Si Deus Nobiscum: A Polish-Lithuanian Scion Quest
- Thread starter Rolman
- Start date
- Mature Historic
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Let's to Witebsk to meet with Voivode Pac.
- Location
- United States
[X] Let's to Witebsk to meet with Voivode Pac.
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
We are truly blessed with our wife Mariana, the fact that she was coragueos enoght to confront us with our mistake speak volumen of value as a good person
We are truly blessed with our wife Mariana, the fact that she was coragueos enoght to confront us with our mistake speak volumen of value as a good person
Sert. on the Strategic Importance of Smoleńsk
Sertorius
Rebellious Legate
- Location
- Roma Invicta
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
I mean, he is the man we will be cooperating with a lot. Best get it done.
By the way, a quick strategic lesson:
Smoleńsk was the most important border fortress for either country. It has been called the Gate or Key to Lithuania or Muscovy, depends on who currently owns it. It is situated on the most direct and easiest route to and from Moscow, that leads conveniently between two great rivers: Dniepr and Dźwina (Daugava). It was therefore ideal for large-scale marches of troops, without any serious topographic obstacles along the way. Hence the powerful fortress to guard this strategic road. Smoleńsk was always well defended, heavily fortified and constantly upgraded with better walls, towers and cannons. It was a number one priority of any larger war (Livonia was an exception, since this front was of secondary importance, therefore raids by Kmita were enough to keep the enemy tied up here) between Lithuania and Muscovy to take the city and own it.
I mean, he is the man we will be cooperating with a lot. Best get it done.
By the way, a quick strategic lesson:
Smoleńsk was the most important border fortress for either country. It has been called the Gate or Key to Lithuania or Muscovy, depends on who currently owns it. It is situated on the most direct and easiest route to and from Moscow, that leads conveniently between two great rivers: Dniepr and Dźwina (Daugava). It was therefore ideal for large-scale marches of troops, without any serious topographic obstacles along the way. Hence the powerful fortress to guard this strategic road. Smoleńsk was always well defended, heavily fortified and constantly upgraded with better walls, towers and cannons. It was a number one priority of any larger war (Livonia was an exception, since this front was of secondary importance, therefore raids by Kmita were enough to keep the enemy tied up here) between Lithuania and Muscovy to take the city and own it.
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[X] Let's to Witebsk to meet with Voivode Pac.
So glad we married her, even though Stanislaw doesn't deserve her. Now to keep our bond protected from our confessor until we have an opportunity to get rid of him - sexism means that our close relationship with our wife may be used to undermine us as a man.
Kmita is indeed impressive. I want him to show us his ways.
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
Kir the Wizard
The Sun King
- Location
- Ukraine
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
The king, whether he intends to truly control this or not, said that Stanislaw is supposed to actually work in this position, so let's do that. So far so good. With the voivode, I expect, it's more of a "don't call us, we'll call you" matter.
Do note, however, that Kmita tried to find out whether Stas talked to the voivode first quite early in the discussion. Some conflict between the two of them? Kmita suspecting being spied on by the voivode, maybe?
The king, whether he intends to truly control this or not, said that Stanislaw is supposed to actually work in this position, so let's do that. So far so good. With the voivode, I expect, it's more of a "don't call us, we'll call you" matter.
Do note, however, that Kmita tried to find out whether Stas talked to the voivode first quite early in the discussion. Some conflict between the two of them? Kmita suspecting being spied on by the voivode, maybe?
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
Like I wrote in a previous post this could give us invaluable experience both in administration and in warfare. Kmita seems like a capable man to learn from anyhow
Like I wrote in a previous post this could give us invaluable experience both in administration and in warfare. Kmita seems like a capable man to learn from anyhow
Rolen von Keng
Sleeping Green Bear
- Location
- The Wilderness
[X] Begin working with Kmita closely.
XII. April 2-April 29, 1574. Orsza, Lithuania to Smoleńsk, Muscovy
- Location
- United States
Weeks pass. The time is spent riding through the countryside with Lord Kmita, familiarizing yourself with villages and roads and little river tributaries, the winding of the Dniepr and Orszica, and the popular infiltration points for Muscovite riders. All the while, Kmita never did anything even slightly suspicious, and you found yourself increasingly taken with the man: a talented administrator, soldier, and spymaster, forthright and congenial.
The trees were in bloom when the calm was disrupted.
Lord Kmita is ushered into your tent. "Your Serene Highness," he says, holding up a wax-sealed piece of parchment, "orders from the King, by way of the Voivode."
You feel a kind of sucking sensation as your stomach drops. Your mind can't keep up with your body. Heat begins to form behind your sternum. You knew it! Are you being ridiculous? No time to wonder. Act now. "And why is it that you and the Voivode get them before I?"
Kmita looks taken back. "Because I happened to receive the courier, and because the King opted to dispatch the message to Voivode Pac," he answers. "Is there a problem?"
Unwrap that bandage. "Are you spying on me, Lord Kmita?"
"No, Your Serene Highness. The King told Voivode Pac to tell me to keep an eye on you," he says matter-of-factly. "If I was spying on you, I'd be offering you new retainers and the castle maids would throw themselves at you."
You grip your tunic-tails tightly, your jaw like a beartrap. "And I'm meant to believe this?"
"No, not at all, Your Serene Highness," shrugs Kmita. "In fact, it's a testament to your good instincts to have never trusted me in the first place." He really means that, he's paying a genuine compliment. "But tabs I've kept, and the tabs look good. Who cares about Frenchie anyway?"
"Me. Do you understand I'm more or less exiled at the moment?"
"Nobody told me, but it seemed apparent, lord prince. You're a long way from Wilno or Kraków," Kmita says. "But the King means very little out here. You're not a wastrel or an extortionist and that's good enough for me, by God."
Well, you're here. There's no way to avoid him, this Kmita. It's his country. "Well," you say, pausing to grind your teeth. "What's the letter say?"
He speaks in-between mouthing words to himself, half-preoccupied. "It says… ya-da-da-we-the-King… Ah! Oooo. Now that could be clever."
"What?" you ask, anxious; he hands you the letter, which you read quickly and hungrily. "I don't understand. A mission to Smoleńsk to discuss the issue of river piracy?"
"Yes, our new King is being a little naïve." Glad it's him for once. "As if Iwan has any interest whatsoever in receiving diplomats on his side of the border. Especially over something so petty!" Kmita looks almost giddy.
Seeing him smile through his Zaporozhian mustache is endearing, and you exhale. "What's got you so excited, then?"
"Oh, don't tell me you can't figure it out, Your Serene Highness."
"It's got to do with spying?"
"Naturally! An innocuous, seemingly-foolhardy mission to Smoleńsk?" Kmita claps his hands. "Do you realize the contacts we'd gain? Plus, I've got a man in need of exfiltration."
"Don't you think you're getting a little ahead of yourself, Lord Kmita?" you ask, putting some pieces together. "Won't they recognize you? And where Kmita goes…" …everybody knows he's a bastard spy. But that will have to wait.
He groans. "Hellfire, you're right." He places a hand to his chin. "Hmmm. Well, Your Serene Highness, are you up for some skullduggery?"
"I suppose I have to be," you smile grimly.
"It's not dishonorable work! Not in my mind, that is."
"It's more so that I've never done it before."
"Well, then, Your Serene Highness," says Kmita, reentering thought, "the man's a cavalry lieutenant named Bielski. Has cousins on our side of the border and wants out, mapped out their patrols and corridors for raiding." He smiles. "No worries about making new spies, I'll live. We're lucky about Prince Szujski, too."
"Prince Szujski?"
"Their Voivode of Smoleńsk. Wishes he was a Sarmatian; a lot of them do."
You've heard of their reverence for the Commonwealth, their respect and envy mixing with wartime hatred. "So where do I come in, exactly?"
"We'd be needing Your Serene Highness to create a distraction of some sort." He shrugs. "I'd feign a raid and scoop up Sir Bielski when they ride out to meet us — always an option — but the conditions of the visit may call for something more subtle."
"You'll send some of your men with me?"
"Of course. They know that city like the back of their hand. Which means you could always try and take him right out from under their noses, if a scrape seems too loud." Lord Kmita's more gleeful than thoughtful now. "Isn't this fun, Your Serene Highness? Being a spy is about creativity, not low cunning."
"Maybe. This is all somewhat… different."
"And novelty is the pepper to the chicken of life!" he laughs. "There's a call-and-response my men know for finding him. I'm sending you with my best, Your Serene Highness."
"Thank you, Lord Kmita." You scrunch up your face. "How do I know this isn't a trap?" You envision Muscovite captivity, life as a hostage, out of the King's hair until you're ransomed.
"They can't risk renewing war, and the King can only toss you about so much. I would enter guardedly, of course, I always do," says Kmita. "Iwan disbanded his murder-monks a year or two ago, but the men themselves persist. They're vicious and smart, too. They fold in a real fight, though," he snorts. "The thugs. Some of my distortions made a whole city get wiped out by them." He doesn't seem to care very much.
Ignore that, that's how all your fellows seem to all be. "So, I would expect a few of them in town," Kmita warns you. "A severed dog's head means they're watching, sniffing you out, Your Serene Highness."
"Christ," you say before popping a hand over your mouth and crossing yourself.
Kmita cracks a grin. "That's one for Confession, lord prince," he jokes. You laugh sheepishly. "My men will be as honest as I am; they'll help you with plans and, yes, they've been told to watch you, too," he says. "But I reiterate: I see no need, but if the King can sleep at night…"
"Certainly," you say, mildly defeated. "Well, I suppose I'll mount up in a few days and try to come up with some ideas."
"Godspeed, Your Serene Highness," he says, giving you a handshake. "Don't underestimate them. It's not Prince Szujski, it's his men. They've tangled with me enough to keep their hackles raised. Get our Bielski home, lord prince."
Indeed, that is the plan. Borders are a funny thing: the villages and birch forests simply keep going, the peasants speak the language, yet here you are in Muscovy, the belly of the beast. Were it not for their red-coated palatials with their fierce bardiches waiting on the road to escort your party, you'd have been none the wiser.
Smoleńsk, too, lent an impression of merely being a transplanted Kijów, well-fortified and boasting stone churches that survived the Tatar hordes in the Dark Age. A fine city; perhaps only their false Caesar is a barbarian.
The entry shall set the tone. How do you arrive at Smoleńsk?
[] with fanfare.
Raise the Radziwiłł colors high and enter the city as highfalutin diplomats. Sure to impress Prince Szujski and lower his guard, a loud entrance will also allow Muscovite spies — who are surely present — to easily take down names and faces. Settle into their kremlin as honored guests and work under their noses.
[] more furtively.
Obviously, a baggage train of richly-dressed foreigners is always going to yield ooo's and aaa's. But by arriving at dawn on an unexpected date, you could quite literally catch their Polonophile Prince in his bed-clothes, raising implications of poor hospitality from a man likely eager to please Westerners. As they scramble to make arrangements, the spies could get to work.
As for the tone of your plans, discussed on the journey, they trend in the direction of…
[] the silent.
Bribes, blackmail, disguises, for example.
[] the quiet.
Pebbles thrown at windows. Chalk-marks on walls. An evacuation under the cover of darkness, perhaps. Take advantage of Prince Szujski.
[] the loud.
Something that would dispatch Smoleńsk's riders into the country, like false-flag banditry or some such. Bielski goes *missing.* Maybe cause some chaos in the city itself?
The trees were in bloom when the calm was disrupted.
Lord Kmita is ushered into your tent. "Your Serene Highness," he says, holding up a wax-sealed piece of parchment, "orders from the King, by way of the Voivode."
You feel a kind of sucking sensation as your stomach drops. Your mind can't keep up with your body. Heat begins to form behind your sternum. You knew it! Are you being ridiculous? No time to wonder. Act now. "And why is it that you and the Voivode get them before I?"
Kmita looks taken back. "Because I happened to receive the courier, and because the King opted to dispatch the message to Voivode Pac," he answers. "Is there a problem?"
Unwrap that bandage. "Are you spying on me, Lord Kmita?"
"No, Your Serene Highness. The King told Voivode Pac to tell me to keep an eye on you," he says matter-of-factly. "If I was spying on you, I'd be offering you new retainers and the castle maids would throw themselves at you."
You grip your tunic-tails tightly, your jaw like a beartrap. "And I'm meant to believe this?"
"No, not at all, Your Serene Highness," shrugs Kmita. "In fact, it's a testament to your good instincts to have never trusted me in the first place." He really means that, he's paying a genuine compliment. "But tabs I've kept, and the tabs look good. Who cares about Frenchie anyway?"
"Me. Do you understand I'm more or less exiled at the moment?"
"Nobody told me, but it seemed apparent, lord prince. You're a long way from Wilno or Kraków," Kmita says. "But the King means very little out here. You're not a wastrel or an extortionist and that's good enough for me, by God."
Well, you're here. There's no way to avoid him, this Kmita. It's his country. "Well," you say, pausing to grind your teeth. "What's the letter say?"
He speaks in-between mouthing words to himself, half-preoccupied. "It says… ya-da-da-we-the-King… Ah! Oooo. Now that could be clever."
"What?" you ask, anxious; he hands you the letter, which you read quickly and hungrily. "I don't understand. A mission to Smoleńsk to discuss the issue of river piracy?"
"Yes, our new King is being a little naïve." Glad it's him for once. "As if Iwan has any interest whatsoever in receiving diplomats on his side of the border. Especially over something so petty!" Kmita looks almost giddy.
Seeing him smile through his Zaporozhian mustache is endearing, and you exhale. "What's got you so excited, then?"
"Oh, don't tell me you can't figure it out, Your Serene Highness."
"It's got to do with spying?"
"Naturally! An innocuous, seemingly-foolhardy mission to Smoleńsk?" Kmita claps his hands. "Do you realize the contacts we'd gain? Plus, I've got a man in need of exfiltration."
"Don't you think you're getting a little ahead of yourself, Lord Kmita?" you ask, putting some pieces together. "Won't they recognize you? And where Kmita goes…" …everybody knows he's a bastard spy. But that will have to wait.
He groans. "Hellfire, you're right." He places a hand to his chin. "Hmmm. Well, Your Serene Highness, are you up for some skullduggery?"
"I suppose I have to be," you smile grimly.
"It's not dishonorable work! Not in my mind, that is."
"It's more so that I've never done it before."
"Well, then, Your Serene Highness," says Kmita, reentering thought, "the man's a cavalry lieutenant named Bielski. Has cousins on our side of the border and wants out, mapped out their patrols and corridors for raiding." He smiles. "No worries about making new spies, I'll live. We're lucky about Prince Szujski, too."
"Prince Szujski?"
"Their Voivode of Smoleńsk. Wishes he was a Sarmatian; a lot of them do."
You've heard of their reverence for the Commonwealth, their respect and envy mixing with wartime hatred. "So where do I come in, exactly?"
"We'd be needing Your Serene Highness to create a distraction of some sort." He shrugs. "I'd feign a raid and scoop up Sir Bielski when they ride out to meet us — always an option — but the conditions of the visit may call for something more subtle."
"You'll send some of your men with me?"
"Of course. They know that city like the back of their hand. Which means you could always try and take him right out from under their noses, if a scrape seems too loud." Lord Kmita's more gleeful than thoughtful now. "Isn't this fun, Your Serene Highness? Being a spy is about creativity, not low cunning."
"Maybe. This is all somewhat… different."
"And novelty is the pepper to the chicken of life!" he laughs. "There's a call-and-response my men know for finding him. I'm sending you with my best, Your Serene Highness."
"Thank you, Lord Kmita." You scrunch up your face. "How do I know this isn't a trap?" You envision Muscovite captivity, life as a hostage, out of the King's hair until you're ransomed.
"They can't risk renewing war, and the King can only toss you about so much. I would enter guardedly, of course, I always do," says Kmita. "Iwan disbanded his murder-monks a year or two ago, but the men themselves persist. They're vicious and smart, too. They fold in a real fight, though," he snorts. "The thugs. Some of my distortions made a whole city get wiped out by them." He doesn't seem to care very much.
Ignore that, that's how all your fellows seem to all be. "So, I would expect a few of them in town," Kmita warns you. "A severed dog's head means they're watching, sniffing you out, Your Serene Highness."
"Christ," you say before popping a hand over your mouth and crossing yourself.
Kmita cracks a grin. "That's one for Confession, lord prince," he jokes. You laugh sheepishly. "My men will be as honest as I am; they'll help you with plans and, yes, they've been told to watch you, too," he says. "But I reiterate: I see no need, but if the King can sleep at night…"
"Certainly," you say, mildly defeated. "Well, I suppose I'll mount up in a few days and try to come up with some ideas."
"Godspeed, Your Serene Highness," he says, giving you a handshake. "Don't underestimate them. It's not Prince Szujski, it's his men. They've tangled with me enough to keep their hackles raised. Get our Bielski home, lord prince."
Indeed, that is the plan. Borders are a funny thing: the villages and birch forests simply keep going, the peasants speak the language, yet here you are in Muscovy, the belly of the beast. Were it not for their red-coated palatials with their fierce bardiches waiting on the road to escort your party, you'd have been none the wiser.
Smoleńsk, too, lent an impression of merely being a transplanted Kijów, well-fortified and boasting stone churches that survived the Tatar hordes in the Dark Age. A fine city; perhaps only their false Caesar is a barbarian.
The entry shall set the tone. How do you arrive at Smoleńsk?
[] with fanfare.
Raise the Radziwiłł colors high and enter the city as highfalutin diplomats. Sure to impress Prince Szujski and lower his guard, a loud entrance will also allow Muscovite spies — who are surely present — to easily take down names and faces. Settle into their kremlin as honored guests and work under their noses.
[] more furtively.
Obviously, a baggage train of richly-dressed foreigners is always going to yield ooo's and aaa's. But by arriving at dawn on an unexpected date, you could quite literally catch their Polonophile Prince in his bed-clothes, raising implications of poor hospitality from a man likely eager to please Westerners. As they scramble to make arrangements, the spies could get to work.
As for the tone of your plans, discussed on the journey, they trend in the direction of…
[] the silent.
Bribes, blackmail, disguises, for example.
[] the quiet.
Pebbles thrown at windows. Chalk-marks on walls. An evacuation under the cover of darkness, perhaps. Take advantage of Prince Szujski.
[] the loud.
Something that would dispatch Smoleńsk's riders into the country, like false-flag banditry or some such. Bielski goes *missing.* Maybe cause some chaos in the city itself?
Astra Myst
Do you want a wish?
- Location
- Milky Way Galaxy
[X] with fanfare.
[X] the loud.
PARTAYYYYY
[X] the loud.
PARTAYYYYY
[X] fanfare
[X] quiet
Stanislaw is fairly uknown and could play into it by pretending to be a loud, arrogant Radziwiłł seeking to make as much noise as possible everywhere he goes. Allow Kmitas men to work in quiet by dragging as much attention to ourselves as possible
[X] quiet
Stanislaw is fairly uknown and could play into it by pretending to be a loud, arrogant Radziwiłł seeking to make as much noise as possible everywhere he goes. Allow Kmitas men to work in quiet by dragging as much attention to ourselves as possible
- Pronouns
- He
[X] with fanfare.
[X] the loud.
i love a good old false-flag operation
[X] the loud.
i love a good old false-flag operation
- Location
- United States
[X] with fanfare.
[X] the loud.
I have no idea how well we'd do at soemthing genuinky sneaky, as it's not really in our character's skillset. But he's done well when thrust on stage before - I see no reason not to lean into that further.
[X] the loud.
I have no idea how well we'd do at soemthing genuinky sneaky, as it's not really in our character's skillset. But he's done well when thrust on stage before - I see no reason not to lean into that further.