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.
