Cato nodded his thanks. 'Soon as the men are kitted up, get the javelins issued. And bring some more cases up from stores.'
'Yes, sir.'
As Cato fumbled with the leather ties of his helmet he glanced back towards the aft deck. Albinus was leaning on the rail, staring over the side towards the Horus. As the Spartan's sail was furled the trireme began to slow down. Then, from below deck, the sharp rap of the pausarius' hammer began to sound the pace for the men at the oars. The blades dropped down into the sea with a rolling chorus of splashes, then with an audible collective grunt of effort, the Spartan lurched forward. It took a moment for the crew to find their rhythm, and then the deck steadied as the warship ploughed forward. The moment they were immediately behind the flagship, Albinus shouted an order to the steersman, who threw his weight against the shaft of the huge oars hanging over the stern of the Spartan. As the broad blades of the steering oars bit into the sea, Cato felt the deck shift beneath his boots and instinctively grabbed at the side rail. Beside him Felix saw the gesture and smiled.
'Better get used to the feeling, sir. There'll be plenty of turning when we close with them pirates.'
'Let's hope they decide not to make a stand.'
Felix looked at his centurion guardedly. 'Why's that, sir?'
'We're overloaded. They'll have the advantage in speed, if not strength. I just hope they count the numbers and beat a retreat.'
Optio Felix glanced forward over the bows at the cluster of distant sails on the horizon. As the trireme rose on a swell the dark hulls of the pirate ships were clearly visible against the gleaming blue of the sea.
'Doesn't look like they're going to run for it.'
'No.' Cato pressed his lips together. The enemy fleet was steadily closing on them, with no sign of changing course. 'Tell Minucius to get the crow ready.'
Felix saluted and turned forward. A moment later Minucius was bellowing orders at his men to drop their shields and javelins, and follow him back to where the boarding device was lashed to the deck in front of the mast. As they set to work, Cato glanced back down the length of the ship, and noted the time it took for the Spartan to make the quarter-turn into the wake of the flagship. To his mind the trireme was an unwieldy vessel, a perception confirmed by the far quicker turns of the biremes as they fanned out on either side of the Horus and took up position on the flanks. It was just like on land, Cato reflected. The heavy bulk of the quinquireme and the triremes in the centre, like the legions, and the lighter vessels on the flanks, like cavalry, waiting to exploit their speed over the open space before them. Slowly, as the two fleets crawled across the sea towards each other, the Roman vessels took station on the flagship and the formation flattened from a chevron into a broad line, with a small reserve of two triremes and four biremes held back to plug any gaps that opened in the Roman fleet.
Cato raised a hand to shade his eyes as he gazed round, looking for Macro's ship. Then he saw the small three-pronged design on the bows of a bireme, out on the left flank. Cato squinted and just made out a red crest on one of the helmets packed in at the bow. He smiled, wondering what Macro was making of his new cavalry role. No doubt his friend was itching to get stuck into the pirates and would order his trierarch to ram the first available enemy. As Cato watched, the distant outline of a crow rose above Macro and his men and hung at an angle, ready to plunge down and impale an enemy vessel.
On board the Spartan, Minucius and his men heaved the boarding device forward towards the bows. As the warship rose and fell on the swell they struggled to line up the thick wooden pivot with the iron socket that had been fixed on to the foredeck. At length, and after much cursing, the crow was lowered into position and ropes fed through the tackles that would raise and swing the boarding ramp. When the men were ready, the ramp was lifted far enough for the iron spike to be attached underneath the front and the ropes were fastened tightly to the cleats to hold the device still, until it was needed. Cato noticed that the weight of the crow and the marines had canted the bows down, and the trireme seemed markedly more sluggish as the oars drove it through the swell.
The Roman fleet was heading directly into the wind, and the bows thudded into the oncoming waves, sending up clouds of spray that fell back into the faces of the men on the foredeck. Cato blinked away each salty deluge as he stared intently at the approaching enemy. The pirates, still under sail, closed swiftly with the Roman ships, and within the hour were in clear view, barely a mile off. Most of the pirate ships were in the same class as the biremes, and at the centre of their line was the trireme Cato had seen several days earlier, its dark pennant flickering in the stiff breeze like a serpent's tongue. Despite what Albinus had told him about the dangers of fighting with overloaded ships, Cato still felt that the coming fight looked one-sided.
'Hello…' Optio Felix muttered.'What's that big bastard up to?'
Cato glanced back towards the trireme. The main sail was flapping wildly, then a moment later tiny figures on the yardarm hurriedly gathered in the sail as oars were thrust out from the sides of the ship. On either side the biremes and lighter liburnians continued forward, into the teeth of the Roman fleet. But as the trireme's oars splashed down into the sea there was something odd about their motion and Cato frowned for a moment, before the truth dawned on him.
'She's rowing backwards.'
Felix stared hard for an instant, then nodded his head.'So she is! What's he playing at? Think the bastard's running for it, sir?'
'I don't know.' Cato felt a sudden icy pang of anxiety deep in his guts. Something was wrong, he was sure of it. Even though he knew little of naval tactics – only what he had been hurriedly taught since his arrival at Ravenna – he was sure that this was some kind of ruse. But all around him his men, and the sailors, were cheering in triumph at the sight of the retreating pirate ship, as if the battle was already won.
'Quiet!' Cato bellowed.'Silence there! Next man to open his bloody mouth is on a charge!'
The cries died away and Cato turned his attention back to the enemy fleet, now close enough for him to make out the details of the men scurrying across the decks of the closest vessels. Telemachus' trireme was steadily withdrawing ahead of the Horus and the excited cries of the men aboard the Roman flagship carried clearly across the waves to the ships following behind. Some of the men close to Cato glanced at him resentfully, but were wise enough to keep their mouths firmly shut. High up, at the stern of the quinquireme, a red-cloaked figure brandished a sword that flickered like a sliver of fire in the morning sunlight as Vitellius urged his men on. Beyond the Horus a flash of colour drew Cato's eye and he saw a bright yellow pennant flutter up the mast of the pirate vessel. At once the other ships in the enemy fleet began to turn to either side, sails shifting round as they filled with the wind blowing over the aft quarter. They had divided in two and now each half of the pirate fleet was sailing directly at the lighter craft on the wings of the Roman fleet.
As if oblivious to the danger to his biremes, Vitellius ploughed on through the waves, in pursuit of the pirate leader. From the foredeck of the Spartan Cato could only watch in growing desperation as the enemy fleet swept across the bows of the largest Roman warships. He could understand the prefect's thinking well enough. If they could only capture, or kill, Telemachus, then the pirate fleet might be broken in this first battle. Sure enough the Horus was slowly closing on the enemy commander's ship. Too slowly. And all the time she was drawing them away from action that would be fought on the flanks of the Roman fleet. It was cleverly worked, Cato realised with despair. Telemachus would hold himself out as bait, knowing that the Roman prefect would be hellbent on winning himself a triumphant victory to further his career. The trick was to make it look as if the Romans stood a good enough chance of catching up with his ship, yet still have sufficient time to turn and make an escape.
'There they go,' Felix muttered, and Cato turned to look towards Macro's ship. Half a mile away across the rolling sea the sails of the pirate ships we
re mixing in with the bare masts of the biremes. Even as Cato watched, one of the enemy vessels raced down the side of a Roman ship and sheered off its oars in an explosion of splinters and wooden shafts. The pirate ship was moving so swiftly that the marines had no chance to deploy their crow, and had only begun to swing it round as the pirate ship snapped off the last of the oars and passed beyond reach. The oars on the far side were still being worked and the bireme started to spin round, heeling the ship over in the direction of the boarding ramp. As the marines on the Spartan watched in horror, the bireme turned on to its side, the sea closing over the rail as men and equipment spilled into the churning water. A moment later there was a dull crack as the mast broke and the ship capsized completely, leaving a glistening hump above the surface, surrounded by men frantically splashing as they tried to find some debris to keep them afloat.
'Oh, shit.' A marine close by Cato shook his head. 'Did you see that? Poor bastards…'
Cato was already casting his gaze over the other ships, searching out Macro's. The Trident had passed through the pirate fleet unscathed and was already struggling to turn round and seek out an enemy to close with. Elsewhere, another bireme had been rammed, the shock of the impact breaking the yardarm of its attacker. But the pirates had their oars out in an instant and as they furiously backed away from their victim the sea rushed into the shattered hull and a moment later the overloaded vessel also capsized. Cato turned back to the Horus, still plodding towards the retreating trireme of Telemachus.
'What the hell is wrong with the prefect?' Felix slammed his fist down on the side rail. 'Can't he bloody well see what's happening?'
'He knows all right,' Cato replied quietly. 'He just thinks it's a justifiable sacrifice.'
'Sacrifice? It's going to be a fucking slaughter. Look! There goes another one.'
Cato stared in silence as the pirate ships continued to cut through the ships on each Roman flank. Only a handful of the biremes had managed to strike back. One had pinned a pirate vessel with its crow and the marines were already pouring across the ramp and dropping on to the pirates, striking them down with desperate savagery. A short distance away another bireme had managed to ram an unwary pirate ship and the latter's decks were already awash as it settled into the sea. Every other Roman ship was either engaged or struggling to close with the pirates.
Optio Felix was right, Cato decided. It was going to be a slaughter, unless someone acted. He took one last look at the flagship, still pursuing Telemachus, then turned and pushed his way through his men, and ran aft towards Albinus. Minucius glanced at him as Cato passed, and there was what looked like contempt in the older man's eyes.
'Turn us round!' Cato called out.
The trierarch stared at him blankly, as if he had not heard the order. Cato clambered up the steps to the aft deck and thrust his arm out towards the flank where Macro and the others were battling for their lives. 'I said, turn us round.'
'No.' Albinus nodded forward. 'There's been no signal from the flagship.'
'Forget the flagship. Look over there. Our comrades need us. Right now.'
'We haven't had orders.'
'Fuck the orders! Our ships are being cut to pieces. If we don't act now – right now – we'll lose them all.'
'But-'
'Turn the ship around. That's an order!'
For a moment the two officers stared at each other, and more and more of the marines and sailors turned to watch them, as they became aware of the crisis. At length, Albinus nodded his head.
'All right, Centurion. But I'll want it in writing that you gave the order.'
Cato sneered at the man. 'You can have it in writing, if we survive. Now, do it.'
Albinus turned to the steersman. 'Turn to port, hard over!'
'Aye, sir!' The steersman hauled on the oar shaft, straining every sinew of his brawny arms, and the water churned under the stern of the trireme. Cato found it hard to restrain his impatience as the bows slowly swung away from the Horus and eventually lined up with the sea battle over a mile away. Glancing round at the other triremes, he saw faces turned towards them, and could even read the surprise in those on the nearest ship. Cato drew his sword and thrust it forwards, pointing out over the bows of the Spartan. He cupped his spare hand to his mouth and bellowed across the water.
'Follow us! For pity's sake, follow us!'
At first there was no response, then the trierarch called out orders to his men and Cato's heart lifted as he saw the bows of the trireme start to turn after the Spartan. Two more of the large warships altered course, steering towards the other flank, but the remainder held their course in the wake of the flagship.
'Better than nothing,' Cato muttered wryly. Then he turned to Albinus.'Steer right at the middle of that lot. Pick out any target that looks promising.'
'Where are you going?'
'We have to lighten the ship.'
Albinus nodded. 'All right. But do it quickly!'
Cato ran back down the deck and sought out Centurion Minucius. 'Get your men down into the hold. I want anything that's portable brought up on deck and dumped over the side.'
'Dump it?' Minucius raised his eyebrows.'But we'll need that later.'
'There's not going to be any later if we don't dump it.'
Minucius shook his head. 'You don't have the authority.'
Cato stared at him, eyes wide and glaring.'Yes I do. Now carry out your orders or I'll have you taken below and hand your command over to your optio. I mean it.'
Minucius saluted and immediately started to give the necessary orders as Cato headed towards his men, seeking out Felix.
'Optio!'
'Yes, sir!'
'Take a section. Go below and bring up the slingshot stores.'
'Yes, sir. How much do you want?'
'All of it. Get moving.'
The optio had served long enough to know not to question orders, however unexpected they might be. He turned to the nearest men. 'Drop your shields and javelins and follow me.'
Felix drew back the cover of the forehatch and dropped down below the deck, quickly followed by the others. A short time later they were handing up small sacks filled with lead shot to the men on the deck. Felix's head popped up through the hatch. 'Slings as well, sir?'
'What?… Yes, why not? Might as well put them to some use while we lighten the load.'
As the marines began to stack the sacks in the centre of the deck Cato looked aft and saw that Minucius and his men were already heaving sacks of grain and spare sheets of plate armour over the side. A quick glance at the trireme following a short distance behind revealed that they too had realised the need to lighten their ship. Cato nodded his satisfaction and then pushed his way to the thick timber post at the Spartan's bow. Below him, the bronze mass of the trireme's ram lifted and plunged into the sea, aiming at the heart of the sea battle being fought out barely a third of a mile ahead.
Cato scanned the vessels still fighting it out amidst the flotsam, wreckage and bodies littering the surface of the sea. The Trident, which had passed through the enemy, had turned about and charged back into the fight, ramming into the stern of a pirate ship that had already wedged its ram into the side of a bireme. The crews of all three vessels were locked in combat on the deck of the pirate ship and, as far as Cato could make out, the Romans had the upper hand.
The sound of forlorn cries reached his ears and Cato noticed that there were men in the water directly ahead of the Spartan, Romans as well as pirates. He was on the verge of crying out a warning to Albinus, before he realised that there was nothing that could be done for these men. The trireme was too unwieldy to set a course to avoid the men in the water. As the warship surged into the fringe of the battle, Cato glimpsed the desperate expressions of the men in their path, and saw them frantically swim out of the trireme's path. Those who were too badly injured to swim fast enough, or who simply clung to debris, could only watch in despair as the bronze ram bore down on them. A handful of men grasping a sha
ttered length of mast were swept from sight as the bow crashed into them with a dull thud, then there were screams as the survivors of the impact swept along the sides of the warship and were crushed by the blades of the oars churning through the sea.
Cato tried to ignore their cries and glanced round. He looked back at the Trident and froze. A short distance beyond Macro's ship Cato saw the front of a pirate ship powering forward under its oars. As the crew of the Roman vessel became aware of the danger their shouts of alarm carried clearly across the water. The marines were still fighting aboard the enemy they had managed to pin with their crow. But now they hesistated and looked back over the deck of their own ship. With a triumphant roar, the pirates they were fighting surged back at them.
'Over there!' Cato shouted over his shoulder as he pointed towards Macro's ship and thrust out his arm. 'Steer over there!'
Albinus relayed the order to the steersman and the Spartan, a little more nimble now that she had shed some weight, slewed round towards the three ships still locked together, and the fourth rushing in to finish off the Trident and her crew.
'Ready your slings!' Cato shouted to his men and pointed out the target. 'Aim for that bastard on the far side! You men, give the slingers some space!'
Only two hundred paces separated the Spartan from the ships locked together when the pirate vessel slammed into the side of Macro's ship. The grinding, splintering crash filled the air as the Trident recoiled under the impact, the shock tearing the rigging apart. The mast splintered and crashed down on to the deck moments later. The collision knocked every man off his feet in the three ships that had been locked together, and there was an instant of silence before they recovered, scrambled back to their feet and continued fighting. The pirates aboard the ship that had rammed the Trident launched their grappling hooks over on to the Roman deck and began to haul the vessels closer together as a boarding party crowded the foredeck, brandishing their weapons as they waited impatiently for the moment to spring on board the bireme and wipe out her crew and marines.
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