want to go down in history as one of the stupid fuckers who runs out bare-arsed at the first alarm and gets a stray arrow in his balls, but I do not. We have got some time.’
They helped each other into the heavy mail coats, then each started to buckle and tie their own various straps and laces. Ballista’s fingers fumbled with his left shoulder guard. Maximus fussed his hands away and fastened it for him.
‘I have said it before,’ muttered the Hibernian, ‘but if I were as frightened as you before a fight, I would not do it.’
Ballista grinned ruefully. ‘I was not aware I ever had a choice.’
Maximus said nothing, because it was the truth.
Up on the roof, Hippothous was waiting. From somewhere, he had acquired a fancy, antique Greek helmet. Its inlaid face mask hid his features. Wordlessly, he pointed to the north. The moon was still up, and the clouds had blown away. In the clear, still, azure night, the longships were easily seen, but harder to number. At least a dozen, maybe more. Evidently, they intended to round the tip of the peninsula and attack at some point on its eastern flank.
Hippothous turned dramatically and gestured south. Out beyond the land wall, the Goths had already come to shore. The boats were beached out of sight, but the first fires glinted apricot in the dark. Above, straight as a spear shaft, the first columns of smoke rose from burning buildings.
There was no need for Hippothous to point out the other two divisions of Goths. One, about fifteen ships roughly in line, although still some way out was wheeling to run in towards the Lion Harbour. The final group of raiders was closer. More than twenty of them, their oars whitening the wine-dark sea, they were pulling hard to the Theatre Harbour.
‘There are more of them than at Ephesus.’ Hippothous’s voice came muffled from behind the narrow ‘T’ opening of his helmet.
Ballista grunted. He was thinking.
‘Success breeds success,’ Maximus said. ‘Every northern pirate in the Aegean will have joined them, maybe some locals too.’
Ballista took a final look all around. For once, the priorities seemed straightforward. With luck, the southernmost Goths would be diverted by looting. They might be intended as no more than a diversion anyway. Those rounding the peninsula would have to be ignored for now. The longships heading for the Lion Harbour would take a little time to arrive.
‘Rouse out the bodyguard.’ Ballista’s voice was decisive. ‘We will go to the Theatre Harbour.’
Hippothous turned to go.
‘And send a runner ahead. Get the men from the Baths of Faustina on the walls, and tell the artillery not to shoot until we are there.’
At the head of the stairs, Hippothous acknowledged the order.
‘One more thing – tell them to light the fires, if they have not done so already.’
Hippothous vanished below. Soon the clattering of equipment and the thud of boots floated up. Ballista and Maximus stood in silence. Beyond and to the right of Lade, across the water and the plain, the mountains were a dark, serrated mass. Ballista thought he could just make out the pale line that was the acropolis of Priene. The Goths were here, not there, and that was good.
‘Ready,’ Hippothous called from below.
They plunged down the steps of the theatre, along corridors three times the height of a man. The noise of their passing reverberated back from the vaulting, torches throwing misshapen shadows across the great stone slabs.
Emerging from the theatre, they ran to their left. Along the wall, the levied men shifted nervously. The regulars from the Baths of Faustina cheered. The militia joined in, but tentatively, uncertainly. A night they had prayed never to see had come.
The two new siege engines stood ready, monstrous, sharp-angled things in the light of the fires. Their throwing arms were winched back, loaded. They smelt of fresh-cut wood and tar.
Panting, Ballista asked the optio in charge if all was ready.
‘We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’
‘Wait for my command, then reload and shoot as fast as you can.’
Ballista and his bodyguard climbed the steps to the wall walk. They fanned out to either side. The levied men shuffled aside gratefully.
The Gothic longships were closer than Ballista had expected. Low and sleek, they were at the harbour mouth, not much more than a couple of hundred paces out. Lines of white splashes showed where their oars broke the water. They were rowing hard.
‘Wait, wait!’ Ballista found himself shouting. Unconsciously, he dragged his dagger an inch or so from its sheath and snapped it back, repeated the procedure with the sword on his left hip, then touched his fingertips lightly on the healing stone tied to his scabbard.
The longboats cut through the water. Ballista had ranged the artillery for a hundred and fifty paces, the limit of effective arrow-shot. He cursed himself for not thinking to place some marker out in the harbour. Gallus had done so at Novae. He had done the same at Arete. Allfather, he was a fool. It was harder to judge distances over water, and at night.
‘Light the missiles.’
Along the wall, bowmen touched their fire arrows into the torches. A smell of burning. From behind came louder sounds of bigger things catching fire.
‘Release!’
The flaring tips of dozens of arrows shot away, bright in the night. Most fell short; some flew wildly askew. A derisive cheer started across the water.
A heartbeat or so later, a great double twang and thump from behind the wall. With a terrible whooshing, the incendiary missiles of the artillery raced overhead. They rose, then dipped and fell like meteors trailing sparks.
One dropped short. The other had the range. It did not hit a ship but splashed, hissing, into the middle of the fleet.
Cries of surprise and alarm came from the Goths. The splash of the oars faltered. The ships lost way. The Gothic reiks were bellowing at their warriors. In no time, the oars restored their rhythm. The longboats surged forward again.
Arrows whickered out. One or two were finding targets. Here and there, red fire blossomed momentarily on the boats, before being doused by the crews.
Ballista could hear the squeal of the winches dragging back the arms of the artillery. How long could it take? He did not look round. All his attention was on the still, dark water in front of the leading longships.
Suddenly, with a terrible splintering and tearing unmissable above the din, one of the leading longboats shuddered to a complete halt. Those behind it swerved. Two of them collided. Yells of consternation from the Goths. Another boat embedded itself on a sunken stake. The longboat behind it rammed into its stern.
The water creamed, as the crews dug their blades into the water, desperately bringing the longboats to a halt. Arrows continued to hiss among them. Confusion reigned in the harbour. Some reiks and warriors roared forward, others screamed retreat. Some boats turned, uncertainly. Most lay dead in the water.
The double twang and thump came again. The great burning missiles arced through the night. One fell almost dangerously short, spinning down to fizz and sink just beyond the dock. But the other, as if guided by the hand of a god, plummeted inexorably down towards a stationary longboat. The world seemed to hush for a moment. Then it exploded in a fury of sound: the crash of timbers, the roar of flame, the pitiful screams of burning men.
There were brave men among these Goths, but it was over. The unseen dangers below the surface, the all too visible threat from the heavens, the growing accuracy of the bowmen: all made it irrevocable. Some longboats stayed in place, trying to rescue those they could from the crews of the three irreparably damaged vessels. The rest backed water, turned and hauled back towards Lade. With those from the stricken ships who had not drowned dragged on board, the last few boats fled. Arrows and intermittent artillery shot pursued them all until they were well out of range.
Ball-is-ta, Ball-is-ta. The chant echoed down the defences; full throated with the exhilaration of relief. Ball- is-ta, Ball-is-ta.
