Castellan (17 page)

There was an ear-piercing shriek as the blade of the dagger, the chain and then the man’s wrist and hand melted in the white heat. The crowd broke into delirious cheering and mothers at the back held their babies aloft so they could see the justice of Novgorod being administered. The prisoner squealed ‘Oh God, oh God’ as the brazier was moved away to leave a red stump where his hand had been.

‘As I was saying, highness,’ pressed Vetseke, ‘Ungannia has rebelled against the Sword Brothers.’

Mstislav angrily held up a hand to him. ‘Do not speak to me of Ungannia. My banner was stolen and my brother-in-law was murdered by the Sword Brothers there.’

The prisoner was thrashing around on the horizontal cross as pain shot through his body, his face contorted with agony. One of the executioners threw a bucket of water over him so he did not fall into unconsciousness and miss the next stage of the entertainment. The others, meanwhile, were heating the pincers in the brazier as the prisoner began frantically reciting prayers.

His next sound was a slow, high-pitched whine that grew in volume as the chief executioner took a knife from the table and slowly sliced off his testicles. This brought giggles and bawdy cheers from the crowd, the executioner slowing his movements and grinning to the people as he cut through the flesh.

Mstislav noticed Archbishop Mitrofan with his eyes closed.

‘Archbishop,’ he shouted, ‘is the Lord’s work not to your liking?’

The archbishop, visibly shaken by the horror unfolding a few paces from him, his face pale, tried to smile at the prince.

‘Keep your eyes open,’ Mstislav growled. ‘All of you watch the punishment that awaits those who try to topple me.’

The executioner held up the prisoner’s testicles in a bloody hand and then threw them into the crowd. Loud cheering.

‘The boyars and merchants grow rich, Vetseke,’ continued the prince as the other executioners proceeded to pinch the prisoner’s flesh with red-hit pincers.

‘Because of the rule of law that I have established in and around this city their trade in musk, sable, ermine, squirrel pelts, flax, jewellery and slaves flourishes. And what thanks do I get? A knife in my guts.’

The prisoner was once again thrashing around on the cross as chunks of his flesh were ripped from his body by the pincers. The scaffold was now awash with the victim’s blood and two of the executioners sprawled on the slippery surface, falling heavily on the boards. One screamed as the pincers he was holding seared his leg.

‘Amateurs,’ sneered Mstislav.

Vegetables were hurled from among the poorer citizens at this display of unprofessionalism and the chief executioner rebuked his subordinates. The condemned, meanwhile, was in the throes of a spasm as his body reacted to being torn, seared and having three appendages sliced or burnt off. The chief executioner raised his hand to Mstislav and bowed his head.

‘Ah,’ said the prince, turning to his wife, ‘the finale is for you, my dear, in recognition of your heritage.’

‘You are too kind, my lord,’ she purred, her mood having brightened at the display before her.

The prince nodded at the executioner who barked an order to two filthy urchins who had been loitering by the side of the scaffold. They hurried away into the crowd as the prisoner, now fading, was again doused with water.

‘If only the boyars had your loyalty, Vetseke,’ mused the prince. ‘And what are you? A landless prince who relies only on his wits to survive?’

‘You are too kind, highness,’ said Vetseke through gritted teeth.

‘Loyalty and bravery must be rewarded,’ continued the prince. ‘But how to reward you? That is the question.’

He looked at the prince as four black stallions were brought into the square, through the crowd and next to the scaffold, the stable hands having difficulty controlling the beasts as the smell of gore entered their nostrils and their ears heard the bloodthirsty cheers of the crowd.

‘What would you have, Prince of Kokenhusen? A mansion in the city, an estate beyond its walls, or perhaps one of my wife’s innumerable sisters as a wife?’

Alarm flashed in Vetseke’s eyes. ‘You are too generous, highness. But if I may be so bold as to request that I be allowed to leave the city with my men and a few additional reinforcements so I may join the rebellion against the Sword Brothers.’

Mstislav threw up his hands. ‘We have been over this a hundred times. I wasted hundreds of lives when Domash besieged Odenpah, and a brother-in-law when Gerceslav invaded Livonia. I see no reason to squander any more of my soldiers’ lives in futile expeditions into the west.’

‘A hundred Russians, highness, to retrieve your banner, that is all I ask,’ pleaded Vetseke.

Mstislav’s ears pricked up. ‘My banner?’

‘It was lost at Dorpat, highness, when Ungannia was the friend of the Sword Brothers. But now that kingdom is an enemy of the heretics. The son of Kalju has blamed the deaths of his parents on the Sword Brothers and has vowed vengeance on them. If your banner is still in his possession my arrival in Ungannia with soldiers to aid his cause would make him amenable to returning it to your highness.’

Mstislav stroked his beard thoughtfully as the prisoner was released from his shackles on the cross and leather straps were fixed around his wrists and ankles. The horses were positioned at each corner of the scaffold and the straps secured to the prisoner were then fixed to the beasts’ harnesses. In this way the prisoner was spread-eagled in mid-air above the scaffold as the horses took the strain. But then the strap around the bloody, raw stump at the end of the prisoner’s right arm slipped off the limb and he hung awkwardly in the air, moaning and trying to wriggle free.

The executioner waved his arms frantically at the stable hands who then shouted and pulled at the horses to retreat a few feet. They did, the prisoner crashing on to the boards.

‘What is the problem now?’ bellowed Mstislav, the prince jumping to his feet and pointing to the chief executioner. ‘Get over here!’

He may have been a brute with massive forearms and a barrel chest, a man accustomed to ripping, slicing and burning flesh, but he looked distinctly nervous as he jumped from the scaffold and rushed over to stand before the prince, whose eyes were bulging with rage.

‘I specifically decreed that the wretch was to have his limbs torn off by four stallions,’ he shouted, ‘as a special treat for my wife. You are making a fool of me and disappointing my wife.’

The man shook his head so hard Vetseke thought it would roll off his shoulders. He laughed; it might be cut off in a few moments.

‘No, no, no highness,’ the man stammered. ‘We are having problems strapping his right wrist. It’s not there, you see.’

Mstislav pointed at him. ‘Sort it out or I will have your head decorating that scaffold.’

The man gulped, bowed his head and raced back to the scaffold, screaming at his men to get the prisoner’s right wrist secured to the horse harness. They did this by strapping a number of belts around the poor wretch’s arm and securing them as tightly as possible. Then the prisoner’s ordeal entered a fresh phase. Princess Maria clapped her hands together with delight as the stallions were whipped and shouted at to pull as hard as they could. The prisoner screamed, the crowd cheered and hooted and Mstislav smiled as he looked for the first limb to be wrenched from its socket. But nothing happened.

The horses strained, the stable hands wielded their whips and the prisoner shrieked and cried for mercy but his limbs remained in place. The crowd quietened and then began whistling and jeering, more vegetables hurtling through the air to hit executioners and horses. The prince pointed at the chief executioner who, in an act of desperation, took a knife and began slicing at the prisoner’s right armpit. The man gave an animal-like yelp as his arm was torn from its socket and the crowd roared its approval. The executioner then went to slice at the prisoner’s left leg, using the knife to cut away the sinews at the top of his leg. Once more the limb was yanked from its socket. Mightily relieved, he used the blade to achieve the same for the victim’s left arm and right leg. Eventually, his apron covered in blood, he stood and gazed down at the limbless torso of the now dead prisoner.

There was an unseemly squabble when part of the crowd decided that the dead man’s left leg would be a good souvenir of the occasion and rushed forward to grab it. Half a dozen of Mstislav’s guards used both ends of their spears to crack heads and pierce bellies before order was restored. Princess Maria, delighted that her husband had recreated the execution method frequently employed by her people, but which she had not seen since she was a child of the steppe, kissed him on the cheek.

He smiled at her and then spoke to Vetseke.

‘Very well, prince, I will grant your request. You may go west with a hundred of my men and may God go with you.’

‘Thank you, highness,’ said Vetseke. He closed his eyes and thanked Laima, the Goddess of Fate, for delivering him from his life of miserable exile.

Across the square the boyars and merchants slowly drifted away, saying little to each other, their heads cast down. One of the boyars, of distinguished appearance with a sable-lined cloak around his shoulders, acknowledged his friend Gregori. Yuri Nevsky, patriarch of Novgorod’s wealthiest and most powerful boyar family, wore a resigned look.

‘It was most kind of the prince to invite us to the execution, do you not think, Gregori?’

His friend, a short, stout man, was agitated. ‘His hatred of us intensifies, Yuri. Your son is lucky to be out of this den of madness. I trust he is well.’

‘Yaroslav thrives, thank you,’ replied Yuri, ‘but he is most eager to return to Novgorod, if only to see his mother.’

Gregori laughed under his breath. ‘It would be better for your wife, his mother, to visit him in Pskov. Safer too.’

‘Do not forget where real power lies in this city, my friend,’ said Yuri. ‘The
veche
appoints and dismisses Novgorod’s princes.’

‘Has anyone told Mstislav that?’ asked Gregori, not a trace of irony in his voice.

*****

From the battlements of the fort atop Toompea Hill Rolf, Count of Roskilde and Governor of Reval, had a bird’s eye view of the town, the perimeter wall and the surrounding terrain. To the north were the blue waters of the Gulf of the Finns, to the south the unending forests of Estonia, though immediately south and ringing the town was an army of Oeselians, Harrien and Wierlanders. It had been a month since King Valdemar, gripped by a permanent black mood, had departed Reval with his bishops, bodyguard and the entourage of his court, or what was left of it following the debacle on Oesel. The loss of hundreds of men had not disturbed the king or his knights. What really troubled them was that they had been forced to kill their surviving warhorses. Two weeks after the king’s departure the Estonians had attacked the town. A week later the Oeselians had joined them outside the walls.

The king’s departing words to him were: ‘I leave Estonia in your safe hands, Rolf. I will return next year with an army to exact vengeance on the Oeselians and Sword Brothers’. As he watched the fleet of cogs sail out of Reval harbour, now no longer blockaded by Oeselian longships, he knew that the simmering resentment of the Estonians would flare up into open rebellion with the departure of the king. The Harrien would have seen the triumphant procession of Valdemar and his army through their land before the attack on Oesel. And they would have seen the pathetic remnants of the kings’ army limp back to Reval in the aftermath of the abortive campaign. The Danes had been in Estonia for three years and in that time they had treated the indigenous people harshly, not least in using them as forced labour to build Reval’s defences.

Rolf turned to Count Albert, who had pleaded with his uncle to be allowed to stay on in Estonia to defend Reval.

‘Here is a question for you, Albert. If we had not abused the pagans in order to construct the defences around Reval, do you think that they would have still attacked the town?’

Albert looked at the groups of pagan warriors being marshalled for another assault against the perimeter, in front of which lay many of their dead from previous assaults.

‘Pagans have no foresight or intelligence, just a cunning, animal instinct. This siege is a case in point. It makes no sense to hurl men against strong defences but they do it day after day.’

‘They probably assumed that with the departure of the king our numbers would be so diminished that we would be unable to hold the perimeter,’ replied Rolf.

But even with depleted numbers that perimeter was a strong one. Over the three years that the Danes had occupied Reval they had substantially increased and strengthened its defences. The perimeter now encompassed not only the town but also Toompea Hill, on which the fort that would one day be a mighty stone castle stood. The trees that had surrounded the original settlement had been cut down, not only to provide building material for the perimeter wall but also to create open ground in front of it. In this way an attacker would have no cover against missiles shot from the walls.

Hundreds of Harrien, Jerwen and Wierlanders were rounded up as forced labour to work on the defences. Many died from malnutrition and exhaustion as Rolf’s soldiers and engineers set a cruel pace to finish the works, because the governor knew that peace in Danish Estonia was fragile and likely to break down at any time. The labourers first dug a deep ditch, its walls sloping at an angle of forty-five degrees, the earth from which was used to raise a high rampart behind it. Sharpened stakes were placed in the bottom of the ditch. The engineers were careful to ensure that a narrow, horizontal strip of land a yard wide was left between the ditch and the rampart to prevent the latter sliding into the former.