Strategos: Island in the Storm

by Gordon Doherty

  Apion’s jaw clenched. Psellos!

  ‘Then what should we do?’ Blastares asked, his sword hand clenching and unclenching.

  Apion’s eyes darted, thinking of Manuel Komnenos and his campaign army. If Psellos was at work once more, then he would not have confined himself merely to an assassination. ‘We should bring the mustering forward with haste. I want the fighting men of the thema readied to march for Sebastae by the end of the month.’

  ***

  The streets of Constantinople baked in the summer heat. Babbling crowds writhed in the dockside fish market. A small dromon with a single bank of oars pulled away from the nearby Harbour of Theodosius, leaving behind the hubbub and the foaming, murky waters lapping at the wharf side. Under oar, the ship manoeuvred into the turquoise waters of the Propontus, then the crew hurried to unfurl the purple sail, pulling the boat westwards, skirting the city’s southern sea walls and heading towards the green Thracian countryside. Soon the city was but a speck on the eastern horizon.

  Psellos stood at the prow of the vessel. Yet he could not enjoy the fresh winds and the gentle noises of the sea, for his chest lesion seared as though a white-hot brand was being pressed to it. It had spread further, he was sure, now covering all of his chest and weeping almost constantly. Great boils had formed over it and just this morning, he had tried to lance one; blood and yellow pus had poured from it, and then a chunk of flesh had come away too. Just a small piece about the size of his fingertip – but it was rotten like spoiled food. Beads of cold sweat scampered down his back at the memory.

  What did you do to me, witch? he fretted, remembering the silver-haired old crone whose touch had spawned the lesion.

  ‘I cannot wait to see his gawping, severed head,’ a gruff voice interrupted his thoughts.

  Psellos swung round to John Doukas, clad in white silks blemished by dark perspiration stains. He wore the look of a man about to sit down to an imperial banquet. His eyes were fixed dreamily on the shoreline, seeking out their destination.

  ‘The Haga must surely have put up a fight. How did you say they killed him?’ John asked, his eyes sparkling like a child’s. ‘Tell me.’

  Psellos considered his response carefully. ‘Plakanos’ message only said that the job was done.’

  ‘Where did you say the meeting point was?’ John asked.

  ‘We’re almost there.’ Psellos flicked his eyes to the shoreline: shingle beach then thick forestation beyond, with no signs of farms or settlements nearby.

  A fine salt-spray whipped over them as they approached a small, timber jetty. Storks picked their way through the shallows here, bills chattering and occasionally spearing into the water to catch fish. ‘Hmm, do you think it was wise to bring only two men?’ John nodded past the ranks of rowers to the two numeroi spearmen. They were clad in fine pure-white tunics, iron klibania hugging their torsos, purple cloaks draped over their shoulders and scale-aventailed helms protecting their heads and necks. Each man carried a kite shield – purple with a white Christian Cross in the centre – and was armed with the finest of spears and spathion blades.

  ‘I think we will be fine,’ Psellos said, his eyes narrowing.

  When they docked, Psellos, John and the two numeroi spearmen filed out onto the jetty, wandered up the patchy grass of the shore side to a small timber hut nestled by a thicket of hornbeam trees. A gentle breeze tickled the leaves into a chorus of rustling and a flock of starlings shot to the sky, startled by the newcomers.

  Psellos raised a hand to halt his retinue.

  He peered at the door of the ramshackle hut. It creaked open ever so slowly. A hulking giant peered out, eyes darting furtively. This one was his finest assassin. The man who had taken over the mantle from Zenobius after that albino agent had been killed on his mission to slay Romanus Diogenes in Syria. Despite his flat-boned, brutish appearance, Plakanos had a shrewd mind, and he had barely suffered a scratch in his duties so far – murdering and sabotaging then fading like a morning mist. But Psellos noticed that Plakanos’ eyelids and cheeks were a mesh of scabs and scars, and the whites of his eyes were bloodshot and bleary.

  ‘Advisor, your strongest assassin seems to have had a run-in with . . . a cat?’ John said, chuckling derisively.

  Psellos shot his puppet a sour look, then flicked his gaze back to the assassin. ‘It is done? The Haga is dead?’

  Plakanos’ eyes darted and a bead of sweat forked across his heavy brow. ‘No. He lives.’

  ‘So you failed me?’ Psellos said then spluttered with incredulous laughter. ‘You failed me and returned to tell me. You, a man who knows full well what happens to those who fail me?’

  It was then that the trees rustled again. Seven men in black cloaks and dark-red tunics emerged and stood in an arc with Plakanos. More portatioi. ‘My men? What are you doing here?’ Psellos asked.

  ‘No, my men,’ Plakanos said, his shoulders squaring and his demeanour changing. Slowly and silently, the other portatioi drew out weapons from behind their backs. One held a nocked solenarion bow, another a small crossbow. One patted a spiked mace menacingly and the others carried clubs and blades. As if reflecting this turn of events, a cluster of grey cloud crossed over the sun, dulling the land and lending just a mite of chill to the coastal breeze. ‘Your time is over, Advisor,’ Plakanos grinned.

  ‘No!’ Psellos gasped. He looked to the equally panicked John, then to his two startled numeroi, then to Plakanos and the closing arc of portatioi agents. ‘No!’ he cried again. But this time the cry was overly-theatrical, and it tapered off with a throaty chuckle.

  Plakanos halted, frowning.

  Psellos flicked a finger and the seven with Plakanos suddenly turned on the giant, one striking him on the back of his head with a club. The giant gawped momentarily, realising they were, indeed, Psellos’ men. Then he toppled to the patchy grass, unconscious.

  ‘It was as you suspected, Master,’ the club-wielding assassin spoke in a sibilant tone to Psellos. ‘He summoned us here, tried to rally us against you.’

  ‘Too shrewd, it seems,’ Psellos glowered down the length of his nose at Plakanos’ prone form. ‘Dispose of him, and make it slow.’

  ‘I have been planning how we might do this all morning, Master. Then I remembered that Plakanos once told me of the recurring nightmare he suffers. A nightmare of creatures feasting on his flesh . . . ’ the club-wielder grinned and nodded as he ushered the other portatioi to lift Plakanos. They carried their colleague over to a hump of raised earth and placed him beside it, staking his wrists and ankles. One of them tore Plakanos’ tunic from his body. Another brought out a jar of honey, then began smearing the viscous substance onto Plakanos’ face, all across his torso and around his genitals. The big man was just coming too when he heard them beating at the hump of earth with sticks. He regained consciousness fully just in time to realise what was happening. In seconds, angered ants flooded from their nest under the hump of earth. Myriad creatures, bodies dark and glistening like some nightmarish horde. They swamped Plakanos’ skin in moments, and the brutish assassin could only scream with all the power in his lungs as they went to work, devouring the honey, then his skin and flesh. Plakanos’ cries were terrible. He thrashed and his limbs strained at the roped stakes, but to no avail. His eyes bulged and seemed set to burst clear of his head. But the ants flooded across his face unimpeded, a cloud of them rushing into his open mouth and nostrils and many more setting to work upon his eyeballs. His screaming grew intense and then fell away, replaced by choking, grunting noises. As the ant-covered mass of Plakanos writhed in the background, John and Psellos turned away, looking back along the coastline to the distant outline of Constantinople.

  ‘So the Haga lives on?’ John growled.

  ‘The Haga’s head will be ours in time, Master.’

  But John’s lips began to twitch. ‘The Haga lives and Diogenes and his bitch remain unchallenged as the toast of the empire.’

  ‘That Diogenes continues to cower in his palace sh
ould not concern you, Master,’ Psellos replied.

  ‘It is not his palace, Advisor,’ John spat.

  ‘No, he has merely bought himself a stay in your rightful home. By lavishing funds on the games and on the armies of the themata, his stock has risen and his failures on the battlefield have been forgiven.’

  ‘Yet the cur has no vaults of gold, no limitless wealth,’ John said.

  ‘No, but he has enough. Enough to allow him this single year of respite from campaign. My spies have been more successful than my assassins. They tell me that he has sold off his manors and great tracts of his family’s lands in Cappadocia to pay for his initiatives. He will very soon be a pauper. He means only to have this year in the capital to plan.’

  John’s pupils narrowed like a preying cat. ‘To plan? To plan for what?’

  ‘To lead a campaign grander than any other. Next year, he hopes to raise the greatest army the empire has ever witnessed and to secure the empire’s borders . . . and along with them, the glory that will cement his place on the throne.’

  John’s eyes darted in panic as he considered this. ‘With the revitalised themata, the imperial tagmata and mercenaries too he might well raise an army as vast as - ’

  ‘You forget, Master, that I am always a step ahead of Diogenes,’ Psellos cut him off, ushering him back towards the dromon. ‘The themata armies he has poured so much gold into are currently on campaign. They march under the banner of Manuel Komnenos.’ He leaned a little closer to whisper in John’s ear. ‘And we both know how hazardous a campaign can be.’

  8. Field of Carrion

  Tepid rain fell in sheets as Apion led the mustered Chaldian ranks through the Sebastae Thema. A thick musty tang of rotting vegetation and wet earth hung in the air and the squelching of boots and hooves sounded behind him. August had brought with it a mackerel sky and then this seemingly never-ending deluge. Every day meant a torrid trek through churning mire in sodden tunics and cloaks and every night was spent under leaking pavilion tents, eating wet rations.

  Rainwater drummed on his helm and trickled down his scale aventail, finding its way under the iron collar of his klibanion as he rode. His eyes remained trained on the south, where Manuel Komnenos’ army was but a half day’s march away.

  He recalled the sharp and loyal man he had met at the Euphrates. A good man to lead this campaign – with a brief to stave off any Seljuk advance here in the borderlands while the emperor stabilised affairs in Constantinople. And he had heard good things from his scouts who had been relaying messages between Manuel’s campaign army and the Chaldians. Manuel had them marching at a fine pace and morale was high. The Thrakesion, Opsikon and Bucellarion themata had been mustered to provide the bulk of his infantry – and the scouts had spoken highly of their appearance: each man kitted out with fine iron klibania, marching boots, helms, freshly painted shields and good, sharp and true spears, bows and swords. Romanus’ funding had transformed them, it seemed. With these refreshed themata rode the Vigla and the Scholae Tagmata. Two fine cavalry corps that would provide a stern hammer to the infantry anvil of the themata.

  He held out his water skin to fill it from the vertical drizzle. Ha! Focus on your own ranks, man! he mused, taking a sip of water then glancing back over his shoulder. There were his fifty riders, and immediately behind them, a sea of infantry faces stared back, eyes shaded under the dripping rims of their helms or archer’s hats, a forest of spear shafts, canvas-covered quivers and soaked crimson banners hanging over their well-ordered lines.

  Just over nine hundred infantrymen. None of the three tourmae they were organised into were even close to having the eight banda of two to three hundred men that the military texts recommended. Nowhere near enough, in fact – each division contained barely enough men for one such bandon. They hadn’t been at full strength for some years, he mused. Not surprising given the constant Seljuk raids and the major clashes in the past two campaigning seasons. What mattered, though, was that each of these three divisions of spearmen and archers were headed by his trusted three. Sha led his tourma with carefully worded shouts of encouragement, being sure to twist in his saddle and catch the eye of as many of his charges as possible when he did so. Ever the diplomat, Apion thought with a smile. Procopius was a more taciturn leader. The men of his tourma always showed him the greatest of respect and a hint of fear at his stern silence. The aged officer had once confided in Apion that is was all an act, a front. ‘Isn’t life?’ Apion muttered, his smile growing. Then he heard a gruff almost animal-like groan. He twisted to his other side to see Blastares, dismounting, scowling, his face bright red and raindrops dangling from the end of his nose. A pair of skutatoi had stumbled and fallen, sending the front line of his tourma into disarray.

  ‘We taught you how to march weeks ago, you bloody fools!’ he roared at the pair who had caused the chaos, then wrenched one of them up from his knees by the scruff of his klibanion like a father lifting a mischievous child. ‘What the-’ the big tourmarches gasped, gawping at the man’s boots. The four leather strips that extended above the shin of the boots were stretched up to his thighs, almost as high as his groin, and tied there. ‘And we taught you never to march with your boots up. Fold them down, below the knee.’ He shook his head in disbelief. ‘How can that even be comfortable? Your balls must be rubbed free of skin by now!’ The men erupted in a babble of laughter at their shamed comrade, and Apion allowed himself a crooked grin too.

  ‘Unbelievable, bloody unbelievable!’ Blastares grunted, ranging level with Apion, Sha and Procopius. ‘And this rain is seriously testing my patience. I tried praying for good weather last night . . . half way through my bloody tent roof falls in and I get soaked with freezing rainwater. I mean, come on – I’ve tried to be a good man?’ The big tourmarches held out his hands and looked to the sky.

  Sha looked to Apion with a devilish sparkle in his eyes. ‘You know, back in Mali, we had a saying: the flower accepts the rain because it knows it will be watered.’

  Blastares stared blankly at Sha for a moment, his jaw hanging open. ‘Hold on. Are you calling me a bloody flower?’

  Procopius was the first to break the tense silence that followed, roaring with laughter from the pit of his belly. Sha broke down in laughter too and Apion found it infectious. Blastares’ scowl lasted only moments before he joined in too. ‘Bloody flower indeed.’

  They splashed through a shallow flood river in one pine-edged valley, then up a snaking path along a mountainous ridge where the land opened out before them. A mile or more to their left stood the city of Sebastae – capital of this eponymous thema. The city’s walls were grey and shiny with rain, and there was just a speckle of iron atop the battlements. He had heard that this important stronghold was garrisoned by only eighty men these days.

  He noticed his men’s heads all twist to the city, no doubt thinking of the taverns and warm fires within those walls. A gentle chatter broke out amongst them.

  ‘Eyes front,’ Blastares boomed, ‘We’re not meeting the campaign army there. It’s a camp on a plain for us,’ he said, flicking a finger to a ridge on the southeastern horizon. ‘Somewhere out there. Anyway, the wine in that city tastes like rat piss and the whores will leave you with warts on your cock!’

  Stunned silence fell, followed by a chorus of chuckling when Blastares swung round on his saddle to flash them a stump-toothed grin. When the big man turned forward again, his grin faded.

  ‘Blastares?’ Procopius frowned, seeing the big man’s gaze snag on something to the southeast.

  Apion looked there too, seeing only the grey mizzle and wet folds of golden land. Then he saw it. The dullest flash of silver out there – maybe two miles distant. An army. Coming north and coming fast.

  ‘Manuel Komnenos?’ Sha asked.

  Apion shook his head, seeing the dull shape take form. ‘See how fast they come? They are all riders. Look, two thousand of them, easily.’ The column broke out in a concerned murmur.

  ‘Seljuk raiders,�
�� Procopius growled, switching his gaze from the approaching horde to the grey walled city. ‘They’re but a few miles from Sebastae.’

  ‘The rain!’ Apion cursed the sky. ‘The damned rain dampened their dust plume until they were this close.’ He looked northeast to the city and southeast to the horde. His nine hundred men and fifty riders were all that stood between the populace of Sebastae and certain slaughter.

  ‘I can have a rider bolt southwards, to reach Manuel Komnenos’ camp and call for his help?’ Blastares suggested.

  ‘Yes, do that, but be swift,’ Apion replied, his gaze flicking to the gorge a few hundred metres to the left of his column. The Seljuk raiders would have to come through that corridor to get to the city – as the rocky land either side was steep and crumbling – nigh-on impassable. ‘Then get your men into that gorge!’

  The rain-sodden gorge was eerily still, until the silence was broken by the splashing of nine hundred pairs of boots and the clopping hooves of fifty horsemen. The din echoed from wall to wall until the Byzantine soldiers came to a halt. Apion thudded down from his mount. He crouched and held a hand to the ground – rumbling, growing closer, from the south, beyond the kink in the gorge. They had moments, he realised. He stood and scoured the terrain. The gorge was a definite choke point, but it was still fairly wide. Standing three men deep, his infantrymen might just be able to form a blockade long enough for Blastares’ messenger to summon reinforcements from Manuel Komnenos. But it would be folly to assume reinforcements were coming, he chided himself.

  ‘Skutatoi!’ he yelled, swiping a finger in the air as if drawing out his imagined spear line. At once, the spearmen hurried to form a phalanx from one gorge wall to the other, crimson shields interlocked, spears levelled, eyes glinting with a mixture of fear and battle-hubris. Next, he looked to the hundred or so archers within the infantry ranks, then up to the sides of the gorge.