City of God

by City of God (retail) (epub)

  Arnau nodded. The weight of numbers certainly should compensate for the terrain, though something about it nagged at him. The Frankish knights were thundering down now, a cascade of steel droplets.

  The avalanche descended upon that wider Byzantine force climbing the slope, an avalanche smaller in number but so focused, so hard, so hungry. Even watching at this distance, where units of men moulded into vague shapes and colours, Arnau could see it in his mind’s eye, superimposed over his own memories of horsemen charging at the Ebro the day he had lost his lord.

  It was the moment he knew Stryphnos would lose.

  The Byzantines moved up in careful formation like an army of old, like the Roman cavalry from whom they were descended, all signals and manoeuvres and military precision. Conversely, the Franks rumbled down the slope like the berserk northmen from whom they had inherited their horsemanship. No amount of order or military precision was going to withstand that sheer focused brutality for long.

  They watched the failure of Byzantium, their spirits sinking. Where the tourma should have braced and pressed to meet the enemy, precisely the opposite occurred. In moments, with the Frankish knights still a quarter of a mile up the hill, the kataphraktoi broke and turned, fleeing back down the slope, every man racing at his own pace back towards the ships. The antiquated army of Byzantium had faced Turks and Rus and Bulgars, but nothing had prepared them for a Frankish charge.

  Ramon was shaking his head in dismay.

  ‘No, no, no, no,’ he breathed. ‘Don’t run. You can win this. If you run, you make them stronger than ever. You have to stop them.’

  But it was too late; even Arnau could see that. The cavalry plunged back down the slope and raced to the ships. The Crusaders stopped moving only part way down the hill, and that silvery mass remained in place on the slope as the Byzantine horse ploughed back into the ships, which put back out into the channel the moment their cargo was aboard, pulling in the ramps even as they moved in panic.

  The young Templar pinched the bridge of his nose. Byzantium had sent its first message to the Crusaders, and it had been an utter failure.

  ‘Perhaps the horses panicked?’ Arnau said without great conviction, for he knew precisely what had happened.

  ‘All of them? No. And those were the empire’s strongest cavalry. They would not flee from fewer than a hundred men, even up that slope. They were routed by their own command. Stryphnos failed them, not the other way around. They panicked at the sight of the Frankish charge. A good commander would have rallied them and held them tight. Stryphnos instead succumbed to his own men’s fear. The fool just squandered the empire’s best hope of averting a war.’

  They watched sullenly as the three merchant vessels crossed the water once more and docked at Galata, unloading their horse.

  * * *

  The next morning, Bochard was busily rushing around his room, gathering gear as the other two knights stood in a doorway, watching him for a moment before Ramon spoke.

  ‘Are we leaving?’

  The preceptor paused and frowned. ‘Of course not. Why?’

  Ramon shook his head in wonder and spread his hands as though explaining the obvious to an idiot. ‘Because there can no longer be any doubt as to what is going to happen. The Crusaders intend to subdue the empire. And we are trapped here. If we stay, we will be dragged into this, no matter that our order has no place here and no part in this war. We need to get out of Constantinople while flight is still a possibility. I had assumed that was why you were gathering your things.’

  Bochard snorted. ‘I am engaged in pursuing a matter of great importance to the Order and I shall not leave Constantinople until my task is complete. Neither shall you. I will be out of the city for a few days at a local monastery with a functionary from the palace. In my absence, I cannot prevent you from observing events here, but remember your vows and my orders. You are forbidden under any circumstances to attack another Christian. Do you understand?’

  Arnau nodded sullenly, and Ramon joined him. ‘We do, Master.’

  They watched Bochard’s squire saddle his horse out in the courtyard and Arnau peered suspiciously as Hugues brought out one of the bags that he was now convinced contained enough coin to buy a sizeable city and fastened it to the saddle. It looked a little smaller than he remembered. Bochard had been spending in his times alone, apparently. Moments later the preceptor was joined by four Waring guardsmen and a man in a monk’s robe on a mule. The small party left the palace, and Arnau sighed.

  ‘We are bound by orders, then. Better perhaps that we stay in our apartments?’

  Ramon shook his head. ‘You would never make a lawyer, Vallbona. The preceptor ordered us not to attack Christians. He never forbade us from attacking non-Christians, nor even from defending ourselves. And he positively encouraged us in observing events.’

  * * *

  So it was that later that morning they found themselves standing on the hill by the column once more with Sebastian and their Waring companions, watching as a small flotilla of ships detached themselves from the Venetian fleet and began to ply their way downstream towards the city once more. The young squire had his well-worn icon in hand once again and was gripping it tight as he watched the threat to his world gradually coalescing. Realising that whatever was about to happen would be close to the sea walls and therefore better viewed from there, the five men hurried down the slope, descending the shining white staircases towards the Bosphorus, passing between elegant gardens and small orchards, odd churches and other unfamiliar structures.

  At the bottom of the slope, having now lost sight of the ships, the five of them approached one of the heavy towers in the walls, which connected oddly to one of the city’s omnipresent churches. There, a Waring hammered on the tower door until it was answered and swiftly secured them access.

  They emerged from the tower onto the walls in time to see that the Venetian ships were close now. They had, very wisely, stayed just outside artillery range, but were moving very steadily downstream, using their oars to slow the natural pace of the current, as though parading themselves before the city. Ten ships, Arnau counted, and each of them crammed with colourfully attired nobles and bearing hundreds of pennants that snapped in the channel’s strong breeze.

  The Byzantines had gathered on the wall tops. Every man with the right to be there had climbed from the base of towers or their gate posts and now stood at the parapet watching the ships approach. A single voice was bellowing out from the lead vessel, though they couldn’t quite make out his words. However, as the ships came ever closer in their stately parade past the walls, it became clear that the speaker was repeating the same phrases over and over for the benefit of those listening in the city.

  ‘Behold your rightful ruler,’ bellowed the impressive voice, in Frankish and then in Greek, repeating the phrase. ‘Behold Alexios Angelos, son of Isaac the Second, true heir to the imperial throne.’ Another repeat in the second language. ‘Rally to your rightful emperor, people of Byzantium, and throw down the pretender who leads you to destruction.’

  There were murmurs of anger all along the wall nearby.

  ‘And if you do not rally,’ called the voice, now attaining an edge of menace, ‘if you do not acknowledge your rightful emperor, you will be reduced to utter ruin.’

  Once he had finished his threat, the speaker took a deep breath and then began the refrain once more, making sure that any ear even close to the city walls could hear. The second vessel now slid past, bearing grander flags and banners, and with what could only be the young exiled prince in full view. He stood high in the prow, presumably attempting to look as regal as he could to win over the people of his city.

  Even Arnau could see how poorly the display had been planned, for young Alexios was attired as a Frankish nobleman, every bit the great Western king. He looked proud and important, and even regal. What he did not look was Byzantine. Arnau shook his head. How could they hope to win over the people of Byzantium by offering them a
foreign lord?

  Predictably, the display and threats drew from the wall tops not fealty, but derision. Men jeered and laughed. One soldier not far along the wall even turned and bared his backside at the ships as they slid past, earning a sharp reprimand from his commander, even as that same officer grinned his tacit approval.

  Someone on the next tower bellowed back that they’d never heard of the prince, their call punctuated by raucous laughter and the thud of a bolt thrower, its missile plopping into the water not more than twenty feet from the figure of the prince.

  Arnau shook his head. It was easy to laugh at this, but when the laughter faded and every man here thought hard, they would realise that this was the last moment of peace. This was the moment when they had been given the one opportunity to end this that the Franks were likely to offer. The next thing the Crusaders would bring after this announcement would be steel and blood and fire.

  War and death were coming to Constantinople, and Arnau felt a little sick that they were trapped here awaiting it, bound to the city by Bochard’s orders. His smile slipped away.

  * * *

  A week and a day passed without further incident. The threat loomed constantly at Scutari, glowering across the channel. The Byzantine leadership prepared in what ways they could. Arnau and Ramon took to touring the walls daily with whatever Waring guardsmen were assigned to them, watching the enemy, and also the preparations in the city. Bochard remained absent. After four days Ramon and Arnau had begun to be concerned, wondering if somehow the preceptor had fallen foul of roving enemies, but on the fifth day, riders arrived at the Blachernae escorting two chests that they took into Bochard’s room and locked up, announcing that the preceptor had extended his stay and would return in due course.

  The emperor had been disappointed in Stryphnos’s failure with the cavalry, but apparently not enough to remove him from overall command, much to the anger of the Laskaris brothers, as well as to the prisoner Doukas, who became the Templars’ source of political news while Bochard was absent. Theodoros and Constantine Laskaris spent much of their time drilling and arranging the disposition of troops, gathering in whatever new units arrived at the city from their border garrisons, and reinforcing the troops at the more vulnerable positions on the walls. Stryphnos seemed to do little more than take credit for the work of the brothers and preen, an impression that Doukas clearly shared.

  ‘Why does the emperor persist in trusting Stryphnos?’ Arnau had fumed at Doukas one day upon hearing of the latest debacles involving the empire’s senior general.

  ‘You do not understand the ways of the imperial court,’ Doukas had smiled enigmatically. ‘Stryphnos is a poor general, but he is no threat to the emperor. Since the days the empire was ruled from Rome, all emperors have known how dangerous it is to put too much power in the hands of another. Strong generals make ready usurpers.’

  Arnau frowned. ‘But isn’t Theodoros the emperor’s heir designate anyway?’

  Doukas laughed aloud. ‘Oh but how simple your Western courts must be. Theodoros is indeed heir designate, but the emperor has no intention of giving his heir the opportunity to move his accession forward at the head of an army. No, better for him to put his army in the hands of idiots than men who might dethrone him. Remember, I know that of which I speak, having been party to just such a usurpation in my time.’

  Arnau had let the subject drop, more than a little exasperated at the subtle wickedness that seemed endemic in Byzantine life.

  On the fourth of July, the Byzantines finally made a move. Pushed into action by the nerve-racking presence of the crusading army on the far shore, the emperor decided to field an army. Doukas reported the details to the Templars that afternoon, and the two knights watched the forces of Byzantium being concentrated near the land walls at the western edge of the city, far from the Bosphorus.

  On the morning of the fifth, the emperor, along with Stryphnos and the Laskaris brothers, led the forces of Byzantium forth from the city. A small contingent split off the main force and used what few transports were available to cross the Golden Horn, while the bulk of the army trekked several miles upstream to round the inlet by a large bridge, and then back down the far bank to rendezvous with the ferried men.

  Arnau, Ramon and Sebastian stood now on one of the towers near the great chain that sealed off the Horn, watching as the huge army of Byzantium deployed on the slope above Galata, facing the Crusaders across the water, threatening and daring them at once.

  Ramon looked nervous as they watched the army moving into position.

  ‘What is it?’ Arnau asked.

  ‘This is dangerous. It’s like Stryphnos’s cavalry all over again but on a larger scale. I can only assume the emperor hopes to frighten the Franks and Venetians into calling it all off and leaving. It’s a dangerous gamble. He’s got a sizeable force there, and it would make most commanders think twice. But I’m not sure that’s going to work against the Doge of Venice and his pet, the count of Montferrat. And if they don’t flee, they will be forced to act in retaliation. I foresee this turning into a fight by nightfall, and if that happens the emperor had damn well better win. If he loses now, he will have lost too much manpower to maintain the walls against the enemy. It’s all or nothing.’

  Arnau nodded bleakly. There were now precious few guards left on the walls, the bulk of the military being gathered above Galata.

  They watched throughout the morning. Finally, after noon, the deadlock broke. The Byzantine force had stood, sweating, for hours in the hot sunshine above the houses of Galata, while there had been no movement in Scutari, or at least none visible from this distance. Then, suddenly, ships began to detach themselves from the Venetian fleet and steer out into open water. Slowly, as those vessels back-oared to maintain position in the channel, others formed up with them until a row of Venetian ships sat midstream, ready. As the next wave of warships and merchants began to depart the shore, the first group began to move in unison, making for the Galata shoreline.

  Arnau found his fingers gripping the stonework of the parapet so tight he was drawing blood in places. He’d been prepared for this, of course, in some fashion anyway, but now that it was actually happening, he stared in disbelief as a crusading army sailed across the strait to meet the Byzantine force awaiting it on the near shore.

  War.

  Shivering despite the heat, Arnau continued to watch.

  The imperial force at this distance was little more than a blob of shimmering silver on the slope, but he could now pick out parts of that huge force detaching and moving down towards the water, readying for the enemy landing.

  The Venetian ships held their line like a cavalry charge; wicked, greedy and untrustworthy they might be, but no one could ever doubt their seamanship. They slipped in to the shore in perfect unison and, as they did so, like some delicate dance, they slewed to the right as one, presenting their side to the Byzantine army. Arnau couldn’t make out the details, but somehow suddenly the first wave of Venetian vessels were almost at the shore, side on, and in moments a flood of silver emerged from them and raced at the closing Byzantines, a great flow of steel moving uphill at an astonishing pace, even as the ships prepared to make way.

  Arnau was stunned. He had seen large groups of soldiers disembark ships before. It was invariably a laborious process, walking steeds down boarding planks and assembling on the shore. What the Venetians and Franks had just achieved should be impossible. In a dozen heartbeats they had gone from ships crossing the water to a force of what had to be heavy cavalry charging the imperial army.

  It ought to have been laughable. Even having delivered a force simultaneously from numerous ships, they could not possibly have disgorged an army even a tenth the size of that which awaited them. All the Byzantines had to do was hold firm and then push them back to the water. Arnau could see that, and he was no grand strategist. Even if the Franks were better equipped, heavier-armoured, faster and stronger, sheer weight of numbers made it a foregone conclusion
. All they had to do was hold their ground and then push back fast enough to drive the Franks to the water before another wave of ships could land.

  He squeezed his eyes shut at what he was seeing.

  No.

  Even at this distance, at this scale, the unfolding disaster was clear. Just as the general Stryphnos had fled with five hundred cavalry at the sight of a small Frankish charge, the same was happening above Galata. Those smaller groups who had been running down to secure the shore were obliterated, completely disappearing beneath the silvery sheen of the Frankish knights. Barely had the Crusaders dealt with the small advance parties of Byzantine infantry before the main army broke. Arnau watched in dismay as the entire imperial force turned en masse and swarmed back down the slope towards the Golden Horn, leaving the Franks in control of the shore.

  ‘Mother of God preserve us,’ muttered Ramon next to him. ‘If that’s all we can look forward to then Constantinople is doomed. If I hadn’t seen the exiled prince for myself, I might be tempted to suggest he could be better for the empire than the emperor is. Doukas was right, though. The Angelids are weak. That force on the hill was large enough to swamp the knights, but either the emperor or Stryphnos, or both, fled the field.’

  Arnau nodded. ‘Not Laskaris, you think?’

  Ramon shook his head. ‘Both of them have strength and intelligence. They should have been in command from the start. I’d wager that if Theodoros or Constantine had been with that first cavalry landing, this whole thing would have been different from the outset.’

  ‘They’ve lost Galata,’ Arnau breathed, watching the imperial army flood back through the streets of the foreign enclaves across the Golden Horn. Some were heading for the meagre flotilla of ferries that could carry them back across the water. The bulk of them, though, were angling west, making for the inner reaches of the inlet and that bridge that would lead them back to the city.