergj said he did not know, as they had split up a few hours after being send out. Gjergj explained how we had lost contact with them and that he had decided to continue his search for the Serbians, rather than worry about Agapetos' group which he assumed was just fine. Agapetos, however, had never returned to the camp and nor had any of the men following him. They never returned. They were almost certainly attacked and killed or taken prisoner by the Serbs. But it was not uncommon for patrols never to return during this war.
Three days after we had returned to Ras where much of the Ottoman army was assembled to siege the city, we moved north. Apparently, one of the 4 prisoners had told the location of the Serbian army and scouts had confirmed the location the following day.
5 days later we reached the Danube and were only 3 days march from the Serbian army.
We had had several small skirmishes with Serbian troops who constantly harassed the army at vulnerable points. Murad, however, was determined to decide the war within the week.
After three uneventful days, except for the usual sporadic attacks that had vained in strength recently, the whole Serbian army was once again spotted. They were marching towards Smederevo, the Serbian capital, most likely in order to make a last stand.
The roles had now turned and Murad ordered several cavalry regiment, not the 21st, though, to harass and attack the rear of the Serbian army that numbered some 8000 men on foot and 4000 on horse.
Compared to the 30000 battle hardened men of Murad II, of which 12000 were mounted. Stepan Lazar II's army seemed like a small bug ready to be crushed as they lined up in battle formation on that plain before Smederevo. . .
A simple servant and brother of God's hand on Earth, Afrim Kastrioti 
