Doctor Who_ Bunker Soldiers - Martin Day [86]
Although arrows rained down from the walls in optimistic defiance, in truth the battle of the mind was long lost. The reputation of the Mongols travelled far ahead of them, inspiring only hopelessness and resignation. It was well known that they had a seemingly limitless supply of well-trained soldiers, devastating machinery, and the patience of God saddled with the savagery of Satan. Worse still was the noise of the great army.
The hooves of ten thousand horses and the thundering rattle of wooden wagons, the bone-curdling war cries, mixed in with the lowing of distant livestock on the move – all made speech within the city near impossible. Women hugged their children tightly, whispering desperate assurances made mute by the evil monster beyond. Soldiers and civilians assembled diligently, holding their weapons and the hopes of their families high.
Some chose to banish their fear and prayed to the hidden god, who had himself felt utterly rejected – Eli, Eli lema sabachthani – and whose triumph had only come through death.
Some controlled their fears, and prayed to the god of miracles, who had parted seas and killed the unworthy. Some succumbed utterly to their fears, and in doing so found the serenity of a thief who wants only to awake next day in paradise. Some prayed to themselves, and saw little but the emptiness of their souls, and feared for the true judgement to come.
The sky was red with the dust thrown up by the horses that pawed the earth beyond the walls. Many of the citizens had seen paintings of the apocalypse; now they were destined to experience their own.
And still the arrows and tar came down in waves from the fortified walls, and still the Mongol army worked diligently beneath them, preparing their great instruments of war. One or two soldiers fell, but they were quickly carried away for treatment or burial.
Within the city, acting governor Yevhen patrolled the makeshift defences. Never before had he felt so lonely, never before had he felt so driven. He bellowed orders, encouraged vigilance, reassured as best he could. He heard the noise outside abate momentarily, and steeled himself for the worst.
The attack began.
The Mongols had chosen to concentrate their attentions on the Polish Gate to the west of the city. There the battlements were made of wood – an obvious weak point, and one that Yevhen had tried hard to strengthen. But the leaders of the Great Khan’s army were no fools.
A mass of shaped boulders began a relentless pounding of the wall. Smaller projectiles, seemingly of clay, showered down like rain, exploding on impact. Yevhen could not disguise his fear as flames licked the ramparts and soldiers scurried for safety.
‘What devilry is this?’ he exclaimed.
He ordered a unit of well-trained men to the area, to bolster the citizens who had been stationed there. From his vantage point he could see that the overall structure was standing firm, but the great doors of the gate were beginning to crack and, worse, the battlements were now ablaze. Water was being ferried to the site, but the amounts were pitiful.
Yevhen glanced back at the governor’s residence, itself blackened with soot, and for a moment he remembered familial stories of the flame that fell from heaven to herald the arrival of the angel. He had always hated fire.
Then the first masonry began to fall from the gateway, and the thought was lost in the panic Yevhen had anticipated for weeks. ‘To the Church of the Virgin!’ he ordered. It was the one building in Kiev that could, the tacticians felt, be well defended, its natural shapes and battlements having been bolstered by weeks of tireless work. Yevhen remembered that the young traveller had been keen to help out. It all seemed so long ago now.
The general order was issued: families were to seek refuge in the church itself, and all men of fighting age were to assemble there for the final pitched battle.Yevhen wondered idly how much of the population