Blood Red Sea by William Napier - The Last Crusaders 02 - Blood Red Sea

Author:William Napier - The Last Crusaders 02 - Blood Red Sea [Napier, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781409147633
Google: TQk2AgAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00DO1Q6OQ
Goodreads: 19069009
Publisher: Orion
Published: 2013-07-17T16:00:00+00:00

7

The people were fleeing into the heart of the city, taking to roofs or cellars like maddened animals. An old man, stark naked, crawled into a barrel and started to giggle. But Nicholas had seen such sights before. The madness of war. Now it was time to steel yourself. Nothing was normal. He wound up his shirt front tightly and wrung out the dead man’s blood. It trickled to the dusty ground, still warm.

‘Below!’ cried Smith, sword in hand. ‘To me!’

All was chaos, but at least the rumours about the Famagusta Gate were false. As cannonballs hurtled in overhead, the ground shaking with huge thumps, and walls and buildings behind them collapsing with a slow, distant rumble, they formed up before the great eastern gate of the city. Paolo dal Guasto was already there with his company, pikes at the ready.

But the gate, at least, had been heavily bulked, on Dal Guasto’s initiative. On the outward face the stonework was all shock-absorbing slopes and angles, and the huge oak gates themselves were covered with overlapping plate metal. Behind that, most simple but most effective of all, was the bulking. A mix of bales of straw, barrels full of sand, stone blocks and sacks of earth, as deep as a barn full of hay. Unlike impressive stone walls, such soft bulking actually absorbed the hammer-blows of cannonballs rather than resisted them. No cannonball on earth could go through it.

Smith grunted approval. ‘The Turk will have to start building defences for himself, right up against the walls, before he can begin lifting and carrying away all this. Like a peasant carting bales of hay from the meadow.’

Stanley joined them. There was blood on his sleeves, and another dead soldier back in the street behind. He had died without even a taste of opium. There was none in the city.

Giustiniani said, ‘It’s mining that brings down cities.’

There was a lull in the bombardment again while the Turkish guns cooled. They crept up on to the walls once more. Stanley peered out, and told the younger three to do likewise.

‘What are we looking for?’ asked Mazzinghi, whispering unnecessarily.

Stanley grinned. ‘You’re looking for where there’s nothing.’

Smith started almost immediately. ‘There, damn it. Just off to the left.’

They all looked. There was one section of the wicker breastwork and earth rampart where a gun barrel poked out, but no gun team was working to cool it with buckets of warm water. Cold water could crack the barrel, even a piece of bronze weighing more than a pair of oxen. It was as if this gun hadn’t been fired. As if it was merely for cover.

And then Nicholas saw a man with a spade.

Smith was already unslinging his jezail.

‘Take us to the countermining tunnels,’ said Stanley. ‘Fast.’

Dal Guasto wore a look of shame on his face.

Stanley said, ‘Don’t tell me . . .’

Dal Guasto said, ‘The Governor thought we had not the manpower to countermine. He said our walls were impregnable anyway.’

Smith lowered his jezail in sheer despair.

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