Casca 48: The Austrian, page 14
“See if any of these carrion are still alive,” an officer said.
Hands roughly grabbed him and Casca yelped in pain. “Hey, watch it, you diseased offspring of a cheap Souk whore,” the eternal mercenary growled in fluent Turkish.
“Hah, well be a man and fight, rather than sleep when you have a scratch!” his ‘rescuer’ advised, a swarthy man with a huge bristling mustache. He leaned back and looked over a shoulder. “One here, Effendi,” he addressed his superior officer. “He does not appear to be too badly hurt either. A shoulder wound.”
“Indeed? Tell this shirker to report to the field physician then. I want him fit for duty again to face the infidel, and this time to find a place in paradise!”
Casca grunted as he was hauled, none too gently, to his feet. He didn’t think they were too impressed by his incapacity. Shit, it had hurt him enough getting it, so he thought they would be at least a little more sympathetic. Two men went with him, probably glad not to be manning the forward positions. The smell of burning wafted over Casca as he stumbled along with them, dodging aside other Ottoman troops hurrying forward to hurl the perfidious Christians back into their surely doomed city.
The trenches twisted this way and that, passing a few bodies or wounded men, a burned station here and there, and then the trench ran straight, climbing as it rose up the edge of the glacis onto the counterscarp, angling away from the line of the walls. Here the ground level was above their heads so they could walk upright. Casca clutched his wound, grimacing every so often.
“Hurts, does it?” one of his escorts said mockingly.
“Shut it,” Casca snapped. “Or I’ll give you one just so you know how it feels.”
“Hah. I wouldn’t make such a fuss. You’re like a woman giving birth. All that fussing over nothing.”
“How would you know?” Casca said, then shut his mouth. He remembered that these men were from a different world. So he would have to be, too. “I hardly gave birth back there.”
“Bah. A pin prick and you’re acting as if you’re ready to meet Allah. What a child.”
Casca contented himself by scowling. Soon they were out of range of the muskets and the trench turned again and then became a shallow scrape and suddenly they were up and out. More Turkish troops were there, standing by tents or around the few buildings that were still standing in the area.
“There,” one of the soldiers pointed to a larger tent set in the middle of the camp. “Go to the surgeon and ask him to pat your head and make it better.”
“Why don’t you fuck off?” Casca asked. “If I were fit, I’d cut your ugly head off and use it as a cannonball to shoot over the walls. It would frighten them so much that they’d surrender immediately.”
“You’re so funny you know,” the Turkish soldier said. “I must remember to laugh.” They pushed Casca onwards, commenting on his ugly appearance, poor dress sense and an inability to grow a proper mustache. “That’s the thing with you Circassians, isn’t it? You’re not proper men. You can’t grow big enough mustaches.”
“No,” Casca agreed. “We don’t bother with that; we concentrate on growing bigger somewhere else,” and he grabbed his crotch. “You puny Anatolians cannot satisfy a mouse, let alone your women.”
“You Circassians are slaves, and that includes your women!” the Turkish soldier spat angrily. “So don’t you go bragging that you’re more of a man than we are! Now go to the tent or we’ll chop you into pieces right here where you stand!”
Casca grumbled and loped moodily into the medical tent. It wasn’t so much a tent as a cavernous area under canvas, but the Turks had a tradition of this kind of thing, like all the peoples who had once been steppe nomads from High Asia. Casca recalled his time, not too many years past, of his life with the great warlord Timur-i-lenk, or Tamerlane as he had become known in Europe. There had been tents galore there, and before that the Mongols whom he had accompanied.
He had no intention of seeing any doctor or physician, so he straightened himself, tried to ignore the sharp, stabbing pain in his left shoulder, held his musket in his right hand and walked through the tent for the exit on the far side. He had got perhaps three quarters through when a medical orderly suddenly stepped across his path, palm outstretched. “And what are you doing here? Are you wounded?”
“What, Effendi?” Casca played dumb.
“Your shoulder,” the orderly said with patience. “It is bloodied and there is a rip in your attire.”
“Oh, that,” Casca shrugged. “A little cut but I am good to return to my unit. I am going there now!”
The orderly frowned but stepped aside. Odd fellow. No matter, he had much worse patients to see and deal with. That scruffy-looking man must be with the Beylerbeli of Sivas’ troops holding the ground between the big river and the center of the camp. Uncouth and undisciplined lot, they were.
Casca emerged and looked left and right. Tents ran in both directions as far as he could see. Behind him the sound of cannons roared, which showed him where the city was. He orientated himself. The direction he wanted to go was off slightly to the right. The land was gently sloping up from the right to the left and ahead, in the distance, rose wooded hills.
The camps were bounded by a line of fences and streams ran through the lines of tents, dividing them into their various wings. Casca knew he had to cross two streams, the first being the Alserbach, just beyond an Austrian village called Hernals, and then there was the second which he could cross at another village called Wahring.
The danger was of course the units assigned to police the camps, to stop deserters and spies. He could be seen as one and was definitely the other. He would be shot if caught. Beyond Wahring he would be out of the Ottoman camp, but then he might run into one of the many loose bands of Turkish irregulars roaming the countryside, looting and burning. He would have to be quick and elusive.
He made out as if he knew where he was going and had the right to be where he was. Walking through the rows of tents and past dozens of soldiers wasn’t a problem; he was just one of many there, and since there was no regular uniform, his attire was no more unusual than scores of others.
The smell of soup being heated in the huge cauldrons made his mouth water as he passed them by, and this competed with the occasional waft from the camp latrines and the smell of thousands of men and horses in the summer sun. He tramped on, noting the way the grass had been flattened and in many places churned into the earth. In the autumn would come the rains and the ground would become a muddy morass.
The Turkish camp was one huge semi-circle around Vienna, the two ends close to the Danube. He was heading north-west and the edge of the camp was around the two villages he was making for. Roads running from Vienna passed through the camp in two places, the closer one to him passing into the village of Hernals. Hernals was not his destination, for a road ran north just before this, running along the edge of the camp, crossing the Alserbach and then entering Wahring. That was his first destination.
He stood close to the edge of the Ottoman camp and took all this in, memorizing the locations on the now destroyed map. There were soldiers policing the roads beyond the fences that marked the edge of the camp, he could see, and they looked very much like members of the Janissary corps. They were the Sultans elite, and Casca knew from bitter experience how good they were. If they caught him and thought he was a deserter, they’d hang him on the spot. If they thought he was a spy, he’d be taken to their HQ, interrogated, then hanged.
Best to wait till dark. It had taken him a couple of hours to get to this spot so he had about three more until dark. He walked past a number of tents until he found one unoccupied, and slid into it, sitting on the ground sheet. To pass the time, and to keep out of sight, he checked his musket, and other equipment, just to give him a sense of familiarity. The tent itself only had a few blankets, a couple of pots and a set of shabby clothes. A common soldier’s lodgings, and maybe he was out of guard duty, or had recently died.
As the sun went down, Casca had a perfect view of it, a red orb sinking below the near-distant Kahlenberg peaks, covered in trees. He sighed, stood up and left the tent.
“Hey, you’re not Ismail,” a voice startled him. He turned to see a man sat cross-legged at the entrance to his tent, sewing a hole in his jacket.
“No,” Casca agreed. “He asked me to fetch his powder case. He didn’t want to get into trouble.”
The soldier frowned. It sounded plausible but this was a total stranger, and a Circassian if he judged his coloration right. Circassians in their unit? Unheard of!
Casca moved away swiftly and approached a thin stand of ash trees, right on the edge of the camp. The crudely-made fence ran past these and on the other side he could see the road to Wahring. There were two Janissaries on it but they were walking away so Casca lifted one leg over the fence, stood on his toes and awkwardly got over it.
Now he moved swiftly along the road, bordered to the right by the Turkish camp and to the left by a grassy sward bordering the streams. The crossing over the Alserbach was by a flat, wooden bridge, only six feet or so long. Ahead he could see in the fading light the village of Wahring. He needed to cross the second stream and then turn left and head away from the Turkish army.
It was likely that the village was a focal point for the Janissaries so he would have to be very careful. Once he was beyond that, he would be in the open and then it was in the lap of the gods as to what he would encounter.
He slipped off the road and trotted at a crouch through the field of long grass, half-seen now in the growing dark. The buildings of Wahring were looming ahead of him when his luck ran out.
“And what do you think you are doing here, effendi?”
Casca stopped and half-turned to his right. A Janissary soldier, complete with cloth-topped peaked hat, and musket, stood there, and his musket was pointing right at Casca’s head.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Casca slowly straightened. As he did so, a second Janissary appeared to the other side. They had him caught in a vise. He put his hands out wide, in a friendly gesture. “Ah, I’m pleased to see you. Glad you’re doing your job well. I’m looking for the agha. Is he here?” The agha was a Turkish rank equivalent to commander, and it was almost certain that the commander of these Janissaries would be an agha.
“Why do you ask? You speak like a Circassian whore. Who are you and what are you doing here. Speak, dog, or I’ll have you hung from the nearest tree.”
Casca eyed the duo. Was that musket loaded? A quick look at the match and it was not smoking – no red glow in the dark. He could make out their faces from the flickering flames of lamps lit in the village ahead, and from the faint light of the stars. Casca unslung his musket. It would get in the way but he couldn’t afford to lose it, so he carefully allowed it to slide to the ground. “Actually I’m a spy, tasked with getting through your lines to reach the imperial army on the far side of the river. Well done in capturing me.”
The Janissaries looked at one another in surprise, and Casca took the chance. He pulled out his sword and sprang forward. The Turk with the musket squeezed the trigger in a reflex manner, giving the eternal mercenary a bad moment, but there only came the dull click of the mechanism moving to the firing position.
Casca’s blade thrust up hard, skewering the Janissary through the chest. He was wearing a fine silken overcoat and a padded jacket underneath, but no defense against a sword. Even as the Turkish soldier was sinking to the ground, face screwed up in pain, Casca was turning, bloodied sword in hand. The second Ottoman had realized a musket was of no use here so he, too, had pulled out his blade and now came at Casca, swinging hard from right to left.
Casca met the blow, deflected it high off to his right with a backhand parry, then planted his right foot down hard and sliced across the soldier’s gut, opening it out. The Turk gasped, clutched his midriff and folded over, falling to his knees. It looked like he was praying to Allah. Casca wiped his blade, sniffed in disgust at their lack of swordsmanship, and picked up his musket. “Corvu would have had your balls for breakfast,” he muttered in Latin as he left the two to bleed to death on the edge of the village.
The village itself was spread along both sides of the stream, no more than one building deep. The biggest building was opposite and to the left, but he guessed there were only ten to twelve constructions in total. Lights were coming from this and he suspected that was where the agha was billeted. There would be men on guard there. The road split the southern half of the village into two equal parts, while it forded the village and reappeared on the opposite bank to the right, running through a wooded area, possibly an orchard. That would give him shelter and protection, so he stepped into the water and waded through it as quietly as he could. The water reached his calves and no higher.
The distant sounds of dogs barking and indistinct noises from the massive Ottoman camp came to him, but he was now squelching in between two houses, both of which looked abandoned, and along the road through an orchard.
The road looked as if it ran back into the Ottoman camp, so at the edge of the orchard he moved away from the road and headed due west into the night, away from the lights of Wahring and Vienna.
From time to time he looked back and orientated himself by keeping the lights of the city directly behind him, but soon enough he found it too dark to press on, so he found a growth of trees to rest for the remainder of the night. In the morning he would press on, but it would have to be with extra care. On his own, he was prey for both sides; the Turks, because it was likely a foot soldier like himself would be a deserter, and the Austrians, because he was on his own, and enemy, and a ripe target to take revenge on.
The dawn came and he was awakened by the chorus of birds that always accompanied the start of the new day. He had trained his mind to recognize it as the signal to wake when out in the countryside. He ate a light breakfast and drank most of his water. Today he would cross the river or fail in his mission. It was the 26th day of August and he reckoned Vienna had ten to fourteen days left at the most. He would have to pass on the messages he had on him from von Starhemberg to the imperial commander urgently, or it might be too late for those he’d left behind.
He threw away his Ottoman fur hat. Now he was through the enemy camp, there was no more need for it and it only highlighted the fact he was a Turk which he didn’t want. There wasn’t much he could do about the rest of his attire but that was too bad.
The land here was flat, and clearly part of the Danubian river plain. He thought back through his long life on the times he’d been there. Not that many. Perhaps in his time with the tribes during and soon after the fall of the Roman Empire he’d been here. What had the Roman fort been called that had finally become Vienna? Oh yes, Vindobona, part of the province of Pannonia. He was sure he’d been along here in the time with the Lombards, but that was eleven centuries back and his memories of that time were hazy, due to the constant moving around he’d done.
The river would be wide and would be watched. He’d be taken prisoner on getting to the far side but he was prepared for that. He pushed on, passing small woods, crossing fields that were not being tended, due to the depravations of the Tartar horsemen, and he saw a burned-out farmhouse on one occasion. Finally he came to the river. It was wide and slow-moving, due to it being late summer, and he was sure he could make it. All he’d need was a log, or some chunk of wood to use as a float.
There were plenty of trees close to the water’s edge, and he rummaged about, seeking something suitable. While he was there he heard the sound of hoofs and so he dropped into a crouch and peered through the trees. A small group of lightly-armored cavalrymen came riding by at a canter, looking left and right, probably on the look-out for deserters or possible threats to the siege army. They would probably be irregulars that would have been called from their homes on the borderlands to partake in the campaign, and they looked like deli, mounted rangers.
After they had gone he found a recently fallen tree and spent some time in ripping off the branches and the top, and hacking at it with his sword. The log was just higher than he stood after he’d done all that and dragged it through the small wood to the water’s edge.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed it in and waded after it, taking hold of the log and lifted his feet from the steeply shelving river bed. The water was cool, and he made sure he kept his musket on top of the log and carried on kicking across the Danube. It took a while, but finally he neared the far bank and made for a woodcutter’s log cabin that the current seemed to be pushing him past. When his legs touched the soft, muddy bed, he rose, picked up his musket and released the log.
He tramped up onto dry land, cascading water. Two men stood a short distance off, regarding him curiously. “And what do we have here?” one said to the other in German.
“Oh, not again,” Casca said with feeling in the same language. “I’ve gone through all that with the damned Turks. Look, I need to get to the commander, urgently. I’ve come from Vienna with a message from Count von Starhemberg to Duke Charles of Lorraine.”
The two Austrians, sentries from the imperial army, conferred for a moment. They had spotted Casca crossing and had waited for him to land on the bank. Now they had a problem; this man in Ottoman clothing and equipment was speaking German, albeit with a slightly stilted accent as if he was a foreigner, but telling them he was on a mission of utmost importance.
Casca had little time to stand there, shivering, wet, while these two idiots discussed the semantics of what he had said and why. “Look, you dummkopfs, arrest me for fuck’s sake if you must, but get me out of these sodden clothes and in the dry. I’m dying here.”
The two looked at him without any enthusiasm. One took his musket and powder case, the other prodded the tip of his bayonet into Casca’s back. “Alright, you mouthy swine, let’s go for a walk to the captain’s quarters. He’ll know what to do with someone like you. Walk!”
