Island in the Storm

17. The Lion Circles

Apion loped down from the northern hills, bathed in sweat and dawn light. He had hoped his morning run along that range might give him a glimpse of some activity in the lands far to the south. But he had seen nothing. Just the majestic Mount Tzipan, still and silent, and the bright, sparkling band beyond that was Lake Van. No sign of Tarchianotes’ half of the army. No sign of the foraging parties sent south across the plain a few hours before dawn. These kursores had been sent out with a brief to try to make contact with Tarchianotes and to gather up what forage and fodder could be found to tide the Manzikert half of the army over in the meantime. Ride swiftly, he thought as he ran onto the flatland and past the walls of Manzikert — the garrison Chaldians cheering him from the battlements.

The siege lines had been deconstructed and transformed into a standard marching camp, straddling the south edge of the fortress mount and enclosing the small brook. Inside, he stopped by a barrel of water and lashed a handful over his sweat-soaked skin. All around, the men were waking for morning roll-call, many nibbling unenthusiastically on their second to last chunk of hard tack biscuit. His belly groaned for his usual breakfast of a hunk of bread and a portion of honey, but the last of the bread had been eaten two days past, and the honey had been finished more than a week ago. He dug out the last morsel from his rations — half a ball of dried yoghurt, almonds and sesame seeds, dropping it in a pot with some water and resting it over the small campfire Sha had kindled at the heart of the Chaldian section of the camp. The yoghurt ball and water blended together to form a thick and nutritious — if scant — portion of stew. He ate slowly, hoping the meal would be enough to see him through the day.

It was then that a shout came from the camp’s southern gate. Apion shot to standing, hearing the tone of the sentry’s voice. He shaded his eyes from the sun: over the sea of pavilion tents and fluttering banners he saw the returning cluster of foraging kursores. It looked like all of the seventy sent out were present, but some were bloodied. He set down his pot and rushed to the gate.

‘Seljuk riders came at us in the lower hills and showered us with arrows,’ the lead rider panted, his klibanion damaged where arrows had struck. ‘We did not meet with Doux Tarchianotes, but we did manage to gather some food,’ the man threw down a few sacks of berries and nuts, others dropping gathered fodder and others had poles draped with shot or trapped rabbits.

‘How many?’ Apion asked, ignoring the fare.

‘The riders? Two to every one of us — maybe a hundred and fifty.’

Apion swung round to see that Igor, Alyates, Philaretos and Bryennios had come to the gate also. Behind them, Romanus strode, ringed by Rus axemen.

‘A band of skirmishers?’ Igor suggested.

‘Perhaps the garrison of Chliat?’ Philaretos growled, clearly dismayed by the meagre food gathered by the riders.

‘Perhaps,’ Apion looked to the south. Still, silent and empty.

‘Take a few regiments of your western tagmata, Doux,’ the emperor nodded to Bryennios. Then he looked to Apion. ‘You should go too. Lead the wing of Norman lancers. Drive off these dogs.’

The emperor leaned in close to Apion, lowering his voice. ‘And bring back what food you can, Strategos. This fare will provide each man with barely a mouthful of food.’

‘Yes, Basileus.’

He hurried back to his tent, throwing on his armour — just his klibanion and helm — foregoing greaves and face veil to aid swiftness. He vaulted onto his saddled gelding, then urged it into a walk to join Bryennios. The Norman riders were assembling nearby, coated from scalp to knee in their mail hauberks, just their pale features visible under the rims and nose guards of their helms. Each man held a tall and lethal lance.

‘Ready, Strategos?’ Bryennios cocked an eyebrow.

Apion offered him a wry grin by way of reply.

They rode at a gallop southwards across the plain as the sun rose and grew fierce. Here the grass of the northern hills became sparse, replaced by burnt-gold, dry and dusty ground. Bryennios had summoned a thousand of his western riders; kursores, in effect — light and swift skirmish cavalry garbed in iron plated klibania and helms, carrying spears and small shields. Apion ‘led’ the Norman five hundred — in fact they seemed intent on riding ahead of Apion and the rest, barking out in their jagged western tongue.

‘Let them win whatever race they think they are running,’ Apion snorted, seeing the disgusted look on Bryennios’ face. ‘If it assures them of their prowess, then what harm is there in it?’

The hills before Mount Tzipan had been but barely visible bumps from the hillsides around Manzikert. Now, as the riders approached, they seemed to grow into mini-mountains.

‘It was here, in these first valleys,’ the nearest kursoris said, tilting the rim of his conical helm, his face whitening a fraction. This rider had been one of those ambushed at dawn.

Apion looked ahead to the precipitous, green-gold hillsides that sprouted up to present a saddle of land, cast in shade. ‘Slow!’ he called out.

Bryennios nodded his assent. The Norman riders slowed grudgingly, muttering to one another. They trotted into the rugged valley, seeing nothing but poppies and grass quivering in the breeze, hearing nothing but the echo of their own hooves. They moved about a mile into the valley. Then there was a faint noise.

Apion, Sha and Bryennios shared a wide-eyed look.

‘Still!’ Bryennios raised a hand.

The Normans’ muttering died away and they heard nothing but the whistling breeze and the chattering of the cicadas. Then came again — the distant whinnying of a horse, quickly stifled. The ghostly babble of voices, there and not there at once.

‘They’re nearby,’ Bryennios whispered.

‘Aye, listen,’ Apion said, lifting his helmet off and covering one ear and then the other. ‘It is stronger to the left. They must be there, beyond the fork,’ he pointed to the leftmost of two routes at the end of the valley.

Suddenly, the babble ceased.

Bryennios nodded. ‘Forward, at a walk,’ he hissed.

The left fork led directly east. The late morning sun blinded them as they rode. Apion squinted and shaded his eyes, desperately trying to discern the path ahead. ‘Stop,’ he uttered flatly.

‘Strategos?’ Bryennios frowned and his riders halted with him. Unsurprisingly, the Normans continued on ahead, heedless of the order.

‘This is a perfect ambush point,’ Apion whispered, careful not to let the other riders hear. ‘The sun blinds us. And see how the valley narrows up ahead? We should turn around and — ’

A whinnying cut him off. He twisted in his saddle to see a dark pack of horsemen spill into the western end of the valley behind them. Seljuk ghazis, more than a thousand of them, rumbling forward at a trot, then breaking into a gallop. Then a roar from up ahead. He twisted to face forward again; another mass of riders washed from the eastern end of the valley.

He set eyes upon the one leading this ambush. An aged Seljuk ghazi. No, he was too finely garbed. Not a mere ghazi, a bey. He glowered at Apion like an angered bear, his brow dipped, his wispy white locks flapping across his face as he lay flat in the saddle and led his men into a charge.

Soundaq?

Apion’s mind raced back to his early days in the ranks, to that Seljuk Bey he had faced on the hilltop town of Bizye. The proud warrior and his warband had thought to strike the townsfolk down and take what plunder he could, but Apion and his trusted three had seen him off with a fierce mixture of tenacity and cunning. Soundaq’s face was creased in fury, mouth agape in a battle-cry shared with the riders he led. ‘Allahu Akbar!’

All around him, the mounts of the Normans and the western tagmata reared and whinnied in panic, their riders bawled in horror, drawing swords and levelling spears. Bryennios hastened to bark them to order. ‘Divide the tourma, form a front to the east and to the west!’ he roared.

‘No!’ Apion cried. ‘This valley is a snare. We must break free.’ He swept his spear up to the steep valley side. ‘Break for the hilltop!’

Bryennios took just a moment to concur, seeing yet more ghazis flood into the valley behind Soundaq. An instant later, he had barked out to his men and had them scrambling up the uneven hillside, making for the brow of the valley. Apion was near the rear of the fleeing Byzantine pack. The going was treacherous and many horses stumbled, man and rider rolling back down onto the valley floor where they lay, bones broken, only for the two packs of ghazi to converge from east and west and hack at them. Within a breath, Soundaq and his ghazis then turned their bows upon the scrambling Byzantine uphill retreat. Arrows thumped into the grass and rocks around Apion and the hooves of his Thessalian. Men fell back with cries all around him and the air took on the coppery stench of blood. They were nearly at the brow, he realised. From there they could break from these hills and back onto the flatland. He risked a glance over his shoulder. The majority of the ghazis were content to shoot at them from the valley floor, but a small wedge had broken ahead. Soundaq led them. His eyes were still trained on Apion as if nobody else existed in that valley. His face was set in a chilling rictus as his sturdy mare saw him bound up the hillside, drawing closer to Apion’s Thessalian with every passing, frenzied heartbeat.

‘I’ll have your blood today, Haga,’ he panted, drawing his scimitar as they crested the valley side and he came to within an arm’s length of Apion. ‘I’ll have what I should have taken all those years ago!’

Apion tore out his own blade just in time to parry, struggling to guide his mount on across the short stretch of plateau as they rode side by side. ‘You were once a noble foe. What has happened to you in the years since we last clashed?’ he snarled as their blades scraped against one another, each man vying for supremacy.

Without hesitation, Soundaq spat back; ‘Nothing, Haga. . nothing!’ His face grew crimson with ire as he pushed on his blade, fixed on forcing Apion’s blade from his hand or knocking him from his horse. At that moment, the bey employed the strength of a bear. A moment later, the force was gone, the man’s face paling. He dropped his sword, clutched a hand to his chest and toppled to the grass, struggling to his knees, gasping for breath. Apion glanced back only to see Soundaq’s body slump, his heart ruptured with anger, it seemed. But he gawped at this only for an instant, as the rest of the riders following Soundaq rushed up onto the flat at the top of the valley too. Apion dropped flat in his saddle and kicked his Thessalian into a frenzied gallop down the other side of the hill, on after the rest of the Byzantines, racing for the flatland.

The thunder of pursuing hooves faded, only to be replaced by the shudder of bending bows. He swung his shield round onto his back, knowing he would be their primary target, then heeled the mount again and again, bringing it to a frantic charge as soon as he reached the plain. Arrows thwacked down on his shield, glanced from his helm and ricocheted from the mount’s scale apron. Many more thudded down in the dust around him. He looked up, seeing that he was catching Bryennios, the western tagma riders and the Normans.

Bryennios turned to urge him on faster, then cried out as two arrows thudded home, finding gaps in the iron squares of his klibanion, also knocking down a clutch of the kursores racing by his side. The next volley of arrows sailed down upon the Normans’ hauberks, punching through the mail and felling at least sixty of the western riders.

‘Get your heads down, lie flat on the saddle! Shields on your backs!’ Apion screamed at the panicked Normans over the rushing wind as they hared north, back across the plain towards Manzikert. Only then did the arrow hail thin.

‘They’re not following?’ Bryennios gasped, blood pouring from the wound on his back where two arrows quivered. ‘I’ll be damned if they were a small raiding party. . or the garrison of Chliat!’

Apion twisted to look back, up to the top of the hill they had just descended. It was now glimmering with silver riders. At the heart of this glittering horizon, a figure stood under the Seljuk golden bow banner. The figure was but a speck in the distance. But even from here, he knew exactly who it was.

Sultan Alp Arslan, the Mountain Lion.

‘No, Doux. It seems the Sultan has come to the field of battle.’

Bryennios’ silence spoke a thousand words. Likewise, Apion’s skin danced in a cold shiver. If the sultan had come to these plains to face the imperial army, then it was a certainty that another had followed.

Taylan, he mouthed, twisting once more and scanning the gathering, thickening crowds of riders up there.

***

Nearing sunset, Apion, Romanus and a clutch of twenty varangoi climbed to the tallest of the northern hills, a safe distance from their camp where they could enjoy a good vantage point across the great plain to view the southern ranges, Mount Tzipan and Lake Van. The only good news to be shared since they returned from the scouting sortie to the south was the discovery of forty barrels of grain inside the cellar of Manzikert’s keep. Thus, the men would eat fresh bread tonight. But it was scant solace given Apion and the other scout riders’ discovery of what lay only a handful of miles to the south.

‘They were there,’ Apion squinted, pointing across the deep orange and shadow dappled land to the tiny, almost indiscernible bump that was the valley of the ambush.

Romanus sighed, his unshaven jaw tensing. ‘Yet I see nothing, nothing but the coming sunset.’

Apion frowned. ‘The arrows in Doux Bryennios’ flesh were real enough, were they not?’ The western doux was somewhere in the Byzantine camp below, being tended to. Fortunately, his wounds were light, the arrows breaking the flesh but not deeply enough to pierce any organs. He would likely be fit to ride again within a day or so. And the chances were he would have to be.

Romanus’ expression grew dark. ‘The sultan was definitely with them? How can a man be cowering in the centre of old Persia and in those hills at the same time?’

Apion sighed, understanding Romanus’ ire. He thought of Diabatenus’ reports that Alp Arslan had fled back into his heartlands upon hearing of the Byzantine advance. Then he thought of that handsome rider’s unexplained disappearance at Theodosiopolis. A dark shadowy truth settled on his thoughts, but he decided not to air them. ‘Who knows what really happened between him and Diabatenus when they parleyed. But believe me, Basileus, the sultan is here.’

‘Then we must ready to resist what forces the sultan has brought to the field,’ Romanus shook his head with a deep sigh. ‘Tarchianotes and his half of the army will be vital — the bulk of my finest cavalry and foot archers. Perhaps the division of the forces might even prove fortuitous — for if we can lure the Sultan’s army onto the plains then perhaps Tarchianotes can fall upon their rear.’

Apion nodded, gazing to the south again. He thought of dampening the emperor’s optimism, then chided himself. ‘Perhaps.’

***

That night, a waxing moon lit the plain of Manzikert, its light coming and going as grey clouds crawled across the sky on lofty zephyrs. The frantic sortie to the southern hills seemed such a long time ago as Apion wandered between the tents of the various regiments in his tunic, boots and a cloak to keep the gentle night chill at bay. The men prayed or chattered gaily, happy to have their bread, ignorant as yet to what lay in the southern hills. Some had grown suspicious when the emperor ordered a double-strength watch, but none yet knew the full story.

Outside the camp, a small band of Armenian traders had come by this otherwise deserted plain and they stopped outside the camp’s southern gate. There were just a few of them, but they brought with them eight ox-drawn wagons laden with trinkets: precious stones set in carved wood, dyed animal hair scarves and fine ostrich feathers for plumage. The Byzantines had little interest in these wares, bar a few who bought up the small amount of prayer ropes the traders had. The Armenian spearmen had browsed the wares with some interest, but the Oghuz had been enthralled by the trinkets, a few hundred of the rugged steppe riders spending hours bantering and bartering with the traders. They even shared some of their bread and wine with the travellers.

Apion headed out to see how they were getting on, taking with him a skin of watered wine. He saw the flat-faced and black-humoured Tamis, leader of the Oghuz wing. The man was squat and sturdy like his fellow riders. He wore black furs on his shoulders, crude leather armour around his torso and an ancient-looking but deadly composite bow on his back. These nimble horse archers — eighteen hundred of them all told including the sixteen hundred or so inside the camp — were the only true archer cavalry left in this half of the bisected army. A vital part of any well balanced force.

‘Ah, Haga!’ Tamis turned to him, arms out wide.

Apion accepted his embrace. ‘Will your men still be able to ride with all these new trinkets?’ he chuckled, seeing one Oghuz rider showing off his purchases — a weighty bronze greave, engraved with spiralling patterns, and a thick iron torc around his neck.

‘Ah, yes, the horses might need a few more handfuls of fodder to carry that one,’ Tamis grinned. Then his smile faded and he beckoned Apion with him on a stroll away from the gathered men and traders and a little further out onto the empty plain. ‘Tell me, Strategos, are these rumours I hear true?’

Apion feigned ignorance.

‘Come on, I know you are as close to the emperor as anyone. The grain and silage Doux Tarchianotes and his men were to send from the southern mountains — it has not arrived, has it? We have been watching and we saw no wagons.’ He stopped and faced Apion, checking he was out of earshot of his men. ‘And that sortie today — it was not merely a skirmish with the Chliat garrison, was it? I saw the state of the men who returned — a good number less than set out.’

Apion sighed. ‘Tamis, you are a wise and noble leader. You know the swiftness with which fear spreads on the wind of such news. Aye, there is a Seljuk army in those hills,’ he looked across the plain to the south. ‘But tonight your men and all the others need nourishment and rest — not rumours.’

Tamis nodded, his expression darkening. ‘I understand. But tomorrow, we will all be told things as they are, yes? Some of my men think it is only them who are not being told — ’ his words faded and his eyes bulged, fixed over Apion’s shoulder. ‘Strategos!’ he gasped.

Apion swung round. To the west, the darkness swirled. Something was moving, flitting between patches of moonlight. A rider, then another, then a vast pack, thundering towards the Oghuz.

Seljuk ghazis.

‘To arms!’ Tamis cried.

‘No — get inside the camp!’ Apion cried, seeing that there were many of the Seljuk riders. Three thousand, perhaps.

The Oghuz, dismounted, swung round, sure this was some joke, then saw the mass coming for them. They wailed, throwing down their goods, staggering from the trade wagons, some rushing to their horses, others plucking the bows from their backs. Their response was chaotic and all too late. The Oghuz arrows spat forth wildly and without aim. Some riders fell from their mounts in their haste to ride for the nearby safety of the Byzantine camp. In contrast, the Seljuk ghazis unleashed a storm of thousands of arrows on the panicked Oghuz.

Apion threw himself under one of the trade wagons as the hail hammered down. Screams were cut short and bodies thudded to the earth, many twitching or crying out. The wagon shuddered as a shower of the arrows smacked into it — the two unarmoured traders pirouetting and crumpling, riddled with shafts, eyes rolling in their sockets.

The ghazis howled in delight as they swept past, loosing another volley on the remaining eighty or so Oghuz who stood their ground. Over half of these riders were also punched to the dust, having felled only a few of the ghazis in return.

Apion saw the ghazis sweep round, readying to circle and come back again. He pounced on the moment, scrambling from under the wagon, rushing for the camp’s southern gate, where the majority of the Oghuz who had leapt on their mounts were cramming to get inside. But something was wrong. Shouts of despair rang up from the men nearest the gate, and cries of pain followed. Apion heard the lashing of iron swords and the shouting of Greek voices. ‘Ghazis at the gate! Cut them down!’

No! Apion barged through the mass of milling Oghuz mounts. He pushed through to the front, where he saw the snarling Byzantine skutatoi sentries — a thick triple line of ninety of these spearmen blockading the gateway, punching forward with their lances, more rushing to the call of alarm. In their fear at the sudden rush of cavalry and blinded by the darkness, they had mistaken the retreating Oghuz for attacking Seljuk riders. The Oghuz, blinded by panic at the real mass of Seljuk riders sweeping to and fro behind them on the plain, babbled frantically but went unheard. Man and mount were skewered on Byzantine spears and fell, thrashing. He saw Tamis trying to pull his men back, realising the confusion of the sentries, when a javelin hurled form inside the camp took the rugged Oghuz leader clean through the throat, bringing sheets of blood from the wound. His eyes, hope fading, met Apion’s as he toppled from his horse. This only panicked his comrades even more. Some even took to trying to have their mounts leap over the tall palisade wall of the camp. All bar a few of these mounts ended up skewered on the sharpened stakes, thrashing, broken.

‘They’re our men!’ Apion roared over the tumult. The skutatos facing him thrust his spear out again, teeth bared and eyes ablaze, thinking he was fighting for his life. Apion grappled the shaft of the spear and wrenched the man from the spear line. ‘They’re our riders!’ he yelled again. The mist of battle faded from the soldier’s face, only to be replaced by a look of horror as he saw the Oghuz for what they were.

‘Stop!’ the soldier cried, his voice joining Apion’s. Buccinas blared all across the camp and the empty tracts between the sea of tents inside became abuzz with men stumbling from sleep, rushing to arms.

By now, the Oghuz were falling away from the gate, racing off into the plain to take their chances there. Panting and bloodied, the sentry line realised what had happened. They lowered their spears, gawping at the dead allies on the reddened earth before them.

‘Keep your spears high!’ Apion cried, exasperated. ‘The ghazis are out there, in the darkness,’ he fell in behind them, pointing out onto the plain. The drifting clouds had covered the moon, and they could see nothing. The Varangoi and a raft of skutatoi now clustered around the camp’s southern gate, readying to defend the palisade walls. But for a moment there was nothing. Nothing bar the death rattle of one of the stricken Oghuz on the ground before them.

Then a chorus of howling, wraith-like voices split the darkness along with a thunder of hooves. A sliver of moonlight betrayed eyes, flashing armour and gritted teeth. The ghazi pack swept past the southern gate like an ethereal gust, loosing a cloud of arrows before sweeping away into the blackness again.

‘Shields!’ Apion roared. This time they listened. Hundreds of Byzantine shields shot up like a brightly tiled roof. The hail battered down, catching out only a handful. Moments later, the men lowered their shields, looking this way and that. Blackness. Then, from the western gate, cries rang out. Apion swung to peer through the sea of tents. Outside the western gate, the ghazis were wheeling away, a rain of arrows hammering down on the tents and soldiers just inside the gate — many not as swift to raise their shields. Again, silence. A short while later, the rain of arrows and chorus of screams came from the eastern gate.

‘We must go out to engage them!’ the skutatoi komes nearest him snarled, grappling his spear.

‘Go out there in the blackness on foot, armed with a spear. . against them?’ Apion hissed. ‘Save yourself time and throw yourself upon your own sword! You stay here, you guard the camp. You are the anvil, remember?’

The man blinked and nodded, his senses coming to him. ‘Yes, Haga.’

‘Strategos!’ A gruff voice called out from somewhere inside the camp. Apion looked round to see Igor beckoning him. Romanus was fitting the last of his armour, tying on his greaves.

‘How many?’ the emperor said flatly.

‘At least three thousand,’ Apion replied. ‘Ghazis, all of them.’

The howling cries of the passing riders sounded again, another volley of arrows — this time wrapped in blazing strips of cloth — reaching deep into the camp, setting tents ablaze and felling men as they ran to and fro, taking one varangos in the eye moments after he had leapt onto his horse. The area where the mass of the magnate armies were camped was in utter confusion, the men of these private armies new to such an attack and bewildered as to how to respond. Their leader, Scleros, fuelled by hubris and panic, roared his men into mindless action with his animal cries. They rushed in mobs to the spots where the hail smacked down, as if they could fight off their harassers by chasing their arrows. Igor lunged forward to stand before Romanus, arms spread, as an arrow plunged into the dirt where the emperor had been about to tread. Moments later, a larger object hurtled down, smacking into the dirt and bouncing to come to a rest before Romanus’ feet. The blood and dirt encrusted features of one of Bryennios’ riders — felled earlier that day in the valley — gawped up lifelessly, face still fixed in the terror of the wretch’s last few moments.

Romanus growled like an angered mastiff, swinging a clenched fist into the air before him. Then, as if to rub salt in his wounds, a thunder of hooves sounded from inside the camp. A pack of the Oghuz riders — nine hundred of them — burst from the area they were camped, lashing out at any Byzantines in their way, then broke through the spearline defending the western gate and hared off out into the plain, arcing round to the south before vanishing into the darkness.

A skutatos rushed over to the emperor. ‘They heard news of Tamis’ slaying, Basileus,’ he gasped. They were not for standing with an army who slay their kin. It seems that they have headed south to join the Seljuk forces. Some of them chose to stay, however,’ he pointed to the Oghuz camping area, where nearly a thousand still remained, helping to marshal the defence of the camp and fight the blazing fires.

Romanus’ top lip quivered in ire. ‘Their defection is a blessing. Best that I know the colour of their hearts tonight rather than tomorrow.’ Another shower of arrows pattered down only feet from the emperor.

Apion glanced up to the high southern walls of Manzikert, illuminated by torchlight just a hundred feet from the camp’s northern gate. ‘It is cramped in there, Basileus, but safe. We can’t all take shelter inside, but I suggest you do.’

‘Stow your suggestions, Strategos. I did not march to the edge of the world just to hide,’ he snapped.

‘Basileus, these riders choose not to engage. They know that to attack a fortified camp is folly. They are here to wear us down,’ Apion insisted.

‘Wear us down?’ Romanus frowned.

‘For tomorrow,’ he and Apion concluded in unison. ‘I am certain that they will attack then.’

‘If you come to any harm from these rogues tonight, the men will be distraught tomorrow.’

Romanus nodded. ‘True, omens are rarely missed by the men of the ranks.’

‘But we have to disperse those riders!’ Igor insisted as another volley rained down on the area where the mules of the touldon were grazing on fodder. Hundreds of them fell with piercing brays.

‘Basileus, with your permission, I will lead a counter attack,’ Apion said.

‘Very well. But do not take unnecessary risks, Strategos. The men will need to see you standing with them tomorrow. . come what may,’ Romanus nodded. ‘Igor, bring the rest of the retinue to the fortress.’

Apion turned away, rushing to the Chaldian tents, ducking down under his shield as another storm of arrows smacked down inside the camp. Some of the tents had fallen and caught light from the camp fires. Men struggled to douse the fires, and he saw Blastares, Sha and Procopius amongst them. ‘Tourmarches!’ he bellowed to Sha. ‘Summon what archers we have!’

Sha looked up, hesitating for only an instant before spinning round to bark at one cluster of tents. ‘Toxotai, form up!’ He saw the few hundred Chaldian archers come together. Too few — the other few hundred who should have been there were gone with Tarchianotes’ lot.

‘Blastares, Procopius, go to the other strategoi and muster their archers too,’ he barked. With a nod, they were off, lurching through the chaos.

As bedlam reigned all around him, Apion stood still, his gaze fixed on the darkness west of the camp from where the last volley of arrows had come, his ears trained on the noise beyond the camp. He heard some muffled Seljuk cry, directing the riders. Then the thunder of hooves outside the southern gate, then the twanging of bows and hissing of the next volley. Then the noise moved on to the eastern gate.

He closed his eyes to the gloom of night, and imagined their movements as if seeing the plain from above. An idea came to him.

***

Taylan kicked his mount’s right flank and brought his ghazi wing wheeling round from the western gate. His eyes scoured the orange glow inside the Byzantine camp. They were in disarray. Men stumbled through burning tents, tripped on ropes and fell from their horses as they tried to cope with the deadly hail. They had been sweeping the camp like this for over an hour now — attacking the east gate, the south gate then the west gate in turn — and they each still had one of their four quivers to empty. He kicked his mount into a gentle jump over the pile of some two hundred dead Byzantine spearman lying on the plain. These fools had lost their discipline, bursting from the southern gate to try to snare his riders. They had been peppered with arrows in moments, and the southern gate had lain temptingly unguarded for but a trice.

Tempting for a fool, perhaps, he grinned. His men had suffered only a few casualties from the arrows of the Oghuz they had surprised south of the camp. And it would stay that way, he mused, for these riders of his would be needed tomorrow. .

A thrum of another volley of arrows sounded, then the rhythmic thuds of them meeting their targets inside the western gate. Taylan punched the air, bringing his riders wheeling round. ‘On, to the southern gate once more,’ he cried over his shoulder.

The men rode adjacent to the camp walls, heads and bodies turned to the palisade walls, almost entranced with their work, plucking arrows from their quivers, nocking, stretching, readying to loose. Taylan raised his sword, readying to chop it down as he gave the order; ‘Loo — ’

Like a storm wind, something hammered into his back, from the blackness to the east. He flew from his saddle and rolled through the dust, winded. He clutched the arrow that was lodged in the scales of his vest, pulling it free to see it had not pierced flesh. He looked up, confused. All around him, the deadly rattle of arrows striking his men down rang out. Hundreds of his riders rolled through the dirt, shafts quivering in their flanks and backs, horses crumpled, thrashing and bloodied. He scoured the blackness of the plain behind them. Moments later, another volley came. He ducked down. Hundreds more fell. He was pinned to the ground as another two volleys came, felling many more of his riders.

There was a brief hiatus. Then, from the blackness, he heard a chant. ‘Ha-ga! Ha-ga! Ha-ga!’

The name curdled in his mind. He snarled, snatching his scimitar and leaping onto his horse once more, readying to charge into the darkness and slay the man who had foiled his sortie.

‘Bey Taylan!’ a fellow rider grappled his arm. ‘Do not! Remember what happened to Bey Soundaq when he lost his discipline?’

‘I must face him!’ Taylan snarled at the man. But he saw that many of his riders had taken to fleeing south, back across the plain towards Mount Tzipan. He threw up his shield arm to catch the worst of the next volley of arrows. As he wheeled his mount away and to the south with them, his mind spun.

In the blackness, he was sure he heard an eagle crying. He glanced up once, twice and again, his teeth gritted. He saw nothing in the night sky. He remembered the crone from the mustering field at Khoi, felt her words pull at him, forcing him to challenge his every action.

Slay the Haga and break your mother’s heart, or stow your blade and let go of this false vengeance.

‘You gave me a choice of poisons, old woman,’ he roared into the night.

***

Taylan’s roar still rang in the air as Apion stood tall from the spot in the gorse bushes where he and his seven hundred archers had hidden. He looked to the black sky and thanked the waxing moon for staying veiled in cloud and allowing his archers to sneak out here, awaiting the next Seljuk sweep past the southern gate. The ghazi leader had been too predictable with his movements. West, south, east, south then west again — like a dead man swinging on a noose — allowing them to sneak out here while the ghazi arrows rained down at the western gate.

What he had not expected was that it would be his own son leading those riders. He looked again at the composite bow with which he had loosed the first arrow. In the flitting shafts of moonlight, he had only realised it was Taylan after the shaft had left his bow. He had watched, silenced, as the boy had fallen from his mount then righted himself. A swirl of emotions had overcome him as the toxotai had then emptied their quivers and driven the ghazis off. So his estranged son lived on. Might Fate see to it that they could parley in this far-flung plain in the coming days? He allowed himself to imagine talking with the boy, assuaging his anger. He even allowed himself to imagine Taylan speaking of his mother, telling Apion where in the vastness of the Seljuk realm she now dwelt.

Then, as if to rubbish his sliver of hope, he heard Taylan’s words from that fraught encounter in northern Persia;

In every dream, in every waking moment, with every step you take on the battlefield, you should beware. I will be coming for you, Haga. I will not stop. And my mother’s whereabouts? Never!

One of the archers with him coughed nervously. Apion blinked, then dismissed the men back to the camp. ‘Do what you can to stamp out the rest of the fires and repair any damage, then be sure to get what sleep you can.’

The men flooded past him towards the camp, while he turned to face south, the darkness and the flatland. Dawn was barely an hour away. The new day was sure to bring the two great armies face to face.

His eyes fell to the moonlit dust before him and his thoughts spun. A lone eagle’s cry pulled his gaze up to the northern hills, behind the camp. A single shaft of moonlight shone on a lone tamarisk tree there. The eagle cry sounded again, from somewhere up there. Apion strode for his Thessalian.