Omake for chapter 5
Jeremi: "I am your father. Join with me and we will rule the Rzeczpospolita together."
Chapter 6
Helena inspected her bedroom. It had a dressing room with a smaller bed for her maid, and the dressing room was almost as large as Helena's room in Rozłogi.
Her own room had a big, deep bed with a canopy over the whole bed, and curtains between uprights which went almost as high as the ceiling. And the ceiling was not beams, but was plaster wrought into geometric patterns. Helena was not sure if 'pretty' was a good description; overwhelming was more like it. The wall was pale blue with gilded frames around gilded swags and plaster flowers inside them alternating with painted panels. The bed's hangings were blue and gold damask, which fabric was also set into the doors of the commode, and padding the top of a stool for the dressing table, whose mirror was intimidatingly large and framed with more gilding. it was a good foot and a half high with three panels at least a foot across, a priceless thing. Cautiously Helena sat on the stool and made a face into the mirror.
She felt better for that.
"You ... you have seen a mirror before, haven't you?" asked Gryzelda.
"Oh, yes, but I'm not used to one which plans on belittling me," said Helena. "I was afraid it might shatter in horror if I pulled faces at it, or admonish me for childishness."
"Mirrors are not ... er ... they don't speak," said Gryzelda.
"Well, I didn't think so, but this one looks so full of itself I was afraid that royal mirrors might become things of fairy tale and legend," said Helena. "I am relieved not to find myself in a tale of magic, even in the home of a prince."
"My poor child! You are sadly out of your depth, are you not?" said Gryzelda. "Why, if I had known how it was, I should have sent Jeremi to collect you as soon as I married him, to be our daughter. You would have been nine or so, I think, and then you would have found it easier."
"Yes, doubtless I would," said Helena, trying not to sound horrified.
She would never have got to know Jurko if that had been the case!
Even the floor had a thick, deep carpet of blue, cream and gold, she noticed absently. Jurko had carpets in his tents to keep out the draughts, but the idea of having anything but a rug for the feet by the bed, to use the utensil in the night seemed extravagant.
Well, the Princess Gryzelda wore a gown which seemed pretty extravagant too, thought Helena.
"It would have been like having a little sister about the place; I was the same age you are now, or a little older when I married," said Gryzelda, wistfully. "I was married on my sixteenth birthday."
Helena was shocked; time had not treated the princess kindly. She had thought her closer to Jeremi in age, and Jeremi must be nearly ten years older than his bride, if she recalled correctly.
"Had you known him long?" she asked. "You must have loved him very much."
"I had met him once," said Gryzelda. "People of our estate do not marry for love, but for alliances. But ..." she hesitated. "My husband is telling your wild Cossack some things about his heritance, and ... and offering him the chance to learn to be a proper szlachcic."
"He doesn't know who is father is, but he is a noble, knightly man, so I care little what his estate may be; to me, he is a prince of Cossacks," said Helena.
"Had his parents been married, he would have been," said Gryzelda. "Oh dear, this is most indelicate; but I must remember that it was long before I was married, and Prince Jeremi scarcely more than a boy; you see, he sired Jurij Bohun. And it must remain one of those things which everyone knows, but which is never spoken of."
"How can it be a thing which people know if it is not spoken of?" asked Helena, bewildered.
"By my prince's manner to him in public; judicious gossip of servants and so on," said Gryzelda. "And that being so, it will not be a disgrace for you to marry him, should you still wish it when you have had a season at court, for he will be Somebody, and of suitable birth."
"Then I am glad that Prince Jeremi was a naughty little boy, and we shall both gain parents," said Helena.
"Oh, my dear, I will try to be as a mother to you!" said Gryzelda. "And I will just love dressing you; you will pay for dressing, which I do not, for I lost my figure quite sadly when I had Michał. I was quite unwell," she added.
"I will try to be active so when I have children, I will be quick like the Hebrew women," said Helena. "Pray tell me, am I to keep to my room? I should like somewhere that I might do sabre drill in the morning, for it has made me fit, and I like that."
"Sabre drill? What was he thinking of?"
"Saving my life; and indeed, I saved his, for I knew enough to stop one who would have cut him down from behind," said Helena. "I will not give it up, even if I have to practise with the fire irons."
"I ... well, I suppose there is no harm, if nobody sees you," said Gryzelda. "You can use the long gallery; we came through it. One may walk there if the weather is too inclement to walk in the garden. And I would prefer that you keep to your room for a day or two until we have gowns for you; I will send for a mantua-maker immediately! You are too tall and slender for anything of mine to fit."
"Oh, I will wear my szarawary, Cossack trousers, shirt and żupan, it is warm enough not to need a kontusz inside," said Helena. "Or indeed outside."
"You will not be seen abroad in male clothes if you please," said Gryzelda.
Helena sighed.
Still, at least Gryzelda's restrictions were kindly meant.
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Jan waited to give sympathy to a devastated Cossack, and found it was not really spurious. The Cossack who emerged, however, looked dazed, and ecstatically happy.
"Bohun?" said Skrzetuski.
"He said I might tell you," said Jurko. "As you are also to be a lieutenant under me, learning the Cossack way. He is my father!"
"Oh, congratulations!" said Jan, warmly. "He is a fine man to look up to."
"Less loved by Cossacks, but ... yes ... he is a father I can be proud of, and ... come and get drunk with me while we get to know each other," said Jurko. "He says we must both court Helena and abide by her choice."
"Then we must be brothers," said Jan.
"We'll fight and quarrel, then, and try to cheat," said Jurko.
"So long as we don't remain angry with each other," said Jan.
"I do not need to feel angry about you being a Pole, and a noble, and more likely to be given her hand," said Jurko. "I need not resent you. I have roots too, and a banner as good as your Jastrzębiec banner. And we are both falcons, you for the one on your banner, me for my nickname ... we will fly against the Ottomans for our prey."
"Sounds good," said Jan, a little taken aback to be assigned to the Cossack's company. "You don't have a full complement of officers?"
Jurko grinned.
"I don't have any officers at all; I have Kurylo, who is a sergeant in pay grade, and adjutant, quartermaster and father to my boys in what he actually does. Come and meet him; I need to collect my stuff anyway, and he can go on a good long drunk with us and talk us out of winding up in jail with the rest of my boys."
"Do you take that as normal?"
"Moderately. I wouldn't let them screw the slave girls so they'll want to hit the brothels instead and pay with loot. Most Cossacks are poor because they get loot and spend it as fast as they get it. I keep what's pretty, and ... well, I used to cache some at Rozłogi, but I suppose that's lost to me. And Helena is worth more than any amount of gold. I suppose I should sell most of my loot and bank the gold or buy land. If I am to be my father's son, he will like me to own land."
"He'll probably give you some."
"I... I'm not sure how I feel about that."
"If he plans to be your father in truth, he owes you for years of not being your father."
Jurko considered.
"I suppose so," he said. "I like to prove to him that I can make my own way; that if I have inherited his drive and genius in any measure, I can use that."
"I think he admires it in you; and I'd say you had inherited it in full measure. I think he means to move against the old princess at some point, though I have to say her sons are no more than amiable buffoons."
"Amiable buffoons! Aye, that describes them well. Now come aboard my warship; and you have no idea how good it feels to say that, aye, and to lay it at my father's feet like a dog brings a duck from the marsh where you have shot it, and a cat brings rats from the barn. Now laugh at me."
"I wasn't laughing," said Jan. "I'd give a lot to still have a father before whom to lay any victories I have; but I had him when I was growing up, which means I have the memories. I am glad for you that you have a father now, and of course you want to please him. It's what being a son is about."
"It is? I am not foolish? I ... I have longed for a father, and to be in a position not to be looked down on by all Poles save the amiable buffoons. Now ... now I have both ... and I want to show him I am worthy of his attention."
Jan slapped his new friend on the shoulder.
"You're worthy," he said.
"Thank you," said Jurko. "Kurylo! You met Skrzetuski, he's our new lieutenant but I have told him he would do well to defer to you for your experience and de facto position as adjutant. And ... Kurylo! I have a father!"
"Jarema got around to admitting it then?" said Kurylo.
"Your face is a study, Bohun," said Jan.
"You knew?" said Jurko.
"Of course I knew! I've known your mother's family forever. An ambitious piece, she hoped to ensnare him, but even at fourteen he was wise to that. Left her regretting throwing herself at him."
"That explains much of her anger and bitterness," said Jurko. "I thought it was just Ukrainian mothers, like the old princess."
"Put it behind you, my friend," said Jan, touching him on the arm. "You have made yourself famous, and your father appreciates you. Enjoy that, and forget."
Jurko considered; and nodded.
"Aye," he said. "Let go of the anger, the bitterness ... oh, it will take work not to let the black rages take me."
"I will help you," said Jan. "You don't want Helena to experience black rages from you."
"Oh, hell, no," said Jurko. "I ... yes, I need help. I have diverted it mostly against the Ottomans, but some of the poncing fools in yellow and red boots just make me want to smash in their fatuous and self-satisfied faces."
"Well, you aren't alone in that," said Jan.
"What, and you a wealthy szlachcic?" asked Jurko.
Jan shrugged.
"Wealthy, yes, but I know the value of my land and of my peasants, and the value of my sword arm to defend what I hold. I despise those who have grown up expecting to be given everything for nothing. I've worked hard to be a warrior to defend my lands, and to give back in that defence what I gain in wealth from my peasantry."
"I see," said Jurko. "So in a way, it's no different to being an ataman of Cossacks, you are the little father to your people."
"Yes," said Jan. "And I'm not fond of fools."
"We have much in common," said Jurko. "Now, let me find my mercantile friend, and see about selling a ship and storing my loot, and Kurylo's, and then we shall go round every tavern in Kijów and see if we can drink a mug of mead in each before we pass out."
.
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Helena dined with her new family, in a gown Gryzelda had borrowed from one of her attendants, and found it hard with the wooden busk down the front of the gown to hold it stiff. She met Michał, a softly-spoken boy who clung more to his mother than his father. She was glad to retire to her room, however, and pull the hateful busk out of her bodice.
"It's an instrument of torture," giggled Jancia.
"Yes," said Helena. "I don't really want to be a fashionable lady; Jurko will laugh at such foolishness."
"Well, it won't do him any harm to have a few rivals," said Jancia. "Make him appreciate you more."
"I think he already appreciates me very well," sighed Helena. "But I suppose this busk is an improvement on going to bed with my buttocks black and blue from the old woman's cane."
"You're safe now," said Jancia.
"Yes, I ... is that singing? It's Jurko's voice!" cried Helena, running to open the window. It looked out onto the garden, a formal knot garden with lilac blossom around the sides of it, and a few early roses, scenting the night with rich perfume.
Jurko had collected his lute, and was singing in his own Ruthenian tongue, like and yet unlike Polish.
"Oj, czyj to kin' stoit, szczosyva hryvon'ka
Spodobalas' meni, spodobalas' meni
Taja divczynon'ka "
"Jurko! Never mind horses and their maidens. You'll wake the household," giggled Helena.
"Well, now I know where you are, I can stop," said Jurko. His voice was slurred.
"Are you drunk?" asked Helena.
"As a magnate!" declared Jurko. "Jan 'n' me an' Kurylo went to every inn in Kijów... glass of mead in each. Jan fell asleep; left him on the ship with Kurylo. Wanted to sing for you and find you."
"You found me," said Helena. "You daft Cossack! Go to bed."
"Yesh," agreed Jurko. "Bed. All big soft mattress an' goose down."
He kissed his hand to her, and made a mostly straight line to a door.
"Well, he can hold his liquor if he went to every inn in Kijów," commented Jancia. "It has three times as many inns as it has churches, and it has a lot of churches."