Imperial Fire (13 page)

‘Sir.’

Aimery stood with legs akimbo, hands behind his back. ‘Since you’ve had no chance to enjoy the sights, I’ve got a treat for you. Run around the city walls as far as the Golden Horn. The Gate of Charisius is particularly fine, I’m told. I’d be interested to hear your description of it when you return.’

There and back was twenty miles and by the time Lucas hobbled into barracks after sunset, his calf muscles were so cramped that he was forced to walk backwards.

After washing his blistered feet, he fell onto his cot and lay staring at the ceiling.

‘Here,’ said Aiken, sliding across a hunk of bread.

Lucas didn’t thank him. ‘If it had been you who’d done the mocking, no one would have punished you.’

Aiken propped himself on one elbow. ‘I don’t understand your animosity. From the moment we met, you’ve had it in for me. What harm have I ever done you? Well? Answer.’

Lucas rolled over. ‘You’ll find out.’

Two days later Vallon rode into the barracks, provoking a scurry of activity.

‘Everyone to the parade ground,’ Aimery shouted. ‘At the double.’

Lucas heard similar orders ringing out from the other barracks. ‘What’s all the excitement about?’

‘It’s the beginning of the campaign season,’ Gorka said. ‘Vallon’s going to give us our marching orders.’

The unit marched out into a glorious April day. Vallon and his centurions sat their fine horses, the sea behind them the colour of hyacinths under an unclouded sky. For the first time Lucas laid eyes on the other centurions. Conrad, the shaven-headed and craggy German second-in command, looked as if he’d been hewn from rock. Otia, the Georgian, with his jet-black hair, wavy beard and beautiful dark eyes, resembled a melancholy saint in an icon. Lucas had heard that in ordinary life, Otia was the most self-effacing of men, but that in battle he was a maniac.

‘Squadron form ranks,’ Conrad ordered.

The men formed up in three lines, Lucas’s unit on the right of the rear rank.

Vallon pitched his voice to carry. ‘Can everybody hear me?’

‘Sir!’ the squadron shouted.

A breeze blew a lock of hair across Vallon’s face. He brushed it back. ‘No doubt you’ve been wondering where your next tour of duty will take you. Well, I for one won’t be returning to the Danube frontier.’ Vallon raised a hand to quell the cheers. ‘My commission takes me much further afield, on an expedition commissioned by His Imperial Majesty. I’m not at liberty to tell you where, only that it will be at least two years before I see my home and family again.’

Not a sound from the Outlanders, all of them straining for the general’s next words.

‘I’m not taking the whole squadron,’ said Vallon. ‘My orders are to select a hundred volunteers. We can whittle the number down by excluding all married men and those over forty. That still leaves almost two hundred of you. I hope I can find enough brave souls from that number to furnish a sufficient force.’

Lucas saw his excitement reflected on his companions’ faces.

‘Those who join me will receive double wages. Those of you fortunate enough to return will be paid the same again. For those who don’t make it back, there will be generous pensions for your families. That tells you something about the dangers we’ll be facing. I want you to dwell on that aspect before you make a decision.’

Excitement rippled through the squadron.

Conrad rode forward a pace. ‘Silence in the ranks!’

The parade ground fell still. At its rooftop nest, a stork clacked its beak with a sound like the roll of a snare drum. Out to sea, ships heeled against the breeze.

‘Front rank first,’ Vallon said. ‘All those who wish to join the expedition, take two steps forward.’

A grizzled Croat thrust up a hand. ‘Permission to speak, General?’

‘Granted.’

‘What happens to the men you’ll leave behind?’

‘They’ll be merged into a new squadron commanded by Centurion Conrad and posted to the Danube border.’

The front rank looked along their line, shook their heads and stepped forward as one.

Vallon rubbed his brow. ‘I said I’m not taking married men.’

‘Permission to speak again,’ said the Croat.

‘If you must. In your case, it won’t make any difference. As I recall, you have at least one wife and four children you acknowledge as your own.’

The Croat glared at his chuckling companions. ‘General, I’d rather risk the unknown than go back to those fever marshes. As for my wife and children, they know a soldier’s fortunes are uncertain. For the last eight years they’ve lived every day with the fear that I won’t be coming home.’

A murmur of agreement ran through the ranks.

‘Silence!’ shouted the three centurions.

Vallon’s gaze raked over the faces. ‘On this expedition, failure to return isn’t a possibility. It’s a probability.’ He paused. ‘I’m flattered that you put so much faith in me, but I don’t demand loyalty for loyalty’s sake. Let me repeat: the expedition will be extremely dangerous. Many of you who ride out with me won’t return. Their bodies will be consumed by wild beasts in lands where no Christian has trod.’ He left another resonant silence. ‘We’ll try the second rank, as before. All those who wish to volunteer, take…’

With impressive timing, the second rank stepped forward.

Vallon conferred with his centurions before addressing the squadron again. ‘Third rank.’

Lucas took two paces forward, face held high, chest straining. No, not every man had volunteered. Lucas glimpsed a gap to his left and realised that Aiken had held back. Vallon noticed it, too, and made the best of an embarrassing situation.

‘Aiken has no need to volunteer. As my son and shield-bearer, his place is at my side.’

Otia the Georgian centurion stuck out his hand. ‘That man there. What are you smirking about?’

Lucas jerked his head back. ‘Nothing, sir.’

Vallon rubbed his forehead again and sighed. ‘I see there’s nothing for it but to choose for myself.’

He went into a huddle with the centurions and several minutes passed before he broke off and faced the squadron. ‘I’d take all of you if I could. No man left behind must take it as a slight on his courage, loyalty and integrity.’

Vallon dismounted and began the long selection process. From where Lucas stood, he saw that the general had words with every man he came to, and warm gestures besides. After he’d passed by, some of the soldiers clutched their fists at their sides and some went grey with the shock of rejection. One man broke into sobs and Lucas saw gritted faces and the sparkle of tears on several others.

Vallon’s progress meant that Lucas was the last to hear his fate. His tense stance made him tremble by the time the general stood in front of him.

‘Trooper Lucas, by all reports you’ll make a fine soldier in time. You handle weapons well and have a natural way with horses. But you’re too young and green for this adventure. It would be a crime to expose you to dangers you’re not ready to meet. Also, your Greek isn’t up to standard.’

Rejection struck Lucas like a kick in the guts. Vallon had turned away before he found his voice.

‘General, you said we might be away two years.’

‘At least.’

Lucas’s voice shook. ‘In that time I’ll have grown to manhood and acquired the necessary military skills. My training goes well and my Greek teacher is pleased with my progress.’

Vallon looked back. ‘I’m sure that when I return, you won’t disappoint me.’

‘General!’

Gorka seized Lucas’s arm. ‘Shut up! Vallon’s heard your plea. He’s turned down many others more deserving.’

Lucas struggled, features contorting. ‘You can’t leave me behind!’

Gorka’s hand dug into his arm. ‘For your own sake, get a grip.’

Vallon turned, his face conveying puzzlement. Everyone within earshot was spectating. Over the sea, gulls wheeled and mewed.

‘You took me into your home,’ Lucas panted. ‘You put me into your squadron with Aiken. To be spear-companions, you said. You can’t separate us now.’

Centurion Josselin jerked his chin. ‘Take him away. Put him on a charge. Failure to obey orders.’

‘Wait,’ Vallon said as Gorka lugged Lucas away. He moved closer and spoke only for the young Frank’s benefit. ‘Yes, I hoped you and Aiken would become companions. Unfortunately, I hear that your attitude towards him is anything but friendly. Spite isn’t a quality I admire.’ He swung on his heel. ‘Dismiss the squadron.’

Lucas made a lunge, but Gorka yanked him back. ‘You’ve said enough,’ he snarled. ‘It’s a flogging for you.’

Blanched and dazed, Lucas knew what he had to do.
Vallon, I’m your son, the son of the wife you murdered, brother of your younger son and the daughter I held in my arms before she died two years ago. Sole survivor of a disgraced family reduced to rooting for acorns in the mountains.

He opened his mouth, framing a shout.
Father!

‘Let Lucas come,’ Aiken said. ‘Unlike me, he acts as if his life depends on it. He doesn’t like me. I don’t like him. That doesn’t matter. I’ll be interested in seeing how he deals with the reality of life on campaign.’

Vallon waved away the bystanders. ‘Gorka, you were in charge of Lucas’s training. What do you think?’

Gorka slackened his grip. ‘Well, General, it’s like this. Trooper Lucas has a long way to go before he can call himself a soldier, but I’ve dealt with worse raw material. The thing is, he gets up my nose, and what I hate is the thought of him twiddling his dick in some cushy billet while me and my mates are fighting whoever it is you’re leading us against. So… I agree with trooper Aiken. Let him come and take his chances.’

Lucas had been standing to attention for two hours. Vallon’s face seemed to go into eclipse, the darkness not like the dark of night, but the absolute blackness of a world where no sun ever shone. He had no recollection of Gorka catching him just before he hit the ground.

All leave was cancelled. For the next ten days the expeditionary force laboured from dawn to dark. They spent most of the time in a cordoned-off section of the harbour loading supplies onto the dromons –
Stork
and
Pelican –
and the two cargo ships. Vallon and Hero sometimes appeared on the quay to monitor progress, and it was on one of these occasions that Lucas, trundling barrels up
Pelican’
s gangplank, crossed paths with the Sicilian. He wiped his brow.

‘These barrels weigh as heavy as bullion. What’s in them?’

Hero smiled. ‘Nothing so precious as gold, I’m afraid. It’s a mineral called cobalt, mined in Persia and used by potters to produce a blue glaze on ceramics.’

‘Is it valuable?’

‘I’m not sure. We don’t know what our clients want from us.’

‘Who are they? Where are we going?’

‘Vallon will tell you once we’re at sea. All I can say is that by the time you return, you’ll be grown to man’s estate.’

‘Sir…’

Hero had already turned away.

Lucas delivered his next statement in a flurry. ‘Thank you for buying the horse. I’ll repay you.’

Hero blushed. ‘You weren’t supposed to know.’

‘It doesn’t matter. I’m grateful – not just for Aster, but for the way you treated my wounds. I crave your pardon for my churlish behaviour on the ship.’

Hero’s expression gentled. ‘Granted without reservation. I know what it’s like to be a stranger in a strange land. I wasn’t much older than you when I fell in with Vallon.’ Seeing Lucas about to pursue the subject, he made his tone brisk. ‘If you want to show your gratitude, bestow it on Aiken. These last few months haven’t been easy for him.’

‘Lucas,’ Gorka shouted. ‘No one gave you leave to chat. Get back to work.’

Lucas lay in bed that night, turning over what Hero had said, torn between the physician’s request and his own resentment. Resentment won, rising like a bitter froth. So Aiken hasn’t had an easy time of it these last few weeks. What about me? I’ve been carrying pain for ten years. Curdled memory dragged him back to the night when Vallon had lurched into the nursery splashed with his wife’s blood, his sword raised to slay his children. Lucas had been six years old, and since then not a day or night had passed when the hideous image didn’t rear up.

‘Aargh!’

He bolted awake to find Gorka’s face leering down, his features grotesque in the light of a candle.

‘No more pleasant dreams, laddie. We’re off to catch a ship and explore the world.’

‘You mean —’

‘That’s right. By the time the city wakes, we’ll be gone, and every one of us no more than a memory.’

Stars were multiplying in the east when Vallon’s squadron began filing aboard
Pelican.
Midnight had passed before everyone had found a berth and stowed their kit. Still no sign of the duke. Vallon couldn’t even send to find out what was delaying him because the Logothete had ordered the quay to be sealed. The general paced the dock with mounting impatience. The stars were paling before Skleros and his entourage trotted up with about as much urgency as a group of clubmen returning from a good dinner. Some of the ambassador’s company were the worse for drink. It was all Vallon could do to contain his anger.

‘My Lord, the minister gave clear instructions that we were to sail under cover of dark.’

The duke’s bottom lip drooped. ‘My dear general, do you really think our departure would have gone unnoticed after all the bustle of the last fortnight?’

‘My Lord, we’re carrying enough treasure to attract every pirate in the Black Sea. It’s imperative we observe all security measures.’

‘Oh, stop fussing,’ Skleros said. He yawned and looked around. ‘Now then, if you’d be so good, I’ll need some men to see to our horses.’

Vallon’s windpipe burned with suppressed rage. ‘That gentleman will learn I’m not to be trifled with,’ he told Josselin.

‘Thank God we’re sailing on separate vessels.’

Lucas was among the party who loaded the duke’s mounts. Josselin had assigned him to one of the cargo ships because of his horse-handling skills, and even in his fuming temper, Vallon noticed how neatly the youth coaxed a high-strung steed up the gangplank.

The sun was sliding up over the rim of Asia when Josselin approached. ‘Everybody aboard and everything loaded, sir.’

Vallon looked around at the empty quay. No one had come to see them off. No priest to bless the enterprise with holy water. No proud flags flying from the mainmast. Vallon had received his last instructions from the Logothete the morning before and bade farewell to his family after a private service in St Sophia. A last glance and he strode up the gangway. ‘Cast off.’

Crew members drew up the plank. A gang of dockers began unhitching the mooring cables.
Pelican
was almost floating free when a commotion at the far end of the wharf drew Vallon’s attention.

‘Hold hard!’ Wulfstan shouted.

But Vallon had already seen the tall blond man loping down the quay with a bow slung over his shoulder, a dog at his side and a porter pushing a hand cart scurrying in their wake. ‘Get a move on,’ he cried to the dockers.

‘No, wait!’ Hero shouted. ‘We can’t sail away without saying farewell.’

Wayland drew up beside the ship and smiled lopsidedly at Vallon. ‘That was sneaky – telling me you wouldn’t be sailing until next week.’

‘I was acting in your best interests.’

‘I’ll decide what’s good for me.’

‘Who told you we were leaving?’ Vallon demanded. He spun round. ‘Wulfstan, was it you?’

‘It was me,’ Hero said.

Vallon growled low in his throat.

Wayland cocked his head. ‘Are you going to lower the plank or do I have to jump? I’m not as agile as I used to be, and my swimming hasn’t improved since I left England.’

‘I don’t want you to come out of any misplaced sense of obligation.’

‘I’m coming of my own will.’

‘Does Syth know?’

‘We discussed it most of the night. She’s not happy with my decision, but agrees it’s the right one. There’s no hurry to return to England. She and the children will remain in Constantinople with your family. They’ll take comfort from each other in our absence.’

Someone on the duke’s ship demanded to know the reason for the delay. Vallon looked at Hero. The smile and shining eyes said it all. Behind Hero Wulfstan was grinning like a loony.

Vallon turned to the waiting crewmen. ‘Lower the plank.’

When Wayland arrived on deck, both men embraced. ‘You always did go your own way,’ Vallon muttered. ‘I pray you haven’t chosen the wrong path.’ He broke off and walked blindly away.

The wind was against the flotilla and when
Pelican
had shoved off into open water, the two tiers of oar ports below deck on each side opened and one hundred and twenty rowers put out their oars. A drum beat a sonorous rhythm and the oars lifted. When the beat was established, a whistle shrilled and the oars dipped in unison. Up they rose again, water flashing in the sunlight, and down once more, the fifteen-foot-long shafts flexing under the strain.
Pelican
gathered way. The rhythm of the oars speeded up until water ran foaming past the prow.

Vallon looked back at
Stork
.
Pelican
was the larger of the dromons – a rakish fighting vessel almost one hundred and fifty feet from bow to stern, only twenty-five feet across the beam. Her crew numbered a hundred and forty, plus about seventy of Vallon’s squadron standing in for the fifty marines she usually carried. Two masts supported the furled lateen sails that gave greater manoeuvrability than the square-rig Vallon had learned to handle on his northern voyage. For combat, she was equipped with a metal-clad ram projecting from her prow, and an armoured wooden castle amidships for archers and catapults. Bronze siphons for spraying Greek Fire had been fitted at bow and stern. The stern cabin, whose roof also functioned as a fighting platform, only accommodated a dozen passengers, including the captain and his senior officers, Vallon, his centurions and Hero. The rest of the Outlanders, plus the off-duty sailors, slept under canvas awnings on deck.

The supply ships,
Thetis
and
Dolphin
, were a type of dromon called
chelandia
, with broad hulls adapted to carry horses and cargo. Crewed by a hundred men, they were slower than the fighting dromons under either sail or oar. Thirty of Vallon’s squadron, together with the muleteers and other non-combatants, had been divided between the transports. The arrangement was to rendezvous at the northern end of the Bosporus before proceeding in convoy across the Black Sea. Already they were in the strait’s southern mouth. Vallon watched Galata approach. He could even see his villa and knew that Caitlin would be up there holding the girls and telling them not to cry.
Hush now. Your father will be home soon.

Three years!

He saw Wayland staring landwards with a bereft expression that flexed in a forced smile when he noticed Vallon’s attention.

‘I would have suffered more pain if I hadn’t joined you.’

‘And your pain softens mine. Wayland, I can’t tell you how glad I am to have you and Hero at my side.’

‘Don’t forget me,’ said Wulfstan.

Vallon’s laugh sounded like a sob. ‘You, too, you Viking rogue.’

Wayland made a fist, shoved it into Vallon’s arm and turned away to watch Constantinople dropping away behind them.

Pelican
and
Stork
reached the Black Sea in mid-afternoon and anchored off the Ancyraean Cape – so named, Hero told Vallon, because here Jason had taken on board a stone anchor for the
Argo
during his quest for the Golden Fleece. The supply ships didn’t catch up until the sun was flaring behind the soft black contours of the Thracian coast. During the night the wind shifted full west and at dawn the fleet hoisted sail and set course for Trebizond. It was the twenty-sixth day of April.

When the coast had sunk from sight, Vallon assembled his squadron and told them their destination. They took the news calmly, unable to absorb the scale of the enterprise or the distances involved. For most of them, the realm of China was a destination as abstract as heaven – or hell. On that first day they were just glad to be away from barracks, bound for a mysterious empire where the natives talked like cats, concubines minced on bound feet and dragons were as common as crows.

Warm airs wafted them east all day and when Vallon woke next morning, the same favourable wind was pushing them along. He stood at the bow, watching flying fish skimming the waves.

Hero joined him. ‘At this rate we’ll reach Trebizond within a week.’

‘And our journey will have hardly begun.’

‘Admit it, part of you is thrilled to be off on such a grand venture.’

‘That’s what makes me feel guilty. It’s always harder on the ones we leave behind. What about you, Hero? Is there anyone who grieves for your absence?’

‘My colleagues will miss me, I expect. Apart from them, there are only my sisters.’

‘The Five Furies, you used to call them.’

‘Marriage has mellowed them. I’m the proud uncle of seven nephews and five nieces now. This journey will save me a fortune in presents.’

Vallon sensed that Hero felt awkward talking about personal matters and changed the subject. ‘Let’s take a closer look at the Greek Fire siphons. I’ve only seen them in action at a distance and I’d like a better understanding of how they work.’

Iannis the ship’s captain was reluctant to stage a demonstration. ‘General, the siphons are only used in battle, and even then only in extremis. Greek Fire poses almost as much danger to the ship that fires it as to the target.’

Vallon was insistent. ‘As military commander, I need to know our fighting capabilities.’

While sailors reefed sails and a team readied the bow flame thrower, Vallon and Hero examined its mechanism. The incendiary compound was ejected from a swivel-mounted bronze barrel with a mouth cast in the shape of a roaring lion. From the rear of the flamethrower a copper tube, fitted with a valve to regulate the flow of oil, led to the fuel reservoir – a welded iron chamber pressurised by a bronze plunge pump. Underneath the reservoir, mounted on wheels, stood a bellows-fanned charcoal brazier to heat the fuel.

Ten men were required to operate the machine. They mustered in leather suits and aprons fire-proofed with vinegar and alum. Vallon noticed that several of the men’s faces bore flame scars. Their leader explained their functions. One man’s job was to tend the brazier and ignite the jet of hot oil at the muzzle. The squad leader aimed the siphon, while another man operated the valve, and two others manned the pressure pump. The rest were firefighters, equipped with buckets of sand and oxhide blankets. Before the team went to work, they spread a layer of sand around the weapon and crossed themselves.

They lit the brazier, and when the coals glowed red, its minder began pumping the bellows. The reservoir made ominous pinging sounds as the metal expanded.

‘General, please stand well back,’ said the captain. ‘It’s not unknown for the cauldron to explode.’

‘I’ve seen it happen myself, sir,’ Wulfstan said behind Vallon. ‘Killed the entire firing crew. I can still smell them roasting.’

One look at the Viking’s face and Vallon retreated half a dozen paces.

The team leader took control of the siphon and the two men at the pump began pressurising the reservoir. The firestarter took up position with a flaming torch. The valve operator stood ready. In their outlandish gear, they looked like agents of Satan preparing to incinerate sinners in the fiery pit.

The leader seemed to take his timing from the sounds produced by the fuel tank. His face knotted in concentration. The tank gave another high-pitched twang. The air around it pulsed and shimmered. Vallon took another backward step.

‘Now!’

The valve operator turned on the oil supply and a jet of hot fuel spewed from the nozzle. The stink of the compound caught in Vallon’s throat and stung his eyes. At full stretch the firestarter lit the stream with a torch.
Whoomph
. A smoky red and yellow jet of flame sprayed twenty feet from the barrel, the range increasing to more than thirty feet as the men working the pump increased their efforts. The jet formed a reverse arc, the partly vaporised fuel curving down before rising in a fan of roaring fire that fell to the sea and, still burning, drifted past the dromon’s hull in fiery pools.

‘That’s enough,’ shouted the captain, scissoring his arms.

The supply valve was turned off. The flame shortened and died, leaving blobs and dribbles of stinking oil sizzling on the carpet of sand. A sooty belch of cloud drifted away downwind. The team wheeled away the brazier and opened a pressure relief valve on the reservoir, while the rest of the crew stood ready with their fire blankets. When the contraption had been made safe, they looked at each other and puffed out their cheeks as if only divine grace had prevented a disaster.

Vallon bowed to the captain. ‘That was most impressive, and more than a little terrifying. Now that I understand the power of the weapon, I won’t imperil your ship again merely to satisfy my curiosity.’

When the weapon had cooled, Vallon and Hero inspected it more closely. ‘Have you learned any more about the formula?’ Vallon asked. In the wilderness north of Rus, Hero had improvised an incendiary to destroy a Viking longship.

‘I think the main ingredient is a substance called rock oil that seeps from the ground in parts of Persia and the Caucasus. As for what makes it stick to whatever it touches… I imagine they use plant resins – dragon’s blood would be an appropriate choice. Quicklime might be involved, too. Did you notice how the fire burned more intensely when it hit the sea?’

Hero examined the pump. ‘Very ingenious,’ he said. ‘It’s double action, drawing air on the up-stroke as well as the down-stroke. I must make a drawing.’

Vallon laughed. ‘There’s not a branch of science you couldn’t master if you set your mind to it.’ He squeezed Hero’s shoulder. ‘It would have been a much lonelier command without your company.’

Vallon wandered down the deck, exchanging words with his men. They seemed to be in good heart, enjoying the fine weather after months cooped up in their winter quarters. He leaned his hands on the rail and surveyed the convoy, the dromons sailing under shortened canvas to allow the supply ships to keep pace.
Pelican
cut through the waves within forty yards of
Dolphin
and Vallon saw Lucas sparring with another trooper on the foredeck.