Finally, the commander’s cry filled the pass. ‘I want a foot reconnaissance on the perimeter. Sweep the edges of this pass and maintain a watch up there – eight men each side.’ Then there was the scuffle of feet and a few barked orders as the riders were divided up into guard parties.
Apion shot darting glances to both Sha and Blastares above him; they still bore anxious stares and remained plastered to the rock. Yet lying here was a death sentence, the Seljuk scouts would be on top of them in moments. Then a shiver of realisation raced up his spine: of course – they don’t speak Seljuk!
‘Sir! We’ve got to move!’ Apion hissed, raising slightly on his hands and jabbing a finger to the jutting lip of the outcrop above Blastares.
Sha simply glowered at him in disbelief. ‘Get down!’
‘Sir, they’re coming up here. If we stay still, we’re dead!’
Sha’s features curled in the horror of realisation.
‘What did he just say?’ Blastares grunted.
Just then a scuffle of boots on scree sounded just below them.
Sha’s face dropped. ‘Move!’
At once the five were up and scrambling for the outcrop above, their din disguised only by that of the approaching Seljuks. The climb was haphazard and punishing. Apion’s fingers slipped and his knees smashed off the rocks as he tried to reach the edge of the outcrop. His bad leg burned as though being pressed with red-hot irons, but he was well used to this now, after six months of running, and the pain was so much less than it had been in those early days. He chewed down on the betel leaf, sucking the juices from it, and just the act of doing this snapped him back to focus on the climb. With a muted grunt he heaved his weight up and onto the outcrop and collapsed, panting. The ledge provided by the outcrop was small and backed onto the sheer mountain face and only a pile of boulders interrupted the smooth floor they stood on. He turned to see Procopius still labouring to come over the lip.
‘Come on, come on!’ Sha growled.
Apion grappled the old soldier by the wrists, hauling him over with the help of Blastares, but not before cries of alarm rang out from below.
‘They saw us!’ Sha gasped.
Apion scrambled back from the edge to join the four of them. Nepos and Procopius braced to the rear, pulling their bows to the ready. Sha and Blastares crouched at the front, swiping spathions from scabbards, grimacing, ready to strike, ready for blood. Apion pulled his scimitar from its sheath. He closed his eyes to compose himself, his thoughts flitting with the image of the dark door, the knotted arm with the white band of skin and the red emblem reaching out for it. His heart hammered, blood pounding in his ears.
A scrabbling and grunting came from the lip of the outcrop.
Sha was crouched with one hand on the ground, the other holding his sword point forward. ‘Ready . . . ’
Something moved at the lip, and Nepos’ bowstring creaked as he readied to loose.
‘Wait!’ Sha hissed, raising a hand.
Then a fawn limb and a hoof clawed at the lip, followed by antlers. Then inky black eyes and a panicked face appeared as a stag scrabbled half onto the lip of the outcrop, back legs trailing, just as Apion had been moments earlier. The five had to stifle a gasp. Then there was the twang of a bowstring, the whoosh and then the thud of an arrow punching through flesh. The beast let out a terrible groan, its tongue stretching from its mouth, its eyes searching the Byzantine soldiers for mercy they could not provide, and then it was gone, tumbling back into the pass with a heavy thud. Seljuk echoes of delight filled the air as they celebrated their kill.
‘Get back, we’re not in the clear yet!’ Sha motioned to the outcrop on the opposite wall of the pass, where the other party of eight Seljuks were only just scrabbling up onto the flat. The dekarchos scuttled behind the pile of boulders. Apion followed the other three to join him. The five were barely hidden behind the boulder pile as they huddled around the dekarchos, who panted as he spoke: ‘They’ve got us pinned down here,’ he jabbed a thumb at the opposite outcrop, then pointed down, ‘and the other group that downed that stag will be bedding in just below us any moment now, just as their commander ordered them.’ He caught Blastares’ eye and shook his head. ‘I know we could take a smaller group out but the rest would be on us in moments.’
Blastares grunted and turned away.
‘We can’t go up,’ Nepos craned his neck up but the mountainside above was practically sheer. ‘We can’t go along,’ the Slav shook his head, the mountain face on either side of them was pockmarked with hand and footholds but they would be exposed and easily picked off, ‘and we can’t go down. They’re on horseback; they’d crush us even if we could get down and onto the floor of the pass. So we’re pinned down until it’s dark at least. Maybe that’s it; we should sit tight and slip away in the night.’
Sha glanced around to gauge his men’s reaction to this: they were all thirsty, hungry and exhausted. It was only just entering mid-morning now so there was still a long time before the eager sun peaked, let alone dipped. They remained in silence, each man scouring the surroundings in search of another option. Apion, however, gazed not at the surroundings, but back through his memories. He heard Mansur’s words: the answer need not lie with the sword. Panic welled in his chest at the idea of speaking up, but he gulped and took a deep breath.
‘Sir,’ he offered, ‘we can get out of here before nightfall.’
All four turned to him, glowering.
Apion’s initial hubris weakened and then crumbled as he felt all eyes on him, examining his every word. These men trusted each other like brothers, he knew. They did not trust him at all, this was also true, despite his now adequate pace on patrol. His throat felt like knotted rope and his tongue shrivelled, but he knew he had no choice. ‘How quickly could you climb along to the end of the pass?’ He pointed to the nearest end, where the ground rose to meet the level of the outcrop they were on.
‘We can’t! Didn’t you hear the pointy-faced bastard?’ Blastares spat, jabbing a thumb at Nepos. ‘We can’t go along.’
‘Hold on, let’s hear him out,’ Nepos cut in.
Apion took a deep breath. ‘Well, we need a short spell where they’re distracted.’
‘Right. Not long, I reckon,’ Nepos added in his characteristic even tone, blue eyes like slits as he peered at the sun, ‘we could scale along there in a count of what, sixty?’
‘And how do we get along there without being spotted?’ Procopius asked in a doubtful tone.
Apion nodded. ‘They’ve not sighted us yet. They know Byzantine skutatoi are likely to be in the area,’ He caught the eye of each of them in turn, one by one, they all nodded, ‘but if a lone man, a civilian, was to cross their path, what would they do?’
‘Gut him,’ Blastares shot back with a rapacious and gap-toothed grin.
Apion couldn’t suppress a smile. ‘Aye, most probably. But what if he spoke Seljuk?’
‘Who knows?’ Sha mused.
‘A decoy? Fair enough, but where do we find a neutral Seljuk whoreson who feels like doing us a favour at this exact point in time?’ Blastares said. ‘That sword of yours can’t talk can it?’
Nepos smiled and answered for Apion. ‘The decoy doesn’t have to be a Seljuk!’
Blastares and Procopius looked back blankly and Sha frowned.
The Slav’s arrow-like nose bent under the grin that cut across his face. ‘Young Apion here, he speaks the tongue.’
‘Eh?’ Blastares grunted. ‘How’s that?’ The giant skutatos eyed him in distaste.
Procopius scratched his chin, eyes narrowing. ‘Here, you’re not some kind of spy, are you?’
Apion hesitated, knowing this wouldn’t go down well. ‘I . . . I come from a Seljuk family. My mother is Rus, my father a Byzantine through and through and from Trebizond. But my family, those who have looked after me since I was a boy, they are Seljuk.’
Blastares’ eyes widened and Procopius shot a stunned look to Sha. Silence hung over the group.
Sha’s features were creased in confusion. Apion held the dekarchos’ gaze, until finally, the African’s face relaxed into a grin. ‘Then may God bless them for teaching you their tongue!’
‘Hear, hear,’ Nepos added, ‘now can we save the congratulations until we’ve actually tried the plan?’
‘Let’s do it,’ Sha affirmed.
‘Aye, I don’t fancy the alternative,’ Blastares squinted up at the blistering sun.
Procopius was the last to consent. ‘You get us out of this, lad, and I don’t care whether you’re Byzantine, Seljuk or even a bloody Slav,’ he grinned at Nepos.
Apion slipped off his cotton vest, sword belt, leggings and boots so he wore only his tunic. The four each glanced at the angry pink scar winding the length of his leg and the metal brace that clamped his knee. He noticed with a spark of pride that the muscles on his leg were beginning to bulge around the scar and the brace, swallowing both. Regardless of this, he had had enough of shame. ‘Not pretty, is it?’ He cocked an eyebrow. The four grinned at this.
‘Your sword?’ The dekarchos suggested.
‘No, I’ll keep this on me.’
‘What about you, Apion?’ Sha grasped his wrist, face etched with concern.
‘Me? I’ll see you back at the barracks,’ he concluded.
***
‘It is as I say, Bey Soundaq: he just stumbled down the mountainside as if he was out for a stroll!’ The ghazi thumped a fist into Apion’s spine, sending him sprawling forward, knees skidding and scraping on the stones by the stream, a slimy gloop of saliva and blood lopping from his lips and onto the mud in front of him. The ghazi had said nothing when they came face to face, simply hammering the hilt of his sword into Apion’s jaw then ushering him down to the commander at swordpoint.
Then there was a silence, broken only by the gentle babbling current by his side. Apion hadn’t slaked his thirst since the previous evening and his eyes hung on the shimmering water, but he shook his head of the distraction, because, so far, the plan had worked as he had hoped it would.
He had exaggerated his fall to come to the other side of the leader, the one they called Soundaq. As he had hoped, Soundaq turned away from the outcrop to examine him, the rest of the ghazis forming an arc either side of their leader. The ghazi on either side of the pass had been distracted by his appearance; they had jostled to escort him down to their leader by the stream in hope of commendation. The window of opportunity had been opened for Sha and the men but their chances of escape were still slim, all it would take would be one glance to the mountainside from a ghazi, and his kontoubernion would be target practice for the Seljuk bows. His own chances, he realised with a convulsion of his bowels, were even slimmer. He could not bring himself to look up at the ghazis, fearful that the truth would shine through in his eyes. Then a polished curved sword blade flashed towards him, the sun’s rays blinding him momentarily as the blade was thrust under his chin to tilt his head up.
‘You seem nervous, boy?’ Soundaq glared at him along the length of the blade.
Apion squinted up at the commander. His eyes were narrowed, spelling out distrust as he peered down his nose, his skin sun-darkened and lined with age. Apion composed himself to reply: he was a traveller, out hunting, poaching maybe; these soldiers would surely approve of poaching on so-called Byzantine lands.
‘Just out for the hunt,’ he nodded to the ghazi who held his scimitar.
‘A fine piece of weaponry that,’ Soundaq mused. ‘One I’d expect to see my commander wear to battle, not one I’d expect to see on an amber-haired boy wandering the mountains. So tell me, what exactly do you hunt with a sword?’
Apion held the commander’s gaze. In the background he noted movement across the mountainside, four figures, scaling silently like spiders. One flinch, one dart of the eyes, one hint of a stammer and he was dead, his unit was dead.
‘Anything that fills my belly,’ Apion tried to sound casual but his throat felt tight. ‘Anyway, I’d never be without it. My father gave me it,’ he shrugged, thinking of Mansur.
‘Then where did he get it?’ Another ghazi spat. The commander silenced him with a raised hand, while holding Apion’s gaze.
‘He fought with Tugrul, as an emir.’ Apion spoke the words with pride and fear.
‘He’s scavenged it from one of our people’s corpses!’ One ghazi barked over him. ‘Or worse, he’s cut one of our brothers’ throats himself, and taken the sword from the corpse!’
‘Another word and you’ll be spitting teeth,’ Soundaq snapped, this time shooting a burning glare at the perpetrator, who dropped his eyes to the stream. The commander turned back to Apion, then stopped, his brow furrowed, then he turned, flicking his gaze along the outcrops of the pass.
Apion’s heart thundered, then slowed as he saw the mountainside was now bare.
Then the commander shot his glare back to Apion. A silence ensued. Then Soundaq barked at his men. ‘I ordered an eight up onto each of those outcrops, yet I find you all gathered around me like dogs looking for scraps? Back to your posts!’
With a grumble, the ghazis dispersed. ‘The rest of you, water the horses and get that stag skinned and on a spit.’
Apion wondered if he should wait on permission to stand, then thought that an honest man, an innocent man, should have no reason to kneel. He pushed up from kneeling with the heels of his hands. As he did so, a boulder crumbled from the outcrop, tumbling down the mountainside. Apion’s gasp at this sparked realisation in the commander’s eyes.
Soundaq leaned in and grabbed his wrist. ‘What is this, you dog?’ he hissed, darting his eyes to the end of the pass, holding the scimitar up to Apion’s jugular. ‘You are no lone hunter!’
The rest of the ghazis turned, suddenly alert to their leader’s tone. Apion’s breath stilled in his lungs, his eyes searching those of the commander. ‘A handful of scouts, they will be on their speedy mounts and long gone by now,’ he lied. ‘To pursue them would be futile.’ He fixed Soundaq with a defiant stare and his leg-brace chinked as he steadied himself. At this, Soundaq looked down, frowning at the brace, then his expression split into a wry half-grin.
‘Well, well . . . ’ Soundaq’s grip on him relaxed and he laughed dryly. He turned to his men and waved them towards their posts again. ‘Sentries on each outcrop, as I ordered!’ He barked. Then he turned back to Apion with a weary expression. ‘It’s your good fortune that I think I know who you are, boy – the messenger with the leg-brace. You saved a rider of mine, Kartal. I don’t know what your story is, but you live to tell it another day. Besides, I’ve seen enough blood over these last months.’ With that, he nodded to the opening of the pass, handing the scimitar back to Apion.
Apion stepped back warily. Was this a game? Would an arrow or a dagger pierce his back as soon as he turned around? Then Soundaq nodded to the end of the pass again.
Soundaq spoke as he stepped back, the words echoing in the pass. ‘But heed this message well: a storm approaches from the east, and the Falcon soars on its wrath. Byzantium’s time is over.’
Apion held the man’s glare, feeling the burning looks from the rest of the ghazis, then turned and walked from the pass.
***
Argyroupolis glowed like a giant firefly in the mountains, the orange of its lights tingeing the otherwise pitch black night sky. Peleus and Stypiotes the skutatoi stood on the towers flanking the main gate, their eyes heavy from the long shift on watch and so they welcomed the night chill that kept them alert.
Peleus mused over the events of the day. Reports of a ghazi warband had come in that afternoon as Dekarchos Sha and his weary and depleted kontoubernion staggered through the gates, parched and coated in dust. One skutatos from his number had been lost; a light price to pay apparently going by the smirk that had touched Tourmarches Bracchus’ face when the loss was reported. But word had spread that this one man had sacrificed himself, saving Sha and the rest. The men in the mess hall had been toasting his memory like a
hero just before he and Stypiotes had to leave and come on duty.
‘Peleus!’ Stypiotes hissed across the gate top.
Peleus jolted to life, he gripped his kontarion and spun to his colleague.
‘Something’s out there.’
‘Aye?’ Peleus shrugged, screwing his eyes tight to peer into the blackness: the dirt road lay empty, dropping into the inky abyss only a few hundred feet ahead. ‘Have you been drinking again, Stypiotes? There’s nothing out there.’
Strategos: Born in the Borderlands Page 24
