The Italian Ugo was a small man, and he could scarcely see over the battlements. Besides, the chainmail he was wearing was far too big for him and hung loosely down over his thin body. His helmet was too big for his head. He looked quite absurd, standing there and scarcely able to see over the parapet. Yet, as the light grew on the plain to reveal the enemy in their serried ranks, he appeared quite cheerful that I began to reproach myself for my sense of impending doom.
“Mark my words,” he says, “they will come for us, but when they do, Turan will be ready.”
The Italian smiled with mockery (indeed, as I think on it later, malice strangely aforethought).
As he did, he let rip an outrageous fart.
Like wind hunting through an empty house –
It rang round the battlements, and all of us who stood there roared with laughter.
You all know his name. You also know his deeds.
The story that I told in the chronicle was the story that we will tell all our children and they will in turn tell to their children’s children.
It is the story of our hero, the one who saves us.
The enemy were at the gate. We did not know what to do. We are lost, or so we think.
Turan has come to join us from the south and broken through their siege with a handful of his men. This bold and daring action by our bold and daring Captain was done just as dawn broke on the thirty-fourth day of the siege.
We were all cheered and heartened to see him with his battle-hardened troop and the defiance we saw in his one good eye.
“Turan has come,” we call. “Turan is here to save us.”
This was before they took the outer wall, and the fear hath grown. We were hemmed in on all sides.
The food is running out and the enemy have found the source of the stream that runs under the castle. Now there is nothing left of the stream but a trickle. And now the well runs low. We could only wait for the snow, but could we survive till winter?
Want of food and water was not our only problem. For the King had grown depressed. His thoughts were with the Queen who was ill, and they withdrew to their inner chambers. The Queen everyone knew was his weakness. He tries to comfort her. Though no coward, in that moment, we believe he no longer cares for us, but only thinks of his sick Queen.
We of the inner circle go to Turan again on behalf of the King, his lord and we implore him to act.
Turan, who we know is a complex, proud man, in his pride calls us out with uncalled for sarcasm.
“You come before me and beg me in the name of your king who hides behind closed doors. You ask me to do this thing, even as your hearts tell you it cannot be done. You look at the odds, see out there the enemy on the plain. The Sultan is ready to pounce. It is all in the law of numbers. Everything is stacked against you. The bridge will be taken, he is convinced, it is a matter of time, and you too are also convinced. But I will do it. And prove to you that a thing that should not be done can be done.”
Turan spoke thus. Like a braggart. A vain man, for indeed he was.
Though, he is right, and things stand bad with us. The enemy has the plain and they have taken the outer gate. Now they prepare to take the inner gate. It was only a matter of time before they overran the bridge and took the citadel. There lies our doom. But the man to whom we have entrusted our fate proves himself to be braver than his vainglorious boast.
The enemy launch their attack. They blow their horns and trumpets.
They come running with their scaling ladders and their infidel curses.
I and the Italian Ugo held up our pikes as they try to come over the wall.
And those who looked down below saw Turan. He hid himself behind a pile of bodies while the others, those few of his men who were still with him and did make a feigning kind of retreat. Turan surprises the enemy from behind.
Singlehandedly, he holds the Muslim at bay. Then he jumps into the moat and swims to the bank where our men throw a rope down to him. With arrows flying all around him he climbs into the turret.
This was all the time we had needed to block the way to the turret. I and the little Italian man cheered when he came to stand beside us.
Turan’s blade flashes, and our pikes hold firm that day.
The first snow was on the ground when the Sultan’s army left. We cheered from the battlements. The siege was lifted and we had won. And in the hour of victory we cheer and praise Turan.
I Janos recorded all these things again in the chronicle and relayed them to our King. The King gave it his blessing, and we slept once again free men in our beds.
The siege had lasted three months. The citadel was safe. The invaders had left for winter. But that is when the malcontent began.
The snow was now thick on the ground. Though now we had water from the icy stream, there was no game to hunt. Supplies had been sent for, but the pass was blocked in the bad weather. Everyone told themselves they were fasting but were merely growing hungry. Would it all have been for naught?
I write this now hurriedly; soon I will eat the fat of the candle.
Our king is unsettled. Something disturbs his soul. He sits now on his throne, or at his dinner table, over his cups, with a hard, brooding expression on his face. All eyes are on him, and yet he does not smile or bang the table with his fist. The japes have stopped and the jesters banished from the poor feast. All are drunk on wine and empty stomachs. We eat poppy seeds to sate our hunger.
Now I will tell you a secret that is not in the chronicle.
The King is a cuckold
Turan hath slept with the Queen.
How do I know this? There is gossip in the castle, and my gossip is an Italian called Ugo, who is always motive hunting.
The plot is hatched. The king who is deep in jealousy will have his manservant stab Turan in his one good eye while he does sleep. Yes, he will order the adulteress’s death. It is a chronicle foretold.
How it has come to pass: who unsheathes the knife? Who slips it into our hero’s chest? Who is the stinking agent of our doom?
Turan staggers into the hall, clutching his bloody wound.
In his last breath, our hero addresses the king and curses him and us. He rants and raves thus, and in his ranting and raving his curse remains heavy on us. We cannot escape the fact now. We are a people cursed. Our women will become barren; our seed will die out.
A pessimism hangs over us, and we can see no way out of the impasse. We dose ourselves on wine and poppy seed. We scarcely wake, and when we do, it is to drug ourselves again. Dare not think of it! We are somnambulists, sleepwalkers – stumbling toward our fate.
Now, as I give it out that our hero died unexpectedly of wounds from battle, I wallow in this falsehood. That man who I am so bold to name has cursed our king and us all. We have betrayed Turan. In fact, we have betrayed ourselves.