King of the Bosphorus t-4

by Christian Cameron

  The enemy ships were caught broadside-on, strung out over a stade of quiet sea in the morning light. Moments before, they had been the horns of a giant envelopment, hunters of the doomed prey. Suddenly they were the target, and the opposite horn was six stades away – hopelessly far to take part in the sort of diekplous head-to-head engagement that the Alexandrians were forcing.

  Diokles grinned. 'That was something worth seeing,' he announced.

  A stade to go, and the enemy ships were turning to face them. The enemy centre, now more than two stades off to the east, was still tangled.

  Another signal from the Lotus and the first line picked up speed. Fennel took up the stroke in the second line, advancing at battle speed until his helmsman realized his error. The second line was there to take advantage of the chaos caused by the first. They continued to move at cruising speed, and Fennel coasted back to his spot.

  'Don't board unless we're sinking,' Satyrus said to Abraham. 'Understand?'

  Abraham gave his sarcastic smile. 'All too well, brother.'

  They embraced briefly, and then Abraham buckled the cheekpieces on his high-ridged Thracian helmet and ran down the catwalk to the marines that he commanded.

  Satyrus had time to gulp a few lungfuls of air and to feel the flutter in his chest and the cringing in his bowels – the fear that never seemed to change for him when danger came. He spat over the side and prayed to Herakles, his ancestor and patron, for courage.

  Half a stade ahead, Golden Lotus seemed to dance, a swift quarter-turn and then back to his course, his oars suddenly in. Lotus was the point of the wedge, the first ship to hit the enemy line, and he was ramming an enemy trireme head to head, the most dangerous manoeuvre in war at sea and the most likely to cripple the attacking ship.

  There was a sound not unlike that of two phalanxes crashing into each other – or like a lightning storm ripping through the woods on the slopes of a mountain – and the engagement was over, the Lotus already getting his oars out and coasting free, the enemy ship half-turned to starboard and showing his flank to the Falcon because the Lotus had ripped his starboard oar gallery and mangled his oarsmen on that side.

  'Ramming speed,' Satyrus said.

  Diokles made a face in the stern. The oar master called the new speed and the ship leaped forward.

  'What?' Satyrus asked.

  'We're supposed to break free, not kill ships,' Diokles said.

  'I'm not afraid to fight,' Satyrus said.

  Diokles shrugged and said nothing.

  'Ready for impact!' Abraham bellowed from the bow.

  'Oars in!' Neiron called.

  Satyrus braced himself against the stern and Diokles crossed his arms over the steering oars.

  As they crashed together, the ram went in, and there was resistance – and then something gave. Men on the deck crew were thrown flat, despite their best efforts, and Satyrus only just kept his feet.

  'Reverse oars! Cross your benches!' Neiron called.

  Satyrus ran forward. The enemy ship, caught almost broadside-on, was turning turtle, his shallow side crushed amidships, so that he was filling with water. But the upper strakes of his well-built hull were caught on the Falcon's ram.

  'Back water!' Satyrus called. 'We're caught!'

  The oarsmen had to get under their oars and sit on the opposite bench to put their full strength into backing water. It took precious time.

  Falcon's bow began to sink. The strain on the bow timbers was immense, and there were popping noises all along the hull.

  Neiron stood on his deck by the mast, watching the oarsmen and rubbing his head. 'Don't rush 'em, sir,' he said. 'We need three good pulls, not a new mess as they panic.' He flashed Satyrus a smile and then raised his voice. 'Ready there?'

  A deep roar answered him.

  'Backstroke! Give way, all!' he called, and the oars bit into the water. One stroke and there was a grinding from the bow – a second stroke and every man standing was thrown flat as the ram slipped out of the stricken enemy and the bow rose sharply. The rowers lost the stroke and oars clashed.

  Satyrus fell heavily and Neiron fell on top of him, and it took them long heartbeats to get back to their feet. Neiron began to yell at the rowers, getting them on beat again.

  Satyrus ran for the bow, looking everywhere. To the east, Fennel had swept down the side of a heavy trireme, destroying his starboard oars just as the ship in the first line had done to his port oar bank, so that the ship lay on the water like an insect with all its legs plucked.

  To the west, a Cardian mercenary vessel had sailed right through the enemy's first line and continued into their half-formed second line, where he was preparing a diekplous oar-rake of his own.

  Dead ahead, Lotus had rammed a second adversary and left him wallowing, oars crushed and the upper oar box literally bleeding red blood where the ram had crushed wood and bodies together.

  Farther east and west, however, the enemy was rallying. They had so many ships that the local disaster didn't materially affect the odds. The enemy centre was still not organized, but a dozen ships, better rowed or more aggressive, were leaving the centre and racing to relieve the beleaguered flank.

  Satyrus took this in and ran back amidships. 'Switch your oars,' he said to the oar master.

  'Switch benches for normal rowing!' the oar master called.

  Satyrus pointed at the second cripple left by the Lotus. 'I want to put that ship down – but don't hit it so hard!' Then he ran aft to Diokles. 'Straight into the blue trireme!' he called.

  Diokles narrowed his eyes. 'Not what your uncle ordered,' he said.

  'Just do it!' Satyrus said. An arrow hit him in the shoulder, skidded across the scales of his corslet's left shoulder, dug a furrow across the back of his neck and sank into the planking that was supposed to protect the helmsman. 'Ares!' he cursed. He put his hand to his neck and it came away covered in blood.

  Satyrus turned to see where the arrow had come from. A dark-hulled trireme was coming up on his port side, from behind, and the enemy ship's archers were trying to clear his helm.

  'Where in Hades did he come from?' Satyrus asked. 'Hard to port!'

  Diokles swung the oars hard. Satyrus turned forward. 'Port-side oars, all banks, drag your oars!'

  The oar master echoed his command and the Falcon turned like his namesake, his stern pulled clear of the oncoming ram. The oar-raked carcass of Glory of Demeter's first victim had hidden the enemy ship, and now he shot by Falcon's stern at ramming speed, already turning to find new prey. Forward, Abraham's marines shot a shower of arrows into the enemy ship's command deck and then he was gone.

  Falcon's evasive manoeuvre had carried him out of her place in the formation and now he was heading almost due north, into the oncoming rams of the enemy's relief column.

  'Glory of Demeter is through the line,' Diokles said. 'Getting his sail up. Just where we ought to be, sir.'

  Satyrus's neck hurt as if he'd been stepped on by a horse. He put a hand to it again and was shocked to see how much blood there was. 'Diokles, we need to go hard to starboard – see the dark green-hulled ship with the golden statue in the bow?'

  'I see him,' Diokles answered.

  'Right at him – at ramming speed. But just short of him, we turn – and pass under his stern. If he turns towards us-'

  'I have it!' Diokles yelled, waving him away.

  Satyrus ran for the oar master. 'Ramming speed. Turn to starboard – see the big green? Straight at him – ramming speed. And when I say, a little more. We'll pass under his stern and never touch him.'

  Neiron had an arrow in his side. 'Fucking point is in my skin,' he said, face already grey-white with shock. The arrow had punched straight through his tawed-leather cuirass. 'Aye! Starboard bank – drag your oars! Port banks, full speed! Now!' His voice lost none of its power. Then he sank against the mast. 'Pull it out, sir?'

  Satyrus glanced forward – the next few heartbeats would be vital.

  'As soon as we're pas
t the green,' he said.

  'Aye,' Neiron said grimly. His feet slipped out from under him and he sat heavily, with his back against the mast. 'You'd better call the stroke,' he said.

  Satyrus stepped over him. 'Pull!' he called. An arrow hit his helmet hard enough that he smelled copper and his ears rang. 'Pull!' he called again. The bow was almost on line – time to stop the turn. 'Cease rowing!' he called. 'All oars! Ramming speed! Now!'

  He felt the surge of power under his feet. 'Pull!' he called.

  He felt the change in weight as Diokles made a steering adjustment.

  The big green ship was turning to meet them. He towered over them – a quadrireme at least, perhaps the biggest ship in the enemy fleet.

  'Pull!' Satyrus wanted to get past the green so his bulk would shield them from the rest of the enemy squadrons. He looked down at his oar master, who was losing consciousness, his face as pale and grey as the sea on a cloudy summer day. There was blood coming out from under his cuirass. Another arrow struck deep in the mast, its barbed head a finger deep in the oak.

  'Pull!'

  Sakje bows.

  He glanced south as he took a breath to call the stroke and almost lost his timing. There was Theron's Herakles at ramming speed, bowon to the same target – going ram to ram with a ship of twice his burthen. 'Pull!' he called.

  Diokles saw Theron too. 'He'll foul us!' the Phoenician roared. 'Sheer off, Corinthian!'

  'All you have, now!' Satyrus roared at the rowers. Falcon moved under his feet. 'Pull!' The great loom of the oars moved, the oars, the length of a Macedonian sarissa, all pulling together like the legs of a water-bug or the wings of a bird. 'Pull!'

  Diokles made a sharp adjustment and Satyrus struggled to keep his feet. 'Pull!' he roared. Herakles was not turning – he was in his final attack run, moving as fast as a running horse.

  'Pull!'

  The green enemy turned to put his bow on to the Herakles – a terrible decision, possibly a misheard order, so that at the last the great ship showed his naked and vulnerable flank to the Falcon's ram.

  'Pull!'

  Herakles, faster because he'd had a longer start, rammed her just aft of the bow – a single thunderclap – and his bow was forced around.

  'Pull!'

  Diokles slapped his steering oars with precision, aiming for the gap at the edge of possibility where the stern of the enemy ship would not be in a few heartbeats.

  'Pull!'

  The green ship shuddered and his stern came at them, swinging sideways through the water with all the transmitted energy of Herakles' attack.

  'Pull!' Satyrus roared.

  'Brace!' Abraham yelled from over the ram – and they struck, the ram catching the enemy stern just below the helmsman with a hollow boom, and then Satyrus was on his face on the deck.

  'Switch your benches!' Satyrus managed from his prone position. 'Do you hear me, there? Switch benches!' he called, trying to rise. There was a sailor on top of him, a deckhand – a dead deckhand. Satyrus got him off, rolled over – his neck awash in pain, his eyes hazed red. The big green ship was above them, and arrows were pouring into the waist of the Falcon. 'Switch your benches!' Satyrus called again. He felt as if he was very far away. Just below his feet, men were getting under their oars.

  An arrow hit him in the top of the shoulder. It hurt, and its force knocked him back a step. 'Backstroke!' he shouted, his voice sounding thin and very far away. 'Now!'

  The ship gave a shudder like a wounded animal.

  'Ram's stuck!' Abraham called. ''Ware boarding!'

  Sure enough, there were men coming down the side of the green – leaping aboard Falcon. Satyrus was three steps from his aspis, the huge round shield of the Greek soldiers and marines. It stood in the rack at the edge of the command platform.

  Satyrus had an odd moment of hesitation – he almost didn't move. It seemed too far. He just wanted to fall on the deck and bleed.

  A javelin, slightly miscast, struck him shaft first and skittered off along the deck.

  There was a pair of enemy marines on the command platform. He noticed this with professional interest. How had they come there?

  He turned his back on them and grabbed for his aspis. It came to him in stages that were prolonged by the nakedness of his posture to their weapons – his hand on the bronze-shod edge, his right hand lifting it clear of the rack, his left arm pushing into the porpax, his shoulder taking the curved weight as he turned-

  Thrunk – as the lead marine crashed shield to shield and the harmonic bronze sounded.

  Satyrus set his feet and reached out with his empty right hand to grab the rim of his opponent's shield. One-handed, he ripped the shield round a half-circle to the right, breaking the man's shield arm, and then he slammed the enemy's shield rim into his nose. The man went down and Satyrus leaped at his partner, drawing his father's heavy kopis from under his own shield arm even as he put his head down and rushed his new opponent. Movement from the stern. Satyrus struck his enemy shield to shield and cut hard around the lower edge of the aspis. His blade went deep into the man's thigh and he was over the side. Satyrus whirled, but the man coming from the stern was an armed deck-crewman with a spear – one of his own.

  'Pull!' he called. The oars bit the water – the stroke was lost and had to be restored.

  As the oars came up, he saw more men coming from the bow. Was Abraham dead? 'Pull!' he called as the top of the stroke was reached. 'Neiron! I need you to call the stroke. Pull!'

  Neiron was sitting against the mast, his eyes unfocused.

  There were three more enemy marines, and they were cautious. On the leader's command, they all threw their javelins together, and Satyrus took them on his shield and charged, shouting 'Pull!' as his war cry. He got his shield into the middle one, took a light cut on his greaves from the one to his front right and punched the hilt of the Aegyptian sword into the man's face over his shield rim – all feint for the backhand cut that Greeks called the 'Harmodius blow'. Satyrus stepped forward with his sword foot, changing his weight with the feint and pushing his shield into the other two, and then cut back at the man who had wounded him, the weight of his blow sheering through the man's helmet.

  Satyrus ripped the Aegyptian weapon free of the man's head and the blade snapped – and Satyrus fell back a step. My father's sword! he thought.

  The deck-crewman behind him saved his life, plunging his spear past Satyrus's shoulder into the centre man's face. The blow skidded off the man's chin and through his cheek and he went down, fouling his file-partner, whose feet had been grabbed by an alert oarsman on the oar deck below. He fell into the rowers and died at their hands.

  'Pull!' Neiron called.

  With a shriek like a wounded woman, Falcon pulled free of the green vessel, trapping the enemy marines on his decks. Many elected to jump – men in light armour could swim long enough to be rescued – but the officers in heavy bronze were trapped. Satyrus watched sailors pull one down and throw him to his death in the water. Abraham accepted the surrender of another – Abraham was the only man Satyrus had ever seen accept surrender in a sea fight.

  'Oh, Ares!' Satyrus said. He could just walk.

  'Pull!' Neiron called, and the Falcon was a ship's length clear of their enemy.

  'Switch your benches!' Satyrus called. He looked aft. Diokles had an arrow through his thigh and was using the oars to keep himself erect.

  Their ram had, in fact, ripped the stern right off the green ship, and he was settling fast, his rowers in chaos. But the enemy was trying to take Theron's ship over the bow as a stolen life-raft. Satyrus could see Theron with his marines fighting in the bow. He was the biggest man in the fight.

  North and west, the whole enemy fleet was bearing down on their fight. The rest of their squadrons were gone. Just a stade away, a pair of golden-yellow triremes had bow waves – full ramming speed.

  'Diokles!' Satyrus yelled, pointing at the new enemy.

  Diokles was already leaning on his oars,
using the momentum of the backed oars to turn the bow south.

  Satyrus saw it as if a god had stepped up next to him and put the whole idea in his mind – he saw the fight and what he had to do.

  As the bow swung south, he saw more and more enemy sailors and marines flooding aboard Herakles.

  'Lay me alongside Herakles,' Satyrus said.

  Diokles bit his lip and said nothing.

  Satyrus accepted his unspoken criticism and ran forward, collecting deck-crewmen with weapons as he went.

  'Abraham!' he called.

  Neiron called the first stroke of the new motion. His voice was weak, but he had to hold on. Satyrus was running out of options, and he was not going to abandon Theron.

  Abraham was kneeling by a dying marine. The man was bleeding out and Abraham was holding his hand.

  Satyrus waited until the man's eyes fluttered closed. Then he seized the dead man's javelin and his sword. 'We're going aboard Herakles,' he said.

  Abraham shook his head. 'You're insane,' he said quietly.

  'I'm not letting Theron die when I can save him,' Satyrus bit back.

  'What about the rest of us?' Abraham asked. 'Punch straight through! Isn't that what we're supposed to do?'

  Satyrus shook his head to clear it. It seemed so obvious to him. 'We put the green ship between us and those two,' he said, pointing at the nearest new enemies, now just half a stade away. 'We rescue Theron and we're gone.'

  Abraham shrugged. He had blood leaking out of an eye – or perhaps just out of his helmet. 'Whatever you say, prince.'

  The rest of the marines looked tired but hardly done in. Most of them had fought at Gaza.

  'On to the deck of the Herakles,' Satyrus said. 'Clear it and we're gone. A gold rose of Rhodos to every man who follows me on to that deck.'

  Even as Satyrus spoke, Diokles had the speed to turn them back east, so that the oarsmen pulled in their oars and Falcon coasted alongside his stricken brother.