Legends Never Die: Pawns (ch. 60) (Patreon)

Strategos Tatzates was the leader of the Bucellarian Theme of the Roman Empire. Which faced against the Black Sea, making his involvement in my taking of Crete rather unusual. His domain was on the other side of Anatolia, and I saw little merit in him providing any kind of support. Its lands weren't affected, or if they were, it wouldn't be a pressing problem. Not like it would be for the Thracian and Cibyrrhaeot Themes, which were just off Crete’s coast.

"Fifty ships," Hoffer remarked, standing at my side as we overlooked their arrival. They were the Roman style of ship -- triremes, I had heard them called. They were much larger than our longships, wider, and overall much slower. It had taken three days for them to arrive after we received word that they had set sail. "It's not much of a fleet," he added.

Honestly, it was a token force in comparison to what Strategos Tatzates could muster.

Strategos Tatzates had no expectations that we would succeed and he sent the bare minimum to say that he had participated in the fighting of pirates, yet not enough to suffer any significant setback if we did fail. It was… annoying, but also expected. In a way, it worked to my benefit. With a token force, I would remain in command and we wouldn't be overly slowed with the Roman trireme ships, which were practically snails in comparison to our longships.

As for Strategos Tatzates himself, I saw him standing on the bow of the flagship. He was a man in his mid forties, if I had to guess. Dark black hair and a bushy beard, his skin holding a natural tanned hue, he stood out with how ornately he was dressed. His fleet of fifty ships sat out in the harbor, floating in the water, as they waited for us to disembark. He made no effort to contact us to discuss plans beyond what had been in the letter that announced that he had set sail.

An insult, I knew. But one I was happy to accept if it gave me control over where we battled. I couldn't claim to control his half of the combined fleet, and I had little in the way of expectation that he would muster a fight on our behalf if we were in a dire situation, but it gave me freedom of movement. Strategos Tatzates was simply here to reach his hand into my pocket and steal my glory, not to earn any himself.

"They will act as our minders. In case we decide to sack Roman cities," I ventured, overlooking the docks that were bustling with activity. It had taken four days for my fleet to gather up, and another three for Strategos Tatzates' fleet to arrive. And that was enough time for Chares to spread his influence. We might have merchant rights, but in the past few days, we found that we were thoroughly unwelcome in Constantinople's markets. "Tatzates seeks to expand his influence with us in some way."

"Michael Lachanodrakon is his rival, is he not?" Hoffer prompted as I took a deep breath of salty air as the mist of early morning hung low to the waters. "Two Jarls can't share a border without getting into a pissing contest. By clearing out a pirate nest on his border for him… he makes Michael look weak." That was true. I hadn't realized it, but I was surrounded by a number of nobility even if, technically speaking, I wasn't. Their insight into such matters was valuable.

Still, the answer didn't satisfy me. This was… this was more than just biting your thumb at an enemy. There were a thousand and one safer ways you could accomplish the same task. It could just be that he was taking advantage of the situation, but I just didn't believe that answer. Tatzates was seeking influence and glory, even if he had to steal it, and for what? Glory alone couldn't be the goal. Nothing was that simple with these Romans.

A horn blast caught my attention -- a signal that my near hundred ships were fully loaded and now we were just waiting to set sail. My gaze slid to the fifty ships and the Romans that manned them -- a few of them were rather odd. Mounted on the bow was a dragon's head that was attached to an odd contraption. True Vision turned the world gray, and standing on the bow of the ship was the captain.

He was marked red.

I wanted to sigh as soon as I saw it. It was like these Romans weren't satisfied until they made something simple become overwhelmingly complicated and utterly exhausting. The captain himself was the only one marked red, but I knew that the ones marked with gray would follow his orders. The only consolation was the fact that Strategos Tatzates was marked gray, meaning that while he wasn't on our side, he wasn't an enemy. The captain wouldn't act on his own behalf, but in the right moment… he could do some damage if given the right opportunity.

"Give the Romans a wide berth," I instructed, turning away from the captain that openly looked up at me.

"They intend to betray us?" Hoffer asked, sounding alarmed.

I shrugged as I began to head down to the ships. "Perhaps. It's more likely to me that they'll forget who is an ally and who is a foe during the heat of battle," I replied. An attack of opportunity. That's what it would be.

The docks were bustling with activity -- we were abandoning the mercenary quarters entirely. There was no point in leaving anyone behind as Crete would become our base of operations. To that end, we dedicated a handful of ships towards more civilian concerns which Morrigan, Jill, and Astrid were on.

Leaving me alone as I got on the flagship while Hoffer got onto his. Grabbing an offered horn, I blew the signal for the sails to lower and my ship went out first into the misty bay. Heading to the bow, I took a seat and opened my bag of scrolls. There were a good dozen, but it felt dreadfully light as I unfurled a copy to begin reading another scroll about Alexander the Great. This one, however, was a little different and the only reason I was touching it was due to Alexios' recommendation.

He had said 'You only get one side of the story if you only listen to one side of the argument.' A compelling argument.

Unlike everything else I had read on the man, this scroll was a critique of Alexander the Great. A rather harsh one as well. More than once, I felt the temptation to simply toss the scroll overboard, but I refrained simply because I knew that Alexios would be disappointed. It at least acknowledged his brilliance as a military commander, but even that was lambasted by criticisms dictating the number of times he survived through dumb luck.

Something that I didn't agree with. Alexander's story was one I knew by heart now -- a son of a god, a peerless military commander that conquered a huge swath of the world. And each time the Norns had nearly cut the thread of his life short, he managed to survive until he finally died back in his homeland after his journey had ended. It… sounded a little too familiar to my ears.

Alexander the Great had been blessed by his gods. I was nearly certain of it. I'm sure that the scrolls and histories were missing details, just as those that spoke of my exploits missed or exaggerated plenty.

Yet, the scroll ruthlessly pointed out his shortcomings that were also all too familiar to me. Because I saw the same shortcomings in myself. I was a poor diplomat. I wasn't particularly adept at intrigue either, even if I was getting good at recognizing the plots of others. The scroll tapped into a fear that I had. The fear that drove me all the way to Constantinople.

The fear that the moment I died, everything that I had accomplished would shatter to pieces. A nation could not be built around a single man, the scroll claimed. No matter how great. Once they were gone, their lessers would try to fill the void… and in doing so, the foundations would crumble like sand in the face of a rising tide.

And as we set sail to Crete, due to my own actions and short temper…

That fear loomed ever larger.

…

The island of Crete was a beautiful one, I reflected as we sailed closer. Hoffer took most of the fleet and began to break off as my remainder sailed towards a village that had settled on one of the few natural harbors of the island. The waters around Crete were a rich blue, and I saw that the island was comprised mostly of rolling hills that were covered in sparse shrubbery. The soil seemed rocky and poor, though I had heard fine things about the vineyards and oils of Crete, so perhaps the soil improved further inland.

The island itself was an odd hundred and fifty miles across. Making it rather sizable. As much as I would like to patrol the entire shoreline, that was functionally impossible. At least with our current numbers.

Our destination itself was one of three notable settlements on the island -- Chania was an official Roman settlement, which we sailed by after dropping off some men. It numbered around a thousand odd people officially, according to the information that Athrun had provided us. A week was enough time for my scouts to not only arrive on the island, but to get a lay of the land and point us in the direction that we needed to go. The destination we were on our way to was one of two settlements that sprung up over the years.

And by years, I meant the past century.

On the other side of the island was a Muslim settlement -- one that was widely considered an Abbasid colony by the locals. They weren't officially, but the Abbasids treated the 'pirate' colony as if it was their settlement. The other settlement was the one that we were heading to. It was a true pirate haven, according to Athrun. An odd hundred miles down the coast from Chania, it boasted an unstable population of around a thousand. It was a popular spot for pirates and merchants alike, the two were essentially interchangeable there, which is likely why the problem has gotten completely out of hand.

It was only a problem if others saw it as a problem.

It was our target. Attacking the Muslims, as of right now, would complicate things. But for the pirates it was open season. Not to mention, it was far easier, as the Muslim settlement was more unified. The pirates… they were just rats in a hole that we needed to smoke out.

"Our arrival hasn't gone unnoticed," Thorkel remarked to me, standing next to me on the bow of my flagship. The pirate haven was a sloppily made settlement, I saw from our approach, made sluggish due to the Roman ships. It was built on a natural harbor, one of the few I had noticed on Crete. A gentle change between the ocean, the beach, and solid land -- around the beach was a sandbar that was barely submerged with only one point of easy access. With a lower tide, the sandbar would be a good barrier. Even with the high tide, I knew the Roman ships wouldn't be able to sail over it. Not like my longships could.

"They're looking the wrong way," I agreed. The pirates weren't unified in the slightest. I did hear that they had their own system of government, with the top crews establishing an uneasy alliance, but it did little for the vast majority of them. I saw them scrambling for their ships, eager to escape the oncoming attack. Some had even managed to set sail and were heading out as fast as the wind could carry them.

Hoffer was in command of his half of my divided fleet, and he proved his experience quickly. I heard him blast a horn a few times before a handful of his ships broke off in pursuit of the pirates trying to escape. Our longships were faster by nearly a third, so I had little doubt that the ships would be caught. And it was worth catching them, I thought, as my longships sailed over the sandbar easily, entering the harbor.

We would crush the bulk of the pirates here, but we wouldn't catch all of them. The ones that were already out somewhere would hear about the attack and weren't likely to return. Which meant that they would continue to plague the Mediterranean Sea and, more importantly, that they could attack my ships.

Thorkel chuckled as he passed the horn to me and I brought it to my lips as we held our position in the harbor. Of my seventy ships, twenty were reserved for noncombatants and the remaining twenty five were split between me and Hoffer. The twenty stayed behind, giving the harbor and the Romans a wide berth. Both Hoffer and I positioned ourselves in a pincer attack, leaving the only natural exit to be guarded by the Roman ships, of which half were currently sailing into the harbor with us.

In all, there were nearly a hundred ships. The pirates wouldn't brave a battle if they could afford it, I knew. Which is why I forced their hand.

I blew a long solitary note at the settlement. A signal. Waiting a second, I paused until I heard one being blasted back at me. It was then that the attack began in earnest.

Olek and five hundred men sprung forth, launching a three pronged attack. We had dropped off the last few of his men in Chania, but most had been ferried over the past week. I wasn't sure how thorough the pirates' defenses would be, but evidently it wasn't enough to catch the five hundred men that had essentially been hidden just outside of the settlements limits. The effects of the attack were immediate as I saw my men stream into the city with little resistance.

They cut down the pirates that had been attempting to flee inland, instilling further panic into the pirates. I could see their fear from where I was, hearing their cries of confusion carry over the water. They didn't know the exact numbers. They just knew that they were under attack from a great number of men. It could be five hundred or it could be five thousand -- the fact that Olek attacked from multiple points only enforced that fear.

"When people are afraid, they'll go to the only exit they know," Thorkel remarked next to me as we saw a wave of people fleeing to the ships in the harbor. It was less than organized, but there were nearly a hundred ships resting along the beach. It wasn't any different for our people -- when a raid went bad, you fled to the ships. To safety. The same response had been drilled into the pirates, and they fled towards the ships in droves, turning what could have been a winnable battle on land into a certain defeat.

There was no organization to be found as the first of the ships started to set sail. They shied away from us, noticing our clear positioning, and started to shift towards the Romans but stalled when they saw them around the only exit like a noose. Their hesitation cost them, in the end. It took a few minutes but more of the ships raced out of the dock, only to pause with the same indecision. The ones behind them, however, couldn't see the looming threat and tried to press on. From where I stood, I heard the sounds of wood smashing against wood as the ships began to collide against one another.

I blew my horn twice, the signal for the archers. They lined the bow of a handful of ships before they began to fire at will. Arrows streamed across the distance before they found the hearts, eyes, and throats of men that panicked on the crashing ships. No ship was targeted in particular, but the threat of our archers made an already chaotic situation that much more pressing as they realized we weren't content to let them sort themselves out. With every arrow that was fired, a pirate fell. Not always fatally, but often enough to prove the archers deadly aim.

The tension eventually snapped, and the mess of ships started to break apart as some pulled forward towards the exit. Most were tangled up in the crash, unable to separate themselves, but of the hundred shipa, a good thirty of them raced towards the Romans with more on the way. I watched as the Romans fired upon the approaching pirates, the navy responding well. They sailed forward, cutting off the escape for those at the head, using grapple hooks to attach the ships together. If the pirates were a united force, it might not have worked.

However, instead of aiding the pirates that were caught by the Romans, the ones behind them sailed around. They used their fellow pirates as a distraction until they were used as a distraction in turn. All so they could inch closer to the exit.

Across the way, I saw Hoffer looking at me and I offered him a small nod. He smiled broadly before he gave the order to sail forward to attack the mess of crashed ships while they were busy untangling themselves. It was tempting to join him, but it would be a good opportunity for him to prove himself as a naval commander. More than that, it allowed me to keep an eye on the Romans and the fleeing pirates.

As my archers flanked around, spreading out, Hoffer and his ships slammed into the disorganized pirates. Using much the same method of binding the ships together as the Romans did, my men began to flow overboard to attack them. I heard the sounds of violence and death, but from the looks of it, the ones doing the dying were the pirates. My men wore their riveted mail, their shields and helms, and were wielding axes -- we were much better prepared for a fight.

Which left me paying most of my attention to the Romans, seeing how they fought. One by one, they picked off the pirate ships, but inevitably, some managed to force their way through-

I flinched when I saw a great belch of flames erupt from the Roman ships that were arranged at the mouth of the harbor. Two of them. I could feel the blast of heat across my face despite the distance, and there were panicked shouts of 'dragon' coming from my men. Such shouts were nearly lost in the agony filled screams that came from the pirate ships that continued to sail through the exit, the Romans allowing them passage as wood and canvas burned. I watched on in awe, realizing that even the surface of the water was burning.

"Gods!" Thorkel yelped at my side as I rushed to the side of the ship to get a better view, and I was greeted by the stench of seared meat and burnt hair. "What was that?!" He exclaimed, sounding as shocked as I had ever heard him. Thorkel, who managed to make light of the most dire of circumstances in Francia.

The pirates tried to divert their course, but it was far too late. Another belch of flames erupted from the dragon-shaped prow of the ship, which washed over the pirate vessel. It struck the sandbar, coming to a halt and burning men leapt into the sea. I saw Romans working on something on the two ships, but I couldn't see what due to the heat haze and the thick black smoke.

"I don't know," I admitted, my brow furrowed as I leaned forward, putting a foot on the edge of the ship as if an extra few inches would grant any clarity. "But I'm going to find out."

That was a weapon that could turn the tide of any ship battle.

And I would not leave the Roman Empire without it.