That was what Bohemund was about, not least because he had on his own deck now double the number of fighting men, a tempting target for an enemy dromon and their archers. Casting his gaze around for a way to occupy them, he saw a line of lances strung across an enemy deck, shield close to shield, with just enough room between for their broadswords to do their deadly work. Behind them stood another conroy with their teardrop shields laid flat to cover themselves and the heads of the men in front, nullifying the attempts of the archers to rain down arrows upon them. His arm, in which he now held a huge axe, shot out.
‘Master, steer for the tiller of that dromon.’
Even if he looked doubtful — the man wanted no more than to set his prow for safety and have his rowers bend their backs — he had long since reasoned that to question the orders of this Goliath was to invite a blow from that axe that would split him in two. As he issued his commands he could hear his giant doing likewise, making sure there were spare lances available, setting the grappling irons for use and arranging the ladders so they could be swiftly employed.
‘The stern is higher than the deck amidships,’ said Ligart, as they came close. ‘These ladders of your father’s will be too short.’
‘Archers,’ Bohemund replied calmly, causing both men to kneel and defend their bodies as he quietly answered that problem. ‘Hook two ladders together and they are more than enough.’
Coming under the high stern protected them from the archers but their approach had not gone unnoticed on deck; there was a large and vocal party of Venetians waiting to oppose their boarding. Their attempt to discourage Normans by leaning over the taffrail and shouting imprecations at them was not only useless; it proved, for many, to be fatal. On the command, Bohemund and his double quota of warriors dropped their shields, stood upright and, after a slight pause, slung their lances. It was a drill they carried out daily, in the same way they rehearsed fighting on foot and mounted, so there was little wastage. Each man, in that short time they took to aim, had picked a victim, fixed that person for an instant before casting their lance. So many of their weapons found some flesh it almost cleared the stern, while the remainder, those who avoided a lance point, were so in terror of the sight of those who suffered wounds that they fled.
‘Irons!’ Bohemund yelled.
The grappling irons snaked over the now near-empty stern and the sheer weight of the subsequent pull had the galley crunching into the decorative fretwork hard enough to smash it to kindling, this as whoever commanded the defenders rallied them to contest the boarding. The ladders followed the meeting of hulls and within a space of a few breaths, swords and axes swinging, the Normans swarmed up with enough vigour to get more than half of them on to the poop, where their actions cleared the way for the remainder.
Bohemund led the way and with his reach and chosen weapon proved the most deadly. The deck planking was stained already from those thrown lances but that was as nothing to what followed — great spouts of red blood and gore, which shot forth as flesh was rent asunder by his axe, this added to by swinging broadswords in powerful hands on the end of massively muscled arms, while in maintaining close contact they made it difficult for the archers to fire at them for fear of hitting their own.
That security diminished as, moving forward, half pace by half pace, they began to drive back their opposition, which necessitated shield cover again, their progress slowed as more of the enemy came to reinforce the defence. Bohemund could see above their heads and if he only had half an eye — the remainder of his vision too busy at his killing, the only result of an axe strike — it was obvious they were winning their fight, while the party of Normans he had come to help were driving from the bows towards the mainmast.
Less cheering was the sight of two Venetian dromons bearing down on them from the shoreside, a development that had Bohemund stop to let the line in which he was fighting go on, it closing automatically to cover for his absence. A thud obliged him to quickly raise his shield, for they were still at the mercy of those archers; one of their arrows had just missed him and was now quivering near his foot. The feeling of anger at what the Venetians had done with their false truce, which had been with him and no doubt every one of his confreres since the first alarm, boiled up, and he rushed to one side where a line of taut ropes lashed round cleats set into the ship’s bulwarks snaked upwards.
The swinging axe, honed and sharpened the day before in preparation for the coming battle, sliced through them like twine. He had no idea what his action would achieve, it being born out of frustration more than thought, but the yells from aloft indicated he had achieved an unexpected result, that confirmed when he spun round to see a body, one of the archers, his bow still in his hand, descend in flaying fall to slam into the deck. A glance aloft showed the boat in which they had been placed was now upended and hanging by one set of lines, not the many needed to keep it level, with other archers hanging on to anything they could get hold of and crying out for help.
That act alone doubled the number of his fighters, for now his men had no need of overhead cover, the result an increase in pressure that pushed back their enemies to a point where Bohemund found himself staring down a hatch, crowded at the bottom with unarmed men, who, when they moved fearfully away, set up a clanking sound. They had to be rower slaves, each one chained and thus no threat, so, calling to Ligart and two other lances, he shot down the companionway and into the gloom of the lower deck, where he sought another hatch cover which would, when lifted, take him below the waterline.
The stink of the bilge water stagnating the ballast rose to greet him and, breath held, he dropped down into what was a storage area for the things necessary to allow the ship to stay at sea, none of which was of interest; what he was looking for was a line of planks that, flat and affixed along the ship’s side, provided a way for the carpenter to inspect for leaks in the hull. It was guesswork to swing his axe at the timbers below, and given the ship had a double skin, both of a decent thickness, it took time to smash his way through. The blow that split the outer hull produced an immediate flow of water; ten more heavy swings of his axe turned that into a torrent that immediately began to flood the vessel.
‘Back on deck, Ligart,’ he shouted as he eased himself out of that torrent and back on to the rowing deck. ‘Pass the word to the conroy leaders to prepare to retreat — we have to get our men back into their galleys.’
Bohemund’s axe was employed again as he made his way back to the companionway, smashing at those timbers that held the ring bolts to free the oarsmen. They were likely to die from drowning anyway, but his action at least gave them a chance to cling to what would soon be wreckage, for if all went well this dromon was going to sink; there was not a carpenter born who could fill the hole he had created. The cries of gratitude were drowned out by chains being drawn through rings, but he would have ignored them anyway, given he needed to be back up on deck to make sure his command was being obeyed.
The need that it should be, and quickly, was looming close; soon the Norman boarders would be in range of arrows fired from the approaching dromons, and if they remained fighting, the crews of those two vessels would get aboard and might overwhelm them. Even more worrying was that water now pouring into the hull, with Bohemund having no idea how long it would take to affect the trim of the ship; for all he knew it could cant over and capsize.