“We’ve got to stop her! Ideas… come on!”
Saja and Culin glanced around at him as they argued, but neither looked hopeful.
“Ghassan?”
Samir looked across the command deck at where his brother had been only a moment earlier, shouting out commands. Now, however, there was no sign of him. Squinting, Samir cast his eyes around the ship and finally spotted Ghassan racing up the steps to the artillery platform amidships.
Running after him, Samir shook his head. There would only be time to get one shot off, and there wasn’t time to prime a fire shot. They might do a little damage, but not enough to stop them. As he reached the foot of the steps climbing up to the artillery castle, the lead casket still lying open nearby, he clambered up to see Ghassan in deep conversation with the young artillerist, waving his arms to illustrate some point he was making.
Samir stopped, panting, at the top of the steps and Ghassan turned to him, a look of quiet determination on his face. Behind him, two artillerists loaded heavy solid shot into the catapult.
“Ghassan? What are you up to? There’s no time for this.”
Ghassan nodded absently.
“There is. There’s time for one shot. Just pray that it’s enough and that your men are that good.”
Samir frowned at his brother and, as the artillerists began to line up the catapult, tightening the ropes a last few turns and checking their trajectory, he and Ghassan leaned over the wooden battlements and watched the scene unfold, their breath held.
The enemy ship was perhaps half a minute from them and still on a ramming course, having to adjust only a few degrees occasionally as the Redemption slowly slid forward.
“Gods, I hope you’re right, Ghassan.”
They stared bleakly at the ever closing bow of the enemy ship with that horrific iron spike, the oarsmen heaving like they’d never rowed before to achieve a crippling ramming speed. Samir closed his eyes tight and held his breath.
‘Crack’.
Behind them, the artillerists let loose the only shot they would have time for.
Samir opened one eye as the great, heavy shot sailed over their heads on a remarkably low trajectory. For an artillerist to manage such a low and straight shot from a catapult was a remarkable enough feat, let alone with the perfect precision targeting that the shot displayed.
Through his squinted eye, Samir saw the shot hit the banks of oars on the port side of the enemy vessel, smashing and shattering them and bouncing along the shafts, cracking and breaking more as it disappeared with dreadful momentum down the side of the ship and disappeared into the water with a loud splash.
Samir blinked. Just as he’d once done to Ghassan’s ship! One carefully aimed shot had removed almost half the rowing power on the enemy’s port side, the remaining oars on that side now disjointed and out of time, in chaos.
The effect was immediate and astounding.
With little forward motion on the port oars, while the starboard banks ploughed on as fast as they could and the sails billowed with the wind, no amount of rudder control at the rear could stop the ship turning. The men of the Imperial ship Redemption watched with fascination as the enemy vessel slewed wildly to port, momentum still carrying it forward at a strange quarter angle.
Samir barely had time to take it all in before he realised what was coming next. The ramming spike had skewed left and out of line with its target, but nothing was going to stop the two ships colliding under the circumstances.
“Brace!” he bellowed and, grabbing tight hold of the artillery fortification, ducked to floor level.
The enemy vessel hit them at that quarter angle, the timbers of both ships crashing and breaking, amidships for Redemption and to starboard of the forward deck on the pirate vessel. The damage was far from fatal for either, but the crews of both ships were shaken, those who were not fully braced being swept from their feet. A number of screams and splashes from various directions announced men overboard among both crews.
The Redemption listed frighteningly following the impact, slowly righting itself as men were hurled from the rail. Similar events appeared to be occurring among the pirates.
Ghassan grasped Samir and the two hauled themselves back up to the crenellated top of the fortification.
“We’re not out of the shit yet, Samir” Ghassan breathed heavily. “You’ve got a skeleton crew at best now, while they’re fully manned.”
Samir nodded, biting back an undeserved retort. Ghassan was right. The men on his ship were brave and among the best he’d ever seen, but the odds would be three or four to one, and no amount of heart was going to even that out.
“I’m not letting them have the Empress, Ghassan.”
“The Redemption, Samir.”
The smaller brother shot an irritated look at his sibling.
“If things get too bleak, make sure you throw that compass over the side. That has to be the end of it.”
Ghassan nodded soberly and Samir turned and cupped his hands around his mouth.
“To arms. Prepare to board!”
Ghassan stared at his brother.
“Board? Are you mad? We should be trying to repel them. You don’t try and board a ship that outnumbers you by four men to one!”
“Indeed,” replied Samir, “which is why it’ll throw them completely off track!”
Behind them, the men of the Redemption drew their weapons as they picked themselves up from the deck and clambered across the wreckage toward the rail.
“Samir, they’ll die.”
“Better to go out trying than cowering, Ghassan. I’m leaving you in charge of the Redemption and the compass. You know what to do when things get too bad.”
“Oh no you don…”
“Yes I do. Good luck, brother.”
As Ghassan launched off on a tirade at the smaller man, Samir, grimacing, leapt down to the main deck and ran to join the men who were even now clambering at the rail.
Ghassan watched from the command deck, helplessly. Samir, however irritating, was right. Someone needed to stay back in charge of the compass. It must not fall into enemy hands. And he, since his back was still weeping when he moved wrong, was the obvious choice. He thumped his hand on the rail as he surveyed the scene.
It was a mess. Many of the oars on both ships had been smashed when the collision occurred, and the pirate vessel had slid to a stop side by side with her prey, both ships rocking and shaking. The gap between the two hulls was almost narrow enough to leap, but if a man missed, given the fact that the two hulls kept washing against one another, drowning would be a blessed option. Ghassan had seen men crushed between two ships’ hulls before and it was never pretty.
The sailors of both sides were clamouring at the rails, awaiting the chance to cross and cause havoc, but neither was ready yet. The collision had left both ships in a state of chaos. No one was willing to take the leap between ships and neither side had expected a boarding action, so the boarding ramps were being brought up hurriedly on both sides.
The crews, who looked largely identical, roared their anger and defiance at one another and the sight was almost comical, given the impotent inability to actually reach the opposition until the ramps were in place.
Ghassan, however, a veteran of so many years of combat, could see a subtle difference in the two crews.
Not the numbers. There was nothing subtle about the fact that the enemy ship’s rail was crowded by a throng of bloodthirsty cutthroats at least four men deep while there were few enough men on board the Redemption that small gaps remained at the rail.
No. The difference was in the tone of the shouts. The enemy ship had that roar of true violence. They knew they had the upper hand and that they would be safe if they overran the Redemption, stole the compass and retreated into the reefs. They had every reason to believe that the fight would go their way.
Samir’s crew, however, knew they were doomed. Though their cries were as angry as those of the enemy, the undercurrent was that of quiet resignation. The crew of the Redemption knew that they were likely to lose here and that the enemy would leave no survivors.