William Napier: The Great Siege

‘And abandon the town to its fate?’ said La Valette savagely. ‘This town of heroes?’

The knight looked ashamed.

‘It is too late anyway. As I joined you here, I gave orders for all the precious icons of the Order to be carried from St Lawrence into San Angelo, the fort to be evacuated, and the drawbridge destroyed. Here is where we take our stand.’ He stabbed the ground with his sword point. ‘Here is where we die, if we must! With our people!’

The invading Turks soon found themselves lost and divided amid a dense labyrinth of narrow, dark-shaded streets and mean, tight-packed alleyways. The undisciplined Bektaşi, their hearts already set on rape and enrichment, dissolved into a mere horde of frenzied individuals, dashing into houses to find the women and steal the gold. One or two managed to satisfy themselves in the murderous panic, but one found that his woman cut her own throat even as he stripped her naked, and more than one felt himself stabbed to death in the side even as he copulated with his kicking victim. Most other maddened Bektaşi, however, were trapped in small rooms of houses and brained with chamber pots in doorways, tripped up in nets, cut down with knives, run through with pitchforks or garrotted with ropes. Having broken into the city, they believed it was finished, and victory was theirs. They learnt differently.

The Janizaries kept order, better acquainted with the savageries of house-to-house fighting, but they found themselves trapped again and again in cul-de-sacs, behind hastily erected but effective barricades of mere furniture, chairs and tables and bales of bedding. More than a hundred charged into the little square of St Mark, only to find that there was no exit, and quickly blocking their retreat was a line of a dozen or more knights, grim and silent in their battered plate. The Janizaries surged against them but could not break out again, and from above, from the first floor windows and balconies and flat roofs of the surrounding houses, missiles began to rain down upon them. Plates smote bare heads, rocks and stones shattered shoulder bones, and they sank down stunned, grovelling on their knees. They had captured the city, surely. The green banner of Islam and the golden orb of Suleiman now stood on the walls of Birgu above the ruined post of Provence. And yet still they were being slaughtered like dazed cattle, as the shadow of armoured knights fell across them.

La Valette’s ruthless preparations had followed every rule of defence in depth. The invaders found themselves faced with one exhausting, attritional barrier after another. Every street, every wretched back alley, was a new battleground. It was a wearying and dispiriting labour. One house after another must be captured, one barricade after another stormed, and again and again they were trapped in small bands, isolated and destroyed.

At times fresh explosions went off behind them as they surged forward through the town, and they were not explosions caused by their own guns, which had fallen silent now. They were charges laid in preparation by the defenders. Houses were carefully blown to collapse behind them as they advanced, another would be blown ahead of them, and yet again they were caught, unable to escape. Yet again missiles rained down from above.

Often at the end of the streets, they glimpsed a tall, ancient figure striding past, grim-visaged with his clipped white beard beneath his high scarlet-plumed helmet, unmistakable yet seeking no cover. Quite the opposite: determined to be seen everywhere. His only protection was his armour and his great shield, emblazoned with the cross and a falcon. His left thigh was bound with a bloody bandage, yet he walked without the faintest limp and directed all operations with a steady energy and tranquillity. That was the Frankish warrior, their Pasha, called La Valette. He had about him an aura changeless and terrifying.

Nicholas and Stanley had chased two Janizaries into a cul-de-sac, and the two warriors now turned like noble beasts at bay and faced them. Four swords and scimitars thrust accusingly towards each other, all four of them panting, exhausted, uncertain. There came shouts and footfalls behind them, a furious exchange of clanking blows of steel on shield. Nicholas fixed his opponent in the eye. The Janizary had blue eyes, fair skin. He had been a Christian until he was seven. Nicholas’s sword point wavered with tiredness and doubt. And then a look crossed the Janizary’s face. Nicholas glanced back and saw two more of the enemy running towards them. Two tall, straight-backed Sipahis with their long cavalry swords, still fresh-looking and alert.

‘Stanley!’

A veteran fighter, Stanley knew from the boy’s tone of voice that danger was coming, he didn’t need to look. He sliced his sword warningly through the air before him and at the same time seized the boy in his left arm and dragged him back into a doorway just wide enough for the two of them, backed up tight, blades before them. The knight heaved but the damnable door was firmly bolted inside.

‘Open up!’ he roared.

The terrified family inside remained frozen.

The four enemy soldiers formed a semi-circle around them. This burly blond giant would not be easy. If only they still had guns, it would be like shooting rats in a ditch.

A distant horn sounded, a single long wailing note that sounded like mourning. The four Turks looked at each other. They still did not step in for the kill. Nicholas doubted that his right arm could mete out another convincing blow. His arm muscles burned, his sword point wavered and drooped before him.

‘Weapon up, boy!’ shouted Stanley.

But there was something about the soldiers’ stance that told Nicholas they were not going to close in for the kill. Something had happened.

The horn sounded again afar off. A long lone call, falling away.

Everything was very still. Then the four lethal blades hemming them in, ready to run them through, were let drop. The blue-eyed Janizary shot his broad-bladed scimitar back in its sheath, his jaw clenched but his expression of sad resignation. Then he took one step back, out of range of Stanley’s sword, and gave a small, unmistakable bow.

The horn sounded a third time, and then he and his three comrades were striding away back to the breach in the walls, heads lowered, silk robes billowing.

All over the town, the defenders stopped and peered through the dust and the black powder smoke and saw that there were few more Turks left to kill. They patrolled carefully through the streets and cut down those few they could find. It was eerily silent. A cry here, a groan there, the last few Turks being despatched by womenfolk with their knives. A Bektaşi who had tried to rape a girl in an alley was punished appropriately by the girl and her mother, and left in the street to bleed to death.

The little square of St Mark with its precious freshwater fountain was awash with blood and the corpses of a hundred Janizaries. Knights lay slain also. But more still patrolled the streets, or returned to the remains of the walls, barely breathing or daring to hope. The attack had died off.

All who entered had been killed or laid low. And instead of the entire Turkish army pressing forward after them, as it could easily have done … no more came.

Nicholas and Stanley found Smith among a group standing with the Grand Master at the head of the street, looking down to the rent in the walls.

‘Master,’ gasped Copier, almost collapsed forward on the weight of his own sword, visibly bending under him. ‘What now?’

‘Sheathe your sword, man,’ said La Valette. ‘It isn’t a walking stick.’

Very slowly, Copier cranked himself upright again, blood leaking from a dozen wounds. With enormous effort he lifted his sword, his muscles so tired that the blade trembled violently. Nicholas stepped forward and helped him and he managed to set the point into the mouth of his scabbard and thrust it home and then took a deep breath.