Shadow of God (35 page)

“And this problem is?”

“The Janissaries. They are very unhappy about this campaign. I fear they could get out of control, unless you act quickly.”

“More tipped cooking pots on the horizon?”

“That, and worse, Majesty.”

“Be specific, Piri.”

“They have never been in favor of this campaign. They knew from the start that it would be long and difficult. You know that they love to go into battle, defeat the enemy quickly, and return home burdened with booty.”

Suleiman nodded. Piri went on. “They have been grumbling since we arrived on the island. No, even before. They stomp around the camp. They swagger, they curse. There have been fights.”

“What do you think I should do about it, Piri? I think you have something in mind.”

“If I may, Majesty. You are officially a Janissary. You are a noncommissioned officer in their ranks. One of them. I was there when you took your pay from the Paymaster. They would have died for you on the spot that day.”

“And?”

“Go among them. Dressed in your battle clothes. Tomorrow at dawn, review the troops as a Janissary, yourself.”

Suleiman thought for a moment. “Why tomorrow? The battle begins at dawn. Why not right now?”

“Now?”

“Yes, now. Send ahead to the camps. Have the men assembled. There is no better time than now. You’re right, we will stop this
discontentment before it starts. They will long for battle when I am done with them.”

“Yes, Majesty!” Piri sent his personal guard ahead with the instructions. Then, he and Suleiman stopped at the roadside. A tent was quickly set up, and the Sultan’s wardrobe brought to the roadside. His servants dressed him in the full battle gear of his Janissaries. His loose tunic was light blue, and his pants white. He wore a steel helmet wrapped in white silk and topped with the white feathers of his men. He mounted his horse, and was immediately joined by Ibrahim and Piri Pasha.

“Now, let us see these unhappy Janissaries of mine. Come Ibrahim, stay close by my side with Piri. Before the sun sets over that damned fortress, we will have the cheers of a hundred thousand men to send us off to battle.”

From the ranks, the Janissaries appeared, led by their military band. Drums and cymbals sounded in the afternoon glare. Trumpets and flutes blared their salutes, and rebounded off the walls of the city. From every camp came cheering throngs of soldiers: Janissaries and Sipahis rushed to greet their Sultan. Azabs and archers, miners and sappers poured out of their tents to see Suleiman,
Kanuni
. They pressed Suleiman’s guard to touch his stirrups. Everywhere the bands played and the crowds roared with delight. The knights on the battlements heard the music, and thought that the Turks were massing for an attack. They knew from their sources that Suleiman’s armies
always
preceded a major attack with drums and trumpets and fanfare. This was to be the last time that they would hear such music without having to pay for the pleasure in blood.

Suleiman’s procession moved past the walls, post after post; tower after tower; rampart after rampart; always just out of cannon range. His procession was dwarfed by the massiveness of the walls and the overpowering depth and width of the ditches. His armies appeared tiny beneath the bastions of stone. For the remaining hours of the day, Suleiman rode with his entourage from sea to sea in the giant crescent that encircled the city.

At dawn on the following morning, July 29th, 1522, the battle for Rhodes would begin.

The Fortress of the Knights of Rhodes
July 29th, 1522

The sun had just appeared over the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Rays of pink light reached from the horizon to touch the parapets of the Port of Italy. As the minutes passed, the sky brightened and the light ran down the battlements of the fortress, coloring the pale brown walls with a rosy hue. Soon the warmth of the summer sun began to perfuse the air. The guards on the walls rotated their necks to ease the aching that had beset their muscles after a night of staring into the darkness at the encampment of the enemy. They stretched and waited for their comrades to come and relieve them of their duties. Breakfast would be waiting at each
Auberge.
A few hours sleep would be welcome.

As the morning watch appeared on the ramparts, the knights straightened their uniforms for the formal changing of the guard. Each
langue’s
captain greeted his fellow officer, and passed on the orders of the day. As the men formed up for the exchange, a series of blasts shook the air. Instinctively, the knights ducked and took shelter behind the walls. The noise intensified, coming from all sides at once. Several of the blasts struck the walls directly below the guards. The stones at their feet reverberated with the impact. The guards huddled behind the wall trying to maintain discipline and assess the extent of the attack.

Within moments, it was clear that a massive artillery barrage had begun, and that
all
the ramparts of the fortress were under fire
simultaneously. Though the knights were unaware of the actual numbers, more than sixty of the Sultan’s cannons were firing stone balls up to nine feet in circumference and weighing hundreds of pounds, from points all around the city.

As the impacts became more closely spaced, dust and rubble flew up from the walls. Some of it blew into the city on the winds that came in from the sea. Several stone balls flew over the walls and into the city itself. The huge cannonballs crashed into the cobblestone streets and smashed on impact into sharp, flying shards. People began to run in panic; some to their homes, others to the nearest
Auberge,
seeking safety in the quarters of the knights. The knights themselves ran to muster at each of the
Auberges
before proceeding to their assigned posts.

Chaos in the city increased. Thousands of panicked citizens impeded the progress of the knights and the civilian militias. Though they had waited for this day for many months, the actual start of the barrage was nothing the people could have envisioned. The massiveness of the attack and the constancy of the barrage was beyond imagining. Few could have conceived of such a force of arms aimed at their city. Even the few knights and citizens who remembered the siege led by Suleiman’s great-grandfather forty-two years earlier were shocked by the force and violence of these huge new weapons.

The first casualties of the war came within a few minutes of the start of the barrage; four citizens of Rhodes lay dead. These were not knights fighting on the parapets, nor were they artillerymen responding to the Turkish fire. Rather, they were a small family, seeking the safety of their home; the shelter and refuge they had known for seventy years. Dead were an old man and woman in the center of the Jewish Quarter. Hiding on their bed, they held tightly to their two grandchildren and prayed. They affirmed the unity of God, as they had every day of their lives. “
Shemah Yisrael, Adonoi elohehu. Adonoi echod.”
Seconds later, after they had bolted their door and huddled together on their only bed, a stone ball smashed through the roof and crushed them all beneath its massive weight. The door of the small house was
blocked by the cannonball as it rested upon the dead bodies of the family.

Neighbors tried to rescue their friends, but they found no way to enter the house. The only window was filled with stone rubble, and the cannonball wedged the front door tight. Three knights paused on the way to their battle stations, but it was instantly clear that there could be no survivors in that pitifully crushed little house, for the ball itself practically filled the entire room. “
Je suis desolé, monsieur. Ils sont déjà certainment morts,”
the knights said to a pleading neighbor who was trying to rescue the family
.
I am sorry, Sir. They are already certainly dead. The knights saluted and hurried to their stations, leaving the neighbors wringing their hands in despair.

In the Palace of the Grand Master, the
Piliers
and lieutenants were converging on the meeting room. Philippe was standing at the great oak table. The windows were shuttered against the attack, the room lit by candles. For the knights rushing in from the bright daylight, it took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the dim lighting. Thomas Docwra was speaking to Philippe as the others arrived.

“They have formed a crescent around the walls. Complete encirclement, as we expected. Our scouts are trying to find out the exact deployment, as well as the numbers of men in each camp. So far, we have counted nearly sixty cannons firing from about twenty positions around the city. They seem to be concentrating the heaviest fire on our weakest walls.”

Philippe was distressed to hear this information, as it suggested that the Muslims had learned about the relative strengths and weaknesses of the city. “How severe is the damage so far?”

“It’s too soon to tell, my Lord. Most of the cannonballs have been swallowed by the walls. They have penetrated the outer stones, but they are lost in the earth and the inner reaches. Thus far, there are no serious breaches.”

John Buck, Philippe’s lieutenant, had been listening to the Grand Master and interrupted. “They have been at it only a few minutes, my Lords. Already there is some damage to the Bastion of England. However, we are now returning fire, and I think we’ll
inflict some heavy damage to their batteries within the hour. Our positions are well aimed, and the Muslims are only firing for effect, making corrections. I hope we can destroy many of their cannon before very long.”

Gregoire de Morgut rushed into the room. “My Lord, we have had our first deaths.” The other knights stopped talking and turned to Morgut. “I was coming from the
Auberge
, and some of the knights told me of a house in the Jewish Quarter that was hit directly with a large stone. It crushed four people to death. They tell me that the stone ball was massive. Bigger than any we have seen before.”

Philippe looked at his knights. There was silence in the room. Then, d’Amaral and his servant-at-arms, Blasco Diaz, came in together. They walked to the head of the table and waited there in silence.

“Chancellor,” Philippe said, acknowledging d’Amaral.

“Grand Master,” d’Amaral replied.

Then, turning away from the Chancellor, he said, “Our presence is required out on the battlements,” Philippe said to all the men gathered. “We need no further planning. The battle has been joined, and I doubt there will be much letup for some time to come. Get to your men, and make sure that the militia and the mercenaries perform as we have trained them. Andrea, muster the Inns of Castile and Aragon, and lead them yourself. We need all of the officers at the forefront of this battle.”

“
D’accord, Seigneur,
” the Chancellor said. He nodded to Diaz, and the two hurried out to the battle.

“For the moment,” Philippe continued, “we need to see just how the Muslim plans to execute this siege, and most of all, to keep the citizens calm. Urge those who are not fighting to stay indoors and keep out of the way.”

The knights bowed and hurried from the room.

John Buck remained behind. When all the knights had left, he approached the Grand Master, who was pouring over the diagrams of the city’s defenses.

“My Lord?”

Philippe looked up, surprised to see his lieutenant still there. “Yes, John?”

“My Lord, I have a man waiting outside whom I think you should see.”

“Yes? What’s this about?”

“He is Basilios Carpazio, from Karpathos; a Greek fisherman, and he has a plan that may help us.”

“What plan, John? What does he want to do?”

“Let me bring him in, my Lord. He will tell you.”

Buck left the room, and in a moment he was back with a short stocky man dressed in fisherman’s clothing. He was darkly complected, with black hair and dark brown eyes that looked black in the dimness of the room. He wore a heavy mustache, with a stubbly growth of black beard that covered the rest of his face. There was the smell of raw fish in his clothes. His boots were worn and old. He stood before the Grand Master with his head bowed. He held his black fisherman’s cap in front of his waist, and worried it with both hands.