Beyond the keep tower, a great town gate usually opened towards the North Bridge was closed. It was a hot August morning with cerulean skies. Beyond the city gates, the kulaks should be overseeing a wheat harvest on such a morning, not preparing for battle. Instead they had gathered what grain they could save and transported it on carts and mules into the fort. Amongst the pastures surrounding Pereiaslavl, the rest of the harvest wheat shone like pale amber. Not a single peasant was working the fields. Many of them had begged shelter within the fortress palisades. Others had closed up their homes and businesses in the small outer town that had crept up against the city’s western edge.
Stealthily, others, mostly traders, had taken boats down river towards the safety of Byzantine territories. They have little faith, Thea thought to herself. They will be returning soon enough. Another inner voice whispered in her ear. As long as the dragon fire does not turn on us and destroy us all.
To the east, the Oak Bear Tower protruded beyond the stockades. One corner reached down into the river. A postern gate led from the south face of the other tower to a wharf area that stretched between the Dnieper and the city stockades. Beside the postern gate, small boats were able to navigate through water gates set deep into the palisades and pass into the city itself. All the gates had been closed to traffic.
Before dawn, Thea had fallen to her knees in the small church dedicated to St Sylvester, whom she was told took care of the human race. She had begged the saint to protect them. She prayed that their use of the dragon fire would be a success and that it would save the city from a siege.
In the fortress cellars, Dimitri had worked hard for two days and two nights as the enemy slowly moved closer over the north-eastern Steppes down through the grassland, poppy-scattered plain towards the city. While the citizens of Pereiaslavl had prepared for a siege, collecting water in buckets, baking bread, putting food into padlocked stores within the fortress and building sand barricades around their courtyards, Dimitri, his potters, blacksmiths and his alchemists had worked ceaselessly, crafting suitable pots, creating metal siphons and manufacturing liquid fire.
Only trusted flame throwers and experienced marksmen would operate the siphons when the time came to use them. Led by Padar, the city’s most agile and fast cavalrymen would ignite and throw the pots. When Dimitri’s fire was ready, the city’s leaders met under the fortress.
Thea, Edmund, Earl Connor and General Luke visited the cellars under the fortress to see Dimitri’s progress.
Dimitri lifted a clay pot from a makeshift shelf. He looked at them, his hand cradling the small vessel. ‘Once filled with the mixture and ignited you will be able to throw these and force the enemy down towards our ships. Then, as soon as the Cumans reach the wharf area where we shall be waiting for them, your men, General, must retreat back to the North Bridge. We shall then let loose chaos through those siphons over there.’ He pointed to the metal tubes. ‘That fire is for them, not you, not unless you fancy being roasted alive.’
The general thoughtfully stroked his moustaches. ‘I shall retreat,’ he said. ‘Though it pains me to do so.’
‘Good. It will pain you more if you do not. This mixture will be lethal.’
Padar nodded. ‘General, we can succeed and we can be controlled.’
General Luke said, ‘Then, God willing, these unbelievers will be washed in front of us as wheat bending in the wind.’
Dimitri walked them through the cellars where his equipment was neatly stored. He touched the tubes that would connect the contraption containing the liquid to the figureheads belonging to the ships. General Luke touched these and praised the two blacksmiths who had worked relentlessly through the night to make them. Thea felt hope grow and grow. Dimitri sounded so confident. She was sure the plan could work. The enemy would not be permitted the opportunity to break their defences.
Looking at Edmund, who was examining the barrels of the liquid that when ignited would become deadly fire, Dimitri said, ‘And since you, Lord Edmund, will command the fire ships, I shall be on hand to see that the liquid is fed into the siphons from our fire contraptions.’ He pointed to a line of stove-like contraptions that had taps and attachments for the metal tube-like pipes. ‘You will deliver the fire onto the river bank from the ships’ figureheads and into the heart of the enemy.’ He folded his arms.
General Luke thanked the alchemists who had helped Dimitri make up the liquid. He turned to Earl Connor. ‘Your archers and swordsmen will wait for tribesmen who survive the onslaught of dragon fire. You will cut them down in the valley.’
Earl Connor said, ‘We can get our troops up into the hills before the Cumans draw closer.’
General Luke nodded. ‘All must be done with stealth and under cover of darkness, loading the ships and riding out of the city into the valley. Now we shall dine and then set to work.’
Edmund bowed to the general. ‘Come, Sister,’ he said to Thea, offering her his hand to aid her mount the cellar steps. She gathered her skirts into her free hand, turned back to Dimitri and said, ‘Thank you, you may be our saviour.’
Turning to Edmund she said, ‘God give us all strength, brother mine.’ With those words she dropped his hand and headed away from the cellar steps, along a corridor towards a staircase that led up to the terem.
The following day, Thea thought she saw the Cumans move closer. She was sure that their pennants were unfurling and she could see the glimmer of their helmets as they rode across the plains. There was a rattle reverberating from the stairway. She spun around to see who it was. It was only Edmund. His sword was hitting the wall.
He sniffed the wind. ‘A breeze from the north-west. Let us hope that it does not change direction. If it does, our plan falls short. We cannot risk burning our own ships.’
‘Perhaps Prince Vsevolod will come to relieve us,’ Thea said, less confident now she had seen the large army out on the Steppe drawing closer.
‘We cannot depend on it. We must save ourselves. All is ready. You look exhausted. Go and rest. Stay with your ladies and the children. Find shelter in the garden. There is nothing to be gained by watching that army come forward.’
She placed her hand on Edmund’s sleeve. ‘We have sent for linen and herbs from the monastery infirmaries and set up our own hospital.’
‘It may not be necessary. If fortune favours the bold, it will favour us. The siphons and the barrels are already on board The Mary, Hope, Faith, The Great Bear, Wolfsan, Swordfish, River Rat and Scimitar, oh, and the Sea-Dragon as well.’ He rattled off the names of the ships that would carry dragon fire.
‘Our best ships. And you can name all of them. And the ship we sailed to Denmark all those years ago. The Sea-Dragon has come all the way here?’
‘Old, yes, but still a fine ship and now adapted for the Rus rivers. The ships need to ride high enough to fire safely. We had to use the steadiest and most competently manned of the fleet. And I offered my own ship.’ Edmund gazed around the tower and then at an army that was steadily riding over the sunlit plain in disciplined lines.
Thea said, ‘There are so many of them, so many banners.’
‘Look, there is a Cuman general.’ Edmund pointed at a group of riders that had detached themselves from the front line of horsemen. ‘He is riding towards the bridge. They carry a white pennant. By Christ’s holy blood, Thea, they want a parley. I had best hurry.’ Edmund turned and raced down the endless, steep, narrow, wooden stairways that turned at right angles as they descended. She could hear his sword knocking again against the stairwell walls as he ran.
Thea glanced across the plain and again towards the south-east at the long, straggling, ribbon-like flags fluttering behind ranks of well-ordered archers and cavalrymen. They wore chain mail and leather. They were carrying javelins. Pommels protruded from scabbards. She saw bows on warriors’ shoulders and then caught her breath for a moment. They bore round shields similar to the Saxon shields she had once known so well, though these seemed to be smaller. If so, and f
rom this distance she could not be sure, they would be lighter. Those shields would never hamper their agility. They were not intended for an interlocking shield wall but to simply protect riders.
She tore her gaze from the waiting enemy and followed Edmund. She called for a messenger. ‘Find Princess Anya. Bring her here at once. Tell her to wear a crown.’
She did not have to wait long because Princess Anya hurried to join her. The princess wore a small coronet over her veil. She handed Thea a jewelled band to wear over her own veil. Already there was an enormous stir by the fortress’s inner gate. The general bustled past them on his horse. He was wearing full chain mail. He pulled his stallion up and said gruffly, with anger blazing in his eyes, ‘You intend showing yourselves at the parley? Much good will that do; they will know you are here and try to take you hostage.’
‘They will already know that since doubtless they have spies,’ Thea said with firmness.
The patriarch approached bearing his huge staff, his elaborate jewelled cross bouncing on his rich robe. He would be sweating under those stiffened damask gowns, Thea thought, thankful for her light linen gown.
He stopped and said to the general, ‘Let the princesses come with us. It will remind the heathens that God and our princes own Pereiaslavl. She speaks true. They will know who is in the city.’
‘Hopefully not who has left,’ the general said, referring to the battalion out in the hills.
‘I say we are coming,’ Princess Anya said, crossing her arms and holding her crowned head high.
The general snapped to a groom, ‘Bring them mounts and be quick about it. There is no time to dither.’
Thea raised her very mobile eyebrow as the general moved off.
The Cuman envoys stood on the bridge. They were watching the Rus bows trained on them from the gatehouses and towers. Their khan wore partial armour, mail and a strong, decorated, leather breast vest, his yellow silk tunic and ballooning hose flowing out from under it. Other envoys wore no armour but instead were dressed in stiffly embroidered gowns and decorated coats. They wore leather caps with furred flaps. Sweat glistened on their foreheads. A young shaman stood by their side. His head was shaved except for a long flaxen plait that hung from the centre of his crown. Although he was richly clad, strings of shells, bones and beads rattled when he moved. Behind the group a standard-carrier held a huge red banner with an enormous goshawk embroidered on it. Its stitched eyes were as furious and as piercing as the shaman’s real eyes. For a moment, Thea – absurdly – wondered at the skill of the embroiderers, that they could make such an eye appear so life-like. The wind dropped and the goshawk eye vanished into the banner’s folds.
The Rus archers lowered their bows.
‘We stand for our lands,’ the khan, said in perfect Russian. So that was the lie that the Sviatoslavichi had spun to make these tribes attack Pereiaslavl.
Princess Anya raised her right hand and stepped her horse forward. She spoke in a Cuman language and in a reasoned tone, as the patriarch translated for the rest of them. Most likely, he had learned the Cuman speech to set an example to missionaries he sent out to convert the Eastern Steppe-lands. He whispered to Thea. ‘She tells them that they are deceived. Her husband, the great Vsevolod of Kiev, who is the rightful ruler of Chernigov and Pereiaslavl, has no plan to take their Steppe grazing lands for Russia. She says it is all a Sviatoslavichi plot.’
‘So it is,’ Thea replied, thinking how the tribes were deceived.
There was a gasp from the patriarch after the Steppe khan’s response. ‘He tells her she is deluded. In marrying a Russian princeling she has betrayed the Steppe people. Her father, a Christian khan, is no friend of his. They are not brothers. His tribe will destroy her father’s tribe after they have taken the fortress and the fertile lands on the west bank of the Dnieper. If she surrenders the fortress she and her court may depart for Kiev. He does not wage war on women. Her army will become his army or they will be slaughtered.’
‘This is our city and we do not intend leaving it to your plunder,’ Anya said clearly in Russian.
‘You will die before my warriors’ swords.’
She shook her head and said in Russian for all to hear. ‘We shall not surrender our city. We stand for all whom we protect. You would do well to broker peace with us because, otherwise, you will never use our great river for trade again.’ For a moment she looked more regal than Thea had ever seen her appear. The Cuman khan spat on the ground and said, ‘So be it.’ He said something else in his own language.
Any colour Anya had owned drained from her face. Her stance went rigid. Her horse pawed the ground. Her eyes blazed fury. She looked as if she were about to explode into flames as fierce as those the dragon fire they promised to deliver. The Cuman khan swept his party around and had trotted off the bridge by the time Anya appeared to recover her usual countenance. The parley was over. The battle for Pereiaslavl was about to begin.
When they had returned to Anya’s apartments in the terem, Thea asked Princess Anya what the khan had said that was so upsetting.
‘He said he would take us into slavery.’
Thea felt physically sick when she learned that the khan would take the English princess as a junior wife because her hair, he could see, was the colour of flame. Thea swallowed her bile and glanced down at her swelling belly. She whispered another prayer to St Sylvester for deliverance.
34
Before midday, Padar and Argon, his stallion, clattered over the Dnieper Bridge, riding close to General Luke. He prayed to all the gods whose names he could remember for protection, crossed his breast, saying in English, ‘By Christ, we shall succeed.’
Chosen riders with calm horses carried the deadly substance, the mix of resin and naphtha, in small pots. These were secreted in the chosen riders’ saddlebags along with flints. Since they planned to ignite them and cause chaos by throwing the small pots into the enemy they rode towards the front line. The idea was to drive the khan’s horsemen first towards the river bank, then down river to the southern bridge close to where the ships lay waiting ready to let loose their streams of liquid fire. Padar glanced down the river. For now, the ships waited, hidden from the north by the bend in the river, by the southern bridge and the wharfs.
The khan’s army had gathered on the Steppe to the east. They spread over flat, grassy territory north of the eastern valley cut. This was to General Luke’s advantage. As long as his army could be disciplined enough to obey his orders when he gave the sound to retreat, there was a chance of success. The Cumans would hope to capture the southern bridge. Padar knew that his warriors must ride back to the North Bridge which was behind them and defended, once their commanders gave a signal by using two blasts of the horn. This would allow Padar’s throwers to get their missiles into the ranks of the Cuman cavalry with minimal damage to their own ranks.
Padar glanced back. His fire-hurlers were riding close behind him, primed to act once he gave his command. His command was different to other commands. He had decided on a long wailing blow from his pipe, the sound so high-pitched it would be easily heard above the clamour of battle. He was convinced that it would work. In theory it should, but out in the midst of hurling spears, arrow fire and cutting swords this strategy had yet to be proved. It was their only hope of success. The enemy army was large. They also possessed siege weapons – mangonels and trebuchets ready to come forward to breach the city walls. It must not come to that. The time to destroy the enemy was now. Padar made another quick prayer to Woden and another to the Virgin, before he looked again and realised that he was looking into the enemy.
Within moments they were forming up in lines facing the khan’s troops, at a right angle to the bridge. General Luke had wheeled them into a semi-circle that reached behind the Cuman army. No doubt, the khan gleefully thought this was madness. How could they defend the city’s two bridges, if they permitted his Cuman warriors an advantageous position this close to the city between the two great bridges?
There was a moment of eerie silence followed by the snap of hundreds of bowstrings. At once, a sound that began as a soft whistle of air passing through feathers became the rushing of a great Steppe wind storm. Arrows whipped in arcs through the sky. When they struck wood, they made a clatter against enemy shields. This was so loud it was as if Thor was throwing hailstones. Their fire was quickly returned. Two great storms of arrows reached the height of their trajectory before falling and striking targets. This happened several times over. The sun beat down relentlessly from the heavens. The two armies moved forwards and engaged.
‘Stay close,’ Padar yelled to his men. ‘Keep me in sight until I gave the signal.’ He felt for his flint. No one could create a spark as easily as Padar. Years of experience travelling the isolated and lesser known route-ways of England on secret missions for Harold Godwinson had given him much practice. Not only was Padar a skald, a storyteller, a harpist, and a merchant, he never forgot that he had been a spy and always a warrior. Momentarily, he thought of Gudrun and his daughters who had joined Thea in the fortress terem. He breathed in, exhaled and charged.
He passed through his own lines, avoiding arrow fire, lunging javelins and wide, deadly sword swipes. He glanced back. His men were leaning low over their horses, intent on following him. The wind of their movement caressed his face. He smelled the battle. They were in the thick of it. Around him he heard the noise of pain. Javelins came plunging towards him but he was small and fast and avoided their thrusts. Others were not so fortunate. Too soon the battlefield had become a weaving advance of swords, lances, battle-axes and deadly maces with spiked heads. Many fell about him. His horse reared and whinnied. He held fast. As the assault raged around him Padar, having regained control over Argon, criss-crossed his way towards the centre.
The Betrothed Sister Page 34