Chapter 496 - The Most Expensive Meat

Night has fallen. 

The Ottomans and Rumelians have reached a temporary ceasefire with each other despite having no official negotiations, because of a simple reason. Most of their soldiers are unable to see properly in this kind of pitch darkness. The Ottomans started using whatever they can find on the ground, twigs, branches, leaves, woods to start fires before resting to prevent themselves from freezing to death, while the others stood guard on various posts watching over the Rumelians. 

This is rather common for battles of this era as a battle between tens of thousands of people can potentially take up to days even when one side has an obvious advantage over the other. The weaponries that mankind posses now, like blades bows and spears, is yet far from enough to wipe out the enemies at once. That is why many soldiers would usually bring along essential living in the wild materials like dried food, water and digging tools. 

On the top of the hill, the only two remaining Ottoman higher commanders Emir and Hussein seat face to face beside a long sword found thrust in a bonfire. Beside the bonfire Emir is cutting off large chunks of meat from the carcass of a dead animal. 

That is his own horse.

The Ottoman commander Hussein looked around. Everywhere his sight reach, he can see Ottoman soldiers inclusive of those nobles and royal guards slitting the throat of their mounts one by one draining their blade and eating their meat, making their beloved mounts serve them for the very last time, by providing their masters with their live and body to in turn sustain their master's life. It is indeed a sad sight for the commanders to see their fellow Ottomans, who are supposed to be horse loving, end up killing their own horses for food facing this kind of dilemma they are in right now.

Emir skillfully stabbed his dagger deep into the abdomen of the horse, turned a circle and dug out a slice of meat and placed it on a branch to be baked above this bonfire. He then picked up another piece of meat that is already smoked sizzling with oil, sprinkled some of the valuable salt from his pouch and gobbled it down without giving a damn about the heat. He cleaned his hands and gave a look at Hussein opposite him, who seems to be stuck in his deep thoughts with his eyebrows tightly squeezed to one another. Emir nudged his comrade passing him a piece of burnt meat on a twig, but the later seems to be reluctant in accepting it. 

"Eat, my friend." Said Emir." You must eat to have enough energy for the battle tomorrow." 

Hussein stays reluctant and sighed heavily shaking his head. "If we have slaughtered our horses, then what shall we ride on to deter the Rumelian cavalry's attack and launch our own counter offensive when the sun rises again?" 

"Deters? Counter offensive?" Emir made a wild laugh like he has heard one of the best joke in the world. "Wake up your mind, my dear friend. Look at the people around you, look at the people around you! They are on the verge of a mass starvation! Do you even think that they can pick their blade up and fight? Counter offensive? Let me tell you what, if there are still half of these men (Ottomans) staying here without using the darkness to run away by daybreak, then we can already proudly say that we are qualified commanders and we have done our best!" 

Hussein knows what Emir is talking about, he made a glance towards the sides and indeed, every single Ottoman combatant are lying around lifelessly, with some eyeing the horse meats of their commanders filled with hunger. Hussein took over the meat from Emir's dagger and passed it to the soldiers looking at him, who gobbled down the piece of meat in less than two bites. Emir watched all of these happening and shook his head in disapproval, but he never spoke anything. 

"What are you planning to do next?" Emir waited for Hussein to come back to the bonfire and asked looking downwards at the horse meat on his blade. "The sun is coming up soon, our time of silence and peace shall end very soon."

The later gazed at the horizon and replied. "I shall stay here and fight.

Upon hearing this response Emir opened his mouth several times but swallowed his words back to his stomach for every single time before it came out of his throat.

Hussein knows what his friend is about to say, he leaned forward and snatched the dagger with horse meat from his friend's hands, gulped it down, wept his mouth and struck the dagger deep into the soil before them. "I know what you are about to say, my dear Emir. We have been working with one another for more than fifteen years, I know you, you know me, there is no need to hide."

Emir frowned for a second looking at the dagger and made a bitter smile shrugging his shoulders.

"You can lead your men and retreat through the North western corner, I have just finished scouting over there just now, the Rumelians have purposely made an exit over there, it should be completely safe for you and your men to pass through."

"Then what about you?"

"There is no need to care about me, my friend. I… I have made my vow of allegiance to the Sultan with the Sanjek twenty years ago, saying that I shall repay their kindness of promoting me from an ordinary footman to a Yuzbashi with my life. I made that oath in front of the Qur'ran, now it is the time for the sincerely of my oath to be tested by the sky and the Mighty Allah, and I shall reply to them with a satisfying answer."

Emir do not know what to say, he felt ashamed of his own idea, thinking that he is just being extremely selfish lacking the virtues of sincerity and loyalty, as he was among those who made the vow towards the old Sultan Murad II and the Sanjek too when they joined the Janissaries when they are still young, before that legendary unit in red got wept out.

The middle aged Ottoman noble Emir looked up at the eclipse high up in the sky and started wandering within himself, has his courage been washed away by the tide of time? Has his loyalty been scrubbed away by the tickling of coins? Has his love for his nation been brushed away by the goat paper of power? Is he still that man who fought for the Sultanate with hot blood in the plains of Sibiu? Is he still that same man? Or has he changed, completely.

The answer is definitely yes.

He has changed.

Just like what the heretic philosopher Plutarch once mentioned in his renowned puzzle called the Ship of Theseus; There is a ship sailing on the seas of Eastern Mediterranean, the sailors on board take off the old wooden planks when they decay slotting in a new wooden plank replacing its position. After months of sailing, all the old decaying wooden planks on the ship has been changed to the new planks during the voyage before it reaches the intended destination. Then the question comes, is the ship still that same ship as when it departed, although it is still bearing the same name?

No matter what the others might say, Emir believes that this answer ought to be no, because he knows that he has changed.

He really wanted to shout out to his friend, pal, comrade and colleague that he shall stay here to fight with him until the very end. But soon this urge is blocked off by his logical senses which kept on telling him that he is yet too young to die in this place, he spent too much effort, blood, sweat and dignity to climb to such a position and it would be absolutely unworthy for him to waste himself in this piece of foreign land. Thus, in the very end, Emir swallowed the impulsive words coming to his throat again, and nodded heavily before plucking the dagger out from the ground, wiping it clean, stabbing up another chunk of horse meat and gobbled it down.

Hussein looked at his old friend, he too has a complicated feeling towards Emir, he too wanted to persuade his friend to stay here to stand with him and continue searching for their Sanjek Bey. But he too swallowed his words in his mouth as he knows that he can force himself to follow his own codex of loyalty and devotion, but he cannot force the others to believe in the same set of codex as him, he do not want to be a selfish man, especially to his friend.

The two men spent their very last night together beside the bonfire, with a long sword burning in the middle of it.