Diablero

by Toby Tate

  “It’s at my dock, in the marina. I can take you there, take you wherever you want to go,” he said.

  “Help me, and you’ll be rich and powerful beyond your wildest dreams.”

  Aiden could not believe the stark contrast between the snarling wolf-thing and this seemingly docile man. He didn’t know what exactly this creature’s mission was, but he knew he had come too far to back off now.

  And being rich and powerful sounded pretty damned good.

  “You can count on me,” he said.

  Thirty-six

  The giant steel suspension cables of the Cooper River Bridge became visible from the highway against a bright blue sky as Hunter and Jason approached Charleston, South Carolina. Though Hunter had developed a phobia for flying, he had always enjoyed looking down at the world from bridges and skyscrapers, seeing life from a wider perspective.

  As they got closer, he glanced over at Jason. “Sure you don’t want me to drive? You look a little peaked.”

  “I’ve driven over this bridge plenty of times. It’s scary only when the wind’s blowing.”

  They came to the foot of the bridge and began their ascent, and as if to substantiate his friend’s statement, the bridge did indeed seem to sway, if only slightly. Vertigo began to take hold, but Hunter managed to tamp it back down.

  As they came to the center of the bridge, he could see pleasure boats and tankers making their way in and out of Charleston Harbor. The salt sea mixing with diesel fumes and car exhaust made him feel a little queasy, but he held his tongue. Whiners could be an annoyance, and Hunter wasn’t about to spend the trip complaining.

  As he considered why he was there and what they were about to do, his thoughts turned to Lisa. He wondered if she had received his message and what she would do about it. She probably figured he was crazy. But she knew he wasn’t prone to making up fairy tales and ghost stories.

  He found himself wishing she was next to him in the seat of Jason’s Prius instead of Jason.

  “You know,” Jason said, snapping Hunter out of his daydream, “it’s kind of ironic that we’re headed to Charleston, of all places. This is where Blackbeard held his blockade. But after weeks of pillaging ships coming in and out of the harbor, he demanded nothing more than a chest of medicine from the city itself. Then, he took that and all his ill-gotten gains, and left the harbor without ever firing a shot or harming a soul. Yet the city of Charleston was in mortal fear of this man. Kind of makes you wonder just how charismatic the guy really was.”

  Hunter stared straight ahead as the Prius coasted down the far side of the bridge and into Charleston.

  “Yeah, or maybe he was just crazy.”

  “Somehow I don’t think so. Greedy maybe, but not crazy.”

  “Seems to me that Blackbeard had a lot going for him if he would have changed his ways and taken the offer Governor Eden made him—to swear off piracy. But he just couldn’t seem to leave it alone. He just had to be a pirate. It was in his blood. He was like a man . . .”

  “Like a man possessed?”

  Hunter glanced over. “Yeah, like a man possessed.”

  “I guess it‘s true what they say about fact being stranger than fiction.”

  Hunter continued to think about the ramifications of a demon-possessed soul. He had always believed in God, ever since he was a child, though there had been times in his life he had questioned his faith. Especially when God had apparently decided that the life of his unborn child and his marriage were expendable. But Hunter soon realized that in times like those, faith was the only thread connecting him to what he hoped was a benign and merciful God, one that would help him piece his life back together.

  But the reality of the situation he now found himself in far outweighed any kind of trouble he thought he may be having in his life. He was after what might be the biggest story of all time, but they were also dealing with something unimaginably evil, maybe even supernatural. As he watched the city go by outside his window, he began to wonder if he had gotten himself into a situation that may cost him more than he was willing to pay.

  Thirty-seven

  The old man took another sip of tea, watching from his front-porch swing as the sunlight crawled across his lawn, slowly feeding on the shadow of his house, chipping away inch by inch. He never wore sunglasses because he felt they detracted from the beauty of natural color. He loved the light, loved to bask in the warmth of the summer sun, watch its beams cascade through the windows of his old house in the afternoon, dust mites swirling through them like a fine mist. The sun had deepened his dark complexion over the years, made the wrinkles around his eyes multiply like the tributaries of a great river. But he didn’t mind. The fact that he had spent so much of his life in darkness made his appreciation of the light even more profound.

  As the old man thought of this, he considered how his life was about to change, maybe for the better, maybe not. But it was about to change. Soon, people would come and ask him many questions, some he could answer, other answers they would have to discover for themselves.

  And he will come, too.

  The old man shuddered at this thought and took another drink of green tea. A marvelous thing, green tea, he thought. The Chinese were a brilliant and resourceful people, surviving the centuries as a race, much like his own people, who spent their lives in the jungles and plains of darkest Africa.

  Then came the slave traders and the white men, and life had never been the same. Even so, he was thankful to be in America, despite its flaws.

  But there were some things he had found hard to let go, things that had been ingrained in him by his parents and their parents before them. They had brought these things with them to this country and now they haunted him, tortured him, refused to let go, demanded that he do their bidding.

  As if on cue, his mind suddenly shifted to a vision of the horizon, with water below and sky above. The cup and saucer slipped from his trembling hands and crashed to the floor, its precious contents seeping through the cracks between the wooden slats. As he watched, his eyes seemed as if they were blind, staring into black, empty space, but the opposite was true. He was seeing what it was seeing, what it wanted him to see. It wanted him to know that it was coming, and was now very close.

  It, or he, was on a boat of some kind. He could see a teakwood rail and a brass bell. There was a cabin with windows and he could hear the thrum of the engines as they plowed through the water toward their destination. Someone else was there. A thin, short man with glasses was driving the boat and saying something he could not understand. He could feel the wind blowing on his face and feel the fine spray of salt water as it leapt over the bow, could smell the salty sea air.

  The vision lasted a few more seconds and then, as if waking from a dream, the old man returned to his senses and sunk down in the porch swing, drained.

  Not much longer now, he knew, and his destiny, perhaps even his death, would be upon him.

  Thirty-eight

  The man once known as Edward Teach felt the presence of the old man inside his head as he looked out over the vast expanse of the Atlantic. The salt sea breeze blew through his black mane, cooling his sunburned skin. Though he knew the old man was not afraid of death, he could still feel the awe, the sense of foreboding that was there. Teach would allow him to see many things, to witness the terrifying power he possessed. It would be enough to let him know who held the reins and controlled their intertwined destiny, a destiny that lay within a book of secrets that only the old man, the shaman, could unlock.

  Many of the things the Teacher had accumulated over the centuries in the body of the old man he had once possessed had been lost and forgotten when Teach destroyed him. The Death Defier had been forced to start over again and he had lost the knowledge gained from reading the ancient book, one he had taken part in writing. But before the Teacher had died, he had taught his apprentice many things.

  Now, the old man held the secrets inside that ancient mind, a mind full of puzzles and riddl
es that even this demon would find difficult to unravel. But Teach could be very persuasive and was confident that the old shaman would come through in the end. He would have no choice.

  Teach absentmindedly ran his hands over the strange clothing he now wore, things that the human, John Aiden, had purchased for him. Something called slacks, a shirt made of strange fabric. Even the shoes were unusual, not stiff, uncomfortable leather like the ones he had worn when he last walked the Earth. He liked the things called sunglasses, for they blocked the intense light of the morning sun and kept his eyes hidden from others.

  His long black hair and beard would have given him an almost Middle Eastern appearance, were it not for his white skin, now red from the sun. He had not bothered to braid his hair or his beard, but thought that he might do so at a later date. In the past it had served to make him appear more formidable, though he was already supremely confident in his ability to cause fear.

  As a man, Blackbeard had been a force to reckon with, a pirate in every sense of the word, taking whatever his heart desired and leaving death and destruction in his wake. Yet even though his soul was full of wanton lust for riches and a need for power, he was a pragmatic man, methodical in his approach and conquest of ships of the sea. He knew what he wanted, but took it only when he felt he was fully prepared to do what was necessary to obtain it.

  Teach was also a highly intelligent man, conversant in several languages and able to read and write. In fact, he kept a log of many of his journeys and conquests, though most of them had been lost over the centuries, buried at the bottom of the Atlantic with the Adventure or confiscated by the Royal Navy, who had likely filed them away in some vast warehouse, never to be seen again. Communication was of utmost importance when relaying to prisoners exactly what was expected of them, and exactly how they would meet their death if they did not comply with your wishes. Teach was an excellent communicator, and therefore became a feared and infamous pirate.

  When the Teacher came, Blackbeard was leery, but drawn to him by the mystique and by curiosity. The power the Teacher possessed was beyond anything Blackbeard or the other pirates had ever encountered. Meeting in the dark, under cover of the night, in the swamp or aboard their vessels, they learned things long forgotten, and saw things that were both astounding and terrifying. the Teacher moved cypress trees and plants and even huge boulders with his mind. Sometimes the Teacher would change into a wolf-like creature or a bear. Or he would reanimate the dead, make corpses rise and walk again. Many of the pirates fled in terror at this, never to return. But Blackbeard refused to run, for he feared no man, living or dead.

  And then, there were the sacrifices for the Teacher, prolonging his life throughout the centuries with their blood. Many, many sacrifices. People in Elizabeth Town and Bath began asking questions, but no one had managed to uncover the nightmarish truth.

  As the months rolled by, Blackbeard decided that being the student was not enough. He wanted more. He wanted to be the Teacher; to be the Death Defier. So he caught the Teacher off guard and cleanly lopped off his head with his cutlass. The demon came into him almost immediately, and Blackbeard, perhaps for the first time in his life, understood the true meaning of evil, and the true meaning of fear.

  The demon eventually became too strong and Blackbeard found he was no longer in control.

  Teach thought back to the day, nearly three centuries ago, when he lay flat on his back on the wooden deck of the English navy ship as his life’s blood gushed from him, staring up as Captain Maynard gazed down at him with unbelieving eyes. Only moments before, a crewman had struck Blackbeard with a sword and nearly severed his head. That was when he—the demon—had revived and discovered he was alone in the body. Up until that time, it had always been a struggle, fighting against the humanity and the morality that even Blackbeard seemed to possess.

  But unlike Blackbeard, there were no accommodating souls aboard the navy ship into which the demon could pass. He was trapped, doomed to inhabit a lifeless body indefinitely, perhaps forever.

  Fortunately, the crew never destroyed the head, as they should have.

  Then, the man with the dark soul had come and reawakened him, reenergized him, allowed him to once again walk the Earth, to find and reattach his missing skull.

  And to grow a new body.

  The demon smiled at this, knowing that a new body was but the beginning of bigger and better things to come.

  Blackbeard glanced at Aiden, thinking he would eventually kill the man. But he still had some usefulness. Aiden seemed dedicated, yet was nothing more than an opportunist, trying to save his own skin. Aiden’s ancestors had once turned tail and run away from him and the other pirates infesting North Carolina, hiding like a bunch of cowards in the colony in Virginia. Teach would take great pleasure in disemboweling him, perhaps even hold up an intestine to let him get a look before he collapsed to the ground.

  The demon turned and surveyed the boat, a marvel of engineering. Sleek and quick, without the use of sails. Instead, the vessel employed what was known as diesel power, twin turbine-combustion engines that pushed it through the water by way of turbo propellers. Aiden had explained the entire workings of the boat to Teach, and of course, he understood it completely. He found that he was able to comprehend many things, and astonishingly fast. Being a demon with supernatural powers had its advantages.

  He would learn as much as he could about this new world and about this culture. America and the world had changed dramatically in the last three centuries, but some reading, watching, and listening would quickly fill the gaps in his knowledge. And by doing this, he would also learn its weaknesses and exploit them.

  Teach thought about the irony of his name, and that he, indeed, was a teacher. And he thought about the things all people of the Earth would soon learn from him.

  Thirty-nine

  Hunter reflected on the times he and Lisa had visited what the locals called the Low Country as he and Jason drove through the streets of Charleston. He eyed a Starbucks and remembered how they had sat beside that very window and watched as the many bicyclists pedaled by, soaking up the sun of a bright summer’s day, narrowly avoiding crashing into one another. He remembered how they had ridden their own bikes in a local park and how he had nearly fallen into a waterway that ran the length of the park.

  Lisa had purchased a handmade basket at one of the shops on Market Street. They had stood for half an hour, watching in amazement as an old woman wove the basket, nimble fingers moving like an accomplished violinist, the strands of sweet grass, intertwining like intimate lovers. After she finished, Lisa thanked the woman, paid her, and inspected the basket as if it were a Monet.

  They rode their bikes downtown and all along Battery Street, down Concord Street to Waterfront Park, getting wet in the sprinklers, laughing as they cruised down the sidewalk past rows of live oak trees. They ended the night at one of the local clubs, drinking beer and listening to the sounds of a cover band playing tunes too old for either of them to remember, but they enjoyed it just the same. They talked of the past and the future and discussed what they would name their baby and what kind of diapers they should buy.

  The bed and breakfast they had stayed in was quaint, and quite a bit cheaper than the hotels. There, they enjoyed the company of the other guests, some from as far away as Alaska, and drank sherry and ate homemade cornbread. At night they made love in the antique bed, enjoying each other’s bodies as if they had just met, basking in the afterglow and wondering what tomorrow would bring.

  Hunter felt a tear begin to form, glanced sideways at Jason to make sure he wasn’t looking, and then wiped it away with the side of his finger.

  Had he really been foolish enough to let her get away; to cast aside years of a carefully cultivated relationship because of his own pride? The baby’s death was certainly beyond anything either of them could control, but his reaction to it was not. Retreating, hiding in the dark recesses of his own emotions, shutting out the one who needed him most—w
ho he needed most—that should have been preventable, was preventable. And Hunter swore if he could have just one more chance to prove himself, to show he had learned his lesson and learned it well, he would never again lose sight of what mattered most—his Lisa.

  “There’s the house up ahead.” Jason pointed with a long finger at a plain-looking white house with a single dormer window jutting from a wooden-shingled roof, and a covered front porch with a swing that hung from two chains. In the swing sat an old black man of about seventy-five or eighty, staring solemnly ahead, lost in thought, perhaps. He was dressed in khaki pants and a red button-down shirt, with dusty, black shoes.

  They parked by the curb and Hunter saw an old, powder-blue Buick Skylark sitting in the narrow driveway. The man on the porch didn’t seem to notice them. They both got out of the car and Hunter followed as Jason led the way.

  They walked up the creaky porch steps. As they ascended the steps, Hunter noticed a broken teacup lying in front of the swing, amidst a small pool of tea that glistened in the sun. He then looked at the old man. He was clean-shaven, his short black hair graying on the sides. The man appeared younger than he had from a distance. He was still lost in thought, and Hunter wondered what the man was thinking about.

  Suddenly, the old man’s eyes fixed on them, and Hunter felt a small twinge of anxiety, unprepared for the intense scrutiny. When the man smiled, it instantly put him at ease.

  “Ah, Mr. Summerfield, and Mr.—ah, Mr. Singleton, correct?”

  The old man’s voice was gravelly and deep, but the accent was unusual, an odd mix of African and southern US, and Hunter wondered where he could be from.

  Jason and the old man shook hands and the man stood. He was tall, maybe six-one or six-two, and solid, like a wrestler or a football player. Hunter was certain the man could hold his own in a fight.