The Tide of Victory (39 page)

The Ethiopian captain ignored the sailing ships in their little marina. His target was the galleys. So, when his ship grounded, it grounded on the beach right in the middle of the Malwa warships.

Near them, rather. By now the Ethiopian ship had taken so much water that it grounded while still twenty yards offshore. The captain issued a string of bitter curses, until he saw that his gunnery officer was practically dancing with joy as he ordered the two guns in the stern of the ship levered around to face forward as much as possible. The crews of the two guns in the bow were already getting ready to fire.

The curses trailed off. The captain of the ship had been thinking in terms of the Axumite traditions he grew up with
.
War at sea, to him, was a matter of boarding. His gunnery officer, trained by Antonina's Theodoran cohort, understood the realities of gunpowder combat better than he did. A ship grounded offshore provided a reasonably level firing platform. Had they actually reached the beach, the ship would almost certainly have canted so far over that none of the cannons could be brought to bear.

In effect, the crippled Ethiopian ship was now a small fortress planted in the midst of the enemy. Once he realized that, the scowl which had been fixed on the captain's face since the collision vanished instantly.

"Sarwen to the side!" he bellowed. "Prepare to repel boarders!"

The Ethiopian marines who had been pulling on the oars left the benches and began taking positions in the bow and alongside the rails. Any Malwa who tried to silence those guns would be met by spears and the heavy cutting swords favored by Ethiopian soldiers.

That still left—

The captain squinted into the rain, trying to spot the Malwa fortress which guarded the harbor. The fortress, perched on a hill overlooking the bay, held at least eight large siege guns, any one of which could destroy his vessel with a single well-placed shot. Especially if they had time to use the heated shot which all fortresses—allied or enemy alike—had adopted over the past year of the war. Fortunately, five of the eight field guns in the fortress were positioned to protect Chowpatty on its landward side from Maratha rebels.

The Ethiopians knew of that fortress. They had been in regular contact with the Marathas for two years, and Shakuntala's spies had given them a good description of Chowpatty's defenses. But they did not possess any of the detailed battle maps which would be taken almost for granted by armies of the future. Warfare was still, for the most part, a matter of words and muscle.

The rain seemed to be lightening, and the captain estimated that they were already into the afternoon. But visibility was still too poor to see more than perhaps fifty or sixty yards. He couldn't spot the fortress at all.

"Good," grunted his lieutenant, standing next to him. "If we can't see them, they can't see us."

The words echoed the captain's own thoughts. He now turned his gaze to the breakwater, barely visible through the rain. Already, two Ethiopian warships had come alongside the pier and were offloading marines, and two more were not far behind.

There was—had been, rather—a wooden structure perched on the very end of the breakwater where the Malwa kept a small squad of soldiers on guard at all times. The thing had been a glorified shack, really. Now it was half-collapsed—not by gunfire but simply by the spears and swords of the first marine contingent. The captain could see no corpses anywhere, although some enemies might have been buried beneath the shattered planking. But he suspected the handful of Malwa soldiers stationed there had run away before the marines landed.

"They're coming now," said his lieutenant. "Finally! What a sorry lot of bastards."

The captain followed the pointing finger. Sure enough, Malwa soldiers were beginning to appear at the land end of the breakwater and, here and there, streaming onto the beach where the galleys rested.

Small streams. More like hesitant and uncertain trickles. Most of the Malwa soldiers were still buckling or strapping on their gear. The way they held their weapons did not, even at the distance, seem to indicate any great confidence and enthusiasm to the captain.

"Garritroopers," he muttered. "What do you expect?"

The Malwa getting organized at the end of the breakwater must have had a fairly efficient officer, however. By the time the first Ethiopian marines reached them, the Malwa had managed to set up an actual shield wall of sorts, bristling with spears. A handful of musketeers, positioned in the rear, sent a ragged little volley at the Axumites.

It did them about as much good as a picket fence against charging bulls. Ethiopian boarding tactics leaned very heavily on shock. The Axumites marines were trained and conditioned to expect an initial round of severe casualties. Over the decades, obtaining a "boarding scar" was a matter of pride and honor.

These marines didn't bother with an initial volley of javelins, or even use their stabbing spears. They just raced forward and hammered into the line; deflecting spears as best as possible with their small light shields and getting into the enemy's midst with those horrid, heavy swords which were basically big meat cleavers. Strength and fury did the rest. Wolverine tactics, developed by an African nation which had never heard of the beasts.

The lieutenant had better eyesight than the captain. Suddenly he emitted a sharp, wordless cry full of distress.

"What's wrong?" demanded the captain, squinting at the distant melee. So far as he could tell, the Ethiopian marines were shredding the Malwa line.

"The negusa nagast is leading the charge!" came the hissing response. "Damned idiot!"

The captain's jaws tightened. So did his squint, as he tried to force slightly nearsighted vision to his will.

"Idiot," he echoed. Then, with a small sigh: "Always the danger, with a young king. Especially one who never fought enough battles while still a prince."

Yet, for all the condemnation in the words, the tone in which they were spoken—as had been true of the lieutenant's—echoed a dim but profound contentment. A mighty empire, Axum had become over the centuries. Its King of Kings might rule over half of Arabia and have a navy whose power could stretch across an ocean. But at the heart of that power still lay the fierce highland warriors whose sarwen, as Axumites called their regiments, were the spine and sinew of Ethiopian might.

Today's negusa nagast might carry, as had all those before him, a long list of grandiose and splendid titles. "He who brings the dawn" being not the least of them. But he had begun his life simply as Eon bisi Dakuen—
Eon, man of the Dakuen regiment.
 

That was his most important name, the one that captured his true soul. Today, did any man doubt it, he would prove it true. Even without good eyesight, the captain knew full well that the first Axumite marine who had hurled his lightly armored body onto that shield wall had been the king who commanded his loyalty.

And so, despite the disapproval of his brain, the man's heart erupted. And, like every Ethiopian soldier in that fleet now pouring its strength against the Malwa bastion at Chowpatty, he spent the remaining time in that battle—even while he oversaw the cannonade which began shredding Malwa galleys on the beach and turning them into kindling for the torching squads—shouting the name of his emperor.

The name, not the titles. Eon bisi Dakuen! 

From beginning to end, the battle lasted slightly longer than three hours. Throughout, the captain kept shouting that name.

The battle was ferocious enough, once the Malwa commander was able to organize the resistance. "Garritroopers," the Ethiopian captain had called his men, but the term was quite unfair. Most of the Malwa stationed at the port had been seamen, accustomed to the hardships of naval life and no stranger to savage boarding actions. Nor were they strangers to Axumite tactics, for they had clashed many times over the past year with Ethiopian ships running the blockade. And the soldiers, because Chowpatty was an isolated bastion surrounded by the Maratha rebellion, were no strangers to bitter fighting.

Still, the contest was uneven. The Ethiopians had been prepared, ready, on edge. The Malwa caught off guard, even if their commander rallied them before they were completely routed. Most of all, the difference in leadership was simply too great to withstand.

Not military leadership, as such. The Malwa commander was a capable and courageous officer, experienced in both land and naval combat. As an infantry officer, one of the Malwa kshatriya who fought with grenades in the front lines, not cannons in the rear, he had been one of the first to pour through the breach of Amaravati's walls which brought down the Andhran empire ruled by Shakuntala's father. Later, transferred into the navy, he had shown the same aptitude with maritime warfare. Promotions had come quickly enough, and not one of those promotions had come from bribes or favoritism.

If truth be told, he was not only more experienced than the king who led his enemies, but a more capable commander as well. In that battle, the negusa nagast could hardly have been said to "command" at all. He simply
led
, cutting his way through the Malwa defenders like any one of the marines at his side. Like Alexander the Great before him—though with little if any of Alexander's strategic and tactical genius—Eon bisi Dakuen would lead a battle in the front ranks, wielding a sword himself.

Indeed, in the course of that battle, Eon even managed to restage one of Alexander's most famous exploits. The negusa nagast was among the first marines who reached the walls of the fortress and began erecting their siege ladders. And then—despite the vehement protests of the soldiers surrounding him—insisted on being the first to scale the wall.

Stupid, really—even idiotic. Eon's great strength carried him to the parapet and cleared it quickly enough of the handful of Malwa soldiers who guarded his section. Just as Alexander's strength had carried him to the parapet at one of the cities he conquered from the Mallians. And then, just as happened to Alexander, he was isolated atop the parapet when the defenders pushed aside the scaling ladders.

Finding himself now the target of every Malwa bowman within range, and with nowhere to take shelter from the arrows on the
inside
of the parapet, Eon was forced to emulate Alexander again. He leapt into the interior of the fortress itself—alone, but at least no longer as vulnerable to missiles. There he took his stand next to a small tree, just as the Macedonian had done—although this was not a fig tree as in the Alexandrian legend—and began fiercely defending himself against a small mob of Malwa attackers.

The Malwa commander died not long afterward. By the time the sarwen poured over the walls of the fortress, taking no prisoners in their fury, the commander had managed to organize a rear guard action which enabled him to lead a small column of soldiers down to the beach. There, in a brief but savage melee, he tried to stop the Axumite marines who were putting the Malwa ships to the torch.

Tried, and failed, and died himself in the doing. In his case, died in the actual combat, not in the slaughter which followed as the sarwen pursued the routed Malwa soldiers for miles inland until the fall of night gave the few Malwa survivors blessed sanctuary.

There would be no mercy for Malwa that day. Although, the next day, the sarwen retrieved the body of the Malwa commander from the piled corpses on the beach and gave him a solemn burial. That was done at the command of Ezana, the leader of the Dakuen sarwe, who also commanded the erection of a small, simple gravestone over the commander's grave.

Another nation's warriors might have mutilated that body. But the Dakuen soldiers, like their commander, came from a different tradition. One whose origins in tribal custom was not so far removed. Beneath the civilized names of regiments, lurked the not-so-dim faces of old totems. And it was that tradition which gave honor to the commander.

A hunting people will kill a tiger, but they will not dishonor it. Not even—especially not even—when the tiger, in its death throes, manages to slay the leader of the hunting party.

Eon bisi Dakuen had gained his treasured boarding scar. The wound, rather. The scar itself would never form, because the negusa nagast of Ethiopia would die from it before it could.

His soldiers had known, from the moment, still fighting their way over the rampart, they saw the spear thrust which took Eon in the belly as he fought alone inside the fortress. The knowing fueled the rage which destroyed the Malwa fleet and slaughtered Malwa's men.

Eon himself had known, and the knowing had fueled his own fury as he beat down his last assailants before collapsing unconscious to the packed-earth floor.

Ousanas had known, from the moment he reached the body and examined the wound. The young king he had reared in the way of kingship since he was a boy would be gone from this earth within a time measured by, at most, a few days. And for the first time in years, the man named Ousanas had no philosophical insights and no quip to make and no sarcasm to utter and no grin to present to the universe. He fell to his knees and simply wept, and wept, and wept.

And Antonina had known, from the moment she saw the first Ethiopian warship pull away from the breakwater and begin rowing toward the flagship on which she had remained throughout the battle. Slow, solemn oarstrokes, accompanied by a rhythmic drum beat which was not so much a time-keeper as a lament.

In truth, deep inside, she had known from the moment she saw the blazing fury with which Axum's marines cut down the Malwa sailors attempting to protect the ships along the strand. Ethiopian sarwen were always ferocious in battle, to be sure, but this went beyond ferocity. This was pure slaughter, animal rage tearing at flesh, the bloodlust of maddened wolverines.

When Eon's body was brought aboard the flagship and carried into the negusa nagast's cabin, Antonina had accompanied it. Had done what she could, with the aid of an Axumite healer, to minimize the damage of the horrible wound. But, long before Ousanas came into the cabin, his face drawn and haggard, Antonina had faced the truth. The negusa nagast would live, for a time. Might even, if she and the healer used every method at their disposal, regain consciousness and speak. But he would not live to see another month go by. Probably not more than two weeks. Not with that wound. The spear had cut great slices of his intestines; damage that would inevitably bring fatal disease in its train.