Chapter 450 - 319: Bagrat’s Plan

The massacre hadn’t been a complete disaster, however. Three or four Heretics had survived, spared on account of their Christian wives, but they were required to be baptized and convert immediately.

The Turkic People were now the undisputed masters of the Near East. Christian Lords either submitted or struggled on in misery, barely clinging to existence.

Renowned for their cold-blooded cruelty in crushing resistance, they viewed their kindred, the Saracens who once ruled the Near East, as weak. Scoffing at their predecessors’ strategies, they vowed to devour everything in their path. If that failed, they would simply destroy it all.

No sane Christian would dare defy the Turkic People in the Near East.

The Norman Crusaders’ victory in Cilicia, the claims of a revelation from Saint George, and the coincidental arrival of Norman adventurers—all these factors ignited a frenzy in the Apamea Diocese.

The flames were fanned by the sermons of two Priests. They loudly proclaimed that God, Saint George, and an army of Angels would drive out the Turkic People, reclaim the Near East—lost to the Christ World for nearly five hundred years—and utterly expel the Heretics.

The arrival of Eric and his Norman Knights—true Crusaders—only intensified this frenzy.

Guymer and the Norman adventurers loudly announced to the villagers that their main force had arrived. He then proceeded to boast, fabricating glorious tales of battles Eric and his men had fought against Heretics on their journey.

Villagers, who had been about to rest, poured from their homes and swarmed around Eric and his party.

The narrow streets were still stained red with the blood of Heretics.

"God sent you!"

The people blocking Eric’s path shouted again and again that King Robert of England was the slayer of Heretics.

The Christians were swept up in the thrill of victory, convinced that the Norman Crusaders’ triumph heralded the final doom of the Heretics in the Near East. Eric’s arrival was seen as a sign of divine providence.

Eric and his retinue struggled through the crowd to a ’mosque’.

The mosque had a distinctly Roman style, built from high-quality, light-colored stone. Massive pillars supported a tiled roof, which had since been patched with dark thatch.

The floor and walls had also been tiled. Those tiles, once used to cover Christian Holy Images, had now been smashed. Reeds, stained red with blood from the day before, were strewn over the broken shards.

The hall reeked like a slaughterhouse, and thick smoke from burning torches filled the air, illuminating the vast space.

Seated in the hall were the leaders of the Apamea Diocese. They had been in a meeting, overjoyed by the news delivered by the Norman adventurers.

The clamor in the hall gradually died down. One of the leaders tried to take charge. "You are...?"

He paused, seemingly unsure of Eric’s name.

"The Conqueror of Cilicia!" a villager who had followed them in shouted excitedly, his eyes sparkling.

"Slayer of the Turkic People!" another villager bellowed.

"Eric, Earl of Gloucester! Son of Giscard!" Guymer declared at the top of his lungs.

"This is the man who killed Hamid the Sand Eagle." A young man suddenly appeared at Eric’s side, trying to raise his right hand to display him like a hero. "And," he continued, "the man who defeated Suleiman Shah at the Battle of Tarsus!"

Guymer informed Eric that this was Bagrat, the Armenian whose opinion they were supposed to heed—the son of their former employer.

Bagrat, along with his brother Philaretos, shared a common ancestry with Ruben of Cilicia, all descending from the Armenian Royal Family, though from two distant, separate branches.

He had long, black hair, the lean face characteristic of his family, and deep green eyes that drew the attention of many women.

Like the fanatical villagers, he gravely exaggerated the deeds of the Norman Crusaders, tirelessly spinning his own fabrications.

"I am Eric of the England Kingdom, and I serve the King of England, Robert of Universal Love," Eric said with a nod, playing along with the charade.

The leaders peppered Eric with questions about the situation in Cilicia and about the Battle of Tarsus—the fictitious battle where the Turkic army in Syria was supposedly annihilated.

They had already heard an account of the battle from the Priest Odo had bribed, but his was a version filled with prayers and miracles.

Eric gave them a warrior’s tale, one of Crusader Soldiers meeting glorious deaths and of slaughter by the sword. All the while, a clergyman with a thick beard and unruly hair kept interrupting, shouting, "Hallelujah!"

’This must be Ephremius,’ Eric guessed. ’The fool of a Priest who replaced the Bishop who fled, the instigator of the massacre.’ He wasn’t much older than Eric, but he possessed a booming voice and a natural authority, one that was amplified by his sheer passion.

Each "Hallelujah" was accompanied by a spray of spittle. Just as Eric finished describing the defeated Turkic soldiers tumbling down the mountainside, Ephremius leaped forward and began to preach fervently. "This is Eric!"

He jabbed a finger into Eric’s chainmail-clad ribs and bellowed, "Eric of England! Eric of Gloucester! Slayer of the Turkic People! Warrior of God! The Sword of the Lord! He has come among us, just as Saint George came to King Robert in his hour of need! These are all signs from Almighty God!"

The crowd roared its approval as Ephremius, practically foaming at the mouth, described the coming slaughter of every last Heretic in the Near East.

Eric managed to slip away from Ephremius’s side and move behind the pulpit, where he grabbed Bagrat by his scrawny neck. The Armenian had been cheering Ephremius’s crude sermon just like any other villager.

Eric dragged him into a corridor leading to a private side room.

"Heh heh, my lord, the show is just getting started. Listen to how beautifully that Priest preaches. I feel like my own soul is about to be baptized."

"The Turkic People will be here soon," Eric said, gripping his collar. "Then there will be a massacre, and all these people will die because of your foolish, ridiculous stunt."

"Saint George will grant us victory, just as he did for you in Cilicia," Bagrat said with a smile, completely unfazed by Eric’s manhandling.

"You damned fool," Eric growled. "You’re a deaf, brainless idiot. If we were in Normandy, I’d cut out your guts and feed them to the hogs."

"But you did come, didn’t you? And right on time. Who’s to say it isn’t God’s will? Yajisiyan, the ruler of Hama, is just an old man in his sixties. With our help, you and your army could take his city easily."

"We made a deal with his liege lord. We could have acquired his domain with ease. Now, thanks to you, he thinks we’re his enemies."

"If that is your only concern, my lord, then I must say you worry too much. The master of Hama is loyal only to himself. His oaths of fealty are more fleeting than clouds in the sky."

"How do you think this massacre started? Solely because we incited it? No, no, no. You can’t expect this rabble to have much courage. They won’t cast the net unless they see the bird."

"Just half a month ago, the master of Hama was currying favor with his new overlord, Tutush, the new ruler of Damascus."

"He sent the bulk of his army to support Tutush. Tutush murdered Aziz and usurped the Damascus Duchy. Aziz’s former subordinates refused to pledge allegiance to Tutush and are now fighting him with support from Fatima."

"Right now, Hama City has only three to four hundred seasoned warriors. The rest are just Recruits for show. We used this massacre to bait them into coming. A hundred Norman Knights could shatter them in a head-on clash."

"I have received intelligence that Yajisiyan’s soldiers will be here by tomorrow at the latest..."

"I only brought twelve Knights."

"Ah. Never mind, then."

"Why are you suddenly wrapping your head in a turban?"

"Feigning conversion. Getting ready to bolt."