The Archer's Marines: The First Marines - Medieval fiction action story about Marines, naval warfare, and knights after King Richard's crusade in Syria, ... times (The Company of Archers Book 5) (8 page)

       Four of our galleys are going for the Tunisian galleys beached off to the left of the two great Tunis docks; six galleys carrying most of our archers are going to the docks and the city gates; and five galleys with a number of prize crews are going for the ships anchored in the harbor. 

       The size of the prize crews is larger for those assigned to cogs and other sailing ships and quite small for those that take a galley.  All the prize crews for galleys have to do is use their rudders and give orders to the slaves on their rowing benches.

       Peter and I will each be leading three of the six galleys going to the two great stone docks and then to block the city gates.  All six are crammed with a large number our strongest archers as well as several dozen prize crews for the ships and galleys we hope to find tied up at the Tunis docks. 

       As soon as Peter’s and my galleys reach our assigned docks our archers will jump off and we’ll each lead our galleys’ Marines at a run to one of the two city gates.  Jeffrey will then be once again in command of his own galley until I return.

       My galley’s assignment is the northern dock and my Marines and I are going for the northernmost gate facing the harbor; Peter will be at the other dock and leading the Marines going for the city gate facing southern part of the harbor.   While we are leading our archers to the city gates the prize crews and a smaller number of Marines from our galleys will be going for prizes from among the ships at the docks.

      
Helen nods her head and agrees when I tell her, quite sternly as a matter of fact, that she is only allowed to stay outside on the deck in front of our forecastle and watch until the fighting starts – and that she absolutely must move inside with the door barred during the fighting.  She’s a curious little thing and I know her well enough that I quietly arrange for Jeffrey to assign one of his most dependable sailors to move her inside when the fighting starts and guard the door.

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       Tunis is a great city with a superb harbor. Its two long docks are close to the city wall and the two gates that serve them. It’s an altogether impressive place with a couple of beautiful white sandy beaches.  The huge dome of a mosque can be seen rising far above the city walls. 

         Beyond the city walls to the left houses with red tile roofs are inside walled compounds.  They run all the way up to the great fortress on top of the hill that towers above the walled city and harbor.  To the right are great open areas where the desert people camp, the city’s caravanserai are located, and the city’s huge livestock market operates where everything from camels and horses to slaves and cattle is constantly being bought and sold. 

       On the beach, particularly to the left, are boatyards with a number of ships under construction or and many more beached. 

       More than fifteen thousand people are said to live inside the city walls and another ten thousand beyond them.  And they are all apparently either pirates or merchants or their slaves and servants and overlords.   Also, depending on the time of the year, there are often as many as ten thousand desert people in the caravanserai and camping outside the city along the nearby little river that runs into the sea from somewhere in the interior. 

      
The desert people camping outside the city walls along the river are a source of uncertainty and concern.  I know they’re there because I can see their tents all over the place.  Will they rush to help fight us off or not? It concerns us all because we don’t know how many of them are here or how they will fight or what weapons they’ll use.  Hopefully they’ll be like the Saracens we fought for Richard and Lord Edmund - lots of boasting and no armor or bottom. In other words, geese for our Marines to pluck.

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       It’s midday Friday, the Islamic Sabbath, and many people, we hope, are at the mosque.  Even so, many people are standing on the beach and on the dock watching as we row in.  There are a lot of us and we’re coming fast so it’s little wonder that they are looking. 

      
Perhaps we’re too early and the prayers and sermons haven’t started yet; well, it’s too late now.  We’re committed.

       We are barely a third of the way into the harbor when I see the first of the watchers begin running for the city gates to escape and sound the alarm; others begin running toward the galleys on the beach to confront us
. 

       Unlike our previous prize taking raids our fighting men are not evenly distributed with each of our galley captains responsible for cutting out as many prizes as possible. 

       This time our strategy will be different in several ways – for one, we’ll have archer-heavy forces under the command of me and Peter going all the way to the two city gates that face the docks.  We’ll disembark from the six galleys and, instead of our Marines staying on the decks of our galleys and trying to keep the Moslems off the docks as we’ve done in our previous port raids, we’ll disembark and try to reach the gates and block them before they can get out of the city to attack our prize crews and rejoin their ships.  Hopefully, this will give our prize crews more time so they can get all the ships at the dock – and everywhere else.

       In other words, instead of staying on our galleys next to the dock and using our Marines’ longbows to fight off the Moslems trying to get at our prize crews as we’ve done in the past, this time we’ll protect them by keeping the Moslems penned up inside the city walls so they can’t attack in the first place. 
At least that’s the plan.

       Similarly, while Peter and I are leading our Marines to the city gates Henry will be leading four other galleys with a large number of prize crews to get the galleys that are nosed in side by side all along the beach.  He too will disembark a force of Marines to move inland and cover his prize crews with their longbows. 

       Only Harold’s five galleys going after the ships in the harbor will be archer light.  They will have some, of course, but nothing comparable to the numbers we’ll have on the beach and at the city gates.

                     
Chapter Six

       Henry promoted me to sergeant and assigned me to lead the archers on my galley when our prize crews go after the Tunisian galleys beached along the edge of the harbor.  There are a lot of them, mostly next to what appears to be a shipyard for the repair and construction of all kinds of ships. 

       My Marines and I are as prepared and determined as men can be.  This is the chance of a lifetime for all of us to become rich and rise above our current class as landless peasants and soldiers.  As you might imagine, I am determined not to let the opportunity pass and neither, I think, are my Marines.

       No less than seven prize crews are on each of the four galleys going after the beached galleys with us.  Every prize crew, so every prize crew’s sergeant claims, is ready and anxious to fight their way on to an Algerian galley and take it off the beach.  Then, God willing, they’ll sail them on to Malta and Cyprus and we’ll all be rich. 

       It’s the job of me and my Marines to use our longbows to keep the heathen far away from our prize crews while they either take or burn all the pirate galleys nosed in along the beach.  Only when the prize crews finish will Henry give the word and we’ll rush back to our own galleys and row them away to safety.

       As you might imagine, we want our prize crews to cut their prizes out and get away quickly before the heathen bastards begin to fight back.  But it’s good luck to the Moors if they want to fight.  We’ll each be carrying a bale of longs and we know how to use them.

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       I am standing here in the bow next to Little Ralph the fisherman, the big sergeant of my galley’s sailors.  At the moment we’re rowing up to the beach and many of my Marines are still on the rowing benches.   Ralph and I are particularly looking for Tunisian galleys that are merely nosed into the beach next to the dock and still floating - so one of our prize crews can quickly push it off the beach and climb aboard to kill any Moors we find and start the slaves to rowing it out of the harbor and on to Malta. 

       If a galley doesn’t have slaves to row it to Malta, the prize crew is supposed to push it off into the water and go look for one that does.  Later, if we have time, we’ll tow out those we find without slave rowers when we leave.

       “Over there.  Put us in there,” I hear Little Ralph shout over my shoulder to his rudder man as he points to a string of galleys that are nosed into the shore.

       “Stand by to back oars” …… “back oars.”

       There is a grinding noise for a couple of seconds as the bow of our hull begins to come over the sands and pebbles of the beach.  The jolt of the hull hitting the shore almost throws me off my feet – and certainly saves the heathen who is running towards the beached galleys from the arrow I was about to launch.  His reprieve is only temporarily - Sweaty Bill puts a shaft through him just as I begin to push out my bow for a shot.  So I adjust my aim and put a long into the heathen running behind him.  Then I leap over the front deck railing and into the knee deep water. 

       “Good luck, John,” I hear Little Ralph shout as I begin sloshing my way up to the beach.

       Even before we finish coming to a stop there are great cheers and shouts and about half the men on the deck, the men of my galley’s seven prize crews, begin to leap over the rail on either side of me to wade ashore and go for the galleys.  Every prize crew sergeant is a volunteer because a promotion to be the sergeant captain of his own ship is on offer if he and his crew get their prize to Cyprus.  The men who didn’t get selected to lead prize crews are jealous of them and rightly so. 
It’s a good thing to be a prize captain and I ought to know; I was one and that’s why I’m here in command of the galley I took out of Algiers last year.

       There are six men in each of our prize crews going for galleys – four sailors and two archers.  The sailors are carrying ships’ shields and either swords or pikes; the two archers long bows and quivers.  One sailor in each prize crew is carrying a bundle of twigs and a lantern to fire them if they come across a galley they cannot take because it has neither slaves to row it nor can be pushed out into the water to be towed

       “Marines follow me.” I shout as I jump in the water and repeat the call I’d practiced so many times on the bank of the River Fowey.

       My Marines pour up from the rowing benches, pause from a split second to grab up a bundle of arrows in addition to those already in their two quivers, and jump into the water to follow me.  It’s up to my knees and cold.  My bow is strung and I’m holding it as high over my head to keep the bowstring dry. 
Some of our arrows are going to get wet but that won’t matter if we use them before they warp.

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       Removing the weight of all the Marines and the men in the prize crews from the front of my galley raises our bow and, as expected, we float free. 

       One of my chosen men jumps down into the water as John and the prize crews and John’s Marines vault over the railing and slosh their way toward the beach.  His name is Ben and he was an apprentice miller in Yorkshire before he ran away to be a sailor. 

       Ben will stand there knee deep in the water and use the mooring line he’s holding to keep our galley close to shore until all of the men I’ve landed are either back on board or safely away on our prizes.  Three others of my sailor men are on deck holding long Swiss pikes and ready to push us away from shore for a fast departure as soon as the last man, that’s Ben, finally scrambles back on board.

       Except for a couple of four-man sailor teams armed with pikes and swords that I’m holding to use as reinforcements if one of our prize teams need help, there is no one left on board other than the three pike men and me and a rudder man.  We will be up shite creek for sure if the archers don’t come back to help row us out of here.

       So far so good.  Already some of my prize crews are climbing on to the decks of the galleys floating next to us with their noses up on the beach.  Others are dashing down the beach to other galleys.

       The sand is loose and deep up on the beach - so they are running along the water’s edge where it is firmer and they can run faster.  I can see the men and archers from our other galleys similarly pouring out on to the beach on either side of us.

      A minute or so later and there are shouts and screams and the sounds of fighting coming from some of the nearby galleys.  It’s time to send in reinforcements where they are needed.

       “Bobby,” I snap to the sailor standing next to me holding a pike as I point at the beached galley down the beach where the noise is coming from. 

       “Take your men down the beach and join the prize crew fighting for that galley; Charlie, you take yours and help clear the two galleys next to us.  Come back or engage elsewhere as soon as you finish.”

       There is fighting and shouting all along the beach.  Worse, it appears that one of my prize crews and their reinforcements have run into a wasp’s nest of Saracens on board one of the beached galleys.  Bobby and his men may not be enough.

       “Everyone follow me.  Emergency.  Emergency.  Let’s go.  Hurry boys hurry.”

       I grab a pike and a ship’s shield off the railing and rush down the beach at the head of my three pike men and Joe the rudder man. Ben is holding the line of a galley without a single man left on it.