Mamluk
Page 23
Badru lowered the glass and handed it to Yusuf. “Find something to hold on to,” he said.
He turned to Hanif. “Do not let him hit us on either side. I do not know what that ship has under its bow planking so let us keep the damage to a minimum.”
He did not know how the Hospitaller ship had been built, but he knew the Wyvern. She had a reinforced hull at the bow and could take an enormous amount of punishment there. This was something Badru knew from many encounters similar to this one, albeit he was always on the charging end.
“Now!” Hanif said to his runner. “Starboard oars, double time!” The young sailor took the stairs to the main deck in a single leap and ran to the opening leading below decks. He shouted down to another man at the bottom of the ladder and he, in turn, relayed the order to the master of the drums.
Two decks below, Badru heard the drum beat out a quick rhythm, and as the oars dipped into the water, the ship’s bow began to reverse its current direction in a slow, ponderous arc.
Hanif’s timing was perfect. The prow of the Wyvern swung into position to meet the Hospitaller ship head on with less than a hundred paces between ships.
“Both decks ahead slow,” Hanif ordered and his runner was off again. Badru realized Hanif needed the smallest forward momentum to keep the bow of the ship from drifting in the waves.
He enjoyed watching a master work. Any kind of master. Hanif was a credit to his trade, and that is why when he turned to Badru with wide eyes and shouted, “They are coming in too fast! Hold on Emir!” Badru did not question his helmsman. He wrapped the crook of his elbow around a thick guide line and grabbed hold of Yusuf’s wrist with his other. He stared ahead and braced for impact.
The Hospitaller ship was indeed coming in too fast. What was Villaret thinking? Did he hope to try and sink them both? That would never happen. Only a fool—
Hanif let out a string of curses. “Retract all oars! Retract all oars!” His runner was fast, but not fast enough.
The Hospitaller ship was under full sail, so her oars were stowed. But then Badru saw a bank appear out of her starboard side. They dipped into the water and slammed backward against the side of the ship as Vignoli spun the wheel in his hands like a man possessed.
The prow of the Hospitaller ship drifted to Badru’s left and straightened out. It continued to bear down on them at full speed and the next thing Badru heard was the sound of the Wyvern’s forward oars on her port side snapping off as the two ships came together side by side.
Badru was aware of everything happening at once. The deck under his feet heaved and he slammed forward into the railing, but somehow he kept his feet and maintained his hold on Yusuf. Hanif bounced around the wheel like flotsam in a whirlpool, until his grip failed him and he went sprawling across the deck.
“Loose!”
Badru heard the command come from the enemy ship as it scraped along the Wyvern’s side snapping off oars and splintering railings.
“Loose!”
Badru steadied himself enough to see how his men were handling the crossbows of the Genoese. They were crouched in their positions, holding onto ropes of their own for balance. Surprisingly, no bolts flew in their direction.
“Loose!”
The sound of the bolts whistling overhead is what turned him on to what the crossbowmen were shooting at. He looked up and watched a volley tear through the sails above his head.
The squealing of the hulls grinding against one another reached a crescendo and Badru found himself looking straight at Foulques de Villaret and the Genoan. They were so close, if he had had a bow he could have put an arrow in either one of the men’s eyes. Foulques stared back, his blue eyes brilliant and unreadable. Vignoli fought the wheel of his ship with both hands, but when he saw Badru staring at him, he made the effort to wrest one hand free to give the Mamluk a mock salute. Then their backs were to Badru, and after another deck-shaking crash and the sickening sound of more splintering oars, the Hospitaller ship broke free of the destruction and sailed noiselessly away. But not before sending one last volley of bolts into the sails of the Wyvern as a parting gift.
The entire event took seconds, but Badru’s heart was pounding like he had just woken from the darkest of nightmares. His chest heaved under his mail, threatening to snap its leather ties.
Hanif was on his hands and knees five feet away. All around the ship, men began to move at the sides of his vision.
A whisper sounded at his side.
“Badru.”
He realized he still held Yusuf’s wrist.
He turned to him and said, “They will pay dearly for—”
Yusuf’s soft brown eyes were wide and wet. “Badru, I…”
He took a hesitant step and that was when Badru saw the blood. The pale blue silk of his tunic had a dark shadow on one side near the sash at his waist. But that was not the source of the shadow.
Badru followed the diagonal cross-seam on the smooth fabric all the way up to its open collar, and there, on the left side of Yusuf’s neck, was a small pyramidal hole. From the hole flowed a steady stream of blood, hardly visible against his dark skin as it rolled over his delicate collarbone and disappeared within the folds of his favorite tunic.
“Yusuf!”
Badru stumbled forward and caught Yusuf in his arms. He pushed his hand against the wound in his neck as Yusuf’s eyelids began to flutter. He thought he was making a difference, but then blood began forcing its way around the sides of his hand, between his fingers.
“Yusuf!” His eyes were open but he did not respond. Badru pulled him to his chest with one arm, kept the pressure on the wound with the other, and called out again and again for the most skilled surgeon of his Mamluks.
He came. They all came. And did nothing.
Safir placed his hand on Badru’s shoulder and tried to remove his hand from Yusuf’s wound. Badru fended him off and dragged Yusuf three steps away, before his legs too began to give way. He fought with all his strength to stay standing, to keep Yusuf standing, but, in the end, he could bear the weight no longer. He crumpled, and fell crashing to his knees. Badru clutched Yusuf to his chest with both arms, sobbing silently, while something began to build in the depths of his soul. When it was ready, he released it to the world.
For the forty prisoners chained together in the darkness, ankle to ankle, in the cargo deck immediately below, Badru’s scream was the finale to a series of truly terrifying events. A child began crying, ignoring the pleas from her mother to remain quiet. A man, shirtless and bloody, clasped his hands together and recited every prayer he knew. Two sisters took turns using their fingers to comb out the matted hair of their catatonic mother, even though the younger of the two could not stop crying. While another young woman pressed a wadded up piece of her own tunic against a bleeding wound in the chest of an older man.
She hummed to herself as tears rolled down her cheeks. But she smiled when she felt a soft buzzing against her breast. For under her clothing, she had concealed a small papyrus tube, and in that tube, was her favorite queen.
EPILOGUE
On the forty-third day of the siege, the Mamluk army breached the second wall. The Hospitallers and Templars joined forces and fought together in a brave attempt to push them back. The mass of bodies became so packed in the narrow streets there was no room to swing a sword. Straight, vicious thrusts to the face or in the joints around armor, such as armpits and groins, killed most who died that day. Many resorted to daggers, some were strangled with mailed hands. Occasionally, someone would throw a jar filled with Greek fire into the midst, and a knight would burst into flames, screaming as he twisted and melted inside his metal helmet. The dry, hard-packed streets became muddy with blood and gore. As defenders were wounded in the front ranks, they were lifted up and passed to the rear. But as the morning wore on, men’s arms became heavy from battle, their breathing ragged, and the wounded lay where they fell. The Mamluks pushed forward like the tide, stepping over the fallen and advancing inch b
y inch until the dead and dying were completely engulfed underfoot.
The fanatical bravery and skill of the fighting men of the religious orders held the breach from the early hours of the morning until the afternoon, and perhaps would have pushed back any normal enemy. But the endless stream of Muslims was fueled by hatred and the dream of revenge. They had suffered at the hands of Christian invaders for two hundred years, and in this breach, they saw a chance to rid their lands of the Franks forever.
The Marshal of the Hospitallers was eventually overwhelmed and killed at the breach, along with almost every other member of the Order of the Knights of Saint John. Only the gravely wounded grand master and a handful of other knights and sergeants were able to escape the doomed city.
The grand master of the Knights Templar also fell in battle, but a group of Templars managed to hole up in their fortified compound. Behind their thick walls, they held out for another ten days. But in the end, the Saracen sappers finally undermined their fortress and Sultan Khalil sent two thousand men in to finish off the troublesome knights. During the ensuing battle, the Templar fortress collapsed, killing everyone inside, Christians and Muslims alike.
In the days that followed, the sultan allowed his army to raze the once proud city of Acre. It had been in the hands of the Christians for a hundred years; it needed to be purged. Soldiers went door to door, ferreting out any who hid. Men were dragged into the streets and killed, mothers and their children were torn from each other’s arms and sold into slavery, if they were fortunate. In the years that followed, so many Christians flooded the slave markets that a healthy Frankish woman could be bought for a single silver coin.
To those who mark the beginnings and ends of such things, the defeat of Acre was surely the end of the Crusades. But to a select few warriors of God seeking refuge on the island of Cyprus, it was only the beginning.
The story continues in Hospitaller (Hospitaller Saga Book 3)
Sign up for the New Releases Mailing List. You will only receive notifications when J. K. Swift publishes something new.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
J. K. Swift lives in a log house deep in the forests of central British Columbia, Canada. When he is not busy cutting wood to survive the winter, he spends his free time making mead, shooting his longbow, riding Icelandic horses, roasting coffee, and writing historical fiction and fantasy.
website:
jkswift.com
…a message from the author:
Thank you very much for reading my work. Reviews and personal recommendations from readers like you are the most important way for relatively unknown authors to attract more readers, so I truly am grateful to anyone who takes the time to rate my work. I do not yet write full time, but I would like to, and you leaving a review or telling a friend about my work is the best way you can help me write more books.
Thanks very much for your support!
All the best,
James
Sign up for the New Releases Mailing List. Your information will never be shared and you will only receive notifications when J. K. Swift publishes something new.
Novels:
The Forest Knights Series: Join Thomas and Pirmin as they return to the mountains of Switzerland and lead a rebellion against tyrannical overlords.
ALTDORF (Book 1):
jkswift.com/books/altdorf
MORGARTEN (Book 2):
jkswift.com/books/morgarten
Short Stories/Novellas:
Keepers of Kwellevonne Series: Why would anyone want to kill a healer?
HEALER (Book 1):
jkswift.com/books/healer
FARRIER (Book 2):
jkswift.com/books/farrier
WARDER (Book 3):
jkswift.com/books/warder