Simon Scarrow - Sword and Scimitar

He looked towards the stairs, willing Richard to return before the enemy launched their attack. Briefly he considered leaving his position to go and find him, and then chided himself. What example would that set to the men under his command? He hardened his resolve and stared in the direction of the enemy.

The first of the Turkish drums began to beat, quickly swelling out of the shadows as more joined. A crash of cymbals and the wailing of pipes added to the din and then, as the first rays of the sun pierced the eastern horizon, the imams led their worshippers in the shahada — the Muslim testament that there is no god but God, Mohammed is the messenger of God. A soft murmuring surrounded the fort as the men within braced themselves, knowing that the assault was imminent.

A faint scraping drew Thomas’s attention away from the enemy and he was relieved to see Richard returning from the top of the stairs, dragging a chair in either hand. A moment later more men appeared: four soldiers, half carrying and half dragging Colonel Mas and Captain Miranda. Richard set their chairs up a short distance to one side of the breach, close to Thomas’s position, and then helped to ease the two officers on to the chairs.

‘My sword,’ Mas ordered, holding out his hand.

A soldier unslung the scabbard from over his shoulder and passed it up. Another weapon was passed to Miranda.

‘I am ready.’ Mas gestured to the men who had carried them up on to the wall. ‘Get to your positions, and may God be with you.’

The soldiers bowed their heads in a final salute and crept away along the wall. Richard crouched beside his father.

‘What are they doing?’ asked Thomas, gesturing towards the two officers. ‘Why are they up here?’

‘It was the colonel’s idea. When I gave them your message he said he’d rather die where the men could see him than down in the chapel. Miranda agreed.’

Thomas shook his head as he regarded the two men sitting erect, their wounded legs sticking out in front of them, swathed in soiled and bloody bandages. ‘Madness . . .’

The murmuring from the Turkish trenches died away and the din from their instruments rose up with renewed fervour. Thomas turned his attention to his son, taking a last opportunity to regard him closely, with affection.

‘I wish . . .’ He tried to continue but there were no words adequate to the moment.

Richard smiled and briefly squeezed his hand. ‘I understand, Father. There is much I would have wished for if we had been granted the time.’

A single gun roared from the top of the ridge, the signal to begin the attack. The deep boom rolled round the harbour and then was drowned out by a frenzied roar as the Turks burst from concealment and rushed the short distance towards the battered mass of St Elmo. The defenders replied at once, without waiting for an order, and spurts of fire darted from the barrels of their arquebuses. The mass of enemy soldiers surged across the broken ground and up the mound of rubble lying in the breach. Thomas fixed his attention on them. The first died, shot through the head, and he crashed forward and was immediately trampled by those behind him. More men fell, shot in the head or chest, easy targets at such close range.

Thomas cupped a hand to his mouth and bellowed, ‘Incendiaries!’ The fuses smeared low arcs in the air before the pots shattered amongst the enemy in savage sheets of flame that set men ablaze as they screamed in terror and agony.

‘Give it to ’em, lads!’ Colonel Mas shouted, punching his sword into the air. ‘For the Holy Religion!’

Miranda echoed the cry and then his lips drew back in a fierce grin. ‘Kill them!’

Thomas raised the tip of his sword and held it ready. Beside him Richard hunched over his pike. The Turks came on, heedless of their comrades struck down by bullets, incendiaries or the rocks hurled at them from either side of the breach. The steep gradient of the rubble began to slow them down and they took several more casualties as they struggled forward to close with the defenders.

Thomas stepped forward, sword held ready, keenly aware of Richard close at his side, lowering his pike, ready to thrust. A Spahi, a few paces in advance of his comrades, rushed up towards the parapet, mouth open wide as he screamed his battle cry. He carried a spear in an overhand grip and thrust it towards Richard. The young man deftly parried the spear aside with a sharp clack as wood struck wood. Then he thrust home with all his weight and the steel point tore through the Spahi’s robes and punched deep into his chest.

More men surged up the rubble slope and Thomas hacked at a man’s turbaned head, stunning him even though the tighdy wound material resisted the keen edge of his sword. A thrust to the throat ripped through an artery and his adversary fell back. Thomas looked for the next opponent. He felt an impact on his shoulder and something flickered past his eyes — the shaft of an arrow. More arrows whipped up from the throng at the bottom of the mound of rubble, and then Thomas saw flashes and billows of smoke as the enemy arquebusiers picked their targets. The head of a Maltese militiaman close to Stokely burst like an overripe watermelon, spattering blood across the face of the English knight. Richard stabbed his pike into the shoulder of a wild-haired man in animal skins who howled in pain, then pulled himself free and slashed at Richard’s helmet with a club. Using his pike like a cross-staff, Richard blocked the attack then lowered the base of his weapon, hooked it round his foe’s leg and tipped him on to his back before ramming the point through the man’s chest.

From behind him Thomas could clearly hear Colonel Mas’s roar. ‘For God! For St John! Fight! Fight!’

Stokely stepped boldly into the breach to give himself space to wield his sword and swung it above his head in both hands before he slashed at an officer rushing forward madly to seize the honour of being the first man through the breach. He saw the dull gleam of the blade in the pale dawn light and raised his round shield to block the sword. The weight of the blade, together with the savage strength with which it was wielded, were more than a match for the best of shields. With a shrill clang Stokely’s sword shattered the shield and cut through the Turk’s elbow and on into his flank, tearing through scale armour, leather, jerkin and flesh and driving the air from the officer’s lungs. The blow sent him reeling to the side and he stood dazed, looking down at the blood pouring from the stump of his arm. Then, teeth gritted in a snarl, he swung his sword at the English knight. Stokely moved his blade to ward off the blow and then swung again, this time at the Turk’s neck. There was a wet crunch and the officer’s head leaped into the air and spun back above his men, spraying them with blood before it fell to the ground.

A groan rose from the lips of the enemy and for a moment they wavered. Already the Turks had lost a score or more of their number and more fell as they were caught between the defenders’ fire from both sides of the breach. They began to fall back down the rubble slope, stopping only when they found shelter to crouch behind.

‘Take cover!’ Thomas shouted.

His men moved back from the breach towards the safety of what remained of the parapet on each side as Turkish bullets ricocheted off the masonry. One of the Maltese volunteers was not quick enough and let out a cry as a ball smashed into his hip. He fell on to the rubble, dropping his sword. He struggled to sit up and examine his wound, then a second shot struck him in the face and the impact threw him back. Stokely stood alone for a moment, sword raised, defying the Turks. A shot deflected off his breastplate and nudged him a step to the side. Another shot glanced off the thick armour on his shoulder before he turned and picked his way steadily out of the line of fire and crouched down behind the parapet close to where Thomas and Richard squatted, breathing heavily.