"Yes, he was imprisoned by SS men this morning."Manstein's voice crackled through the radio, his disillusionment and anger clearly audible through the simple machine.
Paul shook his head.
"Unbelievable. This is exactly what I was talking about, General. This is how a country begins to rot from within," Paul said, leaning back against his chair inside the military tent.
"Such foolishness," Manstein added. "I will return to Berlin and request an audience with the Führer."
A useless endeavor, if you ask me. But perhaps his gaze will finally tilt upward, towards the eagle, Paul thought.
"But if I understand correctly," Paul continued coldly, "I will now receive aerial support? So they have finally recognized the significance of our plan, yet they still punish Kesselring. That is not rationality. That is incompetence."
"Perhaps it is," Manstein replied, his voice sounding almost tired. "I will contact you once the meeting is over."
"Yes, General," Paul said, ending the transmission.
He turned around.
"So what did you say our new friends in the skies observed?" Paul asked Hasso, who stood at the far end of the tent.
"Horses. Hundreds of them," Hasso replied, raising an eyebrow as he reread the report. "Moving toward what we assume is our position."
"Horses?" Paul repeated, genuinely surprised. He stroked his chin, then slowly rose to his feet.
"They are offering us a sacrifice," Paul said quietly as he studied the map. "Believing we will take too long to savor it."
"They are trying to get as many men out as they can," Hasso said, nodding.
"And our battle strength?" Paul asked without looking up.
"I've just received reports from the battalions. Most repairs are complete, but we are still not at full strength," Hasso replied, his eyes fixed on Paul.
"Full strength. Seventy percent. Fifty. Ten," Paul said absentmindedly. "It makes no difference. I pity those horsemen."
Outside, the rain soon ceased, and streaks of sunlight tore through the thick cloud ceiling one after another. Repairs began on the tanks now parked in the courtyard of a school. German mechanics worked tirelessly among the steel giants, while the soldiers claimed a brief, well earned rest. Some lay in the sun, eyes closed. Others slept where they sat.
The rest did not last.
Whistles shrieked. Shouts followed. Even the last Wehrmacht men were torn from their pause. Soldiers sprang to their feet, grabbing rifles, leaping onto trucks already rolling, climbing into the familiar hulls of their tanks.
The column moved once more through the ruins of Gniezno, instilling fear in the remaining residents yet again. Windows were shut where windows still existed. Doors were barred where doors still stood.
Tank tracks rattled over broken stone before grinding to a halt at the outskirts of the city. The formation stretched along the final houses and into the greenery beyond. A long, dispersed line of tanks and infantry took shape. Some men crouched. Others lay prone, rifles aimed toward the open fields and the forest patch behind them.
Every movement carried routine. The kind of calm only earned by men who had survived dozens of battles. Paul's soldiers hardened with every engagement, and under such a commander, experience was never in short supply.
"Do you hear that?" Hans asked quietly. The young soldier lay between a ruined brick wall and a tree, head tilted, ear pressed to the ground. Older Wehrmacht soldiers lay beside him.
"Hear what?" one of them replied, raising an eyebrow.
"That sound," Hans murmured. "It's like…"
He hesitated, concentrating.
"Well?" another scoffed, laughing. "Spit it out."
Hans opened his mouth again, but stopped.
The laughter died.
One by one, the soldiers turned their heads toward the fields ahead, eyes narrowing. From the treeline, countless dark shapes emerged, growing clearer by the second.
In unison, Hans and the others spoke, disbelief heavy in their voices.
"Horses?"
Minutes before
"I will tell you what we will be facing, men," Major Nowak said quietly to the circle of officers gathered within the forest.
His gaze drifted aside, caught somewhere between shame and fear.
Mikhailiv, standing among the officers, narrowed his eyes. A dangerous sense of foreboding settled in his chest.
After a moment of silence, he spoke.
"Major?"
"Yes," Nowak replied. "High command has given us orders."
He paused.
"We are to capture the city of Gniezno."
"The city of Gniezno?" another lieutenant asked, confusion clear in his voice. "Isn't that far behind the front?"
Nowak sighed, looking at the lieutenant with something close to pity.
Mikhailiv noticed it instantly. The feeling in his gut tightened.
"A German Panzer division has pierced deep behind our lines," Nowak continued. "They have taken Gniezno and secured the railway junction. Retreat for our divisions in Poznań is now nearly impos—"
He stopped.
The horror on the officers faces said enough.
Mikhailiv took a small step back, his body reacting before his mind could.
"Major," he said, his voice unsteady. "High command expects us to fight tanks? German tanks?"
Nowak nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on the ground.
"We were the closest unit," he said quietly. "I am—"
He was interrupted.
Normally a grave offense. Today, Nowak did not object.
An older captain stepped forward, his gray beard scruffy, eyes sunken deep into his skull.
"What is this?" the captain shouted. "Where is your honor? The honor of Polish cavalry?"
Spit flew from his mouth with every word.
"We have survived for centuries, striking fear into our enemies, and now we cower before an enemy that is merely stronger?" he roared.
Several officers nodded, fists clenching.
"How will we face our ancestors with such cowardice?" the captain added.
Murmurs of agreement followed, especially among the older men.
Madmen. All of them, Mikhailiv thought, his eyes wide as he stepped back again.
"Lieutenant!" the captain barked, turning sharply toward him. "Where are you going?!"
Mikhailiv froze.
His answer would decide whether he lived another minute.
He saw the captain's hand drift toward his pistol.
"I…" he stammered. "Nowhere, Captain."
The captain studied him for a moment, then turned back toward Nowak.
Nowak met his gaze, helpless.
"It is decided," the major said at last. "We strike."
He turned and walked away.
Moments later, the forest filled with the sound of hooves. Hundreds of horses and riders formed up among the trees. Quiet sobbing could be heard, but it no longer mattered.
The whistle blew.
Horses screamed and surged forward.
Tears streamed down Mikhailiv's face as his horse charged toward the German positions. He looked around. Horses everywhere. Men with fierce expressions, madness flickering behind their eyes. Others sobbed openly, just like him, already knowing their fate.
Yet none turned back.
They spread out as they thundered downhill.
"For Poland!" someone shouted.
"To victory!" another screamed.
Mikhailiv forced his gaze forward. He tightened his grip on the reins as the wind blew away the tears from his face.
He closed his eyes.
There was only the sharp air against his skin, his body trembling with defiance.
Then the explosions began. The shouts of his fellow soldiers were swallowed instantly by the horror unleashed by the Germans.
Gunfire erupted from all directions. Chaos consumed everything. Horses screamed and collapsed, or ran riderless into oncoming cavalry, trampling men already dead into the mud.
Explosions ripped through the fields, hurling earth skyward. Some struck true, burying their targets beneath the falling soil.
Screams, of men and horses alike, rose into the air.
It was all the citizens of Gniezno would hear on that fateful afternoon.
The Second Battle of Gniezno marked the last cavalry charge of modern times. An era that had endured for more than a thousand years came to its end in those fields.
After what felt like an eternity, everything went quiet. Time moved on. Night fell. A thick fog crept across the city and its surroundings, swallowing the battlefield whole.
Countless corpses lay scattered across the vast fields, which now resembled a cratered wasteland more than anything else.
Inside the craters and between them, blood soaked the earth, seeping from the broken bodies of horses and men alike.
Now, only the cawing of hundreds of crows filled the air. One after another, they descended upon the field, some still circling high above, others settling onto the corpses, tearing at them without mercy.
Then, somewhere in the fog, several of them suddenly shrieked and took flight.
A shallow sound followed. Harsh breathing.
Beneath a dead horse, an arm emerged, fingers buried deep into the soil.
Slowly, painfully slowly, more of the soldier's body was revealed, his breathing growing heavier with every movement.
After a long struggle, he finally dragged his torso free from beneath the crushing weight.
He gasped and tilted his head upward, revealing his face.
Mikhailiv had survived. Somehow.
His eyes swept across the fog-shrouded field, the thick white curtain unable to hide the death that surrounded him.
He took another ragged breath. Then he froze.
A sound reached him. Distant at first, then growing steadily louder.
A rhythmic tapping. Patient. Deliberate.
From within the fog, the silhouette of a man began to take shape.
Mikhailiv clenched his teeth, praying it was not a German.
The figure came closer, a dim lantern casting a weak circle of light through the mist.
Only then did Mikhailiv understand the source of the sound.
A wooden cane struck the ground in steady rhythm, supporting the man who was missing a foot...
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