Strategos: Born in the Borderlands (6 page)

Apion edged his head to one side: stood only paces away was a stocky and swarthy young man, shaven headed, stubble-chinned with a broad and flat-boned face, wearing a grey tunic and clenching a scimitar as he examined the hillside for movement.

‘Whoever it is, show yourself! My blade is dirty and I’m keen to wash it in your blood!’

Apion turned to Maria; she hurled a jagged lump of rubble that flew from her hand and bounced from another chunky boulder around twenty paces away. Giyath’s eyes locked onto the disturbance. Then, with a growl, he thundered towards it, his gait clumsy but determined.

‘Come on!’ Maria hissed and yanked Apion by the wrist.

At once they were hobbling up and around the orchard fence, out of Giyath’s line of sight. Then Maria wrenched him towards Kutalmish’s farmhouse. His body roared, his crutch meeting the ground only on every second stride, his vision spotting over and his scarred limb searing as though it was being sawn off. They stumbled past the snoring Kutalmish and into a field of tall barley, still dewy and mercifully cool on his searing scar. They were moving only at a fast walk but his body was spent and then, through dimming vision, he realised they were climbing the hill to the valley top and the goat herd once more. He reached out blindly, mouthing silently, knees shaking, when at last she stopped. He crumpled to the ground, panting.

Maria crouched beside him. ‘We’re safe now. I’m sorry, Apion. It’s just that Giyath is . . . well father says he was a nice boy until . . . ’ her words trailed off. ‘Anyway, he is now a moody and violent man.’ Then she looked riddled with guilt as she eyed his trembling leg, biting her bottom lip.

Apion sought strength enough to push himself to his feet. ‘It’s okay, I’ll be fine.’ He stopped as he saw her eyes bulge, looking over his shoulder.

‘Apion!’ She screamed.

When he turned to see what was behind him, a cold hard shock to his cheekbone sent sparks of brilliant light through his eyeballs and bloody phlegm shooting from his nose and mouth. His world rolled in front of his eyes and he groaned, realising he was prone again.

A shadowy figure loomed over him. ‘Raiders of Seljuk blood I can take but a Byzantine?’ The figure boomed.

Apion shuffled back on the palms of his hands. Vision blurred, he could make out cinnamon skin and a flat-boned face. If it was Giyath then he was surely in big trouble. His eyes focused instead on a pony-tailed boy: younger than Giyath, perhaps his own age, nostrils flaring, eyebrows dipped in the centre like an angry bull. He looked like Giyath but without the broadness or the stubble, his gangly shoulders scaffolding a red, long-sleeved tunic.

‘You think you can take from my father? I think you’re a fool.’ The boy stalked forward and shook his fist, the knuckles bloodied.

‘I . . . ’ Apion stammered as the boy stalked forward, fists clenched.

‘Nasir! No!’ Maria screamed.

The boy wheeled around. ‘And you, you call yourself a Seljuk? You could have your pick from the orchard, Maria, if only you’d not associate with his type!’

With that, the boy Nasir spun around again and thrust his foot into Apion’s stomach. Bile leapt from Apion’s mouth and he curled into a ball, croaking for the breath that had been kicked from his lungs. His eyes seemed to pop from their sockets as he retched, his world on its side. Nasir stomped over to Maria, remonstrating with her and Apion saw only the whites of Maria’s bulging eyes.

‘Nasir, you idiot, you’re acting like your ape of a brother!’ She shoved him in the chest.

Apion felt his hands scrape on the ground and at once he was up, hobbling towards Nasir’s back, a roar rent the air and he barely recognised it as his own as he clasped his arms around the boy’s neck, pulling him down. The pair tumbled to the dust, spilling over in a flurry of elbow and knees. Nasir ended it by pinning Apion to the ground, knees pressed into his shoulders.

‘You lay a finger on her and I . . . I . . . ’ Apion spat.

‘Hold your tongue, Byzantine.’

‘Get off of him, Nasir,’ Maria squealed, shoving him clear of Apion, ‘you’re hurting him!’

‘What?’ Nasir scrambled round to stand over him again, then snorted at the sight of the angry welt of scar on Apion’s leg. ‘A cripple? Well I won’t waste my strength on you. What happened to your leg? Were your parents crippled too?’ He mocked.

A fury erupted in Apion’s chest and he hobbled forward. ‘You filthy Seljuk
whoreson!
’

‘Apion!’ Maria slapped a hand across his neck. ‘Stop it, both of you,’ she gasped. ‘Animals!’

Apion glanced at her and then shared a breathless and venomous glare with Nasir.

Maria sighed, screwing her eyes shut tight and running her hands through her hair. ‘Apion, if you want to continue to share my family home then you’ll apologise to Nasir. Nasir, you behave more like yourself and less like your idiot brother and we might speak again,’ she wrinkled her nose. ‘Make peace,’ she demanded.

As the tension ebbed from his veins and the crushing pain from his scar replaced it, Apion looked at the boy Nasir. He was no more than that; just a wiry boy, but whose words had stirred a murky anger deep inside him. Nasir cast him a mirror image, narrow-eyed stare.

‘For now, Byzantine,’ he growled.

Apion bristled. ‘Likewise.’

‘Come on,’ Maria hissed, tugging Apion by the elbow as he and Nasir remained locked in a fiery gaze. ‘Move or Giyath will come up here and he won’t be so easily talked out of skewering you.’

‘Talked out of? I had the beating of Nasir!’ Apion protested as they descended the hill to Mansur’s farm, the goats skipping alongside.

‘The beating of him?’ Her words cut through his indignation like a razor. ‘We were on his property, trying to steal his family’s food . . . ’ her words trailed off as she saw the hole she was digging. Her skin darkened a little around the cheeks. ‘Well, enough about who’s right and who’s wrong,’ she grumped, pushing back into the barley.

‘Agreed,’ Apion couldn’t contain a weary grin. Before he stepped into the barley field, he cast a glance over his shoulder. Nasir stood like a sentinel on the hilltop, watching them.

5.
Night

Apion stirred from thick sleep. The farmhouse was still and silent. A winter draft tickled his ankles and he pulled them up and into the welcome heat under his hemp blanket. He prised open an eye; it was pitch-black inside and out apart from the pristine crescent of moon hanging in the triangular gap between the shutters, just below the carved Christian Chi-Rho
mounted above the window. It was well into the night, he mused, knowing the path the moon took at this time of year. A gruff choking snore from Father startled him; then the subsequent weary groan from Mother sent a smile easing across his face. ‘Could wake a bear in hibernation,’ she said of Father. He sighed, hugging the edge of the blanket and studying the features of the moon until his eyelids began to droop. Sweet, thick sleep was overcoming him again. Then a shadow darted past the shutters. He sat bolt upright.

It was fleeting, maybe even never there, but he was awake now and his skin rippled with a sense of unease. He blinked hard, rubbing his fists into his eyes. He leaned forward to scan the crack in the shutters, his blanket dropping from his shoulders, the icy air shrouding him. Then, outside, an eagle screeched like a demon, its claws raking at the roof tiles. It had probably hurt a wing or lost its baby and it sounded pained. The bird finally left, its screaming fading. Once more all was still, all was silent. He felt for the creature but welcomed the return of the placid night, then smiled and sank back down onto the bed. He rested his head on the pillow and pulled the blanket back up to his neck. His thoughts began to wander into sleep.

Then a trilling and utterly foreign scream rent the night air. ‘Loukas! Your time has come!’

His feet slapped on the deathly cold flagstones as he leapt to standing in one movement, eyes bulging, prying at the darkness through the open door of his bedroom, heart crashing against his ribs. He crept forward and poked his head out into the hearth room: the shadowy outline of the table sat inconspicuous as always. Another imagining, Apion hoped? But he knew in his heart something was terribly wrong.

‘Apion, get back into your room!’ his father croaked, stumbling from his bedroom, pulling on his tunic by the hearth. Then the thick timber door leading out to the yard smashed inwards as though struck by a battering ram, his father stumbled back and at once, his home was invaded by the dancing flames of bobbing torches. Dark towering shapes and jagged voices flooded into the hearth room along with the acrid stench of burning pitch. At once, Apion felt his skin pulled tight, eyes fixed on the intrusion, terror awash in his limbs. He ducked back into his bedroom and watched them from the shadows. There were four of them, each wrapped in thick black robes, heads and faces covered by thin cotton scarves and each wore a sword belt that bore the dreaded Seljuk scimitar. Then a fifth walked in and barked at the other four in the Seljuk tongue, then broke into Greek, the other four obeying his orders. Apion stalked back into the shadows of his bedroom, cowering, Father would protect them, surely.

‘Can’t find your sword, Loukas?’ The leader spoke in a muffled voice through his veil. Then an awful rasping filled the room as three of the four intruders drew their scimitars from their scabbards, the curved blades glinting in the torchlight. ‘Lucky we remembered ours!’ A nightmarish orange illuminated the blades as three of the figures stepped forward to surround Father. The fourth remained fixed by the door, sword sheathed.

‘Loukas? What’s happening?’ Mother shrieked, her voice trailing off into a series of sobs as she ran to grasp Father’s arm. ‘Where is Ap . . . ’ Father turned and struck her hard across the cheek. Instantly she was silent, one hand on her stinging face and eyes wide in shock, blood dripping from her lip. Father glared at her, terror and urgency contorting his features.

‘Rest easy, Loukas, for tonight you will all die for your sins,’ the leader purred, flicking a finger either side of the cowering pair. The three armed henchmen stalked around to encircle them. Then the leader stopped, twisting his head back to the fourth intruder. ‘What about you? Why are you suddenly so shy, hero?’ The fourth intruder remained stock-still. ‘So maybe your reputation is exaggerated? So be it,’ the leader spat, then turned back to Mother and Father. ‘Slaughter them and then torch this hovel!’ Then he nudged at the wooden blocks and carved toy soldiers on the floor. ‘There is a boy child in this house; make sure you find him . . . and stick him like a pig!’

Apion could only watch as Mother’s scream filled the farmhouse before it was cut short in a single swipe of a scimitar across her neck, her body collapsing like a sack of rubble, head dangling behind the gaping wound and crimson soaking her night robe in a heartbeat. Father roared, thrashing out at his opponents with balled fists, but the intruders danced back easily from every blow.

‘You have brought this upon yourself, Loukas!’

Father could only muster a pained snarl in reply.

‘Take him down,’ the leader sneered, ‘make it slow . . . then bring me his head.’

Apion’s stomach lurched at the words. He stepped forward from the shadows but his feet froze on the floor as one of the henchmen jabbed his scimitar hilt into Father’s face. A dull thud of metal on cracking bone was accompanied by the light patter of blood on the flagstones. Apion’s throat clenched, mouthing a silent scream, as Father toppled to the flagstones, sprawled across Mother. The henchmen flicked their scimitars over and over in their hands and circled Father, like butchers eyeing a fresh slaughter. Then Apion felt a change, like a roaring river suddenly drying to a trickle, his fear was gone. What was there to fear when all was lost? His eyes fell on Father’s battle gear resting in the shadows by the table. The helmet, the klibanion and the spathion.

Apion strode from the shadows, taking the helmet and placing it on his head, the rim resting on the bridge of his nose and the mail veil icy cold on his face, the leather aventail dangling around his neck and shoulders. The flickering torchlight bathed him but the intruders were captivated with their work as he approached them, prodding Father with the razor tip of their scimitars, puncturing his flesh, showering the hearth with blood. Father roared in pain at each prod but his face was drawn and exhausted as he cradled the bloody form of Mother underneath him, his spirit conquered. Father’s eyes were dimming but as Apion took up the spathion, their eyes met. Father extended a hand out past the legs of his torturers, reached out, then shook his head, his mouth haemorrhaging blood.

‘No,’ he spluttered as Apion lifted the weighty blade.

Then the leader stepped in between them, still oblivious of Apion, and snarled. ‘Now finish him!’

One of the henchmen wrenched Father’s head back by the hair and the other swept his scimitar down. Apion’s stomach turned over at the ripping of sinew as Father was beheaded, eyes staring, mouth agape in shock. Apion’s mouth gaped likewise to scream but his voice was simply not there.

‘Now find this dog’s child and bring him to me!’ The leader turned to the silent intruder, ‘and you, you useless whoreson, go outside and make sure nobody gets in or out of this place before we burn it to the ground.’

In a nauseous blur, Apion moved back into the shadows, to his bedroom; this would buy him a precious few seconds of life before he joined Mother and Father. No! Then they would have died in vain, Apion fretted, eyes darting around for any sign of hope as the henchmen emerged from his parents’ bedroom. He realised he still held the spathion but what use was a weapon he could barely swing against these two brutes?

‘He’s not in there,’ one henchman grunted and then extended a finger at the very shadows in which Apion hid, ‘so he must be in that room.’ Together, they stepped forward, scimitars in hand.

Apion realised escape was his only option. If he could flee into the night, wake the soldier-farmers in the next valley, then these raiders could be trapped. He turned to the shutters, ready to unbolt them as quietly as he could. But when he turned he froze, they were already ajar, punched open from outside. Was this some kind of trick? Then he sensed the presence of the two henchmen behind him.

‘Too late to run! Ready to join your Father, boy?’ One henchman hissed.

Apion spun, poised with the sword in a two-handed grip, trembling.

‘Now put that blade down,’ the second henchman hissed, his breath reeking. ‘Just close your eyes and it’ll all be over.’

Apion felt the terror boil in his veins. He roared and swung the sword wildly, the blade glancing from the walls, showering sparks across the room, the henchmen leaping back. Suddenly, the leader stormed into the room and stopped, masked features examining Apion.

‘Is that a boy we have behind that veil? So this is Loukas’ runt?’ Then he pointed a finger at Apion. ‘Take his head.’

Apion was frozen momentarily, eyes hanging on the tarnished ring on the leader’s finger, a snake winding around the band. Then he roared and wrenched the spathion up, the blade caught the leader’s finger, chopping clear a chunk of skin and bone. The leader staggered back with a roar while the blade flew from Apion’s hand, plunging into the gut of the second henchman, who touched the hilt in stunned silence, blood gushing from his mouth, before toppling like a log, dead.

‘Finish him!’ The leader rasped, his voice laced with fury as he clutched the bleeding stump of his finger and ducked back out of the bedroom.

Apion staggered back as the first henchman lurched forward, sweeping his scimitar down. Spinning away, he leapt for the open shutters, then his mind flashed with a white light as the blade hammered down on the back of his helmet then ground into his flesh. He felt a hot streak of agony like nothing before, the blade tearing at his back, ripping through his thigh and hacking all the way down his calf to his ankle.

Then he could see only the floor and a dark liquid pooling around him. His body grew cold and needled towards numbness. Blackness swam over him. He could hear only a dull ringing and the murmur of the intruders.

‘Now drag him outside, I want to see all three heads on spikes.’

Apion felt his ankles being grappled and an unearthly agony stung him to his core.

Then another voice called, the fourth intruder, from outside.

‘Imperial riders!’

‘Then leave him,’ the leader spat from the hearth room. ‘They can all burn where they lie.’

Everything around Apion seemed to be growing distant. He could hear splashing and the smell of pitch grew thicker. Then there was a dull clatter of a torch being hurled to the floor, followed by a roar of fire and anxious yells as they ran from the building.

The heat intensified until it stung through the numbness and was accompanied by the stench of crackling flesh. From somewhere, Apion found the energy to prise apart his eyelids: there, in the corner of his bedroom, lay the staring and unmasked features of the man he had struck down; a Seljuk man, engulfed in the inferno, the skin on his face blistering and exploding like a roasting pig, eyes clouded over. Apion turned away in disgust but all around him was a raging orange; the flames had engulfed his home already. Death was coming for him. He searched for the opening line of the Prayer of the Heart and made to close his eyes, when he caught sight of his own reflection in the blade of the spathion, still lodged in the burning Seljuk’s guts. He grimaced at the image, the weakness he portrayed. Behind the blade, he saw two charred masses where Mother and Father had fallen, the flames having consumed their flesh already. Were they to have died for nothing? Did their killers deserve to walk free? A desperate cry rasped from his lungs and he lurched to prop himself onto his elbows and then pulled his torn body forward, the searing hot iron helmet tumbling from his head and rolling into the inferno. The heat pulled the air from his lungs as he tried to breathe and the room above him seemed to be solid with a jet-black smoke. With a grimace, he pulled himself on through the hearth room on a black slick of his own blood, a smoking timber beam crashing down by his side barely registering as he fixed his eyes on the doorway.