The Thin Wedge of Europe

[Midnite Duke]

War from South? Who are Moravia's allies as the war is probably an ally dragging Moravia in? Thanks

 

[HistoryDude]

Is the Kral worried that the royal court will eat his son alive? He seems too benevolent to last long there… especially given that the court is divided right now.

It’s nice to see the monarchy cracking down on serfdom. I can‘t imagine the nobles are happy about that, though. Hopefully they don‘t rebel…

Let’s hope that Moravia isn’t too reliant on potatoes in the future…

 

[Von Acturus]

Otakar seems on the track to becoming a great king, if he can retain that blindness to rank and social position.

War from the south? That should be an interesting change of pace for Moravia's armies. Against whom? Byzantium?

 

[Revan86]

THIRTY-ONE.
At the Gates of al-Mawṣil
4 August 1559 – 4 June 1563

​

‘Kráľ Tomáš,’ the swarthy, rather near-sighted messenger from Thessaly spoke to him in open court, ‘in times gone by, Moravia provided much-needed assistance to Thessaly in the defence of the true believers of Mesopotamia and Armenia. Your noble ancestors Ostromír and Róbert, in particular, proved to be steadfast friends to our Despots in their attempts to send succour and bring enlightenment anew to the regions where Saint Ephrem and Saint Isaac once walked. Now, Thessaly humbly begs your assistance again. The ancient city of Nineveh is under attack by the Kurds of Hamadan, who lay claim to it in the name of their Mohammedan heresy. Without Moravian assistance, Nineveh will surely fall. I beg you to come to the assistance of your brethren in the Faith.’

Kráľ Tomáš 2. had never really been one for appeals to Orthodox piety, but the appeal to his forefathers did touch his heart rather closely. In particular, Tomáš revered his heroic (diminutive, red-headed) great-great-great-grandfather, and in particular how he kept true to his word when it was given. Thus he answered the messenger:

‘You may tell the noble Despot that Moravia shall indeed answer this call, and that we shall send men and troops to defend Nineveh against this assault.’

In the absence of a suitable general after the death of Zdravomil Krakovští z Kolovrat, the lot fell to the nineteen-year-old Artemie Štefaník to take charge of the Moravian Second Army.

‘Bratku!’ cried a voice from across the castle courtyard.

The Crown Prince, Otakar, came hurtling down the steps and ran to embrace Artemie, who hugged the boy back. Otakar looked up to his ‘brother’ and said:

‘Keep well and safe, Artemie.’

‘Are you kidding?’ the East Slovak zbrojnoš ruffled Otakar’s sandy-brown hair with a laugh. ‘I’ll come back covered with glory and honours! And maybe in defending an ancient Christian city I’ll manage to push my reprobate bastard soul through a couple of the ordeals.’

‘You shouldn’t need that,’ Otakar said earnestly.

Artemie hugged his friend a bit closer. ‘Never change, Otík. You always did look for the best in men.’

The Moravian Second Army was soon joined by the forces of its vassal Drježdźany, as Hrabja Rodźisław 2. sent a healthy contingent of Sorbian riders and gunmen to assist in the defence of Nineveh. But they would see action long before they set foot upon the Asian continent.

The Kárpátok Birodalma was undergoing one of its clockwork-predictable internal political crises as the Moravians were due to march south. This time, the rule of the Detvanských was being challenged not from within the family, but by an unrelated Carpathian nobleman named Nitrabor Vorošilov. Vorošilov had already seized control over the central city of Byhor and was now busy besieging Békéš, which is where the Moravian Armies met his forces in September, on their southeastern march from Bratislava.

The Battle of Békéš was costlier in terms of infantry power than the Moravian commanders expected. Artemie Štefánik charged out ahead with his Second Army cavalry for a bold action against the Carpathian long gun emplacements—but because the gunmen were engaged with the Moravian infantry, they failed to take notice of the cavalry charge until it was already on top of them. Not many of the guns were captured or destroyed, but the rear field had been thrown enough into disarray that it was a relatively simple matter for the Moravians to force Vorošilov’s retreat.

The Moravian armies chased Vorošilov down from Békéš past Makov, and onto the Pannonian Basin, where they met him again in battle at Torontál. This time, Vorošilov’s forces were entirely wiped out. Nitrabor Vorošilov himself was handed over to the new Általános, who received the offer of the prisoner with deep gratitude. Carpathia reassured Moravia of its continuing goodwill and friendship as the Moravian armies marched on southward through Eastern Rome and into the territories held by Thessaly.

Intriguingly, both Tomáš’s agreement to defend Nineveh and his actions against the rebels under Vorošilov in Carpathia won the Moravian court quite a few friends in the Orthodox world, and deepened the friendships they already had. The šafár of Rodźisław 2., Awgust Jakobic, arrived in Olomouc in February of 1560, bringing gifts of hand-painted, gilt icons of several Moravian saints that had been written in Budyšin: Saint Jakub the King, Saint Ján the Blind of Prague, Saint Milo the Recluse and Great-Martyr Dorotea of Utrecht.

‘Moj Pán Rodźisław presents these gifts to your Majesty in token of your firm defence of the Faith and your unwavering assistance in Christian brotherhood to your neighbours. Please accept them in token of Drježdźany’s admiration and appreciation,’ Awgust intoned.

This Tomáš 2. did with gratitude. Again, although his religious observance wasn’t particularly fervent or even regular, he was still touched by the gesture and by the value that his cousin Rodźisław clearly set on his regard. The relations between Moravia and Drježdźany certainly grew warmer and more affectionate as a result of this gift.

However, the Church in southern Bohemia was undergoing something of an internal crisis. A small but vocal and increasing number of monks and nuns were beginning to preach the doctrine of apostolic poverty and rejection of property which had been promulgated by the monastic father Nil of Sora in Ruthenia, and which was almost certainly influenced by the Johanit movement in that region. As strange as it might seem, these monastic ‘Non-Possessors’, or Nedržitelia, found support among the local nobles and landholders for a rather perverse reason: if the Church was divested of its lands, the ownership of those lands would revert to the nobles.

Kráľ Tomáš was thus faced with something of a dilemma. Although he personally sympathised with the non-possessors and their enjoinder to apostolic poverty—surely the Church already had enough funds and power?—the threat which was posed by the nobles to his authority was becoming greater and greater. Serfdom was now deeply entrenched in the Bohemian and Moravian lands, the result of a new spirit of acquisition and greed among the nobles. And now they were seeking to advance themselves behind the masque of churchmen preaching the opposite! That degree of hypocrisy turned the young Kráľ’s stomach. And so he ruled that:

‘For the last thousand years, the Holy Church has used its possessions to care for the poorest and weakest of His human creatures: the sick, the leprous, the indigent, the orphans and the widows. I shall not rob them of their prerogative so to dispose of the material that is entrusted to their care.’

~~~

In support of every army of troops, there must march an army at least equal in size and much greater in spread and scope, of packers and haulers, providers of food and clothes, smiths and carpenters and engineers. This has always been true—as the recent fiasco with the quality of the uniforms had proven. And this was true especially of long campaigns in foreign lands. Unfortunately, the crop of pine and larch timber this year had been blighted by some fungal growth which made the wood all but useless, and therefore the carpenters among this second army were hard-pressed to craft any sort of siege equipment for the infantry, and even basic things like field splints and wooden bunk-frames were in short supply. (Thankfully Moravia didn’t have a navy anymore to speak of.)

When they came to Nineveh—called al-Mawṣil by the locals—they found it being besieged by the Kurdish bey, ’Amîr ibn Ḥassân. The besieged city rallied to see the vanes of the Moravians approaching from the direction of the Anatolian hills, as they moved to intercept the Kurdish attackers.

The Kurds of the Emirate of Hamadan—most of them actually from much closer by than that, from ‘Arbîl—attacked as they knew best: with the assured, practised cavalry actions that often dominated the warfare of the northern Mesopotamian foothills. The heavily-armoured Kurdish aswârân led punishing charges against the corners of the Moravian divisions-en-tiers, managing to decimate the initial lines of infantry and take out even some of the heavy artillery units at the rear before the commanders had time to recoup. It looked for a rather dicey time like ibn Ḥassân would carry the day.

However, on the Moravian left flank, among the First Army, one young commander stood forth and began barking orders to redeploy the long guns for fire in enfilade against the oncoming cavalry. This was a young man of Moravia Proper named Ruslav z Pernštejna, whose family were noble landowners and Rychnovský retainers of very old, established blood. Command came to the youngster naturally. He lifted one hand and clenched his fist, and the long guns behind him roared in staggered volleys across the field. At once the ground upon which the Kurdish aswârân rode erupted in violent plumes of dust; shouts and moans and sounds of dying horseflesh signalled grimly to Pernštejna that his tactic had worked.

Despite the initial losses, the Battle of al-Mawṣil ended in a Moravian victory, as the Kurds began to meet with much heavier resistance from the First Army’s regrouping action. Unfortunately, young Pernštejna let the victory go to his head. He gave the order to chase to the Kurds into the hills, which was a drastic strategic error on his part. Once in their home territory, the Kurds were able to melt into the landscape and engage in asymmetrical tactics that hounded and harassed the Moravian Army in its pursuit. A series of ambushes around Marâġeh which resulted in the loss of nearly half of the Moravian cavalry were enough to turn the Moravian Army back the way they came, all the way back to Diyâr Bakr.

~~~​

On the home front, a terrible wave of the English sweat occurred in Olomouc, resulting in thousands of deaths. Tomáš, in a show of strength and solidarity with the populace, refused to flee the city but instead Mere days before the English sweat outbreak became known, Abbot Trifon sent a sternly-worded message to Olomouc bidding Brother Jeansa to return to Peäccam, in language that would brook no demurral. Jeansa left Olomouc that day. By the time he had arrived in Peäccam he had already contracted the disease, and Abbot Trifon and the brothers of Peäccam all joined in the prayers for Brother Jeansa’s salvation. He was shriven and administered the Holy Gifts, and then met his death peacefully, blamelessly and in the company of his brothers. The Sámi monk was buried after three days in the abbey grounds at Peäccam.

Even the king was by no means immune from the sickness, and Kráľ Tomáš’s breaking out in chills and aches and weakness of body caused great consternation in the court as he was kept under quarantine. Another Štefánik regency seemed to be in the offing, but there was little doubt that the barely-restrained rivalry between said Steward and the Queen Mother would erupt into true bloodletting should the unthinkable happen and Otakar was thrust into the unenviable position of yet another child king. Contingency plans were made to delegate certain powers into the hands of the nobility so that there would be fewer weapons to wield between those two.

As it happened, however, Tomáš’s fever broke and the hue of his flesh and the strength of his body returned. And not a moment too soon, as the reports came in of Kurdish armies descending from the Tatras to lay siege to the town of Zemplín in East Slovakia. The war that Moravia was fighting on Thessaly’s behalf had come home to the Moravian heartland. Tomáš rallied what few defenders could be found still on Moravian territory and moved to defend the central valley from Hamadani attack.

The bulk of ’Amîr ibn Ḥassân’s forces had remained in Mesopotamia, however. And Ruslav z Pernštejna—having learned patience rather the hard way—had regrouped the Moravian armies with Thessalonian reinforcement. The armies took up a strategic, defensive position around al-Mawṣil, and it was not long before ’Amîr ibn Ḥassân and Pernštejna faced each other once again across the battlefield.

Once again, it was an all-too-costly victory for the Moravians: the second battle at al-Mawṣil left untold thousands of dead—Moravian and Kurd, Greek and Turk, Arab and Persian—scattered beneath the walls of the mighty biblical city. In the end, however, it became all too clear that ’Amîr ibn Ḥassân had neither the men nor the materiel to keep up the pressure in that horrendous meat-grinder; and he was forced once again to beat the retreat from Nineveh.

The Hamadanis came to an agreement with Moravia on the fourth of June, 1563. The Kurds agreed to withdraw, and in the name of God Almighty forsake all their claims over Thessalian lands. The Kurds also agreed to pay an extended indemnity consisting of a certain percentage of their trade volume as well as their tax revenue over the following ten years.

 

[Revan86]

THIRTY-TWO.
The Manufactory
2 October 1563 – 1 December 1569

‘… the sad thing is, that Pernštejna never made it back from the front,’ Artemie was saying. ‘He was taken ill as we were coming through Kjustendža. He was indomitable against the Kurds, but against the unseen enemy he had no defence. God took him from us too soon.’

‘May God make his memory to be eternal,’ Otakar crossed himself. Artemie had been regaling the younger lad with tales of the military expedition to al-Mawṣil.

‘And… on the home front…’ Artemie nudged Otakar with his elbow. ‘How did the campaign to capture the affections of the lovely Miss Imriška progress in my absence?’

Otakar flushed painfully. He had long confided in Artemie Štefánik of his infatuation with the court lady Imriška Múdra. He had waxed quite poetic on the physical virtues which the Múdra débutante possessed, as well as the charms of her voice, her laugh, her bearing. But the events that had accompanied the war in Hamadan had robbed Otakar of his innocence in a certain regard.

It was easy for a woman to be attracted to a crown prince’s title, to his position, to his power. Or else, perhaps, it was hard for a woman to say no to someone in Otakar’s position. But Imriška’s heart had remained far away from him. She was happy to accompany him in official functions, to be seen together with him, to bask in the glory that the Rychnovských enjoyed by their mere presence. Kráľ Tomáš led a government that was seen not only as rightful, but popular, and acclaim accompanied him wherever he went. Acclaim can be intoxicating, even in its reflected form.

But when it came to anything privy, she had little in common with him and even less desire to build upon that. She preferred to spend time with a certain swain in the garrison. Otakar—infatuated though he still was with her—couldn’t ignore the truth of his own eyes. All the power, prestige and wealth in Europe couldn’t buy a single dram of love.

Artemie Štefánik let out a long sigh at hearing this tale of woe. ‘Tell me about it. I suppose I come at the problem from the other side, though. Most court ladies wouldn’t look twice at the likes of me, unless it was to sneer at a “son of a whore”.’ He tried to keep his tone light, but he couldn’t quite keep the bitterness out at the end.

‘That’s their loss,’ Otakar said earnestly. ‘No one who actually knows you, or your mother, would think of you that way. I’m not sure there’s anyone in the court who is as honest or as diligent as you are.’

Artemie let out a mirthless laugh. ‘Believe me, if I were anything less, I’d be slumming it in the German quarter rather than living here at all.’

Otakar extended a hand. ‘Let’s make a pact, then. I’ll help you find a woman who can see you for you, and you help me find a woman who can see me for me.’

Artemie thought for a minute, then took it. ‘You’ve got yourself a deal, wingman.’

~~~

It was in May of 1564 when Mahtar Ventimiglia happened to be walking beneath a section of fortress wall that was being expanded, and a sizeable chunk of masonry came loose and fell about fifty feet, crushing Ventimiglia’s head and left shoulder. He died almost instantly.

Ventimiglia’s abrupt demise had prompted a subsequent flurry of speculation among the court at Olomouc. Although he had long been considered Štefánik’s man in the courtly feud between him and Queen Mother Lesana, the resulting investigation found absolutely nothing to link her with Ventimiglia’s end. And in some respects, that was even more troubling than if there had been firm suspicion of foul play in her direction. Who else but the Queen Mother could want Ventimiglia dead?

Unfortunately, an alternative explanation presented itself. The East Franks, who had been fairly quiet neighbours to Moravia for some time (particularly when compared to Bavaria and Austria), had suddenly begun making a series of rather aggressive moves against the Moravians. Seeing the Moravians building up their western defences under Kráľ Tomáš under the advisement of Hubert Kozár, and their opportunities for a quick nab at the lands under Bavarian influence vanish with Tomáš’s quick actions in the Sorbian principalities, had soured the East Franks considerably against their eastern neighbour. When it became known that there had been several workmen on that section of wall that had collapsed above Ventimiglia, who more than occasionally frequented the brothels in Olomouc’s German quarter, the connexions began to become clearer.

And Róbert Sokol had been essentially caught with his pants down by this breach of Moravia’s innermost security—a successful political assassination by a foreign power within the Olomouc city walls.

‘The East Franks,’ Tomáš opined, ‘cannot hurt us any worse than we hurt ourselves.’

This is what he said just before sacking Sokol over this breach of security.

In his place, the Kráľ hired a young local nobleman by the name of Lotár z Ditrichštejna. This choice raised quite a few eyebrows. Lotár not only belonged to ancient high blood of the East Frankish nobility, with the seat of their present honour in Austria (the castle Dietrichstein), but even his name, held first by the son of Queen Bratromila, hearkened back to the period of the Partition and the period of German supremacy in Moravia.

But Lotár z Ditrichštejna was a member of the Moravian Orthodox Church in good standing. He had served the Moravian kingdom in several of its wars—with distinction. And what’s more, he had a knack for understanding the flow of money and goods, of which none else in Moravia but the shrewdest of Bratislava burghers could boast.

Tomáš had also replaced the late Brother Jeansa with a certain Ján z Vartemberka, a natural scientist from Bratislava. He had also selected in place of Mahtar Ventimiglia a Czech Roman Catholic from Praha named Vladimír z Rožmberka. All three of these men were young blood, in their thirties in age. Together, they constituted a thoroughgoing overhaul of the inner Zhromaždenie and a fundamental generational shift of power away from both the Queen Mother and the Steward.

Tomáš 2. was finally taking matters into his own hands and building a coalition within the court that was loyal first to him rather than to any factions. But this action was not without its critics. The Moravian nobles objected to Ditrichštejna, a German by ancestry, taking so exalted a position in his Majesty’s trust. And the Orthodox clergy objected in particular to Rožmberka, who was a Catholic.

~~~​

The changes that accompanied this shift in the King’s Council came swiftly and suddenly—too swiftly and suddenly for the tastes of many in Moravia.

Tomáš, though he had upheld the rights of Orthodox monasteries in their disputes with the Nedržitelia, nonetheless took nearly as dim a view of Churchly power as he did of noble power. He came down firmly on the side of the secular authorities in several Crown cities when certain legal disputes arose between these city governments and the clergy inside them. Tomáš strictly upheld the city laws against the canons, reasoning that the clergy should be expected to abide by all of the standards that the laity did within the city walls.

And the final link between Moravia and the oceans was also severed.

‘In purely finical terms,’ Lotár z Ditrichštejna advised, ‘we spend much more on maintenance and repair of the Baltic fleets than we gain by any trade with them. The Baltic fleets are also an unacceptable division of our attention, if you will excuse my impudence in saying so. It would be far better to sell those ships back to the Sámi, and sell them the port at Luleju as well, so that we can focus on keeping as significant a share of the Wien trade as we can.’

Kráľ Tomáš was privately inclined to agree, and not only for the economic reasons that his advisor gave him. According to the King’s acute sense of justice and sympathy for the Sámi, the Lules deserved to be united with their brethren under the Kola Protectorate. And so Tomáš authorised the sale, at essentially nominal prices, not only of the two Baltic fleets but also of the port at which they were berthed to Kola, with the result that the Kola Protectorate controlled an unbroken swathe of land between the Peninsula for which it was named and the northernmost inlet of the Gulf of Bothnia.

In general, the Kráľ’s insistence on competence over right of birth, and of merits over background or political connexions, by which he had promoted his inner Zhromaždenie, had broad consequences throughout Moravia. In particular, the monastic school in Olomouc began emphasising the purity of research and the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake, rather than as part of a system of patronage or as the basis for intellectual cliques.

And then there came possibly the most revolutionary change of all.

Another private viewing was arranged by Kozár for the benefit of the Kráľ and Kráľovná, as well as the inner Zhromaždenie, of another new-fangled machine. This time, it was Milomíra who exclaimed most over what she saw.

This machine was also mounted on a wooden frame, and from the side it looked like a positive organ, with a seat in front of the mechanism and several small pedals where the feet would rest. But from the hand position it couldn’t have looked less like a musical instrument. There was something that looked like a hand loom mounted on it, with a large pulley and belt apparatus beneath.

‘I see, I see,’ Milomíra marvelled as she walked around it. Then she sat down at the leather-strapped seat and touched the needle bar.

‘Careful—careful with that, moja Kráľovná!’ cried Leoš Přibyl, the Czech burgher whose invention the machine was. ‘The mechanism can pass three threads of weft at once. But you have to set the bar like so, and then pedal…’

The Queen was insistent on learning how to use the automatic knitting machine (or pletací stávek, as Přibyl called it), however, and soon she was setting and working the stávek and producing a length of passable knitting-work from the head end.

‘Impressive,’ noted Ján z Vartemberka, who was engrossed in examining the needle and presser bars, and how they worked in concert using the power from the pulley and belt below. ‘Very impressive.’

‘But will it affect those in handiwork, do you think, who make their living from knitting?’ asked Tomáš.

‘It needn’t do so,’ Přibyl argued. ‘At present, the machine can create quick knit fabrics of the quality you see. For finer work, handicrafts would still be needed, as well as to examine the quality of the output.’

(A rather naïve argument, as it would later become clear. But as it was…)

Soon enough, the grounds were broken and the first textile manufactory was erected along the millrace in Olomouc, featuring five of these automatic knitting machines, which were operated primarily by the young daughters of landless serfs for a pittance. Although the quality of the output was not particularly high, the volume produced was enough that it attracted a great deal of notice.

In addition, the first operational printing press and type foundry in Eastern Europe, using the first complete set of Cyrillic punches ‘in the Strasbourg style’ of Sylvain Bourguignon, was finally established in Olomouc. The five-hundred denár reward was collected by engraver and type-cutter Jonáš Lenárt, who had produced after thirteen years of painstaking work both the typeface and the adaptation of the Western European machinery necessary to deliver it to paper. The Lenárt typeface, which adopted the square and readable shape of the Roman serif fonts then in use in the West, soon also became the standard for civil script in Ruthenia and Carpathia.

 

[HistoryDude]

How did a state named Thessaly come to exist in Mesopotamia?

The nobles are unlikely to be satisfied by Tomas’s explanation.

At least Otakar realized the thing about love and fame quickly. That lesson should serve him well in the future.

 

[Von Acturus]

Moravia seems to have taken quite a lead in matters of technological progress, probably due in part to the relative open mindedness of it's clergy.

That war against the Kurds could have been a disaster if only one or two mistakes were made, as it was it turned into a show of force and devotion that will surely make the enemies of Moravia think twice before attacking.

Otakar extended a hand. ‘Let’s make a pact, then. I’ll help you find a woman who can see you for you, and you help me find a woman who can see me for me.’

Artemie thought for a minute, then took it. ‘You’ve got yourself a deal, wingman.’

Otakar and Artemie's friendship is quite wholesome, notoriously different from any Alliance of convenience.

 

[Midnite Duke]

Oatkar needs to pursue older blondes. Quanity over quality is the way of progress. Thanks

 

[Revan86]

How did a state named Thessaly come to exist in Mesopotamia?

Short version: CK3 happened.

Longer version: the Despotate of Thessalonika became independent of Eastern Rome sometime in the 1200s ITL. The territories that went with it included some holdings in Asia Minor, such as Cilicia. My aforementioned Moravian kings both had alliances with Thessalonika, and were frequently called upon to assist in Thessalonika's wars against their Muslim neighbours, which expanded their Asian holdings into Mesopotamia and Armenia.

The nobles are unlikely to be satisfied by Tomas’s explanation.

At least Otakar realized the thing about love and fame quickly. That lesson should serve him well in the future.

We shall see how Otakar progresses.

Moravia seems to have taken quite a lead in matters of technological progress, probably due in part to the relative open mindedness of it's clergy.

That war against the Kurds could have been a disaster if only one or two mistakes were made, as it was it turned into a show of force and devotion that will surely make the enemies of Moravia think twice before attacking.

Moravia seems to be very well-positioned. Western technology group and Eastern Orthodox religion gives it some decided advantages.

And yeah, the Kurds used some decent tactics to inflict some real pain on my armies. I eventually reverted back to my tried-and-true little army and big army bait-and-switch, which served me well against them.

Otakar and Artemie's friendship is quite wholesome, notoriously different from any Alliance of convenience.

If the mark of a man's moral character, as JW von Goethe said, is in how he treats those who can do nothing for him, then Otakar seems to be doing fairly well for himself on that score.

Oatkar needs to pursue older blondes. Quanity over quality is the way of progress. Thanks

As one twentieth-century statesman once put it: 'Quantity has a quality all its own.' Thank you all for reading!

 

[Revan86]

THIRTY-THREE.
Podolie
2 January 1570 – 1 January 1578

I.
2 January 1570 – 24 December 1572

The enhanced security measures that were put in place against the East Franks were paying some fairly significant dividends—as, indeed, were the more generous salary packages mandated for bureaucrats and civil servants under the Kráľ. There were few foreign operatives who were able to make any headway among the people who knew anything of importance of Moravia’s internal affairs—and those who did usually didn’t get very far before being discovered.

On the other hand, Moravian officials were able to glean quite a bit from the East Frankish operatives that they’d captured. For example: the depletion of the stocks of European beaver in the west was creating a difficult situation for the luxury tailors and hatters that relied on the pelts of such animals. This information was quickly and effectively relayed northward to the Kola Protectorate, and the Sámi hunters who still made their livings from trapping and hunting were able to make a tidy little profit over their increased share of that particular market.

After the glorious victory over the Hamadanis in 1563, the Army of Moravia experienced a groundswell of enthusiasm. The Moravian state had become, in the eyes of many Orthodox Christians, once more a bastion of the faith, and a rigorous defender of oppressed and beleaguered Christians in troubled and vulnerable parts of the world. The armed forces had somewhat capitalised on this development, and by 1570, recruits were flooding in from across the country.

Crown Prince Otakar was given the opportunity to inspect one such recruitment centre, in the far eastern province of Maramoroš. He went in person to view the premises and interview some of the new recruits. But the locals caught wind of his visit. The lieutenant in charge of the recruits in Siget told the Crown Prince:

‘You may get a rather… unpleasant visit during your stay here. I’ve advised your detail to pay attention to calls from a certain lady—I use the term quite loosely in her case—who may call upon you to complain of our activities here.’

‘Who is this lady?’

‘No one you need be concerned with, môj Pán,’ the lieutenant said stiffly. ‘To say it straight: she is a wretched, disreputable woman, a stain upon her noble house and a polluted blot of the old blood.’

‘I believe,’ Otakar reminded the lieutenant bracingly, ‘I asked for her name, not for her résumé.’

The lieutenant sighed. ‘Her name is Nadeža Rusnaková,’ he said. ‘The family is eminently respectable here in Siget, but the lady herself has proven… flexible. For some reason the recruiting in these parts upsets her. I have no idea why: given the way she behaves, one would think a parade of sharp, single young men marching through would excite her in the opposite way.’

Otakar had had rather enough of the lieutenant’s insinuations, and dismissed him to his work.

For the most part, Otakar was impressed with what he saw of the operations in Siget, and to him it seemed that the recruiters made sure that the new enlistees were given the appropriate equipment, arms and rations before being sent off to the nearest training-grounds. But true enough, on the eighth day of his stay he was approached by a local noblewoman, who introduced herself with the Rusnaková surname.

Otakar looked her over curiously. She was about ten years his senior, and possessed a coiffure of bright copper hair. She dropped a courtesy at once she saw him.

‘Môj Pán, if I might beg your patience, I would have some words with you.’

Otakar tried his best not to let the lieutenant’s illustration of her character colour his own impressions. ‘Certainly, lady. What is on your mind?’

‘The young men you have going off to train for the army,’ said Rusnaková, ‘are needed here, closer to home, organising our local defences. Whenever you and your father go off to war, I tell you, it’s Maramoroš which suffers, every time.’

‘Suffers? How so?’

Rusnaková spread her hands. ‘We are not exactly known as the wealthiest region in the kingdom, Pán. We depend upon sparse crops, grown in inhospitable soil. The young men you seem intent to draw off into military careers in Olomouc or Pardubice or Budějovice or wherever, are the sole means of sustenance for many of our elderly. And, we being a border county, we additionally have some problems when foreign armies ride through.’

‘Surely there are enough middle-aged men in Siget,’ said Otakar. ‘Why insist upon the younger ones?’

Rusnaková narrowed her eyes. ‘Who says I insist upon any?’

Otakar shrugged. The red-headed woman put a hand to her brow.

‘What have you heard? Actually, no, don’t tell me. I think I can guess.’

‘If you can guess,’ Otakar ventured as gently as he could, ‘then you can tell me the reason why?’

Nadeža Rusnaková gave the Crown Prince a long, hard stare, as though wondering how far she could trust him. Eventually she opened her mouth. ‘I imagine it is said of me,’ she told him, ‘that my morals in this matter are wanting. That I am a… Jezebel; a seductress; a vamp, intent upon sating my bestial desires with all and sundry of the male sex. Is that about the shape of it?’

Otakar shrugged again.

‘I was thirteen,’ she said, ‘when Moravia was at war with Pomerania. To most men in your position, I would imagine, it would have been thought an “easy war”. But to us here it was not so. We do not have the sort of fortifications one finds in Olomouc or Brassel. The Pomeranians came through. They took everything. They…’

She cut herself off, swallowed hard, steeled herself visibly, and went on.

‘I made the mistake of speaking up. Of protesting their thievery. About twenty Pomeranian soldiers lay hold of me, took me off into a barn, and—’ She broke off. Her voice after that took on a detached note. ‘—Well. Let’s just say no respectable man wanted anything to do with me after that.’

Otakar gasped. ‘Oh, God. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’

‘Nothing you could have done about it at the time,’ Rusnaková spoke matter-of-factly. ‘You’d have been—what, a toddler? But if it helps you to consider the plight of Maramoroš now, it will have been worth telling you.’

As far as Otakar was concerned, her tale of woe had the ring of truth to it. But he still observed Nadeža Rusnaková closely for some time afterwards. Reputation is a very strange thing indeed: he found no evidence of her being the sort of woman of habitually loose morals implied by his lieutenant. On the other hand, he did see quite a bit of evidence that she was closely invested in matters touching upon her region and her people. She gave money quite frequently and quite generously at the Church. She treated her own bowers with respect and courtesy. And she continued to lodge her protests of the recruitment policies in Siget with dogged determination despite the vicious rumours that continued to surround her. Otakar had to admire such constancy.

And then he thought of another person, maligned by fate, who was of a similar bent of mind and habit.

‘Lady Rusnaková,’ said Otakar when he chanced upon her again, ‘there’s someone I would like you to meet, the next time you’re in Olomouc.’

~~~

Kráľ Tomáš 2. had had to replace Vladimír z Rožmberka fairly soon after his gaining office. Although the court was (reluctantly) willing to countenance an Austrian nobleman with a German name in the Kráľ’s inner council, the bishops were insistent on the replacement of the resident ‘Papist’. As it happened, there was another young Czech from Praha who had a similar knack for fortifications as Blahoslav the Bosnian had once had: Siloš Syrový. Syrový’s talents were brought to the king’s attention at the following meeting of the Stavovské Zhromaždenie.

‘Siloš is,’ said Metropolitan Chvalimír of Pardubice, ‘a member in good standing of the Church. As such the Moravian Holy Zbor has no objection to his appointment on religious grounds. However, the man is full young to be advising the Kráľ on matters which touch the entire country.’

Kráľ Tomáš stifled a sigh. At times the quid pro quos of politics in these chambers seemed endless. ‘Very well. What is it that we can do for you in return for your support?’

‘The Church can set a good example, but it is the State that must perform the works of mercy that need to accompany the faith. It would be well if there might be an estate outside of Velehrad, near the Archepiscopal See, that could house and clothe and feed the indigent of the whole county, and be made to assist the Church in her philanthropic works.’

Tomáš therefore gave the order to begin clearing the grounds and laying the foundations for a monastic farm estate near the historic capital of Velehrad, in the county of Brno. And in return, he got Siloš on his council.

‘Môj Kráľ,’ Siloš spoke excitedly as soon as he was summoned into the council chambers, heaving two heaping armfuls of chart scrolls and papers on the central table, ‘I have a number of ideas for improving Olomouc—not only her defences, but her entire façade! The city is indeed grand, but look—there are ways we can make her even grander!’

The Czech’s youthful enthusiasm soon met with the Kráľ’s approval as he went over the plans that Siloš had laid out. Marketplace, warehouses, blacksmiths, barracks, guild-halls, churches, even green commons—he had plans to improve them all. Obviously, only a small part of these plans would be able to be put into motion during the coming year. But there was no reason a solid start couldn’t be made.

‘All those new recruits we rounded up from Maramoroš,’ the Kráľ said. ‘I think we need them now.’

~~~​

‘What are you doing with those men?’ Nadeža Rusnaková asked the military man who was supervising the construction of a block of new warehouses near the German quarter.

‘What does it look like I’m doing?’ asked the large, tow-headed zbrojnoš irritably.

‘It looks like you’re wasting their abilities, and using them as a menial corvée!’ Nadeža put her hands on her hips. ‘These men deserve much better treatment from you!’

‘And who are you to tell me how to command my men?’ the zbrojnoš turned toward the Rusin woman. However, he was at once stricken by the fair face that greeted him, framed by a coppery red coiffure.

‘I am a noblewoman of their land of origin,’ Rusnaková answered him. ‘And I shall not leave here until I am satisfied that the well-being of my countrymen is being assured.’

The zbrojnoš crossed his shoulders. ‘And how might I endeavour to satisfy you, lady?’

The Crown Prince came running up behind her, a bit winded. ‘There you are, Artemie! I wanted to introduce you to—ah. But I see you’ve already met.’

‘Not formally,’ said Artemie.

‘Well then. In that case: Artemie Štefánik, allow me to make Nadeža Rusnaková known to you. Nadeža; Artemie.’

A bow and a courtesy later, Artemie turned to Otakar. ‘This is the same woman you wrote to me of?’

‘The one and only.’

‘The Crown Prince speaks very highly of you, milady,’ Artemie said politely. ‘I can tell he was right about how keen your sense of justice is.’

Nadeža looked sceptically from one best friend back to the other. ‘I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, then.’

Artemie bowed to the Rusin noblewoman. ‘I’ll give these men a break from their detail, and we can work to correct that particular injustice, then.’

Nadeža flashed a dimpling smile. ‘I can’t see any objecting to that.’

 

[HistoryDude]

And… Artemie gets to gain a relationship with Rusnaková. That should be fun. I can‘t wait to see how it develops!

Spies being used for profit… how capitalist.

Does Thessalonica still rule land in Greece (from the last chapter)?

 

[Midnite Duke]

Anybody living in a border province during a war or worse in a small neutral that lies between larger belligerent parties will get a raw deal during wartime and even possible raiding during peacetime. Thanks

 

[Revan86]

II.
24 December 1572 – 12 January 1575​

The wedding of Artemie Štefánik to Nadeža Rusnaková was celebrated in Olomouc just after the feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God in 1572. The principal draw for many to the festivities was the fact that Crown Prince Otakar had volunteered to be Artemie’s best man. Given Artemie’s questionable parentage and Nadeža’s ill-deserved low reputation, the match was thought by many—including the Kráľ—to be a doomed one. But most people didn’t know Artemie and Nadeža the way Otakar did.

Nadeža was a dynamic, energetic, hardworking and pious woman; and Artemie was as honest as daylight, and he’d inherited his father’s protective streak. The two of them had hit it off at once, being quick to recognise and appreciate each other’s good qualities. They were also quick to bond over their shared experience of ostracism from circles of honour. There was, however, a difficult issue that arose between them. They discovered it after several months of wedded life.

Nadeža emerged from the privy chambers, came into her bedroom with Artemie and sat heavily on the bed. She didn’t need to say anything for Artemie to know what she’d found.

‘Again?’ asked Artemie.

Nadeža gave her husband an apologetic look. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve never exactly been, um… regular.’

Artemie embraced her. ‘Nothing you need to be sorry about.’

Nadeža leaned her copper-framed forehead against Artemie’s gold-framed one. ‘I’m not exactly a young woman anymore. We might not have many more chances.’

‘We’ll keep trying,’ Artemie assured her.

By that time the Christmas feast had arrived. Veliky Knyaz’ Aleksandr 2. of Ruthenia observed the pious niceties of allowing the festivities to pass before hurling his thunderbolt against Galicia, and declaring a campaign to subjugate the Podolie—that section of the Ukrainian flatlands lying between the Dňestr and the Južný Bug. Moravia, as ever both a natural friend to Great Rus’ and a natural enemy to Galician Rus’, was drawn into the war on the Ruthenian side: and with Moravia, joined Drježdźany and Kola. Ruthenia was also able to call upon their vassal state in Černigov, as well as the Orthodox Christian Swedish principality on the Baltic coast. Coming to the aid of Galicia were the Roman Catholic powers of Garderike and Livonia.

Since the death of Ruslav z Pernštejna in Kjustendža, there had been no commanding generals promoted to the leadership of the armies. But Artemie Štefánik was called upon to leave his new bride and lead one wing of the Second Army in the new campaign to the north. Nadeža was not exactly happy about it, although she understood the necessity. For his part, Artemie was careful (on his wife’s behalf) to be solicitous of his Uhro-Rusin soldiers’ equipage and provisions.

This time, Otakar too would accompany the Second Army and fight with them. Even though Otakar was of a placid nature and disliked the idea of fighting, particularly against fellow Orthodox Christians, he had nonetheless inherited his father’s sense of honour and fair play. The long-standing alliance of Moravia to Great Rus’ therefore was close to Otakar’s heart, as Aleksandr 2. and his wife, Knyaginya Vyačesláva Žitomirskaya, were family.

The First Army moved against Halyč through Peremyšl and Drohobyč—a well-worn route by now for the Moravian Army against Galicia. With Artemie and Otakar sharing command, the First Army quickly seized and held the territories north of Podkarpatská, while the Second Army fared northward against Veluň and Chenciny.

In the meantime, a fortuitous circumstance arose. Although the Moravians had been for a long time looking to their western border with worry at the East Francian military buildup and challenging moves to extend their influence eastward, evidently the Moravians had not been the only target. The old Lotharing kingdom—or rather that remnant of it which remained in Poland—was targeted for conquest by the East Franks along with Norway, and requested that its armies be allowed to march across Moravian territory in the prosecution of this war. Kráľ Tomáš was only too happy to oblige: he wasn’t going to shed many tears if the Lotharing king sent armies across his backyard to give some Germans and Austrians a bloody nose. And for the time being, the German conquest of Polish Lotharingia meant that Moravia would not be forced to turn its attention elsewhere.

During the Ruthenian conquest of the Podolie, the Moravian First Army came to something of an unspoken agreement with Knyaz’ Aleksandr for control of the Galician territories they seized. As it turned out, the Moravians and the Ruthenians shared the task of garrisoning Galicia pretty much down the middle, with the Rivers Bug forming the rough dividing line between Moravian and Ruthenian zones of control. Brest, Chelm and Volyň, all the way south through Ľvov, were held by Ruthenia; while Lublin, Belz and the territories closer to the Carpathian foothills along the Peremyšl-Drohovyč-Halyč line were kept under the vanes of Moravian battalions.

At the same time, however, Galicia’s Catholic allies in the north had begun to move south against Knyaz’ Aleksandr 2. The Livonians, a kingdom of Germanised Catholic Balts who had supplanted the Adamite kingdom of Estonia as the regional power on the eastern Baltic shores, had little boldness to attack Moravia or Ruthenia on their own—but in coalition with larger and stronger powers like Galicia and Garderike they gained a certain borrowed façade of bravado… at least in the chambers of diplomacy. The Livonians were the most venomous-tongued of vipers in the courts of the West when declaiming the purported evils of the Rychnovských and the necessity of Western Europe’s standing up against the decadent, debauched oriental excess of Moravian and Ruthenian despotism. Yet Livonian armies were scarcely to be seen on the battlefield facing Russians or Moravians directly.

On the other hand, the yellow-haired Garderikeans were eager for battle, even bloodthirsty. The men of Holmgard moved across the north of the Rus’ lands, and took Ryazan and Tambov. Long-suffering Ryazan, then a territory under the rule of the prince of Černigov, bore the brunt of the Eastern Scandinavians’ rage, which their conversion to Catholicism three centuries hence had done little to blunt. When Ryazan was captured, the Garderikean commander issued a general ultimatum to the populace that they should confess the filioque and formally commemorate the Pope in Rome: when the leadership of the town refused, the Garderikeans took the ten heads of household in the leading families in the Ryazan Veče, and selected one hundred fifty-three civilians at random besides—men, women and children, including a local Orthodox priest named Kuzma, or Cosmas—and impaled them upon wooden stakes from the town wall in a gruesome display. ‘Wherever the Swedes of Holmgard went,’ one Ryazanian recounted later, ‘never mind that they confessed Christ with their lips, still the rivers would run red with Christian blood. We suffered worse for our faith under Holmgard than under the Hagarenes.’ Priestmartyr Kuzma and the 162 Martyrs of Ryazan with him were glorified in the Russian Orthodox Church in 1667.

Which is not to say that similar acts of bloodletting weren’t carried out by Moravians on Galician soil, particularly by the ill-equipped Third Army. Indeed, the entire character of warfare in Europe was beginning to change with the advent of paid armies supplanting the traditional networks of feudal contract and patronage. Discipline was often dependent on how well soldiers were remunerated; and when soldiers were not paid, civilians tended to suffer.

~~~​

‘I haven’t forgotten our promise,’ Artemie told Otakar one night in camp. ‘I certainly owe you one.’

‘There’s no rush,’ said Otakar. ‘How are you and Naďa getting along?’

‘Well enough,’ Artemie told his friend bracingly, before amending his tone. ‘Truly she is a fine woman. She’s been undervalued by too many for too long. But we’re… struggling. I fear what people will say of her if, God forbid, she is discovered to be barren. She’s been through enough as it is.’

Otakar was encouraged to hear Artemie thinking first of how their problem was affecting her, rather than himself. But he consoled Artemie all the same: ‘God will be merciful,I am sure. For such grace I will add my own prayers to yours.’

The Second Army was encamped currently along the banks of the Bystraya Sosna River in central Russia, not too far south from where the slaughter at Ryazan had taken place eight months before. The river was already frozen solid and the countryside snowbound, and the weather bit fiercely. And although it didn’t look it from the rather placid appearance of the armed camp, in fact an important military innovation was taking place here.

Moravia had long been at the forefront of the development of long guns and cannonry in Europe, since the days of the first bombardy but also long after that, with Budějovice largely being considered the smithing capital of heavy armaments on the continent. And Moravia had quickly learned the value of carriage-mounted, smaller mobile guns during the Bohemian Uprising of 1415, when the Johanit mercenary troops fielded the first waggon-drawn houfnice into battle against their rebellious noble brethren. The trunnion had since that time been a vital element of the cannon’s design, being placed at the front end of the reinforce as a pivot point so that the bore could be aimed at an angle, providing versatility of fire and a level of useful mobility that the bulkier, largely-stationary bombardy had not enjoyed hitherto.

Yet a lively debate was going on within the Moravian camp among the blacksmiths and gunner teams about the proper placement of the trunnions, with some of the blacksmiths arguing that they should be set closer to the chase for a greater vertical range of fire. The gunners, however, argued that such placement would make each piece too ‘bottom-heavy’, and make aiming from the cascable prohibitively hard. However, the first pieces with the refit trunnions were wheeled into service and put to test in the field sooner than anyone in the camp would have anticipated.

A force of Garderikean musketeers marched southward from the Oka to the Don, and set up their camp on the opposite side of the frozen Bystraya Sosna. The time had come for the gunnery teams to see how well the new weapons could be aimed. The bugle calls went up from the Moravian camp, and the lines of battle were assembled.

The cannon with the adjusted trunnions fired, and the balls sailed high over the frozen plain into the enemy ranks. The Garderikeans were taken by surprise as the field erupted with plumes of frozen debris, from guns which should have been well out of range. By the time they had assembled their lines, the Moravians had already drawn up the ranks of their infantrymen on the far shore, and had begun firing up toward the Garderikean camp. Confusion reigned there, as the Moravian artillery continued to pummel the Garderikean defences and disrupt their array.

The Battle of the Bystraya Sosna was a decided setback for the Garderikeans, who had essentially had free run of the Ruthenian north hitherto. The Prince of Černigov was, by this Moravian action, freed up to countersiege Tambov, and push back hard against the Garderikean fortifications to the north.

 

[Midnite Duke]

Being a civilian in a warzone is an horrible experience on the best of days. Thanks

Now back to baby making for the crown prince's friends.

 

[HistoryDude]

Let's hope that Nada's... problems aren't permanent!

Moravia's wars are as successful as ever.

Also, the latest chapter lacks a threadmark.

 

[Revan86]

Being a civilian in a warzone is an horrible experience on the best of days. Thanks

Now back to baby making for the crown prince's friends.

Yeah, admittedly the tonal shift there is kind of abrupt and jarring. Still, personal concerns don't exactly disappear even in the middle of a brutal early-modern war.

Let's hope that Nada's... problems aren't permanent!

Moravia's wars are as successful as ever.

Could be a well-grounded hope, if we're relying on foreshadowing!

Also, the latest chapter lacks a threadmark.

Actually it's a sub-chapter of 33. I'm trying not to do as many of these multi-part chapters anymore; but at the time I made the (perhaps wrong-headed) editorial decision to put threadmarks only on the full chapters.

The sub-chapters are linked up on the title post, though.

 

[Revan86]

III.
1 March 1575 – 31 December 1576

One lesson which Kráľ Tomáš had taken to heart early in his career was the necessity—sometimes a more urgent one even than strength in arms—of bringing Moravia’s diplomatic strengths to bear in whatever contest his nation found itself in. Thus, while the East Franks were busily erecting presses and churning out literature in the German vernacular to their west, and while the Neustrians were busily packing West African slaves onto ships for transport to their New World holdings, the Moravians were regimenting their diplomatic corps for the unenviable task of swaying public opinion in Europe.

It was a tall order, as the Livonians had largely gotten there ahead of them. Moravia might be winning the war on the battlefield, but they were losing the war of information. In the eyes of most of Catholic Western Europe, Moravia was little more than a border outpost of oriental depravity and despotism. The Rychnovský line, polluted by many generations of incest and inbreeding, was to many an example of such moral squalor. (It didn’t exactly help Moravia’s case that Tomáš and Milomíra were distaff-side second cousins—at the sixth degree of consanguinity technically not incestuous, but still more than close enough to allow for credible innuendoes.) And the concentration of power in the hands of the monarch that had been the reigning trend across the reigns of the last three Rychnovský kings was broadly considered to be an affront to Western liberties.

Such was the situation that faced Kráľ Tomáš in the West, made worse by the rapid spread of anti-Moravian propaganda and polemics through the printing presses. And so he consulted with the aged Hubert Kozár as to what was to be done.

‘My liege,’ said Kozár, ‘it is of course an option open to us. We could use the diplomatic corps in part to help counter the more pernicious and obscene examples of East Frankish and Livonian propaganda. But this would be somewhat defensive and reactive as a use of their talents. The other option available to us is to go on the offensive with the corps’ abilities. Begin publishing, not defences of your person and this court, but instead justifications of Moravia’s alliances and international commitments. These efforts, the Livonians will not be able to answer, as they show Moravia’s demands to be motivated not by self-interest but by the justice of God and the dignity of man.’

‘The best defence is a good offence?’

‘Something like that,’ said Kozár.

‘See it done,’ ordered Kráľ Tomáš. ‘And let these materials be published abroad not only in Slavonic, but also in French and in Latin.’

‘Naturally, môj Kráľ.’

~~~

Moskva had long been a town in a most unhappy position. And it should not have been so.

The town of Moskva, a strategically-important and ancient river town dating back to the Neolithic era, had been a trading post in the vast Volga network which brought together the Finnic tribes of the north, the Slavic tribes of the south, the Germanic tribes of the west and the Turkic tribes of the east for as long as anyone could remember. In the present, wooden-stockaded, forest-bound Moskva might have lacked the cultural importance of Mozyř, the grand architecture and high political stature of Kiev, or the reputation for holiness enjoyed by Ryazan… but it still held a special place in the hearts of the Rus’ and had done so for hundreds of years.

It was therefore most unfortunate that the town had been torn brutally in half between Great Rus’ and Garderike for the past three centuries. Great Rus’ held the Right Bank of the Moskva River from Možajsk all the way down to the Oka; while Garderike held the Left. This meant that the holy monasteries of Saint Simon, Saint Daniel, and the Blessed-Virgin-of-the-Don on the right bank more often than not lay in Slavic hands—but the fortified Kremľ on the left bank more often than not lay in East Norse ones. In the present conflict between Rus’ and Garderike, Moskva had become a ravaged battleground between a Catholic Swedish-speaking North and an Orthodox Russian-tongued South. Great Rus’ would not permanently govern from the Kremľ, or extend any permanent sway over the Left Bank of the Moskva River, until 1659.

In early June of 1575, however, the Moravian Second Army sent back word that they had stormed northwards across the Moskva River and captured the Island—and then the Kremľ on the Left Bank. Artemie had enclosed, together with this missive, an icon of the Righteous Ancestors of God Joachim and Anna which had been written by the monks at Blessed-Virgin-of-the-Don, and blessed by the Patriarch of the Rus’ himself after the fateful capture of the Kremľ. This was meant solely for his wife Nadeža, who understood both the value and the significance of this gift.

For his part, Otakar Rychnovský knelt before the larger original of the same icon within the monastery and kept long vigils on behalf of his friend. The human ancestors of God, long stricken by infertility, would surely understand Artemie’s and Nadeža’s predicament and take pity upon them!

~~~​

‘Ambassador Ernst,’ Kráľovná Milomíra smiled winningly at the Bavarian dignitary upon his arrival, ‘you are most welcome here, sir!’

‘You are most gracious, Königin,’ Nikolaus Hermann Wenzel Maria Anton von Ernst gave the queen a demonstrative bow and a warm smile in return. ‘To return to Olmütz is always a distinct pleasure.’

‘I fear it was not always so,’ Milomíra told Ernst. ‘Our two kingdoms haven’t always been on the best of terms; and I would hate to see any visit of yours cut short.’

‘Schnää vo gestan,’ the Bavarian ambassador waved a magnanimous hand. It was not a detail lost on the Queen that Ambassador Ernst affected a strong southern German accent so as to differentiate himself as far as possible from the East Frankish court dialect. ‘It’s simply bad politics to hold a grudge too long. Besides, it’s unchristian. Seventy times seven, was that not Our Lord’s answer to Saint Peter?’

‘Still, I suppose some trespasses are easier to forgive than others,’ Milomíra pressed—half playfully, half in earnest.

‘I will certainly admit,’ Ernst ran a thoughtful thumb and forefinger over the deep smile-lines on his square, thin-bearded face, ‘that mein Fürst Lantfrid was not overly happy with having lost the independent good regard of our fellow kleine Fürsten in the Sorbian uplands. And yet Bayern’s borders are secure and we have not been enveloped by either the East Franks or our Austrian cousins… and we know who we have to thank for that. If Mähren has turned over a new leaf, then Bayern will not refuse the hand of friendship.’

Fine words indeed. Milomíra was impressed with Nikolaus von Ernst’s speech, but would have regarded it as mere empty diplomatic air if it hadn’t been for the fact that Ernst’s visit was accompanied by a costly gift from Fürst Lantfrid 2. The chapel at Olomouc Palace was now graced and adorned with a delicately-wrought, ornate gilt icon of the sibling-Saints Winebald, Wilibald and Walpurga in the unique Germanic-Byzantine style which had been developed by the Bavarian iconographers. Evidently Bayern was sincere about mending ties with their eastern neighbour.

‘Ahh, Míra! And Ernst!’ came a voice from across the hall. Ernst and Milomíra turned to see Kráľ Tomáš striding across the hall. He looked a bit haggard and preoccupied, but the look of relief on his face to see his wife was palpable… and it was clear he wasn’t averse to seeing the benign visage of the Bavarian ambassador either. ‘It’s good to have you back in Olomouc, Niko.’

‘As I was telling your lady Königin, the pleasure is mine… is something the matter?’

Tomáš shook his head decisively. ‘Oh, nothing you need worry yourself over. Housekeeping.’

Milomíra surreptitiously slipped her hand into her husband’s and gave it a gentle squeeze. She knew in this case what ‘housekeeping’ meant, as she understood the ‘house’. The highborn landowning families in the Stavovské Zhromaždenie, the class to which Queen Milomíra’s Sokol relatives assuredly belonged, had been frothing at the mouth these past months over the continued curtailing of their traditional rights and privileges. It was no secret that the Kráľ preferred to keep the nobles inside Olomouc, and tied to the increasingly bureaucratised military command structure. But the recent wars had seen noble power and right continue to erode, and they weren’t happy about the fact.

Queen Milomíra herself had been importuned by her (and her husband’s) Sokol relations, to intercede with her husband to reinstate certain feudal privileges. Thus far she had refused, and in fact she had taken her husband’s part. The security and integrity of the state, she understood, were more important than the private privileges of any one family.

‘It’s good for a man to keep his house in order,’ Nikolaus von Ernst opined. ‘But one oughtn’t let it get in the way of the more important things. Shall we visit Velehrad later? I confess I have a yearning to visit the Cathedral and the holy relics of Saint Methodius while I’m here.’

Like the best of his breed, the Bavarian ambassador was of a deep and sincere religious bent. Tomáš himself wasn’t particularly, but he understood and valued the tendency in others who were. And besides, assisting in Ernst’s pilgrimage would be a welcome respite from dealing with the irked nobles in the Zhromaždenie.

‘It would be my pleasure to oblige you,’ the Kráľ told the Ambassador.

~~~

​

The tide of the war was turning. After storming across the frozen Moskva and taking the Kremľ, the Second Army advanced on the more heavily fortified Garderikean towns of Tyrveshafn and Jarisleifsborg. The East Norse defenders of these towns were little match for the fine craftsmanship of Moravian cannon and the tight discipline of the Moravian infantry. Tyrveshafn fell to the Moravians in just over eight months; Jarisleifsborg, in a bit under a year.

Seeing these advances made by Moravia against their allies, the Livonians, loath to get their hands dirty in this war and eager to save their own skins, came early to parley with the Rus’. Ruthenia made no territorial demands on the Balts, but they did extract a heavy toll in silver from their state, and effectively dissolved their alliance with Galicia.

It wouldn’t be much longer before Artemie and Otakar would be able to return home—but the Garderikeans had one more card to play in the war for Podolie.

 

[HistoryDude]

That ending is ominous. What is this card? Blackmail? Alliances? Mercenaries?

The better relationship with Bavaria is a good thing...

Poor Moscow! This different timeline has been far less kind to it than OTL was.

Also, it's good to see warfare advancing. Propaganda, huh? I imagine that's going to be relevant in the future.

 

[Midnite Duke]

@HistoryDude hit my top two takeaways: the divided Moska and the ominous ending. Moscow's reign as Russia's top city even in OTL has been brief compared to London, Paris or Athens. The competition has been Novgorod, Kyiv and St. Petersburg. Thanks for the update.

 

[Revan86]

That ending is ominous. What is this card? Blackmail? Alliances? Mercenaries?

The better relationship with Bavaria is a good thing...

Poor Moscow! This different timeline has been far less kind to it than OTL was.

Also, it's good to see warfare advancing. Propaganda, huh? I imagine that's going to be relevant in the future.

Regarding Bavaria: agreed! It's always good to have friends between you and the hostile great power next door.

Moskva in the late 1500s / early 1600s wasn't always in a dissimilar position. Thinking of the Time of Troubles and the Polish invasion, here.

And yes, propaganda is going to become a very potent weapon indeed...

@HistoryDude hit my top two takeaways: the divided Moska and the ominous ending. Moscow's reign as Russia's top city even in OTL has been brief compared to London, Paris or Athens. The competition has been Novgorod, Kyiv and St. Petersburg. Thanks for the update.

Yup! That's definitely true in OTL, though I would argue that Petersburg is in some ways a continuation of Novgorod by other means.

In this timeline's history, the competition is not between Moscow, Novgorod and Kiev; but instead between Kiev, Mozyr and Ryazan. Moskva does become an important city ITL... but later.