Blood of Honour

Balthasar smiled. ‘Good. You,’ he said sharply, pointing to Alexis, ‘and you,’ clicking his fingers at Alopex’s wife and son, ‘your names?’

‘I am Alexis Kristannos,’ said Alexis, ‘and this is my sister-in-law, Nerita Kristannos, and her son Alexandros.’

‘Come with me.’ He watched them glance back, saw the mother clasp her hands together in prayer, then his men were pushing them, so that Alopex’s wife stumbled and her son began to cry. A murmur from the villagers rose into cries as the church door was opened and they heard and smelt the burning.

As they emerged into the narrow road around the church, the doors were slammed and bolted. Nerita gasped, her hands to her face. The village was on fire. Alexis began shouting, hurling abuse at the Germans, and at Balthasar. She tried to claw him, but was restrained, her arms held back by one of his men.

Balthasar slapped her face, then ordered them to his truck where the women and boy were bundled into the back, the weapons of the paratroopers trained on them.

Balthasar ordered the Pak gun to be fired at the bar, three rounds that blasted holes through the wall and set the spirits on fire. More flames now erupted from a house overlooking the stream, angrily licking out through the windows. Thick, curling smoke rose into the sky, blocking out the mountains above them.

‘Right,’ said Balthasar, ‘time to go.’ The guns were hitched back on, men clambered and jumped back onto the vehicles and, turning, they sped away. From his seat in the cab, Balthasar listened to Nerita Kristannos’s wails, but he was unmoved by her fear and grief. Alopex’s village was burning and Balthasar had his wife, son and sister. The operation had gone perfectly to plan.

It was dusk up in the mountains. The sun had set behind Mount Ida, the largest peak in the range, and the sky above was darkening, the first stars beginning to twinkle. At last the heat had simmered down, replaced by cool evening air – air that now smelt delicious. From the mouth of the cave, the scent of roasting mutton and woodsmoke wafted sweetly over the rocky crag where Tanner and Sykes were sitting. They had found a small oak and beneath it a large smooth rock. From where they sat, they could look back down the gorge, at the interlocking spurs of jutting rock, and out to a narrow view of the valleys below and the distant ridge beyond.

‘My stomach’s rumbling something terrible,’ said Sykes. ‘D’you think they’ll let us have any of it?’

Tanner scratched his chin. ‘An extra sixteen mouths to feed is a lot. I won’t be getting some at any rate, not if Alopex has anything to do with it.’

‘You don’t think it might be a good idea to make it up with him? After all, he is one of the gaffers round here. It didn’t matter pissing him off before because we were in charge, but now that’s changed. We need his help.’

‘Stan, you’re missing the point.’ Tanner sighed. ‘I stood up to him because he insulted us, not because we were running the show on this island.’ He picked up a stick and threw it. ‘I’m damned if I’m going to back down. Anyway, I reckon it’s all bluster. We’ve both had our chances to kill each other and neither of us has taken it.’

‘Maybe,’ said Sykes. He sounded doubtful.

‘I’ll give him one thing, though.’

‘What’s that?’

‘He’s got a lovely sister. I reckon I’m quite smitten.’ They laughed, and Tanner took out two cigarettes, lit them and passed one to Sykes. ‘Feels very safe up here, doesn’t it?’

Sykes nodded slowly as he drew on his smoke. ‘I wonder how far the others have got?’ They had heard that afternoon that the Italians had landed in the east of the island a few days earlier; it would make navigating safely that much more difficult.

‘I suppose it depends on whether they managed to get any oil. But, Jesus, Stan, that boat didn’t exactly give a man confidence, did it? All the way to Alex with a cracked cylinder head? Maybe, but you wouldn’t put good money on it, would you?’

‘No. We made the right decision. I hope we did, at any rate.’ He looked out at the mountain peaks rising around them. ‘Feels a bloody long way from home, up here, though, doesn’t it?’

Tanner drew his battle blouse around him, still stained with dried sea salt. ‘I like it. Christ, where’s home anyway?’

Footsteps behind them made Tanner turn. He had assumed it would be one of the men, but it was Alopex, with two of his andartes, one of whom had been with them all the way from Limenas. It was the same man who had scowled at Tanner earlier in the village.

Tanner eyed them, but remained sitting. ‘What do you want?’

Alopex drew level with him. ‘You son of a whore,’ he growled. ‘Is it not enough that you insult me in my town and in front of my men? But now you would shame my sister!’

Tanner still did not budge, instead looking up at Alopex with apparent indifference. ‘We talked, that’s all. She’s a beautiful girl – a credit to your family.’

Alopex leaped at Tanner, surprising him and knocking him back so that his head cracked against the rough, knotted trunk of the tree. The shock, combined with the stab of acute pain, momentarily stunned him, and he now felt a stinging blow to his face. ‘Stop!’ Sykes was saying. ‘Just stop!’ but Alopex had landed another crunching blow. Tanner saw Sykes yank Alopex backwards so that the Cretan’s next punch flailed uselessly at the air. He pushed Sykes backwards so that he toppled, but in that moment, Tanner was able to raise a leg and kick Alopex away. The big Cretan staggered, but managed to remain upright on the loose rocky ground. Tanner now sprang to his feet, anger and adrenalin giving him strength. A couple of steps forward, fists raised, then a short, sharp jab that caught Alopex on the side of his chin. The Cretan staggered again, regained his footing, and charged at Tanner with such weight and force that he could only land his second punch on Alopex’s back as he was rammed into the tree, an old branch stump stabbing his side, so that he gasped with pain and because the breath had been knocked from his lungs. Another punch, this time to the stomach, and Tanner doubled up. He was losing this fight, he knew. He caught a glimpse of Sykes getting to his feet, but Alopex’s andartes were hurrying over the rocks ready to hold him back; this was not Sykes’s fight – Tanner knew he had to face Alopex alone. He grimaced, stabs of pain coursing through his entire body, and a blow fell like a slab of iron on the side of his face, beside his right eye, then another caught his jaw. His vision was blurring but he knew he had to do something fast.

Bringing his arms tight around his face, he ducked and swayed, then lashed out with his leg, catching Alopex’s knee, and as the Cretan tried to recover his footing, Tanner gave two quick jabs, catching his enemy on each eye. As Alopex ducked his head away from more blows, Tanner kicked his boot fiercely into the other man’s groin.

It was now the Cretan’s turn to gasp and double up. He stumbled backwards, nearly lost his footing again, but then recovered his balance. Tanner stayed back, unsure of the ground, his breathing heavy and laboured, blood streaming down his face and feeling his strength ebb as pain shuttled through his body.

‘Why are you fighting?’ he heard Sykes say.

‘Keep out of this, Stan,’ Tanner gasped.

‘Because this dog insulted me in front of my men,’ Alopex snarled, ‘and now he insults my sister!’

‘But you insulted me first,’ Tanner retorted. He coughed, then thought he might retch.

‘Stop it, please,’ said Sykes. ‘You two are allies. Fight Germans, not each other.’

‘You are not fighting the Germans,’ growled Alopex. ‘You are trying to run away.’

‘Stop bloody saying that!’ said Tanner. He took several darting steps forward and, before Alopex could defend himself, landed three quick jabs, followed by a right hook. ‘I’m not running from anyone, least of all those Nazi bastards!’ The Cretan swayed, fell back a step, then reached to his side and pulled out his knife, the steel glinting in the failing light. Tanner stepped back several paces, then pulled out his seventeen-inch sword bayonet. Crouching, feeling for a position of balance on the loose rock, he waited.

Alopex shook his head. Blood was running from a wound over his eye and he dabbed at it with his sleeve. He dummy-lunged, making Tanner flinch backwards. Without taking his eye off Alopex, he squatted and picked up a small, jagged rock, deftly switched his bayonet into his left hand, and held the rock, ready to throw. He would hurl it at his head, but even if he missed, Alopex would have to duck and that would give him the chance to strike.

But from behind Alopex’s shoulder, a Cretan boy was now running along the mountain track up which they had climbed earlier, calling. The andartes behind Alopex began talking urgently to each other and at the same time Tanner heard men approaching from the direction of the cave. He barely dared glance at the boy, but now Alopex’s men were beside him, jabbering and deliberately coming between the Cretan and Tanner.