The Alchemist's Revenge
Page 14
His order and attempt to encourage us sounded ominous, so I had to ask.
“Can you see any sign of a Greek force coming this way to engage us, Commander?”
Chapter Eighteen
The long walk.
We sat and rested for a while under the hot sun and watched the nearby Greek camp. The dust cloud over the camp was beginning to settle and people, both men and women, were beginning to appear. They were gathering in small groups to talk, walking about to check on the condition of their possessions, and, of course, to loot the dead and barber the wounded.
In the distance we could see a small band of horsemen walking their horses through the camp. No one came near us. That would come soon enough when the Greek captains realized we were still here and how badly we were outnumbered. I was getting increasingly anxious and so were the men with me. We needed to move if we were to save ourselves—and we were under orders to wait.
The Greek encampment continued to slowly recover whilst we waited the arrival of the men who had gone over the wall further to the west. I was drowsy and almost ready to fall asleep. That lasted until I heard one of our wounded men cry out. An idea had been asleep behind my eyes and the poor sod’s groan woke it up.
“Captain,” I shouted at Sam as I jumped to my feet. “Take some men into the Greek camp and get some wagons we can pull by hand. We can load our wounded and dead in them. Hurry Sam, there is not a minute to lose before the Greeks come back.”
******
A constant stream of dusty and very tired and thirsty archers came hurrying in from the west carrying their dead and wounded. Several of them had commandeered Greek wagons to carry them just as we had done. While we waited, swords, pikes, infantry shields, and fresh quivers of arrows were hurriedly brought down from the wall and attempts were made to throw them over the moat to us. Most of the throws made it across although more than a few ended up splashing into the water, particularly the shields.
Water skins were also brought down and thrown across the moat to us. At the moment, so far as I was concerned, the water was more valuable than the weapons. The men passed the skins from hand to hand and we did not think we would ever get enough. The water in the moat was not drinkable—it was as thick as soup and foul beyond belief.
The captains and lieutenants of the galley companies which had been stranded west of us, seven companies in all, and I hurriedly distributed the available water and weapons to our best advantage and, at the same time, organized our men and wagons on the assumption that we would have to fight our way through to the gate.
My best guess, and it was certainly only a guess, was that I now commanded a force of about four hundred archers and auxiliaries. We were still thirsty beyond belief, but at least we were better armed and more organized. All of my men were good men and well-led; in every case the captains and lieutenants of the galley companies had gone first and were sharing the hardships with the men of their galley companies who had gotten across the moat before their walkway failed.
Finally an out-of-breath Henry Soldier arrived on the wall above us, slid off the horse he had ridden along the top of the city’s outer wall, and gasped out the words we were waiting to here.
“The last company is coming in to you now. Leave as soon as its men reach you, and move as fast as you can without leaving anyone behind. Give them water to drink as you move. There is a dust cloud to the south that suggests a sizable force of Greeks is coming this way on the Adrianople road.”
Commander Courtenay then shouted out some news that heartened everyone.
“We are assembling a large force of archers, many hundreds of them, to move along the wall in front of you and behind you. They will cover you with a great storm of arrows if there is an attack or blocking force.”
He added more good news after a pause whilst he consulted with his lieutenant commanders.
“Another large force of archers will be going down the wall ahead of you to discourage a Greek blocking force from being established on the moat path in front of you.”
****** George Courtenay.
The news was not good. Our plan for the archers to cross the moat and then return did not even last long enough for all of our men to get across. And now reports were coming in that a large force of Greeks was rapidly coming up on the Adrianople road. It was undoubtedly the main body of the Greeks the Venetians had carried to Adrianople—and they would almost certainly be pissed off and looking for blood because of the destruction we had caused.
Richard and Henry hurried off to gather in and organize the archers who had not gotten across. I remained where I was in order to command the archers who would move along the wall to provide cover for Dan’s increasingly-formidable force that was stranded on the other side of the moat.
All of the auxiliaries outside the wall now had pikes and shields, and some of the archers were now carrying them as well. The archers were not carrying sharpened stakes they could set, so the pikes would be needed if Dan’s men were charged by mounted knights and their squires and mounted men-at-arms.
At that point, the most important question was whether or not Dan’s men could be reached by the small groups of archers who were still stranded further to the east along the wall. Fortunately, at least so far as I knew, the archers stranded closer to the Farmers Gate were already moving as fast as possible towards that gate and carrying their dead and wounded with them.
It was the stranded men from the far western enclosures nearest the sea who had had the farthest to walk that concerned us the most. They would likely be exhausted by the heat and their earlier efforts in the Greek camp by the time they reached the relative safety of Dan and his men. He would march for the Farmers Gate as soon as they arrived, but he would be able to move no faster than his slowest man.
Then I had a thought.
“Dan, grab up a couple of extra wagons with you in case some of your men are overcome by heat and exhaustion.”
I was heartened by his response; he had already done so. Dan was a good commander and we all knew it; and he had just proved it again.
******
“That is the last of them,” Henry said as he once again slid off his horse and handed his reins to Nicholas.
Moments later we heard Dan shout a command and his entire force set off down the moat road. They were not yet being chased and were marching relatively fast under a hot sun. I was not sure how long they would be able to keep up their current pace despite the brief rest most of them had taken and the water skins that had been thrown across to them.
It was a reasonable concern—the last arrivals had already quick-marched four or five thirsty miles in the hot sun and dust whilst pulling a cart loaded with their dead and wounded. There was no time for them to rest. They would have to carry the water skins we threw to them and drink as they marched.
Dan and his captains were marching with a line of their pike men across the front of the column and bending back around its side. Many of the pikes were now being carried by veteran archers. They would know best how to kneel and set the butts of their pikes if the column was charged by mounted knights. The auxiliaries who previously carried the pikes were now helping to pull the carts.
I began rapidly walking along the top of the wall to keep pace with Dan and his men who were now marching on the moat road below me. So did a large and growing force of archers with grimly determined looks on their face. They apparently felt guilty about not having gotten across the moat to suffer with their mates.
An idea began coming together behind my eyes as I walked.
******
“George,” someone shouted from the men marching ahead of me on the wall. “Look off to the east.”
It was my father. He was walking with the archers who were about a two hundred paces ahead of me where the wall curved. I had been so intent on the archers marching below me, and the dust cloud rapidly approaching on the Adrianople Road, that I had not seen him arrive.
A few moments later I was able to
see around the bend in the wall. My heart skipped a beat when I saw what had caused the shouted warning—a large company of horsemen, as many as a hundred and perhaps more, were coming up the road between our archers and the Farmers Gate towards Sam and his men. The riders were definitely not ours.
It was quite surprising. We had not known the Greeks had so many horsemen. Then it suddenly dawned on me as what might have happened—the knights and other horsemen accompanying the main body of the Greek army carried to Adrianople by the Venetians must have been detached from the main Greek column and ridden through the dust cloud to cut off our retreating men.
My mouth had no sooner gaped open in surprise at seeing the horsemen when, quite suddenly a ripple seemed to pass through their ranks. They began to scatter in all directions a moment later. There was no surprise in that—the archers walking along the top of the wall ahead of us had obviously begun pushing arrows at the Greek riders in an effort to move them off the road so Sam’s men could continue marching towards the distant gate.
Our arrows turned out to be particularly effective against the horsemen. That was understandable—it was much too hot to be wearing armour and the horses and men were easy targets because they were bunched up and so close to the archers on the wall above them.
******
The Greek horsemen who had their horses under control abandoned their dead and wounded mates and galloped away from moat-front cart path in order to escape from the archers pushing arrows at them from atop the wall. Even at this distance we could hear the screams of the wounded horses. Some of their riders were motionless on the road and others were moving about.
It was a chaotic scene. Wounded and out of control horses, some with riders still on board, ran in every direction, including up the road towards us. Several of them had blindly dashed into the moat with their riders and were thrashing about. One of the riders who had come unhorsed was trying to climb out of the moat.
As we watched, some of the unhorsed riders who had been moving on the roadway about went down as additional arrows reached out to them from the archers on the nearby wall. So did the man who had been trying to climb out of the moat.
Dan and his men did not know about the Greek force coming in behind them in the rapidly approaching dust cloud. So they would undoubtedly stop to gather up the available arrows and finish off the rest of the Greek casualties when they reached them—unless they were ordered otherwise.
“Dan,” I shouted. “You are at least five miles short of the gate and there are wounded Greek horsemen on the road ahead of you and a big force of Greeks coming in fast that may reach you before you get to the gate. You need to increase your rear guard and move even faster if you can.
“We need as many of the wounded Greek horsemen as possible for questioning. So pass the word to your men to throw them in your wagons as you pass them. But do not stop for even a moment to retrieve any of the Greek wounded or pick up arrows. Just grab up whatever you can as you go past.”
As I gave my orders, I was watching both the surviving Greek riders work their way through the camp towards the approaching column, and also the column itself. More of the riders seemed to have survived than I would have expected since they were almost certainly not wearing armour because of the heat. Or perhaps there were more of them than I initially thought.
At that moment the surviving Greek riders were riding through a devastated camp that was beginning to come back to life. They were clearly headed for the rapidly approaching dust cloud. More horsemen and a large force of rapidly moving men on foot could now be seen coming through the dust. It looked like the main column of the Greeks who travelled by sea to Adrianople was arriving.
It did not take someone who could read and scribe to see that the men leading the Greeks’ main column were going to cut off Dan and his men before they reached the safety of the open gate. The men marching at the front of the column had probably begun moving fast as soon as word reached them with the news that the camp of the early arrivals was under attack.
Chapter Nineteen
Preparations are made.
We watched with bated breaths, and prepared our bows, as the pursuing Greeks got closer and closer to Dan’s slow-moving and outnumbered band of exhausted archers. He and some of his able-bodied men might still be able to escape by running if they abandoned the wagons carrying the dead and wounded archers. But that was unthinkable. Wounded men were never abandoned. It was in the Company’s contract and the contract’s requirements were always followed.
George began giving orders and men began running and galloping off in all directions. He sent Nicholas galloping back along the top of the wall to see if there were any more archers or stragglers coming to join Dan and his men.
****** Major Captain Daniel Tenn
We picked up three wounded Greek riders as we hurried through the site of the recent fighting on the moat road. They were unceremoniously thrown into one of the wagons we were pulling that was already carrying some of our wounded and the bodies of four dead archers.
The latest word shouted down to me from Commander Courtenay was grim—a large force of Greeks was going to catch up with us before we reached the gate. There was no doubt about it. I looked back and saw for myself that he was right; we would not make the gate.
“Hoy, Dan,” the Commander shouted. “The road gets a bit closer to the wall up ahead. It would be a good place to stop and form up your defences. We can give you and your lads more cover from there.”
We were walking fast as we shouted across the moat to each other—me with my men on the road that ran along next to it and the Commander with the archers who did not get across the moat on the top of the wall on the other side. A moment later the Commander shouted more information across to me.
“We are collecting ladders from the company enclosures. Some of them may be long enough to go all the way across the moat.”
It sounded encouraging, but I knew something that most of my men, and perhaps the Commander, did not—we had already tried to use the ladders in the enclosures to cross the outer moat and failed; the outer moat was much wider than the inner moat—the ladders the companies used to get in and out of their enclosures would almost certainly not be long enough. But it was worth a try.
“Hoy, Commander. The ladders may not be long enough. If they are not, we will defend ourselves until something can be negotiated. In the meantime, please throw more water skins and shields over to us. Additional pikes and arrows would be useful as well.”
There was a brief pause before the Commander responded.
“Hoy, Dan. I understand your message. More water skins and weapons are being collected. They will be thrown over to you as soon as you and the lads stop up ahead. We will try to open negotiations.”
I hoped he understood what I meant about something being “negotiated.” More weapons and water may not be enough to save us. We may be forced to surrender.
******
George and his lieutenants talked as they walked, and he was soon issuing order after order as they hurried along the top of the wall. They had to walk fast to keep up with Dan who was marching along on the road below them with his men in a desperate effort to reach the one bridge over the moat that was still up.
As the Company’s leaders walked rapidly and periodically jogged in order to stay abreast of the fast moving marchers below them, archers began running past them carrying shields, pikes, and water skins. Others ran past them with the ladders that would be needed to bring the shields and skins down to the foot of the wall so they could be thrown across. The top of the wall became a beehive of activity.
It was a hot summer day with sun beating down mercilessly. Everyone was puffing and sweating. No one stopped when one of the archers ahead of them suddenly fell down on the path that ran along the top of the wall and went to sleep. They just stepped over him and kept going. A few seconds later one of his mates pulled him to one side so a galloper’s horse would be less likely to step on him.
“How about another “all hands” sortie from the states’ troops, Henry?” George asked. “Could they launch a sufficiently strong sortie soon enough to save them?”
“Probably not,” Henry replied. “Most of the captains and many of their men went into the city to celebrate getting back alive from today’s sortie. But I will go and see. If it is possible, I will lead it myself.”
Then George had another thought.
“Major Captain Oremus, I want you to take a horse and gallop to where our galleys are pulled ashore. Send a fast-moving wagon to us with all the lines and line-throwing sticks you can quickly gather. Then row out to the galleys holding our coin chests and bring back a wagon with at least twelve chests of coins from the toll collections—if all else fails we may be able to ransom Dan and his men. And get some lines and line-throwing sticks from them as well. And hurry.”
George’s father was listening and smiled when Michael repeated the order so that George would know he understood it and would immediately comply. George was a good commander. It pleased his father immensely.
****** Major Captain Daniel Tenn
More shields, water, and pikes were already being thrown across the moat when we reached our defensive position and halted. It was the best available place for us to stop, and not very good at all because there were no natural barriers to slow down an enemy charge.
In addition, the men were exhausted and thirsty. Half a dozen or so had already collapsed from the heat and gone to sleep, and many more, including me, were on the verge. Those who did had been quickly thrown into one of the wagons so our desperate, and now failing, attempt to run for safety could continue. No one had been left behind, at least not so far as I knew.