The Mongoliad: Book Three

creeping up on him-staring back from the water in the horse trough, leering from behind the eyes of his men. Doubt. Fear. Panic.

He had lost his way, and he was leading the Fratres Militiae Christi Livoniae to ruin. Had Heermeister Volquin suffered this same realization shortly before the battle at Schaulen? Dietrich recalled the fury in Kristaps’s eyes when the knight had revealed the ugly scars of his failed Shield-Brethren initiation. That same fervor had driven Volquin, and he had been blind to the trap at the river. The Heermeister’s obsession had nearly destroyed the order; the Teutonic Knights had taken pity on the survivors of Schaulen, welcoming the lost Livonians into their ranks. Many of the Sword Brothers wore the black cross rather than the red, and were content to leave the past buried along the muddy banks of the Schaulen River.

But some had strained under the Teutonic yoke. These men-veterans of the Northern campaigns, survivors of Schaulen-secretly spoke of taking the red cross again, of taking their own lands, of regaining their old glory. They chose him to lead them, and all they had needed was a sign that their purpose was just and right.

And they had been given that sign by the Pope himself. The Sword Brothers found an unexpected patron in Rome, and once Dietrich had sworn himself-and the order-to serve not just the Church, but the men who secretly ruled the Church, they could wear the red cross again.

But the memory of Schaulen proved difficult to shake.

Dietrich sat on the bench beside the trough and stared at the tumbledown wall of the barn that was the extent of their holdings in Hunern. Was this all that he, Dietrich von Gruningen, the fourth master of the order, had accomplished? Would history even remember him?

He shuddered, shaking himself free from the grip of this tenacious melancholy. Such weak-mindedness! This would not be the legacy of his command. He would right himself; he would find honor and glory for his men. The rest-the ones who still wore the black cross-would come back. He knew they would.

The Fratres Militiae Christi Livoniae will survive, he vowed. Whatever storm threatened, he could not shrink from his duty: his order must survive. No matter the cost, no matter the danger, he must not shirk his responsibility.

Having dispersed the phantom of failure, Dietrich whistled for his squire and began the slow, deliberate ritual of donning his armor. As his squire ensured that maille was fitted properly over gambeson, that surcoat hung properly, and that sword rested at the proper angle on his hips, Dietrich von Gruningen, fourth master of the Fratres Militiae Christi Livoniae considered his meager options.

He had been given one order by his master in Rome, and after securing the safety of his men, that was his only other responsibility. Destroy the Shield-Brethren.

His squire offered him his helmet, and Dietrich shook his head. He would not need it. Not where he was going. His dressing complete, Dietrich strode out into the main compound, hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

Burchard and Sigeberht were waiting for him. Constant companions, their devotion was absolute. With a hundred like them, we would be strong, he reflected as he looked at their stoic faces.

“Is my horse prepared?” he asked.

“As you asked, Heermeister,” Burchard murmured. “Where do we ride?”

“The Mongol compound,” Dietrich answered. “I must speak with Tegusgal.”

The tree had never had any leaves, as far as Hans could recall; to an outsider, the tree was a scraggly ash, grown from a wind-tossed achene that had sprouted in the unkempt wilderness of a neglected alley. It would never get enough sun. It would never get enough water. But it refused to die, and Hans and the other boys-the Rats of Hunern-adopted it as their own. It was their standard, and beneath its twisted arms, they felt safe. Protected. Sheltered from the cruelty of a world gone mad.

Axis mundi, Andreas had said of the tree when he had last visited the tiny shelter. It is the pillar of your world, he had explained. He had reached up and touched the highest branch of the stunted tree. Though it has some growing to do before it can hold up Heaven, don’t you think?

Andreas was dead. But the tree still lived. He still lived. Hans wrapped his arms around the tree and pressed his cheek against the rough bark. Only then would he let himself cry.

But he had no tears. He was as dry as the tree.

“Hans.”

He jerked upright at the sound of his name, and instead of fleeing he only hugged the tree more tightly. When his name was spoken a second time-the tone of voice filled with compassion and tenderness-he dared to look around for the speaker.

His uncle, Ernust, peered under the dirty tarp that hung over the narrow entrance to the tree’s tiny enclave. Ernust’s face was streaked with dirt and soot and a stain of something darker-blood? Hans’s brain offered an idea-and then refused to speculate further-about the source of the smear.

“Boy,” Ernust said. “Are you hurt? You came running in here so fast, it was if the Devil were…” He dismissed the rest of his observation. “Are you hurt?” he repeated.

Hans shook his head.

“Yesterday…” his uncle began. The portly man sighed, at a loss for how to finish his thought, and ran his hand across the rounded dome of his head. His eyes flicked over Hans-head to toe and back-and the boy read all the unspoken words in his uncle’s restless gaze. “It is time to go, Hans,” he said. “There is nothing left for us here, and the Mongols won’t wait for the mob to find its strength. They’re going to ride out-soon-and kill all the knights. Not just the Rose Knights-though they will be first-but every man who can possibly lift a sword. It will be just like-”

“A Livonian killed him.” Hans barely recognized his own voice-flat, echoing with exhaustion. He wanted to lie down beside the tree and cover himself with one of the dusty blankets used by the Rats. He wanted to lie down and let the bleak despair of his words flow throughout his body. Let it fill him until he drowned. “Not one of the Mongols. He was killed by one of us.”

“No, boy,” Ernust said sadly. “They’re not like us. None of them are. They fight for their own causes, for their lords and at the whims of their lords. Never for us. We are nothing to them. We board their animals. We feed them. We give them shelter. We care for them, and they do not think of us. They think only of themselves.”

“Andreas didn’t,” Hans countered.

Ernust shook his head. “The others are preparing to leave. There will be no one left to drink our brews-no one who will give us coin for it, anyway. We have to go with them. Back to Lowenberg.” He let loose a hollow laugh. “Not that we’ll be safe there for-”

“I’m staying,” Hans said, tightening his arms around the tree. His fervor surprised him, as did his certainty.

His uncle’s face lost its doughy softness, and he fixed Hans with an intent stare that was supposed to be intimidating. “He’s dead, Hans. I know he offered to take you with him, but he can’t. And the rest won’t keep his word. If they even survive. We have to survive, and that has little to do with waiting for a hero to rescue you.”

Hans flinched at his uncle’s words, but his initial reaction passed quickly, and he stared silently at his uncle. Ernust sighed, and ran a hand across his head again, looking down after at the smear of dirt and blood on his palm. Neither said anything, and the narrow sanctuary filled up quickly with a portentous silence.

His uncle was a prudent and savvy man, the sort who could see past the tragedy of the Mongol invasion and realize the opportunities present in the ragged tent city of Hunern. During his short stay with Ernust after his mother’s death, Hans had heard stories about why his uncle had left the family enclave in Legnica for the untrammeled landscape around the new settlement of Lowenberg. The forest needed to be cleared, fields planted, and houses built: all thirst-making work. The same was true for Hunern, albeit work of a bloodier sort. And what his uncle said was true: the brewers-as well as the carpenters, millers, smiths, leatherworkers, cooks, whores, and all the rest-served at the whim and mercy of the knights. When the knights were gone, the rabble dispersed as well.

Think of the living, boy.