CHAPTER 89 - 89 – THE BATTLE OF AL-SARHA, 3

May 24th, 1180 - Plains outside Aleppo

The dawn sun painted the horizon in streaks of copper and ash. Saladin stood on a rise south of Aleppo, eyes narrowed against the wind as he surveyed the Christian line. It had not moved since the day before. That alone spoke volumes. Baldwin would stand and fight, on ground of his own choosing.

But it was the deployment that seized his attention.

Reports from scouts confirmed what his own eyes saw: the Frankish center had been reinforced. Denser lines. More wagons. More crossbows. Yet the left flank—yesterday sturdy and resolute—now sagged. Gaps between banners. Fewer knights.

Baldwin had shifted men.

"Why would he make the center his hammer," Saladin mused aloud, "and weaken his shield?"

"Perhaps he expects us to fear the hammer," Taqi ad-Din replied beside him, fingers tightening on the hilt of his sword.

Saladin's gaze stayed locked on the Frankish left. "No. He wants me to fear the hammer. But I fear no bait when I carry the fire."

He turned in the saddle. "Order the attack. All leftward elements. Crack the line. Draw out the hook. Then break it."

The Assault on the Frankish Left

The desert winds shifted as Saladin's left wing surged forward—a howling tide of horse and steel. Five thousand light cavalry swept down the ridge, bowstrings taut, arrows hissing in the dry morning air. Behind them thundered two thousand more: tribal auxiliaries from the Jazira and Ghulams with lances like lightning bolts.

The Franks on the left responded with grim determination. Shields locked. Spearmen crouched behind makeshift ramparts of rock and wood. But it was clear—they were undermanned. Their cavalry charges were thinner. Crossbow fire came in slower bursts.

By the second hour of battle, Saladin's men had seized the forward barricades, burning wagons and pushing deep into the line. Smoke coiled upward. A crimson banner bearing the Ibelin stag fell to the dust.

"The line is folding," Taqi whispered.

"It is bending," Saladin corrected. "We'll see if it breaks."

The Ghulams and the Deepening Push

With a signal from a red flag on the ridgeline, Saladin released the elite Ghulam lancers. Clad in lamellar and scale, they galloped in tight formation and crashed into the fractured segment of the Frankish left with a sound like thunder splitting stone.

Dozens of knights were unhorsed. Christian footmen reeled backward. The Saracen tide pressed harder.

Still—Baldwin did not move the center.

Why?

Why allow your left to bleed and burn?

Saladin began to grow uneasy. The more he drove into that flank, the more he expected the trap to spring. But none came.

The Frankish center remained immobile, silent as a tomb.

He began to doubt.

Until the tremor in the distance changed everything.

Bohemond's Arrival

From the northeast—beyond the Saracen right—a horn sounded.

Then another.

Then a thunder, rising from the low hills.

A fresh cavalry force emerged like a hammer from the mist—Bohemond of Antioch, his red-gold standard unfurled, leading over eight hundred heavy knights.

"Where did he come from?" hissed Taqi ad-Din, eyes wide.

"From the hills". Saladin spat.

Bohemond's force did not hesitate.

It slammed into Saladin's right flank, where archers and skirmishers had stood unarmored. The crash of steel rang like a gong. Horsemen toppled. Muslim banners were trampled beneath hooves.

Saladin snapped orders: "Send the household guard! Seal the flank! Hold the ridgeline!"

But already, the damage was done. The Saracen right was in chaos, many units fleeing toward the center. What had been a poised attack on Baldwin's left had now become an overextension.

And in that moment, Baldwin moved.

The Frankish Center Advances

With a single trumpet blast, the iron wall in the middle of the Christian formation came to life.

The chained wagons parted.

Pike blocks marched forward in tight columns.

And behind them came the knights, led by Baldwin himself—his silver mask gleaming in the sun, the golden Jerusalem cross burning on his surcoat.

The Franks were marching straight for Saladin's center, the one he had kept thin to feed the flanking push.

For a heartbeat, he hesitated. Then his hand flew up.

"All reserve to the center! Now!"

But it was already too late to hold cleanly.

Clash of Iron

The two centers collided

in a roar of steel, screams, and cracking wood.

The Frankish pikemen hammered into Saladin's lines like a battering ram. Crossbows thudded from behind them. Syrian levies reeled. Egyptian footmen staggered. Taqi ad-Din threw himself into the melee with his bodyguard, rallying men to hold.

Saladin watched from behind the main tent line, fury growing.

The center had become a meat grinder. Knights on both sides fell, skewered or trampled. Horses screamed as arrows punched into their sides. The dust of the plain turned muddy with blood.

He could see Baldwin himself riding behind the third wave—his presence unmistakable, the silver mask glinting like a ghost in the heat.

"Damn him," Saladin muttered. "He planned this perfectly."

His flank was faltering. His center was bleeding. His men were committed on two fronts, and the sun had not yet begun to sink.

And still—there was no retreat.

A Stalemate of Carnage

By late afternoon, the entire field had descended into brutal melee. Lines broke and reformed.

Charges were met with counter-charges. Trumpets blew desperately on both sides to recall scattered units.

Bohemond's knights continued to carve a swathe through the Muslim right, but they were now bogged down, surrounded by Saracen reinforcements who fought savagely, seeking to trap them and end their surprise advantage.

In the center, Saladin's elite Mamluks met the Frankish heavy cavalry head-on. Swords shattered on shields. Men fought with maces, with daggers, with fists. No ground was given, even as bodies piled in heaps.

It was no longer a clean battle. It was a storm of limbs, a churning mass of screams and dust and flame.

Saladin in the Fray

He passed wounded men crawling in the dust, bleeding riders limping away from shattered formations, officers shouting desperately.

At the center, his elite Mamluks were locked in combat with Baldwin's knights. The lines were collapsing inward, both sides unwilling to give ground.

Saladin drew his scimitar and plunged into the melee.

He hacked down a Frankish infantryman trying to gut a Mamluk horse. He turned in time to parry a spear aimed at his back, then slashed it from the attacker's hands. His guards formed around him, blades gleaming red.

He could hear Baldwin shouting orders on the other side of the melee. The Leper King did not sit back—he rode behind his knights, calm, issuing instructions through a voice like cold iron.

The two men never met on the field—but they were directing the storm like rival gods.

Saladin pressed forward with his personal guard, rallying the wavering center. But the Frankish push was gaining ground.

For every five Muslims that held the line, three fell.

A Saracen commander was cut down beside Saladin. Another lost his horse and was trampled.

Still they fought.

But Baldwin's center kept advancing, slowly chewing through the lines.

And Bohemond—damned Bohemond—was now threatening to wrap around the Muslim rear.

Collapse of the Muslim Line

It began as a slow recoil.

Units pulled back a few steps. Officers tried to reform. Then, suddenly, an entire battalion of Syrian footmen broke ranks and fled the center.

The Frankish cavalry charged through the gap.

Saladin's heart sank.

He turned and looked over the battlefield: his right was broken and scattered, his center pierced, his left barely holding its gains but now being rolled back by Frankish reinforcements.

Baldwin had done it.

He had baited the attack, absorbed the blow, and then crushed the weakened flanks with reinforcements.

This was no longer a battle.

It was a rout.

Saladin shouted for withdrawal signals, but the drums were slow to carry. Pockets of his army continued fighting, not knowing the line had fallen apart.

He slashed at another Frank charging him, then spurred his horse away before the swirl of knights around him could encircle.

Smoke filled his lungs. His guard was down to a dozen men.

He fled westward through the chaos, cursing, sweating, bleeding, his scimitar red with a dozen kills—but it had not been enough.

Then came the crack of a crossbow.

The Wounding of the Sultan

The bolt struck Saladin just below the ribs. It tore through the side of his cuirass, embedding in his flesh with a brutal jolt.

He gasped—then reeled.

His horse stumbled but held. Blood poured down his side. His vision swam.

"My lord!" a guard cried, catching him before he could fall.

Another guard grabbed his reins, urging the horse into a gallop.

Saladin tried to speak but couldn't. He clutched at the shaft protruding from his side, biting down a scream.

"Get him out! Sound retreat! Now!"

His personal bodyguard formed a wall of shields as they rode hard from the battlefield. Behind them, the Muslim center disintegrated fully.

Saladin remained conscious, but barely. Pain roared through his body. The bolt was deep. He would not ride again today.

End of the Second Day – A Frankish Victory

Night fell, blood-soaked and bitter.

The field south of Aleppo belonged to the Franks. They had held their ground. They had endured the baited assault, shattered the enemy flank, and driven deep into the Saracen heart.

The dead lay thick—both Christian and Muslim. Over 15,000 corpses carpeted the fields. Hundreds of horses twitched in agony. Banners fluttered among the broken.

Bohemond had carved a crescent through the Muslim flank and nearly reached the center.

Baldwin's forces now held the entire field, his camp moved forward among the dead.

Saladin lay in a surgeon's tent miles away, pale and shivering. The bolt had been removed, but the wound was deep and ragged. He could barely sit up.

Taqi ad-Din stood over him, his face grave. "We must retreat."

Whatever his resolve, the day had ended in defeat—and the Sultan of Egypt and Syria had bled on the soil of Aleppo.