‘Tell your men to leave their lances behind. There will be no charge; we will engage them at the water’s edge.’
They rode back to their companies and moments later over twelve hundred men were cantering towards where Vagises’ men were shooting arrows at the enemy cataphracts now entering the Tigris. The arrows would not be able to pierce the armour of the men or their horses but would hopefully slow them enough to allow us to deploy.
I shook Orodes’ hand and then we galloped to the head of our men, the ground around us littered with discarded lances. I smiled to myself. Rsan would have a fit if he saw items of expensive equipment treated thus. Orodes and his bodyguard formed the extreme right of our long line, which was as thin as parchment — only two ranks. In this way we had a frontage of nine hundred yards.
As the men dressed their lines Vagises’ horse archers moved further downriver to allow the cataphracts to fill the space they had been occupying and to extend our line further south. He rode up to me as we walked our horses forward to the riverbank. Ahead I saw a great mass of enemy riders walking their horses through the water towards us. They moved slowly to retain their order, red, yellow and blue flags fluttering from the end of each kontus.
‘Send a rider to Lord Herneus,’ I told him. ‘Tell him that if the enemy horsemen break through us, he and his men are to retreat towards the city to form a screen so Domitus and his men can get inside the walls. That goes for you and your men also.’
‘What of you, Pacorus?’ he said with alarm.
‘We will most likely be dead so you will not have to worry about us. Now go.’
He raised his hand in salute and went back to his horse archers. The camel train loaded with fresh arrows had been brought forward from the rear to replenish the ammunition expended against the enemy cataphracts, whose front ranks were now at the midpoint in the river. I looked behind me up and down the line and saw every man had armed himself with either his axe or mace. I reached down and grabbed the mace that was hanging from one of my saddle’s front horns.
The mace is an extraordinary weapon — two and half feet of solid steel with four flanges on one end. These sharpened protruding edges can dent and penetrate even the thickest armour. Leather is wrapped round the other end to make a handle, with a metal ring at the base to which is fitted a leather strap that goes round the wrist. I gripped the shaft tightly and raised it in the air, a move reciprocated by every man behind me. Some of my cataphracts were very skilled in the use of the mace and used the strap to spin the weapon round their wrists before delivering a lethal blow, but I frowned on such antics.
The mace is an effective and brutal impact weapon ordinarily used after the charge, but today there would be no charge. Some men preferred to use axes, which were also solid steel instruments with a head comprising a blade and a point on the opposite side.
I nudged Remus forward and the others followed, walking to the edge of the riverbank and then down its side and into the water. In front of me the front rank of the enemy’s horsemen threw their lances into the water and armed themselves with their own maces and axes. And thus began a grim close-quarters battle. There were no battle cries or thunder of horse hooves, just a great clatter as each side began hacking at the other with their weapons.
In such a mêlée the ability to avoid blows is as important as the skill to deliver them. I leaned to my left to avoid a scything blow from a man holding an axe that would have lopped my head off had it hit me. His horse stopped beside Remus as he brought the axe in front of his body then swung it up and then down to split my helmet and then my skull. I deflected the blow with my mace, forcing his axe away from me. But he attacked me with its point using a backswing that I stopped with my mace only inches from my face. I grabbed his axe with my left hand and he grabbed my left wrist with his free hand, and so we pushed and pulled each other like a pair of has-been wrestlers.
He was strong and the only thing that weighed our private war in my favour was the leather strap wrapped round my wrist. His axe had no such attachment and I eventually managed to wrench it from his hand and throw it into the water. I brought my mace back and then with all my strength swung it against the side of his helmet, splitting the metal and causing him to let out a groan. I swung the mace again and again at the same spot, penetrating the metal and his skull. One of the blows must have driven a steel flange into his brain, for he slumped in the saddle and then slid off his horse into the water without making another sound.
I looked left to see a horsemen coming directly at me with his mace held high above his head, ready to bring it down on my head. But before he could reach me one of my own men attacked him and they became embroiled in their own personal fight. I transferred my mace to my left hand and pulled my spatha as another rider attacked me on my right side. This time I blocked his overhead swing with my own mace and drove the tip of my sword into his exposed right armpit, driving the blade deep into his flesh. He gave a high-pitched scream as I forced the blade forward and yanked it back. I was prevented from finishing him off by a mace blow that dug into the steel rings on my left arm.
I instinctively swung my mace back with my left arm and felt it strike something, then turned to see a horse rear up and throw its rider into the river. I must have hit it on the head with my weapon.
And so it went on, men hacking and slashing wildly in all directions in a huge disorganised mêlée that seemed to go on forever. I do not know how long we were in the water. It seemed like hours but in reality was probably around thirty minutes. But as Remus moved back and forth in the brown water streaked with blood it became apparent that the enemy’s greater weight of numbers had not achieved a breakthrough, at least not yet. But their numerical superiority meant that they could feed in more and more men against our tiring ranks, replacing their own injured and exhausted riders with fresh reinforcements. And yet it did not seem so because after what seemed like an eternity, following which my arms and shoulders ached, a gradual lull descended over the two sides. As if by mutual consent each side withdrew from each other, revealing a river filled with armoured corpses, most lying face down in the blood-streaked water. Some men had been unhorsed and these now waded towards the safety of their own lines. My arm armour was battered and dented though it had saved me from serious injury. I looked at the head and neck of Remus, then at his sides and rear. Not a mark on him; indeed, looking up and down the line it appeared that no horses had been killed at all.
Orodes came to my side, his armour missing several metal scales and his helmet’s right cheek guard almost hanging off where a blow had smashed the hinge. He was breathing heavily.
‘Are you hurt?’ I asked.
He shook his head. ‘Exhausted would be a more accurate description. I don’t know if we can hold them if they attack again.’
Around us men had pushed their full-face helmets up on their heads and were breathing in great gulps of air. By contrast their horses appeared relatively fresh. At least they would be able to carry their riders back to the city if we were forced to retreat.
‘They are they falling back.’
I looked at Orodes. ‘Who?’
He pointed with his mace towards the enemy horsemen whose front ranks were now backing slowly away from us, the ranks behind having about-faced and were exiting the water. To the south the mass of enemy light horsemen who had been riding up and down the riverbank in preparation to cross once the cataphracts had scattered us were also pulling back.
‘My father’s army,’ I said, grinning at him.