John Stack - Armada

‘Stay close.’ He pulled the priest down into a low crouch as he slipped behind the nearest wall.

‘This is your last warning!’ the voice called out again. ‘Come forward or we will advance!’

Robert crept forward, moving at right angles to the voice. He dragged Father Blackthorne over a wall and raised his head to look about him. A faint light caught his eye and he stared at it for a moment. It was the glow of a slow-burning match, the tiny smouldering flame that was poised to ignite the charge of an arquebus. He looked left and right of it and saw others close by. The cordon was compact and ordered. There was no chance they could simply slip through. Their only chance was to create confusion and hope that a breach would emerge.

‘On my order, prepare to advance,’ the voice called out. ‘Advance!’

Robert drew out his wheellock pistol and took careful aim at the smouldering match. He fired. A man cried out and Robert heard his arquebus fall to the ground.

‘I’m hit,’ the man screamed. From all sides others began to shout in the darkness.

‘The papist bastards have pistols!’

‘Let ’em have it!’

The air was rent with the sound of gunshots. Bullets whizzed over Robert’s head and ricocheted off the walls around him. Another man screamed out in pain, then another, while others shouted in anger as they charged forward.

‘Cease fire!’ a voice roared. ‘God curse you, cease fire!’

The order was ignored and the firing continued sporadically as men reloaded. Robert saw a figure lumbering towards him and stood up to meet the charge. Another bullet flew past him. The soldier saw him and screamed a curse, bringing his sword up. Robert saw the silhouette of his arm against the sky. He reacted on instinct and sidestepped. Their blades clashed and Robert backed off, quickly absorbing the momentum of the soldier’s attack. The ground underfoot was strewn with rubble and the soldier stumbled. Robert whipped his sword around for the killing strike but in the final instant he reversed his thrust and struck his attacker in the face with the pommel of his sword, breaking his nose. The solider cried out and slumped to the ground.

Robert reached out and grabbed Father Blackthorne. The priest staggered to his feet. He called out incoherently, consumed with fear. Robert dragged him forward.

‘Move damn you. We need to go, now.’

He pulled the priest over another low wall. A bullet ricocheted overhead, sending splinters of stone flying through the air. The summit was blanketed in gun smoke and for a moment Robert lost his bearings. He heard the clash of steel nearby and the angry shouts of attackers.

Reaching out with his hand he felt his way forward and began to increase his pace, but ran headlong into a solid wall. The blow stunned him and he tasted blood. He angrily felt along the line of the ruins, dragging Father Blackthorne behind. Suddenly he sensed the fall of the ground beneath his feet. They had reached the edge of the summit. A bullet whistled past, then another, but Robert was already descending. Father Blackthorne grunted behind him and fell forward, crashing into Robert. The two men tumbled down the hill of loose stone and gorse.

Robert swore as he regained his feet. He glanced up at the smoke strewn summit. It was impossible to tell what was happening. One voice was shouting above the others, the voice that had first challenged them. It was calling for an end to the fighting, for order, but chaos had been unleashed and would only end when the last man regained his wits. Robert looked for Father Blackthorne. He was slumped nearby and Robert grabbed him under the shoulder to haul him to his feet. The priest cried out in pain and Robert cursed his screams, fearing they might draw attention. He lost his grip and Father Blackthorne fell backwards onto the grass. Robert made to seize him again but stopped. His hand felt slick and wet. It was covered in blood.

Cross bellowed in rage as the shooting finally ceased. He stepped out from behind the shelter of a wall and called for torches to be lit. A flame appeared in the gun smoke, followed by a dozen more and he stalked over to the nearest one, grabbing it off a soldier before catching him by the collar of his doublet.

‘Find Francis Tanner,’ he snarled. ‘And spread the word. I want a full sweep of the summit. I want those men found.’

The soldier nodded fearfully and moved quickly away. Cross held the torch out and turned slowly. The body of a solider was nearby and he walked over to see he had been shot in the chest.

The skirmish had lasted for five minutes, five long minutes. Cross’s every order to cease fire had been ignored and he spat on the body at his feet, knowing that in the confusion the soldier had probably been killed in the crossfire by one of his own comrades.

The gun smoke was clearing slowly and Cross watched the men, silhouetted by torch light, move in every direction amidst the ruins. His ambush had been a disaster. He had thought that by surrounding and surprising the traitors they would submit quickly and quietly. But they had not. Instead they had turned the tables and Cross realized that whatever the outcome now, it would be worse than he had hoped.

‘Cross,’ he heard and Tanner approached with a group of soldiers.

‘Well?’ Cross asked.

‘The bastards shot dead two of our men and another was slain by a sword. Two more have bullet wounds.’

‘And the papists?’ Cross asked angrily, caring little for the soldiers. The fools had brought death upon themselves.

‘We got one,’ Tanner said, indicating over his shoulder.

‘Alive?’

Tanner smiled maliciously. ‘He’s dead.’

Cross brushed past him and walked quickly through the ruins. A group of soldiers was standing in a tight knot around a body.

One, Cross thought furiously. Out of four, and not even that one taken alive.

The soldiers separated as Cross approached, wary of his murderous expression in the torch light. He looked down on the body. The man was lying face down. He had been shot in the back. Cross turned him over with his foot, crouching down to look at the man’s face and unseeing eyes in the orange glow of the torch fires. It was the Duke of Clarsdale.

‘Sir,’ a soldier called and Cross looked up. A soldier staggered towards him, his blood soaked hand covering his nose.

‘Two of ’em got past me over there, sir,’ he burbled, pointing behind him.

Cross was immediately on his feet.

‘Follow me,’ he commanded the assembled soldiers and spun the injured man around, ordering him back to the exact spot. The soldier led them to where he was struck down. Cross shoved him aside and kept going to the edge of the summit. He drew his sword and began to descend, holding his torch out far to his side to scan the ground. The gorse was flattened in places, as if someone had tumbled down the slope. He quickened his descent.

Reaching the base he peered into the blackness beyond the light of his torch. He looked down and noticed a large dark patch in the grass at his feet. He played his torch over it and smiled. Blood. It was not over yet. He turned to the soldiers who had followed him down. There were more than a dozen of them.

‘Spread out along a line,’ he ordered, looking to each man in turn. ‘We can still catch them. But I warn you, I want these men taken alive. If any man fires without my command, I’ll see him whipped within an inch of his life.’

The soldiers nodded darkly and moved off, fanning out on either side of Cross. They advanced quickly, their torch lights sweeping the ground before them. Ahead of them the solid outline of the church of Saint Michael’s stood resolute in the darkness.

‘Enough,’ Father Blackthorne cried out. ‘Please, I can’t go on.’