Centuripe, like every other Sicilian township, was set on a high hill and dominated by its citadel, this a fortress on a conical outcrop so steep it was near impossible to assault. The Normans needed the garrison to surrender, but whoever was in command, a vassal of al-Hawas, was wise enough to discern that this walled town was not the main target for these invaders. He refused to even parley, forcing Robert to call off what was in any case a half-hearted attempt to invest it. Yet Centuripe could not be just left on his line of march so he shifted that to the east and took the less formidable town of Paterno, detaching even more of his limited strength to garrison that. Given there was no sign of the great army al-Hawas was reputed to have gathered to oppose him, a further thrust brought him eventually to the plains below Enna, the most fearsome fortress in Sicily.
‘God save us if we don’t win here,’ groaned Serlo de Hauteville, looking up at the fortress, standing high above what was already an elevated plateau. ‘Any Mass said will be a requiem.’
Enna was in a position that could not have been improved upon: nature had already set it apart. The town was clustered along an elevated, impressive table, while at the highest end stood the castle, the only approach along the narrow ridge of the walled town, the other three sides of the escarpment falling away into the valley.
‘His army is not in there,’ Robert barked, ‘and it is they we have to beat.’
Roger spoke to support Serlo. ‘If it is anything like the size of the rumours we have heard it would be wise to choose our ground to fight.’
‘I will not attack them,’ Robert replied, just as angry with him, ‘and before you point it out, we cannot just sit here either, we must get them to attack us. Serlo, this is something you will enjoy: get out there, find them, and prick them until they can stand it no longer.’
‘And me?’ Roger asked.
‘You, brother, have got to help me choose where we are going to bring them to battle.’ Then he pointed up, as if to the sky. ‘And once we have scattered them, how we will besiege that damned fortress.’
It was well away from Robert’s ears that Roger voiced his opinion to Serlo. ‘He is praying for divine intervention when he talks about taking Enna.’
‘The Saracens took it from Byzantium. It is not impossible.’
‘They took it after a two-year siege by sending men crawling up the main sewer through decades of shit and that, you can guarantee, has now been blocked off. They will have strengthened the place since, as would we.’
‘Are you saying we cannot take it, Uncle?’
‘Not with what we have, Serlo. We need a more secure rear and thousands more milities just to seal it off, as well as to mount the kind of repeated assaults that will be needed to wear down the defenders.’
Serlo nodded. ‘What about Robert’s plan to pester the forces outside?’
‘It’s not only sound, it’s essential. All al-Hawas has to do is sit still. It is we who will get weak, not he.’
‘You did not say this when you had the opportunity.’
Roger wondered how to reply to that, then it occurred that Serlo might be young but he was no fool. ‘Do I need to say why?’
That got him a grin. ‘No, Uncle, you do not.’
‘Robert has favoured you as I did. Make good use of it.’
That Serlo did over the following days. Having located the Saracen host he first established where they were strong, around the main command tents, then where they were weak, on the flanks. His probing attacks were just that, sorties designed to annoy and spread panic, to force the enemy to be alert at all times, for if they were not they would find a fast-moving Norman band inside their lines, slashing and cutting at often unprotected flesh.
Stronger cohorts were moved out to stop these raids, weakening the main concentration, so his final incursion was launched there when the leaders were in their tents at their evening meal. Using the swiftest mounts as well as the terrain, Serlo seemed to appear from nowhere, driving through the central camp roadway. If a flashing sword or swinging axe was not used to kill or maim, then it served just as well to cut the guy ropes and bring the canvas down about the leaders’ ears, the dent to their pride doing more to rouse them to action than any number of their followers being killed or maimed.
The horns blew the following morning, the sound faint but clear in the warm air. Robert soon had sentinels riding in from their outposts to tell him that the whole host was on the march, heading straight for his position. In anticipation, the orders had already been given: Roger was on the right flank with a hundred and fifty knights, Serlo on the left with the same number and for once the Guiscard was clear that they should act as they saw fit. He commanded six hundred lances and the eight hundred milities.
‘Serlo puts our enemies at seven thousand in number, with at least fifteen hundred horses. Those, if the Saracens act as they usually do, we will have to face first.’ Seeing the look in many an eye, for Robert had never fought a Saracen army, he added, ‘Today I will follow the advice of my brother William, who did battle with these men many times in his life. Do not be troubled by the numbers, for they are but levies, poorly trained. The horsemen are the elite; kill them and the exposed fellows on foot will break at the first sight of our advance.’
Faint now, they could hear the drumbeats setting the pace of those coming to fight them, a deep timbre that seemed to resound within their hollow bellies, for, not yet shriven, they had not broken their overnight fast. Quickly the priests moved to their allotted places, calling on these bands of warriors to kneel, captains at the front, each with his sword before his eyes as a makeshift cross.
Each man now looked to his own soul and his own sins, seeking forgiveness for much transgression, while the priests moved amongst them, dispensing the body and blood of Christ crucified. Cleansed of sin they could eat a hasty breakfast, then see to the horses on which they would fight, the sturdy destriers, fed early so they would have well digested their oats. Now they were tied with their heads on a short halter that ensured they could not graze.
Having chosen the crest of a hill they saw their enemies debouching over the opposite rise, each eye keen in examination. Robert had deliberately waited so that his deployment would be visible: he wanted the enemy to see how disciplined were his men, desired they should observe the orderly way they formed their lines. In the centre, under his personal command, he drew up his lances in three lines of two hundred men but kept them still, as the sun rose to fully light the valley in which the contest would be decided.
Aware that al-Hawas was not leading his army in person, and close enough to the fortress of Enna to be overlooked, Robert guessed the emir would be watching from the ramparts, no doubt praying to Allah for a victory this day. He would see the mass in the centre and the way the other de Hautevilles had taken up their positions and spread out in a single line to deny his men the chance to outflank the main Norman force, puny in number when he gazed upon his own army, now all visible and covering the ground so it had disappeared from view.
Robert wondered if he might be invited to parley, with the offer that he could withdraw peacefully. When no sign came he was pleased: al-Hawas wanted to see him crushed and, if he had passed on such a command to his captains, it might make them rash. Right now there was no evidence of that: they were stationary, if you discounted the flurries of activity designed to get them into reasonable order.
‘Look at us, Ibn-al-Hawas,’ he said softly to himself, ‘and see what it is you would dearly love to command.’
There was movement in his ranks, but it was slight, as horses were troubled by their neighbours and the men astride them were obliged to use a sharp tug to keep their heads facing to the front. Robert surmised he would have to initiate any action and he did not want his enemies to deploy in peace. He ordered the horns blown and the first line of two hundred lances, under his personal command, moved forward. No directive was needed for the second line to move, which it did when the requisite gap had opened up, a manoeuvre repeated by the third line. The ragged mass of foot soldiers, pikemen in the main, stood their ground, something obvious to those in the fortress, but hidden from those to the front. Had they seen it they might have wondered why.