Antonina did less than anyone, waiting for the charge. She simply followed Ashot's advice-say better,instructions- and stood firmly in her place. Right at the center of the camp, where everyone could see and hear her.
"Your job," Ashot had explained cheerfully, "is simply to give the troops confidence. That's it, Antonina. Just stand there, looking as resolute as Athena, and shout encouragement. And make sure you wear that obscene breastplate."
Antonina donned the cuirass, with the help of her maid, Koutina. Looking down at her immense brass mammaries, she had her usual reaction.
Ashot's good cheer faded. "Andtry not to giggle," he grumbled. " That looks bad, in a commander, during desperate battle."
Antonina giggled.
Now, as she waited for the charge, Antonina had no trouble restraining her giggle. She maintained her outward composure, but she was quite scared. Terrified, if truth be told.
Ashot could make his veteran pronouncements, and her young officers could decree the certain future. But all Antonina could see, staring at the horde of shrieking nomads coming down the hill like an irresistible force of nature, was a wave of rape and murder.
Cursing at the weight of her awkward firearm, she shifted the strap which held the thing over her shoulder. Her hand groped for the hilt of her "sword." Once her fingers curled around the plain wood of the blade's utilitarian handle, she felt her confidence return. She had used that cleaver before-and used it successfully-to defend herself against rape and murder, when Malwa-paid thugs attacked her in Constantinople. Maurice had purchased the cleaver, afterward, and given it to her for her personal weapon in the battle at the stadium.
Ask any veteran, Antonina, he'd told her at the time.They'll all tell you there's nothing as important in a battle as having a trusty, testedblade.
The cleaver brought confidence. And so, even more, did Ashot's whispered words: "It's just another knife fight in a kitchen, Antonina. Like you've done before."
The grenades began landing among the Arabs. Few of them missed. The Syrian slingers were combat veterans themselves, now. The confidence which that gave them, added to their own skill, made for a murderous volley.
As before, against cavalry, the main effect of the exploding bombs was moral. Not many of the Arabs themselves were killed, or even seriously injured, by the crude devices. Most of the casualties were sustained by their mounts, and even the camels did not suffer greatly. The year before, when used against Ambrose's rebel cataphracts on the paved streets of Alexandria, shrapnel from exploding grenades had wreaked havoc on the unarmored legs of their horses. But here, on desert sand, there were no ricochets to multiply the damage.
The camels did not suffer greatly fromphysical damage, that is. But the beasts were completely unaccustomed to artillery fire, and immediately began to panic. The sound and fury of the explosions caused most of that terror. But even the sputtering flare of a burning fuse caused camels to stumble and shy away.
Camels are large animals, heavier than horses. Once started on a charge down a hill, they were impossible to stop. But the charge, as hundreds of camels either collapsed from wounds or simply stumbled from fear, turned into something more in the nature of an avalanche. An avalanche is a fearsome thing, true. But it has no brains at all. By the time thousands of bedouin piled up at the foot of the hill, not fifty yards from the Roman front lines, they had about as much coordination and conscious purpose as a snowdrift blown by the wind.
Euphronius gave the order.Level! Antonina held her breath.Fire!
Fifty yards was within range of the smoothbore arquebusses. Some of the bullets went wide, and many simply buried themselves in the sand. But of the hundreds of rounds fired in that first volley, almost a fourth found a human target.
It mattered hardly at all whether the bullets struck a head, a torso, or a limb. Round shot loses muzzle velocity quickly. But, within fifty yards, the loss was not enough to offset the weight of the.80-caliber lead drop shot. The heavy projectiles, at that range, caused terrible wounds-and struck with incredible force. Arms were blown off, not simply wounded. Thigh bones were pulverized. Men died from shock alone.
The first line of musketeers stepped back, replaced by the second. Antonina expected Euphronius to give the order to fire immediately, but the Syrian waited for the dense cloud of gunsmoke to clear away. She began dancing impatiently, until she realized what she was doing and forced herself to stand still.
Restraint was difficult, even though Antonina understood Euphronius' inaction. It was impossible to see more than a few yards from the front line-and would have been, even in broad daylight. Even the crest of the hill was obscured by the gunsmoke. Until the smoke cleared, the musketeers would be guessing at their target.
A few gaps began appearing in the clouds. Enough, apparently. Euphronius gave the order, and the arquebusses roared again.
The second line stepped back, and the third line came forward. By now, Antonina saw, the first line was already reloaded and ready to fire again.
She felt a certain female smugness.Her troops could manage a much better rate of fire, she knew, than those of her husband. Despite the fact that they were using the same type of firearms,her troops had wives, standing with the men. The Theodoran Cohort carried twice as many handcannons as they had gunners. The women kept the spares ready and loaded. As soon as the men stepped back, a freshly loaded gun was in their hands, while their wives set to work reloading the fired pieces.
With that advantage, Antonina's cohort could manage a rate of fire which approached that of Wellington's men. As a battle wore on, of course, the rate would drop quickly. After a few rounds had been fired through the crude arquebusses, gunpowder residues fouled the bores. The weapons had to be cleaned before they could be reloaded, and even efficient Syrian wives could not do that instantly.
Still Fire! she heard Euphronius shout. The third line discharged their pieces.
The only reason her troops were not maintaining a faster rate of fire was simply to let the clouds of gunsmoke clear away sufficiently to aim. Had there been a strong wind blowing, they could have been hammering the Arabs almost ceaselessly.
Antonina cursed the light desert breeze. The curse seemed to be effective. A sudden gust blew a great hole in the clouds.
The gap was closed, within seconds, by the first rank's second round of fire. But in those seconds, Antonina saw the carnage.
By now, just as she had experienced in her fight in the kitchen, Antonina was feeling nothing beyond controlled fury. But even with battle-lust burning in her veins, she was glad that the scene was filtered through dim moonlight. The shrieks coming out of that murky mass of struggling men were bloodcurdling enough.
That's got to be pure horror.
The thought was at the edge of her mind, however. At the forefront came recognition that the enemy had recovered enough to change tactics. Wails of agony were overridden by frantic shouts and commands. Murky movement blurred, poured to the sides.
"They're going to the flanks!" bellowed Ashot, loud enough to be heard all through the Roman camp. On the heels of that baritone shout, Antonina heard Menander's high tenor. The young cataphract was shifting his pikemen, shoring up all four sides of the camp.
Seconds later, Euphronius did the same. The commander of the Cohort had concentrated half his musketeers on the southern flank of the camp, facing the hill. Now, he began moving units to the other three sides.
Within two minutes, the Roman formation was that of a classic infantry square, bristling like a hedgehog with muskets and pikes. The Arabs were swirling all around the camp, attacking on every side in small lunges and sallies.
For the first time, the pikemen went to work. Euphronius, for all his youth, was too canny to waste entire salvoes on small clots of enemy cavalry. The threat of those shattering salvoes, in the long run, was all that was holding the enemy at bay. If the Roman musketeers fired too often, their weapons would become hopelessly fouled.