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) (9 page)

       Our arrival makes the difference.  Several of the Tunisians jump off into the water.  Others are still fighting but the tide is definitely turning and the pikes we are carrying are deadly - they quickly go down. 

       “Everybody off except the prize crew,” I shout. “Everybody off and help push this bastard off.  Hurry lads, hurry.”

      “Push it out.” … “That’s it.”  …  “Push it out.” … “Is everyone off except Andy’s prize crew?” … “Back to our galley.” … “Hurry boys, hurry….Run damn you, Charles run.”

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       I’m on my galley with the Marines I’m going to lead to one of the city gates in front of the dock.  A few minutes ago Jeffrey told everyone to piss on the deck and now the rowing drum is beating at an unsustainable rate.  I can feel my heart pounding and I’m glad I pissed when everyone else did. 

      
I don’t know why but it seems a lot of men always need to piss before a battle.  I know I always do.  It seems strange but there you are.

       Jeffrey heads our galley for the ships and galleys tied up along the longest of the two stone docks.  Our designated place among the three galleys heading for our assigned dock is in the middle left of whatever shipping is tied up along it. 

       One of our galleys is coming even faster, too fast I think, and pulling alongside of us.  It is going to unload its archers and send its prize crews after the galleys and cogs docked further to our left.  The other galley in our set of three will unload its Marines and then its prize crews will go after the Moorish ships docked to our right while the Marines run for the city gate.

       As we approach the dock Jeffrey shouts “Rowers stop”…and then after very brief pause he shouts what the rowers expect to hear next … “Back oars.. Pull…Pull…Pull. ..Pull… Prize crews and deck archers.  Get ready … Prize men and deck archers …  Get ready.” 

       There is a hard bump and the sound of splintering wood as we bang into the dock between two Tunisian galleys.  There is a man standing on the deck of one of them gaping at us with his mouth open.

       We hit so hard the upper part of our front rail splinters and is pushed in and some of us who are standing ready to leap on to the dock lose our balance.  We quickly recover and instantly vault over the deck railing and on to the dock.  Within seconds the Marines and prize crews on Jeffrey galley are pouring off the deck behind me and we are on the dock racing for our objectives.

       As I run towards the gate I look back to see my archers and can also see some of our boarding parties running along the dock to the Moorish galleys and ships on our left and others running to the Moorish galleys and ships on our right.  The ships moored at the dock are close together so the men don’t have far to go.  They are running hard and reach them and leap aboard in what seems like the blink of an eye.

      Archers are beginning to catch up with me.  All around me I can hear an archer’s rhythmic chant of “Notch and push” followed by a grunt as he launches at the handful of Tunisians in range.  Our boarding parties pour off our deck and climb on to the dock. 

       For a moment as I’m getting ready to vault over the deck railing I caught a sight of Peter jumping down from the deck of his galley on to the other dock, I least I think it was Peter.  Then he is lost from sight from sight and mind as I vault over the deck railing with my Marines and we start running towards the city wall gate ahead of us.  

       There is much shouting and commotion both on the dock behind me and on the ships behind us moored to the dock.  The next time I look back I can see Jeffrey standing there alone on the deck, as he should, ready to give whatever orders are necessary to his crew and the men on his section of the dock.  

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       “Archers below to row.  Steer to the big cog over there” Harold shouts to the rudder man as the rowing drum begins to beat. “Yes. The big one, the one with two masts and all the square sails.  Go for it…Hurry damn you.. Hurry.”

       And then a few minutes later. 

       “Grapplers, archers and number three boarding party men to the deck.”  …  “Grapplers, archers and number three boarding party to the deck.”  …  “Get ready lads.  Here come more coins for us all.” ….  “Throw your grapples as she comes”…. “Throw ...  Throw”… “Stand by with the tow line.”

       The ship I’m after is one of the biggest two masted ships I’ve ever seen.  Two tall masts, square sails, no oars, and a strange flag with Islamic markings. 
Wonder where it’s from?  Well I guess we’re about to find out.

      
“Who’s ship is that, Harold?” my pilot asks. “I’ve never seen a flag like that before.”

       “First time for me too, by God?  Eighty paces long if she’s a foot.  I think she’s one of those new heathen ships I heard about after the goddamn Moors catched me up as a slave.  I saw a couple of ships with the same flag; at least I think it was the same.  In Acre it was … when the Saracens held the castle and the Moors was welcome.  Square sails it had and two masts … not as big as this one though.”

        “Stand by to throw the climbing grapples.”  …. “Stand by lads.”  …. “Throw. Throw.”

       “No one on deck” came the cry from one of the two Marines in the lookout’s little nest on our mast.  It changes to “here they come” few seconds after our grapples begin to thud as they land on the cog.  Then the Marines in the nest begin launching their arrows and shouting begins in a strange tongue on the cog’s deck. 
Well the heathen are obviously on the deck now.

      
Our prize men are just starting to climb the grapple ropes with swords and bows slung on their backs when there is another grunt and a scream above us and then a hail from the mast.

      “The deck’s clear.  They’ve run below.  We got three of the bastards.”

      Our prize crew sailors and their two Marine archers go up the knotted grappling lines in a hurry and disappear over the cog’s rail.  Less than a minute later a face looks down at us and the sergeant of the prize crew shouts to me in an elated voice.  “We’ve taken it.” 
Of course he’s elated; he’ll be its captain if he can get it to Malta. 

       “Good luck,” I shout back.   Then I pick our next prize.

       “Go for that one next,” I yell into the ear of the sailor sergeant standing next to me as I point to a cog at anchor nearby.  It’s smaller cog with a single mast.

       “Grapplers and boarding party number two stand by.”

                                  Chapter Seven

       My Marines and I are sweating heavily under the glaring midday sun as we leave the dock and begin lumbering towards the city gate carrying our longbows.  It’s a hard slog because we’re all laboring under the weight of the half dozen or so leather quivers full of arrows each of us has slung over his back. 

       As we get closer to the gate a couple of the Marines in front of me stop running and begin launching arrows at the men they can see around the gate and on the ramparts above it.  Others think that’s what they’re supposed to do and stop to join them.

       “Don’t stop.  Don’t stop.” I croak out with a gasp as I go past them. “Get to the gate.  To the gate, lads.  Run.  Run.”

       So far the wind looks to be somewhat favorable.  Our fear, Harold’s and mine, is that the wind will shift so that some of our men will be trapped in the harbor on their prizes and unable to leave.  That’s because we’re trying to take off the Moors’ sailing ships as well as their galleys.  How long we have to hold the city to keep the Moors away from the sailing ships in the harbor and the galleys beached along the shore depends on the wind. 

      
Within a few minutes we reach the city gate and sprint into the little square beyond it.  The gate’s open and the area in front of it is deserted except for a couple of dead and wounded Moors, the men who went down from our archers’ brief spurt of shooting as we ran. 

       Most of the people we’d seen standing around in front of the city gate disappeared when our initial burst of arrows began falling.  To our surprise there are still a few people standing around in the open area immediately inside the gate – they gape at us in disbelief as we run in.  But they too quickly disappear.

       Even before I can catch my breath I begin shouting orders to the archers who’ve beaten me into the little square – they’d gotten inside the gate and just stopped because they didn’t know what to do next.

       “Get up those stairs; take the gate house and clear the walls in both directions.  Hurry, all of you.  Run.  Run” 

       Before I can even finish giving my first order there are literally hundreds of wild eyed and panting Marines in the open space inside the gate.  The sun is so scorching that they’re all huddled against the buildings seeking shade – and several doors are quickly broken down so men can shelter inside out of the sun. 

       It’s a good thing there are so many of us because streets and alleys run in various directions from the little square inside the gate and along the city wall. We need to block them all.  There is not a moment to lose.

       “Sergeant,” I shout at an older Marine whose name I suddenly can’t remember, “take your men and go down there to the next intersection and hold it” …  “Hurry man.  Run, damn it, run.”

       In less than a minute I have reinforcements dashing up the stairs to help clear more of the ramparts on the wall and groups of men pounding down the various streets and alleys to set up blocking positions at the first intersection they reach.

       “Clear the wall in both directions all the way down to the next gate in the city wall - and beyond if you can,” I tell the sergeant whose men go rushing up the stone stairs next to the gatehouse. 

       A hundred or so Marines stay in the little square a rapid reaction force I can send to wherever their longbows might be needed most.

      
Damn, it would have been helpful if we’d had a map of this place before we came through the gate.

 
     “Sergeant, send your strongest runner down the outside of the wall to see if we’ve taken the other city gate in front of the dock.”

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       An hour later and things seem to be falling into place.  The city is silent and we control most of the city’s walls.  From the top of the gate house I’ve been watching more and more galleys and sailing ships leaving the harbor.  I know they’re prizes because some of them are being towed.  And I know Henry’s finished on the beach because I can see the last of his Marines running back to one of our galleys and climbing back aboard.

       A Marine runner arrives from Peter.  The city gate he was trying to reach was closed by the time he and his men reached it.  But he has it now because the men who came through my gate were able to come across along the unguarded ramparts on top of city walls and open it from the inside. 

       Peter reports there is an increasing amount of activity in the tent encampment and livestock markets along the river.  He doesn’t know what it means so he has decided to keep a large part of his force outside the city wall so he can block a counterattack coming through the open area between the encampment and the harbor.  

      “Good decision” is the message I send back.  “Protecting the harbor is more important than taking the city.”

       Amidst the turmoil and confusion I can see some of our galleys and even more of what are obviously prizes rowing for the harbor entrance.  Others have already passed through the entrance and are disappearing into the distance.  Smoke is coming from a couple of galleys on the beach.
Damn; the galleys must not have had slaves on their rowing benches and been pulled to far up on the beach to be gotten off and towed.

       I can also see smoke coming from one of the galleys anchored in the harbor next to where Long Bob and his men appear to be boarding a cog. 
I know it is Bob and his men because his galley has such a unique sail; I wonder why he decided to burn the Tunisian instead of towing it out?

       Despite the hot sun there is activity all along the beach and in the harbor.  It’s like a wasp’s nest that has been overturned.  Worse, the wind seems to have died and there is still a great deal of activity on two or three of the ships in the harbor.  Even from here I can see people massing on their decks.  They may be there to repel our boarders.

      
Damn.  They must be newly arrived and didn’t have time to unload their men in time for them to attend the prayers in the mosque.  Or could they be Venetians or Genoese?

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       I can see Harold’s galley boarding a cog off to our right as we row closer to the two masted Moorish cargo cog I’ve set my eyes on.  That when the Marines up in the lookouts’ nest on my mast report the Moor’s deck is crowded with armed men. 

       “They’ve got swords and shields,” one of the Marines shouts down to the deck. “More than twenty men; maybe thirty.” 

       Suddenly both of our Marines shout warnings and begin shooting arrows as fast as they can launch them.

      “They’ve got archers, by God.  Archers.”

       We no more than hear the warning of the men in the lookout’s nest when one of them suddenly slumps back against the ropes and his bow drops to the deck.  Then rocks start coming down around us. 
Damnation.  They’ve got slingers too.