Tim Severin - King's Man

I looked around the sweep of the bay. Ahead of us, perhaps half a mile, I saw a narrow break in the cliffs which rose again on the far side. 'Over there,' I said, pointing. 'Perhaps in there we will find a landing place. And maybe the entrance is too narrow for the Arab ship to follow us. If we can squeeze in, we might have a few moments to abandon ship and run clear.'

'It's worth a try,' grunted the captain, and altered course.

We laboured ever closer, heading for the cleft. But as we approached, I saw that I had misjudged it. The gap was wider than I had supposed, which meant our dorkon could slip in, but so too could the pirate ship if her steersman was bold enough. The skipper of the Arab craft must have thought the same, for he did not harry us as we crept closer to where two low reefs reached out, leaving a narrow gap between. Our pursuer even had the confidence to stop rowing: I saw the regular beat of the sweeps come to a halt. They waited and watched.

Sails flapping, our dorkon glided through the gap. As we entered, I knew we were doomed. We found ourselves in a natural harbour, a small cove, almost totally landlocked. Sheer cliffs of yellow rock rose on each side, banded with ledges. They enclosed a circular sea pool, some forty paces across. Here the colour of the water was the palest blue, so clear that I could see the sandy bottom, no more than ten feet below our keel. Despairingly I realised that the water was deep enough for the Arab galley to float. There was not a breath of wind. The cove was so tightly surrounded that the cliffs overhung the water in places, and if the lip of the precipice crumbled, the rocks would fall straight on to our deck. We had found the refuge marked on the map, and had we reached it earlier, even by a day, we could have concealed ourselves here and waited in safety for Harald's monocylon to appear. I had failed.

'We're trapped,' said Theodore quietly.

In the distance I heard a shout. It must have been the voice of the Arab captain prowling outside, ordering his men to furl sail and prepare to row their larger ship through the entrance. Then I heard the creak of ropes in wooden blocks and supposed that the

Arabs were lowering the spars as well. They were taking their time, knowing that they had us at their mercy.

'Every man for himself 1.' called Theodore, and his crew needed no urging. They began to jump into the clear water - it was no more than a few strokes for them to swim ashore. At the back of the cove was a ledge of rock where a man could haul himself out. From there the faint line of a goat path meandered up the cliff face. If we scrambled up fast enough, maybe we could get clear before the slave-catchers arrived.

'I'm sorry—' I began to say, but Theodore interrupted.

'It's too late for that now. Get going.'

I threw myself overboard and he jumped a moment later. We were the last to abandon the ship, leaving her bobbing quietly in the placid water.

I hauled myself out on to the rock ledge, reached down and gave Theodore a hand, pulling him ashore. He followed the line of wet footprints where his crew had scrambled for the goat path. Up above me I heard the clattering of falling stones as they clambered upwards as fast as possible.

Glancing back, I saw the Arab ship was nosing in cautiously through the gap between the rocks. Her hull almost filled the entrance, and her oarsmen had scarcely enough room to row. Several of the pirates stood on deck and were using the long sweeps to push the vessel into the cove.

I turned and climbed for my life. I had kicked off my boots before I swam, so I felt the sharp rocks cut and bruise my bare feet. I slipped and grabbed for handholds while I looked upwards trying to locate the path. Dirt and small pebbles dislodged by the Greek captain rained down on me. I was less than halfway up the cliff face when I caught up with Theodore. There was no room to overtake him, so I paused, panting with exhaustion, the blood roaring in my ears, and stared back down into the cove.

The Arab galea now lay alongside our abandoned ship, with about a dozen looters already on the dorkon's deck. They were levering up the hatch cover, and soon they would reach the bullion chests lying in the hold. Shouts from below told me that the Arab captain - I could clearly identify him by his red and white striped turban - was ordering some of his men to pursue and capture us. Two or three of them were already swimming ashore.

Suddenly, a speck dropped past the cliff face on the far side of the cove. At first I thought it was a fault in my eyesight, a grain of dirt in my eye or one of those black spots which sometimes swims across one's vision when one is panting for breath. Then two more dark specks followed, and I saw the splashes where they hit the water. Something was falling from the lip of the cliff. I looked across and glimpsed a sudden movement in the fringe of scrub and bushes. It was an arm, throwing some sort of object. The projectile travelled through the air, curving far out and gathering speed until it struck the deck of the galea. It burst on impact. I watched in amazement. Several more of the missiles sped through the air. Whoever was throwing them had found their range. One or two of the missiles splashed into the water, but another four or five landed on the pirate vessel.

From below me came shouts of alarm. The men who had boarded the dorkon began to scramble back aboard their own ship, while their captain raced towards the stern of his vessel. He was shouting at his crew and waving urgently. One of the Arabs picked up from the deck a missile which had failed to burst and threw it overboard. I saw it was some sort of round clay pot, the size of a man's head. The Saracens kept their discipline, even though they had been taken totally by surprise. Now, those who had been swimming ashore turned back towards their vessel. Others hacked through the ropes binding the galea to the captured dorkon and began to push clear. Most of the crew found their places on the benches again and set their oars in place, but they were hampered by the confines of the little cove. There was little room to row and not enough space to turn the galley. The Arab captain yelled another command and the oarsmen changed their stroke. They were backing water, now attempting to reverse the galea out through the narrow gap.

Meanwhile the clay pots continued to rain down. From several came spouts of flame as they struck. Fire broke out on the galea's cotton sails, neatly furled on their spars. The rolled-up cloth served as enormous candle wicks, and I watched the flames run along the spars, then catch the tarred rigging and race up the masts. More fire pots struck. As they burst, they spilled a dark liquid which splashed across the wooden deck. Sometimes the liquid was already ablaze as it spread. At other times it oozed sideways until it touched a living flame and then burst into fire. Within moments the deck of the galea was ablaze with pools of fire expanding towards one another, joining and growing fiercer.

The Saracens began to panic. Rivulets of flaming liquid spilled down and ran below the galley benches. An oarsman leapt up, frantically beating at his gown, which had caught fire. His companions on the bench abandoned their task and tried to help put out the flames. They failed, and I saw the desperate oarsman fling himself overboard to douse himself.

Then I saw something else which I would not have believed was possible. The burning liquid from the fire pots dripped from the galea's scuppers and ran down the hull, then spread across the surface of the pool and the liquid continued to blaze, even on the water. Now I knew I was witnessing the same terrible weapon that had destroyed the Rus fleet when it attacked the Queen of Cities two generations earlier. This was the Fire.

As the Fire took hold, there was no stopping or extinguishing or diverting it. The blazing liquid spread across the galea's deck, sought out her hold, ran along the oar benches and surrounded the vessel in flickering tongues of flame. The expanding fire licked the sides of the abandoned dorkon, and soon that vessel too was alight. Smoke was pouring up from the two burning vessels. The column of smoke twisted and roiled. Its base expanded and shifted, enveloping the wretched Saracens. Some wrapped their turbans around their faces to protect themselves, and tried uselessly to beat back the flames. The majority jumped into the fiery water. I watched them try to duck beneath the floating skin of Fire. But when they surfaced for air they sucked the Fire down into their lungs and sank back down, not to rise again. A handful managed to swim towards the open sea, heading towards the gap between the reefs. They must have dived down and swum underwater to get beyond the reach of the floating Fire. But their escape was blocked. Now their attackers showed themselves.