Si Deus Nobiscum: A Polish-Lithuanian Scion Quest
- Thread starter Rolman
- Start date
- Mature Historic
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
- Pronouns
- He
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
- Location
- Singapore
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
It sucks, but I can imagine that those around him will emphasize that he lost that leg victoriously and valiantly fighting against the Heathens to rescue Christians from slavery.
It's terrifying to realise that there are no therapists in this time and place, and that the closest is likely your confessor in this era.
It sucks, but I can imagine that those around him will emphasize that he lost that leg victoriously and valiantly fighting against the Heathens to rescue Christians from slavery.
It's terrifying to realise that there are no therapists in this time and place, and that the closest is likely your confessor in this era.
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[X] "God, I'm starving."
An appetite is the best thing that can happen to us.
Strap us to our horse, hand us our lance and point us to a windmill. We're not done yet.
An appetite is the best thing that can happen to us.
What were the other rolls, the ones that came down to 4s?
Okay, so what I'm hearing is that we didn't take enough risks.
Strap us to our horse, hand us our lance and point us to a windmill. We're not done yet.
- Location
- United States
[X] "God, I'm starving."
- Location
- Mists of Albion
Things to note even if Matthias has won the Election:
-After doing some research it is possible for someone to ride a horse despite being an amputee, as the horse can be trained to pay attention to hand movements or vocal commands, however this would require a horse be trained from the ground up or entirely retrained and if we rode it to battle we better hope we didn't choose the verbal commands and that it isn't killed beneath us or us knocked off.
Because we'd basically be doomed.
So incredibly risky, but possible,
-Ivan IV also known as The Terrible, yes that Ivan, is currently invading Livonia, historically this would lead to the Livonian War. He may back off in the face of a Habsburg and no rebellion from the Baltic Cities that supported Maximilian IOTL, but that's still a war that people will fight for command over,
If we want we could try and grab a command post, and maybe try and fight, I wouldn't recommend the later however. And a lot of these battles were historically sieges, which were brutal, iirc there was only one major cavalry engagement.
-No Stephan Bathory means no formalised Winged Hussars, their equipment isn't standardised, they don't get their wings, their lances aren't given their unique design and the sale of their special warhorses outside of Poland isn't banned. Further, little chance of Hungarian Hadjuk light infantry who were very useful for the Commonwealth War machine over the next century being adopted as a formalised unit too.
-If Matthias wins, that means Sweden isn't going to invade Poland, or persecute the Protestants and Calvanists, or get dragged into a century+ long enmity due to the House of Vasa. But, that does probably mean we'll get involved in the Habsburgs wars against the Ottomans. So everyone be aware of that.
If we're lucky we'll die before we have to see the Wars of Religion or the more brutal part of the Counter-Reformation spread east.
-After doing some research it is possible for someone to ride a horse despite being an amputee, as the horse can be trained to pay attention to hand movements or vocal commands, however this would require a horse be trained from the ground up or entirely retrained and if we rode it to battle we better hope we didn't choose the verbal commands and that it isn't killed beneath us or us knocked off.
Because we'd basically be doomed.
So incredibly risky, but possible,
-Ivan IV also known as The Terrible, yes that Ivan, is currently invading Livonia, historically this would lead to the Livonian War. He may back off in the face of a Habsburg and no rebellion from the Baltic Cities that supported Maximilian IOTL, but that's still a war that people will fight for command over,
If we want we could try and grab a command post, and maybe try and fight, I wouldn't recommend the later however. And a lot of these battles were historically sieges, which were brutal, iirc there was only one major cavalry engagement.
-No Stephan Bathory means no formalised Winged Hussars, their equipment isn't standardised, they don't get their wings, their lances aren't given their unique design and the sale of their special warhorses outside of Poland isn't banned. Further, little chance of Hungarian Hadjuk light infantry who were very useful for the Commonwealth War machine over the next century being adopted as a formalised unit too.
-If Matthias wins, that means Sweden isn't going to invade Poland, or persecute the Protestants and Calvanists, or get dragged into a century+ long enmity due to the House of Vasa. But, that does probably mean we'll get involved in the Habsburgs wars against the Ottomans. So everyone be aware of that.
If we're lucky we'll die before we have to see the Wars of Religion or the more brutal part of the Counter-Reformation spread east.
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- Pronouns
- he/him
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
Poor Stanislaw. I hope he doesn't have another bout of fanaticism, because for him it could look like divine punishment.
Poor Stanislaw. I hope he doesn't have another bout of fanaticism, because for him it could look like divine punishment.
[X] "God, I'm starving."
Kir the Wizard
The Sun King
- Location
- Ukraine
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
"On the bright side, we may have more time to get to know each other better."
"On the bright side, we may have more time to get to know each other better."
- Location
- Abu Dhabi or Manila depending on the time of year
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] "Leave me with my wife, sirs."
Frostbyght
Not Dead Yet
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] "God, I'm starving."
The man has been unconscious for two days and lost a huge chunk of flesh. Stan needs to have a snack at least.
The man has been unconscious for two days and lost a huge chunk of flesh. Stan needs to have a snack at least.
“Quare Maerore Consumeris?” October 5, 1575. Warszawa, Polish Crownlands.
- Location
- United States
"Leave me with my wife, sirs," you say. "Thank you."
The men in the room mumble: Of course… Yes… Right away, Your Serene Highness… God keep you, Your Serene Highness.
You listen to your own steady breathing and feel the painless sting of tears welling up, feeling the lump in your throat take shape; Mariana breathes into your neck. You stare at the ceiling.
When the shuffling of fabric and leather-soled footfalls cease and the door latches shut, you at last let go. You can count the times you've cried on perhaps one hand since you've sprouted chin hairs – during prayer doesn't count – and this is by far the worst, the hardest. You feel like half a man as your body curls up at the abdomen, tense and pushing as if vomiting and, open-mouthed and trying not to wail, you let out near-silent, breathy sobs, wanting to scream and stifling yourself. No words come as your body heaves. Mariana just keeps stroking your hair, shushing you as if a babe. "All will be well, Stanisław, all will be well" and "you're a soldier, Stanisław" and "You'll have a new leg, Stanisław" – repeated again and again as you shake and cry yourself into a numbed, dripping nose and a headache beyond the one yielded by fever. As the shock wears off and you grow more and more weary, you feel the pain in your thigh, even pain where your leg should be. Throbbing, aching pain, mixed with an awful raw sharpness.
Time passes, and you dry yourself out of tears. You realize how drunk you are, and half-dimly understand they must have filled you with liquor before and during the surgery this morning. You're starving. "I'm drunk and hungry," you observe aloud. "I haven't eaten in days, have I?"
Mariana draws back and places the compress back on your forehead. Her eyes brimming with feeling. She has not cried further herself. "Nothing but vinegar, gorzała, sometimes water," she says. "I can get the servant to…"
"Not now, thank you. I think I want to talk about it," you say, feeling as if you're facing a Tatar battle-line. You swallow. "I'm very afraid." Be honest before your wife as you are before God.
"I was, too."
"You were crying."
"Yes, from fear," she says. No matter what they did to you, I wouldn't let them make me leave." She exhales, looks off, hesitates. "I thought if my husband were to die at twenty-four, to be widowed two weeks before my twenty-first — I should be brave about it."
You remember her birthing day through the haze, the shock. "October twenty-second."
"That's right."
You must ask: "So did you… Did you…"
"Watch it happen? Yes," she says. "It was awful, it's why my powder's running," she manages to chuckle. "The things you were saying, the sounds you were making. You were calling out for me."
"I was dreaming that Tatars had kidnapped you," you say. "I was trying to save you. God and His angels came down to help me, my sword was aflame like Saint Michael's." She's listening very closely. "I think I may have been able to hear what you were saying. Was I gnashing my teeth? You said 'he'll break his teeth' — it's like you were whispering in both ears at once."
She covers her mouth slowly. "I did say that. Your jaw was locked so tight when you weren't speaking. Screaming through your teeth," she says, stroking her chin, hiding her lip. "And, you know, a strange thing: at one point, you called me your love."
You can't quite read her face. Perhaps bemused? Flattered? She seems to be waiting for you to speak. "I care very much about you — I know I said 'I don't know' — but, well, I don't know!" You've forgotten about your circumstances, pain and despair traded in for confusion and an attempt to watch your words. "You're the only lady I've ever really known."
She circles around the bed, looking at you all the while — you cannot hear her footfalls — and sits where your leg would have been. You bizarrely feel the pain of her pressure upon it as if it were still there, but say nothing. Your chest is fluttering. That look on her face hasn't gone away. "I hope to love you someday, Stanisław. I care about you, I want you, and consider myself a blessed woman to have you." She at last smiles, reaches out, and traces her finger on your bare chest. "When they pulled down the covers to show you what had happened, I still thought that you were such a beautiful man. It felt wrong to think that at that moment, but it's strange: like a Roman statue with a leg broken off." She blinks. "I'm sorry to bring it up."
The drink has made you braver. You have sobbed out some portion of your terror. "No, no…" you pull down the covers to the point where Mariana's weight prevents it, revealing your naked body criss-crossed with bloodletting slices – you can see the plaster-stump in its terrible glory. "It's alright. I should get used to it," you say, trying to control yourself and focus on it. God, this sensation! So similar to the fight that brought you here.
Yes, there it is: your missing right leg. Your thigh goes on into nothing, exactly as you had seen before. The skin around the ligature above the plaster is an angry red, but thankfully one of compression rather than infection, you reckon. You wonder grimly what hides beneath the cast.
She is sliding her hand up toward your collarbone and neck, leaning in towards you. Mariana kisses you. Despite the pain and exertion wrought by your illness, you sit yourself up and lean into it, returning deeply. It goes on and, for a moment, you forget all the hurt and fear. Tongues cross and you cup her cheek, giving her the greedy kisses of a drunken lover. She pleasantly rakes her nails down your torso, moaning softly into the embrace. You feel the tingling blush of arousal, all of you melting and palpitating, and you curse yourself for wanting to be prudish about it, for being embarrassed about anything at a time like this, as if anything even matters. She can see it, she's allowed to, she's your wife; you leave yourself exposed to her and the October chill. Yes, I must love her. You are too afraid to say it.
"Before God I am your wife," Mariana says, staring into your eyes, voice velvet. "And not a single thing has changed." She taps your nose, and gets that mischievous glint in her eye – yet so soft. She strokes the left side of your head with her right hand. "Not your ear…" Her left sweeps down your flank, over the dip of your hip, stopping at the ligature. "...and not your leg. They may well be the same thing to me."
You shake your head and scoff. "But I'm crippled, nothing will ever be the same–"
"No, it won't be," she says. "But our bond is sacred, and that will never change." She rises from your bedside, tucks you in, starts for the door, and looks over her shoulder. "I'll get the servants to bring you some food."
"Thank you, Mariana." I love you.
The men in the room mumble: Of course… Yes… Right away, Your Serene Highness… God keep you, Your Serene Highness.
You listen to your own steady breathing and feel the painless sting of tears welling up, feeling the lump in your throat take shape; Mariana breathes into your neck. You stare at the ceiling.
When the shuffling of fabric and leather-soled footfalls cease and the door latches shut, you at last let go. You can count the times you've cried on perhaps one hand since you've sprouted chin hairs – during prayer doesn't count – and this is by far the worst, the hardest. You feel like half a man as your body curls up at the abdomen, tense and pushing as if vomiting and, open-mouthed and trying not to wail, you let out near-silent, breathy sobs, wanting to scream and stifling yourself. No words come as your body heaves. Mariana just keeps stroking your hair, shushing you as if a babe. "All will be well, Stanisław, all will be well" and "you're a soldier, Stanisław" and "You'll have a new leg, Stanisław" – repeated again and again as you shake and cry yourself into a numbed, dripping nose and a headache beyond the one yielded by fever. As the shock wears off and you grow more and more weary, you feel the pain in your thigh, even pain where your leg should be. Throbbing, aching pain, mixed with an awful raw sharpness.
Time passes, and you dry yourself out of tears. You realize how drunk you are, and half-dimly understand they must have filled you with liquor before and during the surgery this morning. You're starving. "I'm drunk and hungry," you observe aloud. "I haven't eaten in days, have I?"
Mariana draws back and places the compress back on your forehead. Her eyes brimming with feeling. She has not cried further herself. "Nothing but vinegar, gorzała, sometimes water," she says. "I can get the servant to…"
"Not now, thank you. I think I want to talk about it," you say, feeling as if you're facing a Tatar battle-line. You swallow. "I'm very afraid." Be honest before your wife as you are before God.
"I was, too."
"You were crying."
"Yes, from fear," she says. No matter what they did to you, I wouldn't let them make me leave." She exhales, looks off, hesitates. "I thought if my husband were to die at twenty-four, to be widowed two weeks before my twenty-first — I should be brave about it."
You remember her birthing day through the haze, the shock. "October twenty-second."
"That's right."
You must ask: "So did you… Did you…"
"Watch it happen? Yes," she says. "It was awful, it's why my powder's running," she manages to chuckle. "The things you were saying, the sounds you were making. You were calling out for me."
"I was dreaming that Tatars had kidnapped you," you say. "I was trying to save you. God and His angels came down to help me, my sword was aflame like Saint Michael's." She's listening very closely. "I think I may have been able to hear what you were saying. Was I gnashing my teeth? You said 'he'll break his teeth' — it's like you were whispering in both ears at once."
She covers her mouth slowly. "I did say that. Your jaw was locked so tight when you weren't speaking. Screaming through your teeth," she says, stroking her chin, hiding her lip. "And, you know, a strange thing: at one point, you called me your love."
You can't quite read her face. Perhaps bemused? Flattered? She seems to be waiting for you to speak. "I care very much about you — I know I said 'I don't know' — but, well, I don't know!" You've forgotten about your circumstances, pain and despair traded in for confusion and an attempt to watch your words. "You're the only lady I've ever really known."
She circles around the bed, looking at you all the while — you cannot hear her footfalls — and sits where your leg would have been. You bizarrely feel the pain of her pressure upon it as if it were still there, but say nothing. Your chest is fluttering. That look on her face hasn't gone away. "I hope to love you someday, Stanisław. I care about you, I want you, and consider myself a blessed woman to have you." She at last smiles, reaches out, and traces her finger on your bare chest. "When they pulled down the covers to show you what had happened, I still thought that you were such a beautiful man. It felt wrong to think that at that moment, but it's strange: like a Roman statue with a leg broken off." She blinks. "I'm sorry to bring it up."
The drink has made you braver. You have sobbed out some portion of your terror. "No, no…" you pull down the covers to the point where Mariana's weight prevents it, revealing your naked body criss-crossed with bloodletting slices – you can see the plaster-stump in its terrible glory. "It's alright. I should get used to it," you say, trying to control yourself and focus on it. God, this sensation! So similar to the fight that brought you here.
Yes, there it is: your missing right leg. Your thigh goes on into nothing, exactly as you had seen before. The skin around the ligature above the plaster is an angry red, but thankfully one of compression rather than infection, you reckon. You wonder grimly what hides beneath the cast.
She is sliding her hand up toward your collarbone and neck, leaning in towards you. Mariana kisses you. Despite the pain and exertion wrought by your illness, you sit yourself up and lean into it, returning deeply. It goes on and, for a moment, you forget all the hurt and fear. Tongues cross and you cup her cheek, giving her the greedy kisses of a drunken lover. She pleasantly rakes her nails down your torso, moaning softly into the embrace. You feel the tingling blush of arousal, all of you melting and palpitating, and you curse yourself for wanting to be prudish about it, for being embarrassed about anything at a time like this, as if anything even matters. She can see it, she's allowed to, she's your wife; you leave yourself exposed to her and the October chill. Yes, I must love her. You are too afraid to say it.
"Before God I am your wife," Mariana says, staring into your eyes, voice velvet. "And not a single thing has changed." She taps your nose, and gets that mischievous glint in her eye – yet so soft. She strokes the left side of your head with her right hand. "Not your ear…" Her left sweeps down your flank, over the dip of your hip, stopping at the ligature. "...and not your leg. They may well be the same thing to me."
You shake your head and scoff. "But I'm crippled, nothing will ever be the same–"
"No, it won't be," she says. "But our bond is sacred, and that will never change." She rises from your bedside, tucks you in, starts for the door, and looks over her shoulder. "I'll get the servants to bring you some food."
"Thank you, Mariana." I love you.
XXXI. October 5-12, 1575. Warszawa, Polish Crownlands.
- Location
- United States
The most abject form of despair began to shed itself over the course of two or three sleepless, tearful days, coinciding with the slow lowering of fever and inflammation and, as the physician tasted, an improvement to the quality of your urine. Fear and sadness still exist: you are in mourning, you reckon, though God be praised that you haven't had the occasion to know what it's like. Things have changed forever, and so suddenly, and so drastically. You have been told that, like with a death, there are days where one can almost forget, and days where one cannot. Days of frustration and a rush of melancholia, and other days where blood and the cholera resurge. It is a fickle thing, measured in weeks and months, and you eagerly await the coming of the surgeon Paré's false leg. The physicians say you should not do anything bolder than use crutches until November, device or no device. In November, too, will the ligature and plaster be removed, and you'll be forced to take in something you had hitherto only seen on beggars; with the cast in place, it doesn't quite feel real yet. But there will be smooth skin, a rounded nub. Such a fact cannot be avoided.
You hated God for a fleeting few moments, in the earliest instants of horror. But you realized that you've been spared for a reason, albeit tortured as a test: the sensation of the leg still being there keeps you awake well into the night, and dreams of being made whole again – or losing the rest of your limbs – leave you jolting awake in cold sweats. You want to share a bed with your wife again as soon as it's possible; she can get you back to sleep with ease. Indeed, it's Mariana, Marszowski, and much communion with the Holy Virgin that keeps you sane, stable, even hopeful. Ten French leagues a day with a false leg, that medicus said, and riding, and kneeling, and sitting. It's a daily refrain in your mind, but then you realize that you'll never dance again.
You tell Mariana that that fact saddens you. "Oh, well, branles were designed for old men and their infirm crone-ladies, you know, merely strafing in a circle and all," she says. "Surely you can do that with a false leg. But perish the thought – your soup'll get cold, my lord!"
Marszowski, sitting in the corner of the room, as great a sentinel as your wife, claps his hands and laughs. "Mother him, lady princess, mother him!" He breaks out into a coughing fit. Mariana beams with equal parts evil and care.
"Quiet!" you snap, the chuckling spreading to you. It's good to laugh, may Saint Benedict forgive it. "Quiet. Let me eat, then, if you're both so worried!"
You're sitting up in bed before your tray-table, boasting a spread of surprisingly appetizing (albeit peasant-y) humorally-corrective food. You've been advised to eat slowly, but the plates stare you down, steely-eyed and tempting, especially after days of starvation. Representing the melancholia is a steaming and egg-thickened sorrel soup containing various chopped vegetables, alongside a saucer of cold dill pickles and a little bowl of buckwheat porridge. Meanwhile, the main course is phlegmatic in nature: cold pickled herrings, counterbalanced with sanguine honeyed onions to restore you after constant bleeding. For your drinks, you have cold beer, tepid twice-boiled water, and hot dandelion tea – to be consumed in that order – all rounded out with humorally-neutral dark serf's bread. How rustic and restorative! A far cry from the rich French and Italian fare to which you've been long-accustomed, the kind of spicy and fatty stuff recommended for a phlegmatic such as yourself.
But, Hell, you'd eat horse or dog meat. Weeks of bread and water and thin soups, answered with vomiting or a loose stool or terrible stomach pains, left you with a concave stomach and protruding ribs. And Mariana still said you were a beautiful man looking down at your fragile, broken body – a "Roman statue." I'm not broken, don't say that! In any event, you're more than grateful for her words, and Lord knows you're grateful for your improving condition, too. You decide to start by dipping a hunk of bread into the sorrel soup, digging your teeth into the earthy, bitter, eggy delight. You moan with satisfaction, and wash it down with beer.
"I'll play serving girl just to see that look on your face!" exclaims Mariana. She adopts a peasant's accent and gives a little swing of her hip: "more soup for you, m'lord? More Warka for me master?" Sir Marszowski literally slaps his knee.
"It's not that funny!" you call out to your fencing master. You wave your hand at Mariana: oh, quit it. But, of course, you're grinning as you chew.
It's people that make life worth living, and you've no shortage of visitors. Even if some of them are being cynical, you'd be lying if you said you didn't appreciate the extreme activity of your chamber door. The Zborowski brothers (including Batory-supporting Piotr) filed in one by one to offer condolences, as did the Ostrogski princes, the Archbishop-Interrex prayed over your body, Sierotka did his utmost to cheer you up, even Jan Zamoyski and his second-in-command Mikołaj Sienicki dropped by to give you a handshake and compliment your tenacity. "I'm told Your Serene Highness was given last rites twice!" exclaims Zamoyski. "And yet here you are – two horses killed under you at Zawadówka, too, and still Your Serene Highness went on!" Hopefully he's not upset about those facts.
"Thank you, Lord Zamoyski," you say from your bed, feeling mildly odd about this particular visit. "Perhaps two shall be my lucky number, despite just one ear and just one leg," you joke. You've been trying effortfully to make light of your situation. A man goes mad otherwise.
The Royal Secretary chuckles in a way you feel is customary. "It may be so!" he says. "I truly wish we weren't on the opposite sides of things – to be frank, I wasn't sure of Your Serene Highness' mettle till we went on campaign," he admits. "You are indeed Ajax."
You nod graciously and gratefully to that, genuinely flattered, though all of a sudden realizing that you can never talk to this man about anything of consequence. He's a foe when one gets down to it. "Well, I'm certainly no Achilles," you say, gesturing to the flat side of your covers, eliciting another vaguely forced laugh. Please leave.
"Well," says Zamoyski as he claps his hands down on his pantlegs, ever the people-reader, "Jews don't share their recipes for beer with each other, do they? I suppose it's back to being rival innkeeps," he winks.
"Very well, then," you say. It still felt somewhat nice to see him – heaven is full of Saints, but none of the people you know just yet. Except for Mother.
You weren't ready for the arrival of your family. Septimus and Krzysztof entered first and seemed like their normal selves, more or less, the latter even smiling and looking impressed – but it was Father that left you reeling. He barges into the room and hugs your neck, saying: "Son, Son, the news was so grave, I thought you'd be gone before we made it here."
You pat his back tentatively, shocked at the disappearance of his steel. "I'm alright, Father, I'm alright," you say. "There's a smith and a carpenter and a locksmith in Kraków making me a leg. I'm told it's jointed at the knee and ankle."
He breaks the embrace to look into your eyes. You feel like crying, but obviously swallow it down. Not in front of men, never in front of men – only Mariana. "So you'll walk again? Without crutches, I mean?" You nod. "What about riding? Can you still lead men?"
"Yes, Father, they say the only things I'll lose are running, jumping, and dancing," you say.
"Oh, praise God," he says, hugging you once more. "Praise God. Praise God."
You look over his shoulder to see your brothers equally-shocked. Krzysztof shifts from foot to foot. "Quite a victory you scored out in the Fields, brother."
"Not sure if it was worth all this," you say. "But may it secure us the election. The only problem is that Zamoyski was there, too, and who knows how he'll try and spin it. But the Ostrogski know that I led charge after charge, drew up most of the battleplans."
Krzysztof smiles wide; Septimus remains still, staring at Father, looking like he may have been rendered mute by the scene. Your father at last withdraws and clears his throat. "You're a hussar after all," he says. Now he's back.
"Indeed he is – my warrior of a little brother!" says Krzysztof. "With the war wounds to prove it!"
There it is again! Zamoyski refrained from doing so, but there's been this odd undercurrent of pride amongst your many visitors, maybe even jealousy, at one of the worst things that can ever happen to a man. People seem to admire that you're no longer whole, as if it makes manifest your bravery. You feel like an imposter: it was an infection and a long knife and a bonesaw that did this to you, all stemming from a little knick of a Tatar's dagger. They say you're a hero – maybe you are. But just because your leg's gone?
"You have honored this family and made us all proud," says your father. "Clinging to life the way you have… A true Radziwiłł."
"Thank you, Father."
It's good that they're here – and not just for the sake of your morale. The Habsburg camp will be needing all the help they can get, and the late arrival of the great Mikołaj Rudy and his two elder sons will be a boon for the faction indeed.
Your melancholy at bay for now, you decide that busying yourself is a good idea for your mind (and a political necessity). You are not going against your physician's orders this time around, you've learned from that blunder and then some: you shall work by writing and through your lieutenants.
But what's your focus?
[] Coordinating with the Austrian delegation regarding bribes and campaign promises.
This represents the most aggressive stance – trying to flip elements of the lower and middle Crownland nobility away from Stefan Batory and Zamoyski. On one hand, ensure that wheels are greased and concessions upheld. On the rhetorical side, focus on a unifying message through speeches and statements penned by your own hand, reminding likely Batory voters of the strength of an Imperial-Commonwealth alliance and its implications for Livonia and even Moldavia, the youthful vigor (and impressionability) of the Archduke, and the trickle-down of Vienna's wealth and influence.
[] Maintaining cohesion among the Ruthenians.
One of the less daunting tasks in light of your sacrifices and successes against the Tatars, but it's still wise to cover all of one's bases. The primary fear of the borderland lords would perhaps be being dragged by the Habsburgs into conflict with the Turk (and by extension, the Tatar once more). Remind them that our King could easily be dissuaded from such a path on account of isolation and inexperience.
[] Maintaining cohesion among the magnates and Catholic clergy.
Another easier task: much is to be gained in terms of material and immaterial power from a union with the Habsburgs for those already at the top. Meanwhile, the clergy is eager for the restoration of the ecclesiastical courts and, for the more firebrand, the potential for a campaign of countering the Reformation. The only concern is that some of the esteemed men of the court and Church are antsy about the inexperience of the Archduke, and look to the much older, much more experienced Batory to right the ship of state in these stormy times. Remind them that we'll have free reign of the house until Maciej comes into his own, surely well-influenced by the Sarmatian ideal.
You hated God for a fleeting few moments, in the earliest instants of horror. But you realized that you've been spared for a reason, albeit tortured as a test: the sensation of the leg still being there keeps you awake well into the night, and dreams of being made whole again – or losing the rest of your limbs – leave you jolting awake in cold sweats. You want to share a bed with your wife again as soon as it's possible; she can get you back to sleep with ease. Indeed, it's Mariana, Marszowski, and much communion with the Holy Virgin that keeps you sane, stable, even hopeful. Ten French leagues a day with a false leg, that medicus said, and riding, and kneeling, and sitting. It's a daily refrain in your mind, but then you realize that you'll never dance again.
You tell Mariana that that fact saddens you. "Oh, well, branles were designed for old men and their infirm crone-ladies, you know, merely strafing in a circle and all," she says. "Surely you can do that with a false leg. But perish the thought – your soup'll get cold, my lord!"
Marszowski, sitting in the corner of the room, as great a sentinel as your wife, claps his hands and laughs. "Mother him, lady princess, mother him!" He breaks out into a coughing fit. Mariana beams with equal parts evil and care.
"Quiet!" you snap, the chuckling spreading to you. It's good to laugh, may Saint Benedict forgive it. "Quiet. Let me eat, then, if you're both so worried!"
You're sitting up in bed before your tray-table, boasting a spread of surprisingly appetizing (albeit peasant-y) humorally-corrective food. You've been advised to eat slowly, but the plates stare you down, steely-eyed and tempting, especially after days of starvation. Representing the melancholia is a steaming and egg-thickened sorrel soup containing various chopped vegetables, alongside a saucer of cold dill pickles and a little bowl of buckwheat porridge. Meanwhile, the main course is phlegmatic in nature: cold pickled herrings, counterbalanced with sanguine honeyed onions to restore you after constant bleeding. For your drinks, you have cold beer, tepid twice-boiled water, and hot dandelion tea – to be consumed in that order – all rounded out with humorally-neutral dark serf's bread. How rustic and restorative! A far cry from the rich French and Italian fare to which you've been long-accustomed, the kind of spicy and fatty stuff recommended for a phlegmatic such as yourself.
But, Hell, you'd eat horse or dog meat. Weeks of bread and water and thin soups, answered with vomiting or a loose stool or terrible stomach pains, left you with a concave stomach and protruding ribs. And Mariana still said you were a beautiful man looking down at your fragile, broken body – a "Roman statue." I'm not broken, don't say that! In any event, you're more than grateful for her words, and Lord knows you're grateful for your improving condition, too. You decide to start by dipping a hunk of bread into the sorrel soup, digging your teeth into the earthy, bitter, eggy delight. You moan with satisfaction, and wash it down with beer.
"I'll play serving girl just to see that look on your face!" exclaims Mariana. She adopts a peasant's accent and gives a little swing of her hip: "more soup for you, m'lord? More Warka for me master?" Sir Marszowski literally slaps his knee.
"It's not that funny!" you call out to your fencing master. You wave your hand at Mariana: oh, quit it. But, of course, you're grinning as you chew.
It's people that make life worth living, and you've no shortage of visitors. Even if some of them are being cynical, you'd be lying if you said you didn't appreciate the extreme activity of your chamber door. The Zborowski brothers (including Batory-supporting Piotr) filed in one by one to offer condolences, as did the Ostrogski princes, the Archbishop-Interrex prayed over your body, Sierotka did his utmost to cheer you up, even Jan Zamoyski and his second-in-command Mikołaj Sienicki dropped by to give you a handshake and compliment your tenacity. "I'm told Your Serene Highness was given last rites twice!" exclaims Zamoyski. "And yet here you are – two horses killed under you at Zawadówka, too, and still Your Serene Highness went on!" Hopefully he's not upset about those facts.
"Thank you, Lord Zamoyski," you say from your bed, feeling mildly odd about this particular visit. "Perhaps two shall be my lucky number, despite just one ear and just one leg," you joke. You've been trying effortfully to make light of your situation. A man goes mad otherwise.
The Royal Secretary chuckles in a way you feel is customary. "It may be so!" he says. "I truly wish we weren't on the opposite sides of things – to be frank, I wasn't sure of Your Serene Highness' mettle till we went on campaign," he admits. "You are indeed Ajax."
You nod graciously and gratefully to that, genuinely flattered, though all of a sudden realizing that you can never talk to this man about anything of consequence. He's a foe when one gets down to it. "Well, I'm certainly no Achilles," you say, gesturing to the flat side of your covers, eliciting another vaguely forced laugh. Please leave.
"Well," says Zamoyski as he claps his hands down on his pantlegs, ever the people-reader, "Jews don't share their recipes for beer with each other, do they? I suppose it's back to being rival innkeeps," he winks.
"Very well, then," you say. It still felt somewhat nice to see him – heaven is full of Saints, but none of the people you know just yet. Except for Mother.
You weren't ready for the arrival of your family. Septimus and Krzysztof entered first and seemed like their normal selves, more or less, the latter even smiling and looking impressed – but it was Father that left you reeling. He barges into the room and hugs your neck, saying: "Son, Son, the news was so grave, I thought you'd be gone before we made it here."
You pat his back tentatively, shocked at the disappearance of his steel. "I'm alright, Father, I'm alright," you say. "There's a smith and a carpenter and a locksmith in Kraków making me a leg. I'm told it's jointed at the knee and ankle."
He breaks the embrace to look into your eyes. You feel like crying, but obviously swallow it down. Not in front of men, never in front of men – only Mariana. "So you'll walk again? Without crutches, I mean?" You nod. "What about riding? Can you still lead men?"
"Yes, Father, they say the only things I'll lose are running, jumping, and dancing," you say.
"Oh, praise God," he says, hugging you once more. "Praise God. Praise God."
You look over his shoulder to see your brothers equally-shocked. Krzysztof shifts from foot to foot. "Quite a victory you scored out in the Fields, brother."
"Not sure if it was worth all this," you say. "But may it secure us the election. The only problem is that Zamoyski was there, too, and who knows how he'll try and spin it. But the Ostrogski know that I led charge after charge, drew up most of the battleplans."
Krzysztof smiles wide; Septimus remains still, staring at Father, looking like he may have been rendered mute by the scene. Your father at last withdraws and clears his throat. "You're a hussar after all," he says. Now he's back.
"Indeed he is – my warrior of a little brother!" says Krzysztof. "With the war wounds to prove it!"
There it is again! Zamoyski refrained from doing so, but there's been this odd undercurrent of pride amongst your many visitors, maybe even jealousy, at one of the worst things that can ever happen to a man. People seem to admire that you're no longer whole, as if it makes manifest your bravery. You feel like an imposter: it was an infection and a long knife and a bonesaw that did this to you, all stemming from a little knick of a Tatar's dagger. They say you're a hero – maybe you are. But just because your leg's gone?
"You have honored this family and made us all proud," says your father. "Clinging to life the way you have… A true Radziwiłł."
"Thank you, Father."
It's good that they're here – and not just for the sake of your morale. The Habsburg camp will be needing all the help they can get, and the late arrival of the great Mikołaj Rudy and his two elder sons will be a boon for the faction indeed.
Your melancholy at bay for now, you decide that busying yourself is a good idea for your mind (and a political necessity). You are not going against your physician's orders this time around, you've learned from that blunder and then some: you shall work by writing and through your lieutenants.
But what's your focus?
[] Coordinating with the Austrian delegation regarding bribes and campaign promises.
This represents the most aggressive stance – trying to flip elements of the lower and middle Crownland nobility away from Stefan Batory and Zamoyski. On one hand, ensure that wheels are greased and concessions upheld. On the rhetorical side, focus on a unifying message through speeches and statements penned by your own hand, reminding likely Batory voters of the strength of an Imperial-Commonwealth alliance and its implications for Livonia and even Moldavia, the youthful vigor (and impressionability) of the Archduke, and the trickle-down of Vienna's wealth and influence.
[] Maintaining cohesion among the Ruthenians.
One of the less daunting tasks in light of your sacrifices and successes against the Tatars, but it's still wise to cover all of one's bases. The primary fear of the borderland lords would perhaps be being dragged by the Habsburgs into conflict with the Turk (and by extension, the Tatar once more). Remind them that our King could easily be dissuaded from such a path on account of isolation and inexperience.
[] Maintaining cohesion among the magnates and Catholic clergy.
Another easier task: much is to be gained in terms of material and immaterial power from a union with the Habsburgs for those already at the top. Meanwhile, the clergy is eager for the restoration of the ecclesiastical courts and, for the more firebrand, the potential for a campaign of countering the Reformation. The only concern is that some of the esteemed men of the court and Church are antsy about the inexperience of the Archduke, and look to the much older, much more experienced Batory to right the ship of state in these stormy times. Remind them that we'll have free reign of the house until Maciej comes into his own, surely well-influenced by the Sarmatian ideal.
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Were we hale and hearty I think I would suggest working the Austrians. If they have a biggest weakness its local knowledge something we can provide. But we are taking it somewhat easy right now and presumably our family will also be helping with the politicking. I think Ruthenia is the best target for us right now. It may be the lighter target but we're recovering and it naturally follows on our recent moves to gain influence there. best to play on our war heroism while those events are still fresh in everyone's mind.
[X] Maintaining cohesion among the Ruthenians.
[X] Maintaining cohesion among the Ruthenians.
bookwyrm
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[X] Maintaining cohesion among the Ruthenians.
Might be losing some ground on potentially not getting on the same page with the clergy on speechifying on Matthias' candidacy, but at this point with how frayed Stanislaw is going to be it might just make things worse with a public blow-up or something at the inopportune and overzealous suggestion of one of those firebrands of the Counter-Reformation. Still though, the chance for the Bathory party to make hay with the specter of the Spanish Inquisition or indeed for some real freaks to actually gain some steam decrying the assaults on the national character of the Catholic church kinda worries me, if and when this election turns into a nail-biter and each camp is pushed to scrape together every vote they can.
Pretty much all the rest of Europe is busy lighting itself on fire on just this conflict after all, and while not to the degree of the Golden Liberty of the Commonwealth, there were times places like France and England patted themselves on the back for successfully navigating through it and avoiding all that mess.
Might be losing some ground on potentially not getting on the same page with the clergy on speechifying on Matthias' candidacy, but at this point with how frayed Stanislaw is going to be it might just make things worse with a public blow-up or something at the inopportune and overzealous suggestion of one of those firebrands of the Counter-Reformation. Still though, the chance for the Bathory party to make hay with the specter of the Spanish Inquisition or indeed for some real freaks to actually gain some steam decrying the assaults on the national character of the Catholic church kinda worries me, if and when this election turns into a nail-biter and each camp is pushed to scrape together every vote they can.
Pretty much all the rest of Europe is busy lighting itself on fire on just this conflict after all, and while not to the degree of the Golden Liberty of the Commonwealth, there were times places like France and England patted themselves on the back for successfully navigating through it and avoiding all that mess.