1453: Revival of Byzantium

Chapter 278: Solidify!

It is now the middle of October year 1454, Antonius and the bulk of his newly assembled army has moved in to the chain of fortification constructed near Diavata by Helio in preparation for the incoming battle.

The quick fortress constructed by Helio is a mainly wooden structure building, with some of its foundation laid in stone bricks that Helio could find from nearest towns and settlements. The entire fortress has a simple moat of only one meter deep, two walls with one being only three meters tall and another one being five meters tall. The entire chain of defence is divided in to three parts guarding Thessaloniki's western fronts. The entire defence is designed in a way combined with the highly mobile cavalries that if the Ottoman forces want to get past these fortresses and reach the city walls of Thessaloniki.

According to the initial plan, the Ottomans shall have to at least take down two fortresses and surround the final one under the mountains, or else the defenders can always stab a dagger on to the sieging Ottoman troops, encircle them, cutting out their supplies starving them to death. The three fortresses are capable of holding at least ten thousand troops in its defensive lines inclusive of another three thousand cavalries and enough resources to be used for thirty days, a big achievement considering that Helio only had around two month after he got his hands on the project. 

Despite all the earlier preparations, the situation has went straight down since Abdullah and the Mamluk reinforcements came back. In just less than ten days' time Antonius has went through a series of negative events worsening the plans set previously. The informants that Antonius used to corporate for a long time inside the city Edirne has not been responsive ever since, and on top of that the Ottoman regime started arresting every Rumelian or Christian in the cities suspected of passing information to 'pirates and rebels' and put in to detention.

Things are definitely not looking good, and Antonius started dispatching scouts in the near by areas. However, after a few days Antonius started losing contact with these scouts as well with no one came back at the supposed timing. Every morning even before the sun has rise Antonius climbed to the tallest tower in the fortress looking a far and anticipate whether there will be one, just one scout coming back with the information he needs. But just no, for four days there has not been a single scout out of the hundred scouts coming back.

Antonius knows that obviously his rookie mounted infantries just trained for less than two month is no match for those natural Turkish riders, but still this result is still a little bit too much for him after putting in his effort and some of his expectations. Now although he knows that his enemies are fast approaching but being completely blinded looking at this entire map covered in the fog of war he simply cannot tell where his enemies are.

Candarli Halil Pasha is no simple enemy to be dealt with, looking at what he is now many often forget that this man was an Ottoman military leader who spent years in service under the war banner of the previous Sultan Murad II, refining his tactical skills sharpening his blade. Although he has not used his blade and his tactical knowledge hiding it away in to the store rooms, but it does not mean that they do not exist, and now when the Grand Vizier took his formal pride and blade out it instantly created an impact on Antonius and his hard trained scouts.

Veterans never dies, and they never fade away.

Things began to have some change when reports came from a north that the Ottomans launched a surprise attack on the fortress below the Mount of Chortiatis, but was successfully countered and the enemies retreated once realising that the Rumelian have already prepared themselves over here, leaving behind a trail of bodies scattered around going back in to the woods. The Ottomans too launched an attack on the fortress guarding the right wing of Thessaloniki as well but is spotted by the patrolling scout ships on the seas and foiled their element of surprise.

Hope that the Ottomans will learn that unlike the land where their horse men are the dominant species, on the sea it is the world of Antonius' war ships.

However, the main battle field in the end of the day, is needless to say still on the land.

After a few days signs of enemies eventually started showing up out of the fortress Antonius is staying in, mostly mounted scouts of the enemies signifying that the Roman scouts will never return again. They first just stayed in a distance of one hundred plus meters and looked at the fortress walls drawing maps and graphs, then slowly by time they became bolder and bolder approaching the walls of Antonius' fortress testing the patience of the defenders, and by night fall they have sneaked below the walls taunting and howling strange war cries luring the defending archers to shoot at them, so they can count the approximate range of the Roman archers.

On that night the grand vizier of the Ottomans Candarli Halil Pasha sneaked to the front line under hoods escorted by two hundred newly formed Janissaries. Under the vague light of the moon, he put down his black hood revealing his ashen hair and hawk like eyes on a wrinkled thin face staring at the direction of the fortress. 

"Look, my honourable Grand Vizier." Under the dense star light, a junior officer who has been scouting this region for the entire day pointed out what he has studied in the day with a dense winter white mist coming out from his mouth. "The Rumelian have constructed a series of defences along the only plain between Thessalia and Thessaloniki, mainly grouped in to three larger fortresses and twelve smaller fortifications, some is built right beneath the mountains, some is built on the steeps and plains in the centre to limit our movements, some is built along the coast line, some is for protecting transport route from the city and water resources"

Another junior officer followed. "These fortresses lined up forming a complete defensive complex filling this entire plain before us, some of them are built on a foundation laid by pebble bricks, while some are complete wooden structure If given the time I bet that they will all by replaced with brick fortifications"

"All of these fortifications are built in a way that if there is one being attacked, there will be at least one other fortress that is able to provide support for the flank preventing us from encircling it The two fortresses on the middle, which is the largest, can at least house around five thousand troops, while the rest probably a few hundreds to a thousand Thus, I think, my Grand Vizier, that we shall be facing around fifteen thousand men."

Candarli Halil Pasha frowned and replied. "We have more than two hundred thousand combatants, we have the upper hand and the first strike capability."

The Grand Vizier studied the entire chain of defences and enquired further to the generals, beys and pashas behind him. "Do any of you have an suitable idea how to get past these disgusting defences."

"I am afraid that we are restricted to taking a brute force attack, my honourable Grand Vizier." Abbas Pasha answered behind him. "The smart use of the local terrain advantage combined together with all these fortresses simply forces us to take these places by force And what makes it even worse is that I am afraid we don't have advantage in artilleries."

"What about brute attack?" The Grand Vizier asked again.

"We can make use of our high morale, superior number in men power, and organise them in to three battle groups. The Sipahi calvaries can use their horses to try to pull down those barricades and cover the infantries can use the chance to fill up those moats, then charge in to the fortress and break it from within But if we cannot take it within five days, our troops will get tired making further attacks harder and harder, and Rumelian reinforcements might arrive making us stagnate here forever."

"Then we shall be forced to retreat due to insufficient supplies?"

"I am afraid so."  Abbas Pasha sighed. "Those Rumelian are not going to come out by themselves and let us slaughter them, if we want to get them we have to break through these turtle shells?"

"What about a surprise attack by fire?" The Grand Vizier interrupted. "Is an attack by fire applicable? We have a dry weather here and we can try to burn down these annoying barricades."

"You can always try, my honourable Grand Vizier."

"Pass my orders" Candarli Halil Pasha told the junior officer holding his blade on the ground. "While the others pitch their tents, the Janissaries get ready with three fire torches each and prepare for a surprise attack this night."