Crescent Dawn (2 page)

“Celeusta,”
called out one of the rowers, a dark-skinned man from Syria. “The wind blows fierce and the waters seethe. Why hath we been given the command to row?”

The drummer’s eyes lit up. “It is not for me to question the wisdom of my officers or else I, too, would be pulling an oar,” he replied, laughing heartily.

“I would wager that the monkey could row faster,” the Syrian replied.

The
celeusta
eyed the monkey curled up beside him. “He is a rather strong little fellow,” he replied, playing along. “But in answer to your question, I know not the answer. Perhaps the captain wishes to exercise his talkative crew. Or perhaps he simply desires to run faster than the wind.”

Standing on the upper deck a few feet above their heads, the galley’s captain gazed fitfully astern at the horizon. A pair of distant blue-gray dots danced on the turbulent waters, gradually increasing in size with each passing minute. He turned and looked at the breeze filling his sail, wishing that he could run much, much faster than the wind.

A deep baritone voice suddenly disrupted his focus.

“Is it the wrath of the sea that weakens your knees, Vitellus?”

The captain turned to find a robust man in an armored tunic staring at him with a derisive gaze. A Roman centurion named Plautius, he commanded a garrison of thirty legionaries stationed aboard the ship.

“Two vessels approach from the south,” Vitellus replied. “Pirates both, I am most certain.”

The centurion casually gazed at the distant ships, then shrugged.

“Mere insects,” he said without concern.

Vitellus knew better. Pirates had been a nemesis to Roman shipping for centuries. Though organized piracy in the Mediterranean had been wiped out by Pompey the Great hundreds of years ago, small groups of independent thieves still preyed on the open waters. Solitary merchant ships were the usual targets, but the pirates knew that the
bireme
galleys often carried valuable cargo as well. Contemplating his own vessel’s lading, Vitellus wondered whether the sea-borne barbarians had been tipped off after his ship had left port.

“Plautius, I need not remind you of the importance of our cargo,” he stated.

“Yes, of course,” the centurion replied. “Why do you think I am on this wretched vessel? It is I who has been tasked with ensuring its safety until delivery is made to the Emperor in Byzantium.”

“Failure to do so would mean fateful consequences for us and our families,” Vitellus said, thinking of his wife and son in Naples. He scanned the seas off the galley’s bow, noting only rolling waves of slate-colored water.

“There is still no sign of our escort.”

Three days earlier, the galley had departed Judaea with a large
trireme
warship as escort. But the ships had become separated during a violent squall the night before, and the escort had not been seen since.

“Have no fear of the barbarians,” Plautius spat. “We will turn the sea red with their blood.”

The centurion’s brashness was part of the reason that Vitellus had taken an instant disliking toward him. But there were no doubts about his ability to fight, and for that the captain was thankful to have him near.

Plautius and his contingent of legionaries were members of the
Scholae Palatinae
, an elite military force normally assigned to protection of the Emperor. Most were battle-hardened veterans who had fought with Constantine the Great on the frontier and in his campaign against Maxentius, a rival Caesar whose defeat led to the unification of the splintered empire. Plautius himself bore a wicked scar along his left bicep, a reminder of a fierce encounter with a Visigoth swordsman that nearly cost him his arm. He proudly wore the scar as a badge of toughness, an attribute that nobody who knew him dared to question.

As the twin pirate ships drew near, Plautius readied his men along the open deck, supplemented by spare galley crewmen. Each was armed with the Roman battle accoutrements of the day—a short fighting sword called a
gladius
, a round laminated shield, and a throwing lance, or
pilum
. The centurion quickly divided his soldiers into small fighting groups in order to defend both sides of the ship.

Vitellus kept a fixed eye on their pursuers, who now stood within clear sight. They were smaller sail- and oar-driven vessels of sixty feet in length, roughly half the size of the Roman galley. One displayed pale blue square sails and the other gray, while both hulls were painted a flat pewter to match the sea, an old disguise trick favored by Cilician pirates. Each vessel carried twin sails, which accounted for their superior speed under brisk winds. And the winds were blowing strong, offering the Romans little chance of escape.

A glimmer of hope beckoned when the forward lookout shouted a sighting of land ahead. Squinting toward the bow, Vitellus eyed the faint outline of a rocky shoreline to the north. The captain could only speculate as to what land it was. Sailing primarily by dead reckoning, the galley had been blown well off its original course during the earlier storm. Vitellus silently hoped they were near the coast of Anatolia, where other ships of the Roman fleet might be encountered.

The captain turned to a bulldog-shaped man who wielded the galley’s heavy tiller.

“
Gubernator
, steer us to land and toward any leeward waters that may avail itself. If we can take the wind out of their sails, then we can outrun the devils with our oars.”

Belowdecks, the
celeusta
was ordered to beat a rapid-fire rhythm. There was no talking now between Arcelian and the other oarsmen, just a low bellow of heavy breathing. Word had filtered down of the pursuing pirate ships, and each man concentrated on pulling his oar as quickly and efficiently as possible, knowing his own life was potentially at stake.

For nearly half an hour, the galley held its distance from the pursuing vessels. Under both sail and oar, the Roman vessel pushed through the waves at nearly seven knots. But the smaller and better-rigged pirates ultimately gained ground again. Pushed to the brink of exhaustion, the galley’s oarsmen were finally allowed to slow their strokes to conserve energy. As the brown, dusty landmass arose before them, almost beckoning, the pirates closed in and made their attack.

With its companion ship holding astern of the galley, the blue-sailed vessel worked its way abeam and then, oddly, moved ahead of the Roman ship. As it passed, a motley horde of armed barbarians stood on deck and loudly taunted the Romans. Vitellus ignored the shouts, staring at the coastline ahead. The three vessels were within a few miles of shore, and he could see the winds diminish slightly in his square-rigged sail. He feared it was too little and too late for his exhausted oarsmen.

Vitellus scanned the nearby landscape, hoping he could put in ashore and let his legionaries fight on soil, where they were strongest. But the coastline was a high-faced wall of rocky bluffs that showed no safe haven to run the galley aground.

Speeding almost a quarter mile ahead, the lead pirate ship suddenly pivoted. In an expert tack, the vessel swung completely around and quickly veered head-on toward the galley. At first glance, it appeared to be a suicidal move. Roman sea strategy had long relied upon ramming as a primary battle tactic, and even the small
bireme
was outfitted with a heavy bronze prow. Perhaps the barbarians were more brawn than brains, Vitellus considered. He’d like nothing more than to ram and sink the first ship, knowing the second vessel would likely retreat.

“When she turns again, if she turns, follow and impale her with our ram at any cost,” he instructed the steersman. A junior officer was stationed in the ladder well to await directional orders for the oarsmen. On deck, the legionaries held their shields in one hand and their throwing spears in the other, awaiting first blood. Silence befell the ship as everyone waited.

The barbarians held their bow to the galley until they were within a hundred feet. Then as Vitellus predicted, the adversary tacked sharply to port.

“Strike her!” the Roman shouted, as the helmsman pushed the tiller all the way over. Belowdecks, the starboard rowers reversed their oars for several strokes, twisting the galley hard to starboard. Just as quickly, they reverted to forward propulsion, joining their port-side oarsmen at maximum effort.

The smaller pirate ship tried to slip abeam of the galley, but the Roman ship turned with her. The barbarians lost momentum when their sails fell slack as they tacked, while the galley surged ahead. In an instant, the hunter became the prey. As the wind refilled its sails, the smaller ship jumped forward, but not quick enough. The galley’s bronze ram kissed the stern flank of the pirate ship, ripping a gash clear to the transom. The vessel nearly keeled over at impact before righting itself, the stern settling low in the water.

A cheer rang out among the Roman legionaries, while Vitellus allowed himself a grin in belief that victory had suddenly swung in their favor. But then he turned to face the second ship and instantly realized that they’d been had.

During the engagement, the second vessel had quietly drawn closer. As the galley’s ram hit home, the gray-sailed ship immediately drew along the galley’s port beam. The crunch of shattered oars filled the air as a fusillade of arrows and grappling hooks rained down on the deck. Within seconds, the two ships were drawn and lashed together as a mass of sword-wielding barbarians flooded over the side.

The first wave of attackers barely touched the deck when they were impaled by a barrage of razor-sharp spears. The Roman slingers were lethally accurate, and a dozen invaders fell dead in their tracks. But the invasion barely slowed, as a dozen more barbarians took their place. Plautius held his men back until the horde swarmed the deck, then rose and charged. The clang of sword on sword rang over the dying shouts of agony as the slaughter ensued. The Roman legionaries, better trained and disciplined, easily repelled the initial attacks. The barbarians were used to attacking lightly armed merchants, not well-armed soldiers, and they faltered at the stiff resistance. Beating back the boarding party, Plautius rallied half his men to press the attack and personally led the way as the Romans pursued the barbarians onto their own ship.

The barbarians quickly broke ranks, but then regrouped at the realization that they vastly outnumbered the legionaries. Attacking in groups of three and four, they would target a single Roman and overrun his position. Plautius lost six men before quickly organizing his troops into a fighting square.

On the stern deck of the galley, Vitellus watched as the Roman centurion cut a man in two with his sword, mowing through the barbarians like a scythe. The captain had gamely turned the galley inshore during the fight, with its pursuer lashed alongside. But the pirate ship dropped a stone anchor, which eventually found bottom and ground both ships to a halt.

Meanwhile, the blue-sailed vessel had curled around and attempted to rejoin the fight. With flooding from its damaged hull slowing its pace, it aimed clumsily for the galley’s exposed starboard flank. Duplicating the move of its sister ship, the vessel slipped alongside, and its crew quickly flung grapples.

“Oarsmen to arms! Report to the deck!” Vitellus shouted.

Belowdecks, the exhausted oarsmen rallied to the cry. Trained as soldiers first, the oarsmen and every other sailor aboard were expected to defend the ship. Arcelian followed his brethren in line as they gulped down a splash of cold water from a clay pot, then rushed to the deck with a sword in hand.

“Keep your head down,” he said to the
celeusta
, who had passed out the arms and now followed at the end of the line.

“I prefer to look the barbarian in the eye when I kill him,” the drummer replied with his trademark grin.

The oarsmen joined the fight none too soon as the second wave of pirates began storming the starboard rail. The galley’s crew quickly engaged the attackers in a mass of steel and flesh.

As Arcelian stepped onto the main deck, he was aghast at the carnage. Dead bodies and severed limbs were scattered everywhere amid growing pools of blood. Untested in battle, he unwittingly froze for a moment, until an officer ran by and yelled at him, “Sever the grappling lines!”

Spotting a taut rope stretching off the galley’s bow, he sprang forward and sliced the line free with his sword. He watched as the cut line whipped back toward the blue-sailed ship, whose deck stood several feet below his own. He then peered down the galley’s rail and noticed a half dozen more grapple lines affixed to the pirate ship.

“Cut the lines!” he shouted. “Shove the barbarian clear.”

The words fell on deaf ears, as he realized that nearly every crewman aboard was engaged with the barbarians in a fight for life. Only at the stern of the galley did he observe with encouragement that the
celeusta
had joined the effort, attacking a grapple line with a small hatchet. But time was short. Aboard the slowly sinking pirate vessel, the barbarians began making a determined effort to board en masse, realizing their ship had little time left afloat.

Arcelian stepped over a dying shipmate to reach the next grapple and quickly raised his sword. Before the blade came down, he heard a whistling through the air, and then a razor-tipped arrow bit into the deck an inch from his foot. Ignoring it, he swung the blade through the rope, then dove beneath the rail as another arrow darted overhead. Peering over the edge, he spotted his assailant, a Cilician archer wedged at the top of the pirate ship’s mast. The archer had already turned his attention away from the oarsman and was aiming his next arrow astern. Arcelian looked on in horror as he realized that the archer was aiming at the
celeusta
, who was about to cut a third grapple line.

“Celeusta!”
the oarsman screamed.

The warning came too late. An arrow ripped into the little man’s chest, burying itself nearly to the quiver. The drummer gasped, then dropped to his knees, as a flow of blood turned his chest red. In a final act of allegiance, he slammed the hatchet through the grapple line, then fell over dead.