On the morning of July 13, horns blared from within the city, cries and warning bells could be heard from the towers, and frantic activity atop the city walls signaled the beginning of the second Crusader assault on Jerusalem. Two massive, sixty-foot-tall siege towers began to inch their way forward out of the Crusader camps. The twin juggernauts of wood and iron crept sluggishly toward the walls on opposite sides of the city like lumbering giants, burdened by their own weight. Horses whinnied and snorted as they strained to pull the ropes attached to the towers, and the Crusaders behind yelled and grunted with exertion as they pushed with all their might.
The wooden wheels of the tower creaked under the strain of the weight as though they might break at any moment, and the tower slowly r
