'What have you to show us, Dalassenus?' the emperor asked. He rubbed his hands in anticipation, and regarded his kinsman fondly.
'This way, if you will, Basileus,' replied Dalassenus, Grand Drungarius, Supreme Commander of the Imperial Fleet. The family resemblance was strong in the young commander: thick black curly hair and keen black eyes beneath even brows, he was short-limbed and muscular like all the Comnenimen, and swarthy-skinned like his cousin; he differed only in that where his kinsmen displayed the Greek half of their heritage, his own features tended more towards the Syrian.
Reining in beside Alexius, he led the emperor up a winding rocky path towards the crest of the hill. The two rode together side by side, easy in one another's company. They had fought alongside one another many times, and both knew and respected the other's skill and courage.
As the emperor and his entourage gained the top of the hill called Levunium, the light from the setting sun struck them full like the blaze from victory fire. The sky, aglow with flaming reds and golds, shone with a brilliance exceeded only by the sun itself. The men, blinded for a few moments, shielded their eyes with their hands until they could see once more, and then looked down into the dusky valley below.
The extreme desperation of their predicament became apparent only gradually as they beheld the dark, spreading blotch rippling north and south from one promontory to the other, and stretching into the distance as far as the eye could see-like a vast black river whose waters were slowly filling the Maritsa valley with the flood of a vile and filthy sea.
Alexius stood in awe-stricken silence, gazing into the valley at the assembled enemy: Pechenegs and Bogomils in numbers beyond counting, tribe upon tribe, whole barbarian nations rising to the slaughter of the empire. Nor were these the greatest enemy bawling for the blood of Byzantium. They were merely the last in a long, long train of barbarian hordes seeking to enrich and aggrandize themselves through the plunder of the empire's legendary wealth.
Alexius, the light of the dying sun in his eyes, took in the unholy sight before him, and remembered all the other times he had gazed upon the enemy before a battle. In the last thirteen years he had faced Slavs and Goths and Huns, Bulgars and Magyars, Gepids and Uzz and Avars – all howling down across the windswept steppelands of the North; and in the south the wily, implacable Arabs: first the Saracens, and now the Seljuqs, a sturdy and energetic warrior race from the arid wastes of the East.
God in heaven, he thought, there are so many! Where does it end? Forcing down his dismay, he declared, 'The greater the enemy, the greater the victory. God be praised.' After a moment, he turned to his kinsman and asked, 'How many Cuman have pledged to fight for us?'
'Thirty thousand, Basileus,' replied Dalassenus. 'They are camped just over there.' He indicated a series of rough hills, behind which a pall of smoke was gathering. 'Does the emperor wish to go to them?'
Alexius shook his head slowly. 'No.' He squared his shoulders and straightened his back. 'We have seen enough barbarians-they hold no fascination for us. We would rather speak to our soldiers. It is time to kindle the flame of courage so that it will burn brightly in the fight.'
He reined aside and departed the hilltop, returned to the Byzantine camp and commanded Nicetas to assemble the themes and scholae. While the soldiers were summoned, the emperor waited in his tent, kneeling before his chair, hands clasped tightly in prayer.
When Alexius emerged from his tent once more, the sun had set, and two stars gleamed in a sky the colour of the amethysts in his swordbelt. A raised platform had been erected beside the tent so that he might address his troops and, with the coming of night, torches had been lit and placed at each corner of the platform. Preceded by an excubitor bearing the vexillum, the ancient war standard of the Roman Legions, Alexius mounted the steps and walked to the edge of the platform to look out upon the assembled might of Byzantium-a force much reduced from its former size, but potent still.
The last of the ancient and honourable themes stood in ranks before him, their separate regiments marked out by the colour of their cloaks and tunics: the red of Thrace, the deep blue of Opsikion, the green of Bithynia, the gold of Phrygia, and the black of the Hetairi. Rank on rank, upraised spears gleaming in the dusky twilight, they stood, fifty thousand strong, the last remnant of the finest soldiers the world had ever seen: the Immortals. Alexius' heart swelled with pride to see them.
'Tomorrow we fight for the Glory of God and the welfare of the empire,' the emperor declared. 'Tomorrow we fight. But tonight, my brave companions-tonight, above all nights, we pray!'
Alexius paced the edge of the platform, his golden breastplate glimmering like water in the torchlight. How many times had he addressed his troops in just this way, he wondered. How many more times must he exhort men to lay down their lives for the empire? When would it end? Great God, there must be an end.
'We pray, my friends, for victory over the enemy. We pray for strength, and courage, and endurance. We pray God's protection over us, and his deliverance in the heat and hate of battle.' So saying, Alexius, Elect of Heaven, Equal of the Apostles, fell on his knees and fifty thousand of the finest warriors the world had ever seen knelt with him.
Raising his hands to heaven, the emperor sent heartfelt words of supplication and entreaty winging to the throne of God. His voice rang out in the twilight stillness with all the passion of a commander who knows his troops woefully outnumbered and must trust their courage to sway the scales of war.
When at last the emperor finished, night had descended upon the camp. Alexius opened his eyes and stood to gaze in amazement at a most miraculous sight; it was as if the stars above had fallen to earth, and the plain before him now sparkled with all the glory of heaven itself. Each and every soldier had a lighted wax taper affixed to the blade of his spear-fifty thousand earthstars shining with bright-flecked rays, illuminating the camp with a clear and holy light.
The glow from that light sustained Alexius through the long, restless night, and was with him still when he rode out at the head of his troops before dawn. The imperial cavalry crossed the Maritsa a few miles upstream of the encamped enemy, formed the battalions, and waited for daybreak. They attacked from the east, with the light of the rising sun at their backs. To the sleep-sotted barbarians, it seemed as if the warhost of heaven was streaming down upon them from out of the sun.
Alexius struck the confused mass at the centre of the Pecheneg and Bogomil horde. It was a swift, sharp thrust into the belly of the beast, and he was away again before the barbarian battlehorns had sounded the call to arms. Having roused and enraged the enemy, he fell back – just out of reach of their slings and spears-and waited for them to make their counter attack.
The invaders, eager to avenge the assault, hastily formed a battleline and began their plodding advance. The imperial defenders looked out on a single vast, clotted mass of bellowing barbarians -less an ordered line than an enormous human tidal wave rolling across the land-and heard the deep jarring bone-rattling thump of the drums, the strident, sense-numbing blare of the huge, curved battlehorns, and the defiant cries of the warriors as they swept towards them with quickening pace.
It was a display calculated to produce terror in the beholder; it was their chief weapon, and one which served them well; with it, they had conquered tribe and nation, overrunning all they surveyed. The empire's soldiers had faced it before, however, and the sight and sound of barbarians massing for their attack no longer inspired shock or dismay, no longer quelled the heart in terror, or swallowed the senses in panic. The Immortals gazed with narrowed eyes and tightened their grip on lances and reins, calmed their horses with gently whispered words, and waited.
Flanked on either side by his standard-bearers-one lofting the purple banner of the Holy Roman Empire, the other the golden vexillum-Alexius looked across to his officers, the strategi, who anchored the long ranks at the centre of either wing. The foremost of these was a seasoned veteran of the Pecheneg wars, a man named Taticius, whose fearlessness and shrewdness had often saved lives and won battles. The emperor signalled his general, who sang out in a strong voice: 'Slow march!' *
The trumpets sounded a single, shrill blast, and the troops started forth as one. The imperial formation-two divisions, each made up of ten regiments in ranks, five deep, and a hundred riders to the rank – moved in close concert with one another; shoulder to shoulder and knee to knee, the riders formed a wall not easily breached or broken. Their long lances kept the foe out of reach of their horses, and themselves out of reach of barbarian axes and war hammers. Once in motion, there was little on the ground that could withstand a charge of mounted warriors.
Taticius gave the sign, the trumpets blared again, and the riders quickened their pace. The invaders met this
