Island in the Storm

19. Island in the Storm

Every man in the beset Byzantine ranks cried out in lament, as word of the rearguard’s desertion spread. This only spurred the encircling Seljuk host to attack with renewed ferocity, spilling around them, swords, axes and spears swinging and cutting, innumerable arrows raining without mercy. At the heart of the Byzantine ranks, Apion held his shield overhead, arrows battering down upon it. He glanced northwards through the chaos, seeing Andronikos and the magnate armies melt away. Their last hope of reinforcement. Gone. You foul-hearted dogs!

He fought on numbly, knowing that the few hundred brave Oghuz would not be enough to turn the battle. The rugged steppe riders swept around the outside of the battle, showering the ghazis with arrows in an attempt to relieve the pressure on the trapped Byzantine ranks.

The battle raged on as the last slivers of light began to fade. Soon, any semblance of opposing lines had evaporated and the two forces were entangled, men fighting men in single combat, small pockets of comrades taking on groups of their foes.

Apion caught sight of his trusted three and his Chaldians, fighting like giants in the crush of bodies nearby. He saw they were struggling, saw the Seljuk cavalry had them pinned. ‘Ya!’ he cried, kicking his mount into a charge. He threw down his spear and plucked out his scimitar and mace, then surged towards his men, cutting through their attackers.

‘Come on then, you whoresons!’

***

Sha and his tourma of Chaldian spearmen had managed to form some semblance of a defensive huddle, but the press of the surrounding ghazi noose pushed the breath from their lungs, and they were being driven back pace after pace such was the pressure, their boots ploughing a furrow in the dust.

A pair of siphonarioi had managed to ignite their fire canisters, and the thunder of Greek fire rolled across the din of the storm, the orangey flame driving back a section of the Seljuk front. Riders screamed and toppled as thick black smoke roiled in the air. For just a moment, the pressure was eased, then the first siphonarios was peppered with Seljuk arrows and toppled. Moments later, the second was struck down and his canister was punctured by an arrow too. The canister erupted, spilling a blanket of flame over Byzantine and Seljuk alike. The screams were harrowing, yet only a few heartbeats later, the fire died and the Seljuk cavalry thrust forward and the crush resumed. They pressed like demons, their lances skewering swathes of the brave Armenians. Prince Vardan took to swiping his long sword at them, determined to drive them back. He cut down four or more of the riders before he disappeared under a flurry of hacking Seljuk swords and spouting blood. Moments later, the Armenians were all but broken.

‘Hold!’ Sha screamed over the din of the storm and the battle, jabbing his spear up into the chest of one hulking ghazi. He looked to his left and right, seeing that big Blastares and old Procopius were faring little better. Each of them and their tourmae were but islands of men now, surrounded by the ocean of ghazi riders. He filled his lungs and roared. ‘Chaldians — come together!’

Blastares was first to react, forging a path through the melee with gusto. The big man had lost his helm in the action. His scalp was torn from some spear wound and his face awash with a nightmarish mask of blood. But his eyes gleamed and his anvil jaw jutted defiantly as he swept his spathion at the riders before him. He parried an axe blow then brought his spathion round to cleave the attacking man’s axe hand clean off, before prizing the weapon from the severed hand and promptly leaping to lodge it deep in the rider’s face. The clutch of two hundred or so that remained of his tourma came with him, inspired by his utter lack of fear.

On the other side, he heard a bitter tirade cutting through the din and the gale. ‘I’ll use your guts to string up a trebuchet,’ Procopius snarled, hobbling with the aid of his spear, swinging his sword this way and that to cut a path towards Sha, ‘then I’ll use it to hurl your balls into the Eternal Fires of Chimera!’ he finished, sweeping his spathion across the throat of one ghazi then punching it into the crotch of another.

At last, the remnants of the three Chaldian tourmae came together as one.

‘The army is in pieces,’ Blastares gasped, slotting into place by Sha’s right, adding to the desperate spear wall.

‘What do we do?’ Procopius panted, coming to stand by the big man.

Sha looked to his close friends. These two had been pillars of the Chaldian army for years. Never had they looked so lost. Never had Sha felt so adrift. ‘We do all that we can,’ Sha said.

‘Aye,’ Blastares grunted, ‘All that we can. As it has always be-’

His words were cut off by the hissing of an arrow and the thunk of splitting flesh. Blastares clutched at his throat, blood leaping from where the shaft had punctured. The big man clasped a hand to Procopius’ shoulder, then slid down, under the hooves of the advancing ghazis.

Procopius gawped, grappling to retrieve his friend’s body. ‘No!’ he cried, seeing his comrade’s corpse churned into the reddening mire. The aged tourmarches set eyes upon the Seljuk who had loosed the arrow, nocking his bow and aiming for his next victim.

‘Forgive me, sir, but I must leave my place in the line,’ Procopius rasped in Sha’s ear.

‘Stand firm, Tourmarches!’ Sha demanded, swiping out to deflect a jabbing Seljuk spear.

‘I am already dead,’ Procopius cried, pulling up the hem of his klibanion to reveal the deep gash in his thigh. Black blood was washing down his leg. ‘One of those bastards got me. I have moments, at most. Let me spend them well. Let me take the cur who killed the big man.’

Sha parried a spear thrust and nodded, cursing the tears that stung behind his eyes. ‘Do what you must, old horse, and do it well,’ he croaked.

With that, the old soldier barged forward, leaping up at the ghazi archer, barging him from the saddle and into the mush of bone and blood. Sha saw old Procopius straddle the ghazi then choke the life from him. Moments later, the mortal struggle was obscured by the advancing Seljuk crush and a flurry of flashing Seljuk blades.

Sha fought to banish the anguish from his chest. He heard his own battle cries as if from another, and felt his every spear thrust numbly. When the spear was torn from his grasp, he fought on with his spathion, barging his shield up and hacking at everything that came his way. Moments later he realised he was one of just a handful of Chaldians remaining. A searing pain raked down his thigh. He swung to see a Seljuk spear lodged there, then cried hoarsely as it was torn out. He fell to one knee, his vision spotting over and his strength leaving him, the battle noises growing distant. In his fading vision, he saw Apion on his Thessalian, coming to save his men, kicking out at the ghazis surrounding him, swiping his old ivory-hilted scimitar at all who tried to cut him down.

‘Fight on, Haga. I pray you find your peace,’ Sha mouthed before he toppled into the gory mire.

***

Palladius’ vision jostled as he fled with the many other Byzantine soldiers. He had been swift to run after his false cry. Get clear of the battle, think of nothing else. But already his mind was turning to the imperial loot that sat, barely guarded in the camp outside Manzikert. If he ran fast enough, he might be one of the first back there. He could have his pick of the jewels and fine silks there. And that was even before he picked up his purse from Psellos. Elated, he stretched his stride and overtook fleeing comrades, throwing down his quiver and bow. He let loose a whoop of joy as he burst ahead of the foremost runaway. But a dark splodge in the corner of his eye spoiled the moment. Riders were overtaking him.

Bastards! He thought. They’ll get the best of the loot before me! A moment later, he realised they were not Byzantine riders, but a clutch of ghazis who had broken away from the battle in the foothills to pick off the Byzantine deserters. There were thirty or so in this pack. They raced ahead of him, then swung round and charged back, coming head-on at him and the fleeing soldiers. The lead rider leaned to the right of his saddle and held out his scimitar, his feral eyes fixed on Palladius.

‘No,’ Palladius panted, slowing, waving his hands. ‘I’m not your enemy.’

The rider lay flatter in the saddle, rode harder.

Palladius’ eyes widened. ‘No, there is gold,’ he pointed frantically to the north, in the direction of the camp. ‘There is go — ’

It was an odd sensation. A sharp, biting pain where the ghazi blade scythed into his throat, then a dull clunk where it sheared bone and ripped out through the back of his neck. There was no feeling after that, just a whoosh of air as the world seemed to spin violently around him and a thud as he landed on the dust. He blinked, wondering why he was at eye level with the feet of passing men. Then he noticed a headless body standing where he had been just moments ago, blood spouting from the neck.

The body crumpled and the life slipped from Palladius’ head. The din of the battle he had fled raged on.

***

Apion’s face dripped with gore, his sword hand and every inch of his blade glimmered red and his Thessalian’s skin was slick with sweat and blood. Arrows battered from his helm, shield and armour relentlessly and the gale threw up sprays of blood like some gory ocean. He brought his mace up and across the face of one ghazi, smashing the man’s jaw and crushing his face, then brought it round to crumple the chest of another. He slashed out with his scimitar at the next few who came at him, then found himself with a precious instant of respite. He panted, hearing his heartbeat drumming in his ears, seeing the faces of his trusted three. Lost. Cut down before he could reach them. He buried the blade-like sorrow and swung his mount round, parrying frantically as he tried to make sense of the battle.

All he had known, all he had been taught about warfare, strategy and tactics by Cydones and Mansur meant nothing now. There were no formations, no ordered lines, no options. Just a seething tide of ghazis pressing in on the archipelago of Byzantines. Bryennios and his cavalry had fought well, it seemed, clustered by the emperor’s left, but many had fallen. The Varangoi had dismounted and were now standing valiantly around Romanus, Igor swinging his breidox axe tirelessly at all who tried to breach their roughly formed square, his face and white armour spattered red.

A wing of ghazis surged for the varangoi square, forging a path towards the emperor. One chopped his scimitar across Igor’s breastplate, another swept his blade across the Rus’ shoulder, cleaving deep into a gap in his armour and leaving his axe arm hanging uselessly. But the warrior took up his weapon in his other hand and swung it out regardless. Yet the next blow tore out the Rus’ throat. The old, gruff axeman sputtered lifeblood and looked around as his last moments of life ebbed away. A heartbeat later, he was gone, but his staunch resistance had allowed the varangoi either side of him to close up the gap in the square, and the ghazis were rebuffed in their attempts to get to Romanus. Amongst them was Alp Arslan, the great warrior sultan’s sword held aloft and his mouth agape in a battle cry, his white shroud soaked with blood. The next ghazi surge pressed one side of the varangoi square back until it was on the verge of collapse.

‘Ya!’ Apion yelled, guiding his mount through the heaped bodies, the clusters of fighting men and the mire of blood to aid the tenacious Rus in their last stand. He veered away from swiping blades and ducked under jabbing spears. Then, suddenly, his world was thrown into chaos. He heard the agonised whinnying of his Thessalian and felt the gelding fall away under him. Earth and sky changed places as he tumbled through the slick of blood and bone. Dazed, he staggered as he tried to stand, clutching his head, realising his helm had been lost in the fall. His scimitar had fallen too. Worst of all, he saw his Thessalian breathe its last, crippled by the spear that had been hurled into its chest, piercing its heart. He looked on numbly, seeing the light in the beast’s eyes dim.

All around him, men fought with their blades and with their bare hands. The hundreds fighting for their lives around him seemed oblivious to his presence. They barged around and past him, splashing a filthy mix of blood and earth up at his face. He gazed through the forest of horse legs and saw his scimitar, a few paces away, in the mire. When he reached out to lift it, an arrow sliced through the air before him, punching into the mire and quivering.

He swung round to meet Taylan’s glower. His son was mounted, only paces away.

When another ghazi rider raced for Apion, sword hefted, Taylan swept up a hand and the rider pulled out of the strike then raced on into the fray.

Taylan slid from his saddle, thumping down into the blood-wet earth as the struggle raged on around them. He dropped his bow then prised Nasir’s helm from his head and threw it to the mire, letting his dark locks billow in the whipping wind. His brow was dipped like an angry bull’s, his eyes glimmering like jewels in the dusk.

‘You saved me?’ Apion said, flashing a glance to the ghazi who could have slain him. Likewise, many more skirted past, eyeing Apion as if to strike then thinking better of it upon seeing that Taylan was already facing him.

‘Perhaps only so that I could slay you myself,’ Taylan replied, one corner of his top lip flickering. He drew his scimitar.

‘Perhaps?’ Only now Apion could see the young man’s face was streaked with recent tears. ‘Unlike when we last met, you do not seem so sure this time?’

‘You killed my true father, your armies sacked my home in Hierapolis. You stole my soul. . ’ Taylan growled over the squall.

Apion saw the knuckles of Taylan’s sword hand flex on the hilt of his scimitar, then he eyed his own blade — still jutting from the ground. ‘I wished for none of that. I, like you, am just a leaf in this storm of war.’

‘But my mother,’ Taylan snarled.

All of Apion’s senses pricked up. His son looked him in the eye.

‘She did not want this,’ Taylan continued. ‘Not for Bey Nasir, not for me.’

‘She has a good heart, Taylan. One of the few who do.’

‘Don’t you speak of her!’ Taylan barked, lifting his scimitar to point it like an accusing finger. The wind blew his locks across his face and part-masked his gritted teeth.

Apion raised his hands in supplication. ‘Tell me she is well, Taylan,’ he cried over the din. ‘Tell me she is happy. Tell me this and I will not seek her out any more. Tell me this and we need not clash swords.’

Taylan looked along the length of his scimitar and frowned, his sword arm quivering. ‘Then what would be my purpose?’

‘You can be a good man. Do not let a quest for revenge stain your life like it did mine and Nasir’s.’

Fresh tears darted from Taylan’s eyes. Slowly, he unbuckled Nasir’s scale vest, the armour jacket crunching to the ground.

‘Taylan, what are you — ’

‘I am unshackling myself of the past,’ he said with a weak smile. ‘The shame, the anger, the hatred. . ’

His words shuddered to a halt and he staggered forward, his back arching and blood lurching from his mouth. A wiry-bearded older Seljuk swept past on his mount, reaching down to wrench his thrown axe from between Taylan’s shoulders. ‘Where is your hubris now, whelp?’ the older rider spat, a sneer wrinkling his blade-like features.

The man’s victory was short lived. Apion swept up his scimitar and brought it chopping round on the rider’s belly. The blade cut through the man’s mail shirt and sliced open his flesh. He toppled from the saddle, screaming, then scrambled up onto his knees, desperately trying to scoop his steaming, spilling entrails back into the wound — scraping up blood, earth and slivers of flesh from other bodies in the process. Devoid of feeling, Apion strode over to the man, who glared up at him, mouthing some kind of plea. With a swipe of the scimitar, the man’s head was off, gawping as it rolled through the mire.

He heard a distant cry; ‘Bey Gulten has fallen!’

Apion stumbled through the fray to the prone Taylan. He fell to his knees and cradled the young man, lifting him from the filth. The snarl was gone, replaced by a look of fear. He looked every bit a fifteen year old boy, breathing his last on a battlefield.

‘She is. . she needs you,’ he spluttered, the colour draining from his face and his pupils dilating. ‘Go to her. Be swift. . tell her I’m. . sorry.’

‘Where is she?’ he gasped.

But there was no reply. He felt the boy’s body relax, a last rattling breath escaping his lips. He stared into Taylan’s lifeless eyes, hearing the boy’s last words over the screaming, gnashing of mounts and rasping of iron nearby. Tears blurred his vision and his chest racked with a sob. His trusted three were gone. His faithful old warhorse had charged its last. The emperor’s army was on the brink of destruction. And now his son lay dead in his arms. Surely now he too was to die on this field. The truth he had sought about Maria would die with him.

‘What is left?’ he mouthed, feeling bloodspray settle upon him.

It was then that he heard a desperate cry from amidst the pocket of Byzantine resistance. ‘Do not lose heart!’

He looked up. The voice was unmistakable. Emperor Romanus. Apion lay Taylan down and stood tall. A short distance away, the writhing mass that had been the Varangoi and the remainder of Bryennios’ cavalry wing were now clustered together in a desperate last stand. A few thousand other men still held out in pockets here and there, despite the relentless press of Seljuk cavalry. A pair of ghazi riders circled around him at that moment. He levelled his scimitar and swept up a discarded shield, seeing they each had their bows trained on him. But the lead rider looked down at Bey Taylan’s body and then at Apion, then flicked his head towards the nearest cluster of Byzantine resistance. ‘I saw what happened. Go, join your comrades. Fight your last. You deserve to die in battle at least. We will tend to Bey Taylan’s body.’

Apion backed away, panting, giving the man a brisk and earnest nod. He turned and hurried for the cluster of varangoi — now in a swiftly shrinking circle. These Rus — barely a hundred of them — swung their axes valiantly. Seljuk bodies fell back in swathes, cleaved open or deprived of limbs or heads, only for many more to replace them. He saw a gap that had been forged in the circle, and, just before the varangoi had a chance to close it, he rushed for it, tumbling into the tiny patch of ground within. At one edge of the circle, Romanus tugged on the reins of his rearing stallion, swiping out at the attackers, aided by Bryennios and a clutch of his cavalrymen. The emperor’s armour was battered and gore-coated, his helm lost and his hair matted with blood. Then, with a flash of steel, the Golden Heart’s mount was struck down, peppered with Seljuk arrows. The emperor sunk out of view.

‘No!’ Apion cried.

Romanus thrashed in the blood-soaked earth, desperate to free his trapped leg from under his dying mount. Apion and a pair of varangoi wrenched him out by the shoulders and to his feet.

‘Get me armour,’ Romanus growled over the whistling gale, unbuckling his ornate white and silver breastplate. ‘Proper armour.’

A varangos came to him with an old iron klibanion — the lamellar armour jacket of the ranks — and a simple conical helm, before rushing back to the tight defensive circle.

‘Basileus?’ Apion frowned.

‘What use is splendid cavalry armour when you are to fight on foot?’ Romanus offered him a flash of a grin that did well to mask his fear. This man was the figurehead of all the Seljuk army were here to conquer. His head would surely be a prize sought by every blade coming for them.

Apion did not protest, clasping a hand to the emperor’s shoulder as he buckled the klibanion and helmet on. The vicious squall circled around them with a howl as if it had come to battle too, and the relentless arrow hail thickened further, striking men down in swathes. ‘I will be by your side to the last, Basileus.’

Like an island in the storm. .

When a pair of varangoi cried out, lanced by Seljuk spears, and fell from the circle, Apion and Romanus leapt into the breach as one. The wailing storm buffeted them, arrows danced from their armour and the Seljuk blades were relentless, and they fought with all they had. Apion parried, swiped and cut out, feeling his sword arm tremble with fatigue, knowing he had little left to give, sensing that this last stand was about to fall. The hundred varangoi became thirty, and all too quickly just a handful. Soon, he felt Romanus press up back-to back with him and realised they were but two. He felt the vibrations of a defiant war cry vibrate in his bones. Then a Seljuk axe cut down across his cheek and sliced the skin open there. A heartbeat later a spear punched into his klibanion, puncturing his flank. He faltered, falling to one knee, blood lurching from the wound. He felt Romanus, at his back, sink to the ground too. The emperor clutched his forearm, an arrow having pierced his wrist, knocking the spathion from his grip. Weaponless, Romanus tried to barge out with his shield. Apion swiped weakly at those who came at the emperor. His parry was swept aside with ease, and a Seljuk shield rim cracked against the bicep of his sword arm, shattering the bone. He roared in agony, barely seeing the scimitar that scythed for him, the flat of the blade crashing against his temple.

He fell back into blackness, hearing pained cries all around him as the Byzantine resistance collapsed. Cries for mercy rang out from the pockets of men who fought on. A Seljuk war horn spoke next. It sang across the battlefield, echoing through the hills and into the near-dark sky. The Seljuk victory cries were relentless.