"Is it you, my faithful friend?" the Sultan asked, with emotion.
"It is I, father. Escape; the battle is lost!"
"Then let me perish," replied the Sultan. "You had best return. You have wife and children, and have yet a long life to live."
"God can alone bring help," answered Lazaruvich, and quitted the battle-field.
It was already twilight. The escaping forces were seen in all directions. Only 10,000 Janesars stood steadfast round Bajazet. Since the morning they had been thirsting for water: now they thirsted for blood! They could have had plenty of time and opportunity for escape, for Timur did not attack them until later on. The night came on; the sun disappeared, and the comet—the dread of heaven and earth—shone out on the sky. By the aid of its demoniacal glitter Bajazet could see the opponent's army. He was not frightened, either by the star or by Timur's victory, and motionless he stood with his ten thousand men on the spot where half a million men had already perished. Then Timur raised his hand to heaven, as though he would grasp the flaming club, and with it strike his enemy.
"Well, so be it," he said, and with this he gave the signal to start his troops of mailed men, the Dzsagata horsemen and the rows of fighting elephants, against Bajazet's Janesars. Maria heard tremblingly from her tower the bellowing of the elephants. "Ah! the Dzsins, the Dzsins! But Bajazet will pursue them and rout them asunder, for he is the 'lightning.'"
The flying Greek fire opened the attack. From the elephants' towers the blinding sparks came in clouds, and created dazzling colours in this night battle, whilst arrows shot at the same instant from all sides. The Janesars fought and died speechless, as though they were not men, but spectres. The two forces fought without a word. Only the clanking of their swords spoke. Oh! the Dzsins, the Dzsins!
Suddenly one of the flaming arrows cut its way through the ranks of the Janesars, and flew to the women's tower, igniting a velvet curtain, and so setting the whole place on fire. The women, terror stricken, rushed down from the burning amphitheatre, which, in a few moments, was as a burning torch in the midst of the camp, lighting up the spectacle of slaughter. Immediately Bajazet saw this his heart gave way, and he turned back with his suit of horsemen, and, leaving behind him the fighting Janesars, he galloped towards the women. Maria was then lying on the earth, her face covered with dust.
Oh, the Dzsins—the Dzsins! "To horse quickly, by my side, away to the mountains!" exclaimed the defeated "lightning," lifting his wife from the dust, and with these words he escaped from the field. One thousand brave horsemen and two thousand fighting Amazons accompanied them. Mahmud Khan saw the Sultan's flight, and rushed after him with 4000 Dzsagata horsemen. Until midnight he pursued him up to the foot of the mountain. The soldiers left behind fought with Timur's men whilst the Sultan got away.
The Khan of Dzsagat did not relax his search after Bajazet, whose horsemen and horses fell to the right and left, and by daybreak only forty men remained. The Sultan was, therefore, left almost alone with his women. He then stopped and awaited his pursuers. He was clad in impenetrable armour, and held a good Damascus blade in his hand, for he had to defend his beloved harem. Ten of his pursuers fell before their swords could touch him, but finally becoming dazzled by the frequent strokes of his sword, he fell down from his horse at Maria's feet, where he was captured. Maria had to see the face of her demigod become pale and besmirched with dust. His eyes were heavy, and from his lips issued impotent curses.