Killer of Men - Christian Cameron [195]
We were five stades off the beach when I leaped back to Paramanos’s ship. The Medes and the Syrians could see us coming, and men were running down from the burning town to form on the beach. Most of them were Greeks – I could see from their arms. In the centre was a knot of Persians, but their line wasn’t long enough to cover the whole length of the beach, even two deep.
But there were other men – Thracians. Some of them came down from the town in clumps, like thick honey dripping from the comb. Others hung back.
The enemy commander had hired Thracians. It probably wasn’t hard, because from all we heard, the locals detested Aristagoras as much as we did. I had never faced them, but I heard that they were titans, big, tough men with no fear of death. I always doubted such tales, but the men I could see in the red light of sunset had tattoos like black slashes on their faces and around their arms, and they held heavy swords and long spears.
‘I’m going for the town as soon as we break their line,’ I said to Paramanos. ‘I know that you don’t have to follow me.’ I looked at him.
He shrugged. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t.’ He pointed at the Thracians – there were more of them every heartbeat. ‘You think we can break that?’
We were three stades out from the beach. I got up on the rail where it rose to protect the helmsman and balanced there, waiting for the rise of the wave. ‘Watch me,’ I boasted, and jumped.
I landed on my own deck. ‘Bow first!’ I said. ‘Marines aft! Empty the first ten benches forward and send all those men aft!’ I waved at my deck master. ‘Sails down! Then masts!’
The other ships were starting to turn, because they intended to beach stern first – a necessary precaution to prevent their ram-bows from digging so deep into the sand and gravel that the ship was damaged – or worse, could never be brought off.
I caught a stay and swung up on the rail. ‘Stephanos!’ I called. He was behind me in line, in the smaller Raven’s Wing. I had to wait while he came forward – precious time, while my bow rowers ran back, dragging their cushions, unsure what they were supposed to do – while the deck crew swarmed over the masts, caught in the midst of arming, and the marines clustered by the helmsman’s bench. Hermogenes was in full armour, and Idomeneus looked like a hero in a solid bronze thorax with silver work and a fine helmet with a towering crest shaped like a heron.
‘My lord?’ Stephanos called back.
‘Into the port!’ I said. ‘Land your full crew and take the Thracians from behind! See?’
Indeed, the little port itself was covered by a mole. There were two ships moored to the mole, and no defenders – because the lower town had been lost, so there was no longer any point in holding the harbour. Before the lower walls fell, there had no doubt been a garrison on the mole. I had seen this and Miltiades had not. If Raven’s Wing could get into the harbour, her marines would be behind the enemy line.
Stephanos turned away, already calling orders, and his ship turned, went to ramming speed and sprinted for the mole.
‘On me!’ I shouted, and ran forward as far as the amidships command station at the foot of the mast. ‘Get that mast down!’ I called to the deck crew – who looked like hoplites. Pirates are always better-armed than other men, with the pick of many dead men’s gear to plunder, and I dare say that my sailors had better armour than the front rank of many a city.
The deck crew let the mast down on to the central gangplank, with all the marines and thirty rowers to speed things along.
We passed the other ships, who were all still turning or backing ashore. The smaller Ember was already halfway around.
I had just time to line up the marines and sailors and rowers behind me. They filled the central catwalk all the way aft to the helmsman, and filled the small deck around him, pushing the stern down in the water and raising the bronze-tipped bow. The weight of the mast and the sail helped, too. I pushed the men farther back, and again, pushing against them with my shield to pack them tight in