With a sick feeling Thomas turned his mount away and spurred it back down the lane.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Thirty-five thousand men, you say?’ La Valette slowly stroked his beard as he digested Colonel Mas’s report of the interrogation. The Grand Master was standing with his officers on the bastion assigned to the knights of the langue of Castille, one of the strongest positions in the line of defences that protected Birgu. Thomas had been summoned to the bastion in the early hours. Throughout the night the Turks had been moving into position in a wide arc around Birgu and Senglea, their progress revealed by the torches that flickered across the landscape, and the noise of orders shouted from the darkness. Dawn had revealed the enemy drawn up in formation just beyond the range of the cannon mounted on the bastions along the walls.
As the pale light spilled across the island the enemy had gone down on their knees in response to the wailing cries of their imams and the sound of their chanted prayers carried clearly to the ears of those watching from the walls and bastions defending the two promontories. The spectacle of the horde ranged against them had stilled the tongues of the defenders who looked on in awe and apprehension at the array of coloured cloth and glinting weapons in the dense ranks sprawling across the landscape. On the high ground behind the enemy formations Thomas could see Turkish engineers labouring to level the ground for the artillery batteries. Each gun had been laboriously drawn by hand from the beaches where they had been landed the previous day. Soon they would be in position, ready to bombard the defenders, although the enemy seemed keen and arrogant enough to attempt to rush the walls without waiting for their cannon to open fire.
‘Yes, sir.’ Mas nodded sombrely. ‘And they are expecting a further force of ten thousand to arrive under the command of Dragut.’
The other men of the inner council stirred uneasily at the mention of the corsair warlord. Dragut’s ships had brought terror and destruction to ports and shipping across the Mediterranean. Tens of thousands of people had been seized from their homes by his men and sold into slavery. The corsairs who followed him were all experienced men, ready to fight as fiercely as the most devout Muslim fanatic, but for loot rather than faith.
‘With Dragut, that makes some forty-five thousand in all,’ Mas continued. ‘Together with around a hundred cannon of various calibres, a thousand engineers, and plenty of siege equipment. And of their fleet, no less than two hundred are warships. Not only do the enemy vastly outnumber us, they also outnumber any force that Don Garcia can assemble on Sicily.’
‘What is the latest count of our strength?’ asked La Valette.
Mas consulted his notes briefly. ‘We have less than seven hundred knights, one thousand two hundred Spanish and Italian mercenaries, and the five hundred soldiers from the galleys. There’s perhaps two hundred Greek and Sicilian volunteers and ninety squires. And then there’s the militia. We’ve been fortunate there, the latest strength returns show that over five thousand of the local men have taken up arms - far more than we estimated. I know you have reservations about them, sir, but from what I have seen they are determined to defend their homes and their families. I think they may surprise us all before long.’
‘We shall see,’ the Grand Master responded doubtfully.
‘There are also the slaves from the galleys,’ Mas concluded. ‘They won’t fight for us but we can use them to repair the damage to the walls of Birgu and Senglea and work on improving the defences.’ There was a brief silence before Thomas spoke up. ‘The odds are only seven to one against. I pity the Turks.’
The other men, save La Valette, smiled.
‘There is some good news,’ Mas added. ‘The officer we captured said that Suleiman has divided the command between Mustafa Pasha and Piyale Pasha. The first is in command of all land forces while the latter commands the ships. Apparently they are already disagreeing over their course of action. When Dragut arrives, that division will be three ways.’
‘That is good news,’ the Grand Master conceded. ‘However, I suspect that the reverence in which Dragut is held will mean that he will take overall command of the siege, which will considerably increase the danger to us. He is the most bitter opponent the Order has ever fought. Dragut is a fine leader, and an inspiration to all who follow him.’
‘You admire him?’ asked Mas.
‘Of course.’ La Valette smiled briefly. ‘I am not blind to his qualities as a warrior, even if he is little better than a pirate and cleaves to a false faith. But for an accident of birth I would be proud to fight at his side.’ His expression hardened. ‘But as my enemy I will do all in my power to destroy him, without mercy. Meanwhile, let us pray that the Sultan’s decision to split the command contributes to the undoing of his cause. Did the prisoner reveal anything else of value during his interrogation?’
‘Not before he died, alas.’
‘A pity. At least we have a more precise idea of the forces that confront us.’ La Valette turned to Thomas. ‘You did well to capture the officer, Sir Thomas.’
‘Thank you, sir. Though it was at the cost of one of our own knights. I only hope that La Riviere and those with him fought to the death. If not, then it is likely that the enemy is as well informed about our strengths and weaknesses as we are about theirs.’
‘Assuming that La Riviere gives way to their torture,’ Stokely intervened. ‘I think you may well underestimate his quality. Some knights hold to their oath of service more devoutly than others. La Riviere is such a man.’
Thomas fought to keep his expression fixed at the barbed comment and responded in a calm tone. ‘And I think you may underestimate the quality of the enemy’s interrogators. The Turks are as skilled in the art of torture as they are in the art of siege craft. No man is immune to torture. It is only a question of finding his weakness, and then breaking him down. Sooner or later La Riviere will talk. Our only hope is that he does not give up too much useful intelligence, if he has been taken alive.’
There was a brief silence amongst the officers as they stared towards the dense ranks of the Turks who completed their prayers at length and rose to their feet, and at once the air filled with the rhythmic sound of their drums and cymbals and the shrill notes of their horns as they raised their weapons and shook them at the walls. The chaotic flicker of the sun’s reflections on the weapons of the Turks reminded Thomas of the sparkle of the sea, as if they were a wave about to crash upon a rocky shore.
‘They mean to attack without delay,’ Thomas decided. He turned to look down the line of the wall. The bastions occupied by the langues of Castille and Auvergne were the only fortifications that had been fully completed. The other bastions were still without embrasures solid enough to withstand the fire of enemy cannon. The same was true for lengths of the wall between the bastions.
‘Look there.’ Mas pointed towards the Turkish lines. A handful of richly dressed officers with turquoise turbans rode out a short distance ahead of their battle line. Behind them marched a company of Janissaries, their ostrich feathers wafting above their tall hats like a faint haze. The foremost of them was leading a man whose arms were tightly bound behind his back. He stumbled as he was dragged along and Thomas could just make out that he was barefoot and wore only the tattered remains of a red surcoat bearing a white cross, the instantly recognisable garb of the Order. His blond hair hung down to his shoulders and there was no doubt about his identity.
‘That’s La Riviere,’ Stokely muttered. He glanced quickly at Thomas and scowled. ‘You were right, it seems.’
The officers watched as the procession began to make its way along the enemy line, parallel to the defences. Every so often the Turkish officers would stop and point towards Birgu as they questioned their prisoner.
Mas shook his head. ‘He shouldn’t have let himself be taken.’
‘Perhaps there was nothing he could do about it,’ said Thomas. ‘He was overwhelmed, and they would want to take one of our knights alive just as keenly as we desired one of their officers.’
‘Still,’ the colonel muttered, ‘it was his duty not to fall into their hands.’
Thomas shrugged. ‘Blame him as you will, there is nothing that can be done now.’
‘Obviously,’ Stokely sniffed.
Mas turned to La Valette. ‘Sir, we should order our guns to fire on them. We must silence La Riviere before the Turks can make any further use of him. We might kill some of their officers at the same time.’
La Valette squinted towards the enemy for a moment and shook his head. ‘The range is long and we need to preserve powder. Besides, I think La Riviere might yet provide us with one more useful service.’
‘Sir?’
