Whirling, he turned, ran back on deck, hurried aft. They had not seemed to make much headway, but with the hail and the wind and almost consuming storm-darkness it was difficult to see anything anyway. Anything except the big Spaniard looming ahead.
“Abandon ship you men!” Jesamiah called as he reached to take the tiller from Rue. “Get your arses off here.”
They did not need a second telling. Clinging to the cable rigged from the rails to the gig, they were out, over the side, coughing and spluttering as the sea tried all she could to wash them away.
In case they fell, Jesamiah had chosen these men especially for their ability to swim, though he guessed, with those fuses burning any man would have learnt pretty damned quickly.
Rue grabbed at him. “Come on, Jesamiah. Tie off the tiller, let us jump together.”
“I’ll hold her a few more seconds, go on, you go. Cut the gig free and row for the Sea Witch.”
“You are coming, mon brave?” Standing up on the rail, Rue hesitated, was suddenly sceptical and worried, his captain had been in a most peculiar mood this past hour.
“Course I am. Get going.”
Rue jumped.
“God be with you my friend.” Jesamiah had no intention of following him. His plan was simple. Sail straight for la Santa Isabella, plough into her, and blow her up.
In a maniacal way, Jesamiah found it exhilarating to stand on the shallow quarterdeck with the wind screaming its raging fury around him, matching his inner madness. The heavy roll and lift, sway and dip as Kismet lurched and tossed verging on near loss of control, as if she were a horse rearing then bucking, close to throwing her rider and bolting away headlong. He found the sheer effort of having to keep her steady as the sails cracked and billowed exciting, almost to the point of arousal. If he was to die, as he must, this was how he wanted it to be, pitching himself against the sea and the storm. And ridding the world of an evil bastard who raped women and murdered children at the same time. Why he was doing this he did not know. He was too angry, too hurt, to understand his motives. All he knew was that he wanted Don Damian del Gardo dead, and if he was to also die in the process, well, a quick end was preferable to the pain that was ripping his insides apart.
Every stay and shroud was vibrating and humming almost to screaming point. No captain in his right mind would be driving a ship so hard in such conditions, but Jesamiah was not in his right mind, and what did it matter if Kismet was tearing herself to pieces? In less than a minute she would be nothing but smoke and flame anyway. Another tearing cry of thunder shattering overhead, the rain fell hard, beating at him as if it were a woman pounding him with her fists. An explosion roared – Jesamiah started, fearing he had set the fuses too short, but it was the maintops’l ripping into a mass of flapping and twisting streamers. The Kismet slewed to starboard, he lost control.
The thunder was cracking so relentlessly that he was not noticing it any more. Lightning was flickering and streaking over and around and through the black clouds. A broken stay fell from aloft and was writhing about on its shackling halyards like a demented sea serpent. More would soon be following.
On the la Santa Isabella, no one had appeared to notice him – they were too busy gawping at where the guardship had been. Then someone saw the Kismet. Too late, for although she was yawing away from Jesamiah and he had totally lost steerage, her bowsprit was only feet from ploughing into the Spaniard’s bow – with a great rip of splintering wood her momentum carried her on and forward. Railings, timber, spars, everything was shattering, tearing and splintering and screaming her death knell.
Men were running about in panic aboard the Spaniard, shouting, pointing at the Kismet, waving their arms as if that would magically remove her from their own bowspirit. Was that del Gardo himself among them? Jesamiah could not be certain, for he was looking up into another face, one that was staring back at him in open mouthed horror and hatred. How van Overstratten had got to be standing there Jesamiah did not know. Did not have time to think or worry about it, for the fuses blew and what was left of the Kismet erupted into savage hell, taking the forward half of la Santa Isabella with her.
Tethys rose up in a wall of green water. The sea had claimed one vessel and the lives of every man aboard, but she wanted more, she wanted him! And at last, at last, as the remains of the Kismet burnt and sank, she had him!
The water filled Tiola’s mouth, the roaring in her ears shattering through her, deafening her as she sank with Jesamiah beneath the churning foam of water that was littered by burning debris and dead and dying men.
She was with Jesamiah, as one with him, felt every sense, heard every sound; took that last, instinctive, gasping breath with him, trying to keep air in his lungs as Tethys sucked him down.
~ Why Jesamiah? Why? ~
Tiola did not understand. She could not comprehend the deliberate wasting of his own life.
~ Why? Why! ~
He made no answer to her pleading cries. Perhaps he did not hear, perhaps he did not choose to hear. Perhaps, it was already too late for him to hear. She would not give him up without a fight! All she had to do was keep him breathing and get him to the surface.
Tiola rarely panicked, but on this occasion she did. She screamed and screamed as Tethys wove her embrace around him, screamed her agony and despair as Jesamiah drowned.
Thirty Nine
Rue clung to the bouncing and rocking gig that somehow, against all odds, had managed to stay afloat, despite the huge mountain of water that had seemed to boil upward from the destruction of the two vessels. The green face of the wave had built and built and then curled over, white foaming at its crest, to hurtle up the river, destroying everything along the banks as it passed. Bringing down trees and buildings, rocks and rubble. Sweeping live creatures into its gape, and tearing vegetation out by the roots.
One of his strong hands was clasped around the gig’s rigging, the other was twisted into Jesamiah’s collar.
By chance, as the torrential rain had momentarily cleared, Rue had seen him thrown into the sea by the force of the blast as the Kismet had exploded. He had cried out to the men to pull for their very lives, staring and staring at the spot where he had seen Jesamiah go in. And he was there, floating face down! His black hair waving, his blue ribbons so distinctive! Rue grabbed, held on, and the rain, mercifully, eased.
Using all his strength, his muscles straining, Rue heaved, struggling to bring Jesamiah’s inert body aboard. It was almost as if unseen hands were holding his captain back, clasping him in a vice-like grip determined to keep him there in the sea. But Rue won the battle, and he rolled Jesamiah over the rail, flopped with him to the bottom of the boat to lie there gasping like a landed fish.
Jesamiah opened his eyes, twisted to his side and spewed water from his lungs. After a while, he struggled to his knees.
“It’ll come back,” he puffed. “The wave will have a pull-back. It’ll go in hard but unable to spend itself, will pull back and spill where it can.” Ashen faced, trembling, he looked at Rue and smiled. “Thank you my friend. Thank you for saving me.”
Rue merely stated, “You are a fool.”
The surge wave, having reached its height and limit of forward momentum was slithering backwards, returning from whence it came, as Jesamiah said it would. The sucking, squealing noise as it retreated to its own domain of the ocean was horrible to hear as it scooped up everything it could in its grasp as plunder. Trees, lumps of masonry and timber. Small, wrecked fishing boats. Lobster pots, barrels, crates. The carcasses of the drowned. Animal and human. For ages it seemed to slide back and back, and Jesamiah and Rue and the men clung to the sides of the tossing gig until their fingernails bled. The sea was angry and it swirled and lashed at everything it could, boiling with its torrents of green, icy death.
But the storm, too, was not finished. In the wake of an ear-splitting crash of thunder another squall came racing down from the hills. Rain scythed across the flooded village of Puerto Vaca and bea
t down upon the surface of the heaving sea. It stung the men’s flesh, drummed against the planking of the gig and hissed into the several inches of water slopping in the bottom. The sea was churning with its own wrath, fighting back, a great battle between the water of the oceans and its daughter, the rain of the skies. A battle for domination, a force of wills. Two elementals pitched in brutal savagery one against the other.
Rain had always hated her mother, and the Witch Woman had been kind to her.
~ Save Jesamiah. Please Rain, save the man I love. Do not give him to your Mother. She will take him down into the darkness of her world, and he is so frightened of being shut away in the dark. ~
Rain knew that. She had seen his fear when he had been in that tower. And she had seen his smile and his beautiful eyes. He had smiled at her when he had seen her in her form of the Grey Lady. Smiled and saluted her.
~ No, I will not help you, Witch Woman, I think it is best for you to fight your own battles with my Mother. But I will help him. For so few see me and smile. ~
The rain battered at the sea with such force that it stirred the surface into a froth of yeasty foam. She drove upon the ocean relentlessly and unremorsefully, without pity or mercy, beating, bullying her mother down. Driving horizontally she forced Tethys to subside, pounding at the high, crested waves until they were flattened into submission.
And then the rain stopped as suddenly as it had started. The storm was gone, and the sea was flat and calm.
Forty
Jesamiah and Rue lay in the bottom of the gig, sodden, breathless and battered. The men rested on the oars, their energy spent. The sickening bobbing was easing, and the sky overhead was paling brighter into a fresh blue. The black clouds were rolling away into the distance as quickly as they had come.
“I hope that’s the end of the rain,” Jesamiah remarked. “As much as I don’t mind a dousing, I’m sure I’m getting webbed, bloody feet.”
Rue could only nod, too exhausted to answer.
Raising his head, Jesamiah searched for the Sea Witch, found her hove to where she was meant to be, over by what was left of the mangrove swamp. The mangroves would survive, so would the palm trees, and the vegetation would re-grow. The village, when Jesamiah turned to look was battered and damaged, but much of it had survived. Although the Sickle Moon had gone. The overhang of rocks had tumbled down and engulfed it. Jesamiah was not sorry to see its demise.
Every bone in his body was broken, or so it felt. He would not be surprised to find, when he stripped his clothes, that he was bruised blue and black from head to foot. Giving encouragement, he chivvied the men into pulling for his beloved ship. It was over. Finished. What the islanders did with their rebellion was up to them, but del Gardo was dead, and very likely, because of it, so was the rebellion. What was there to fight against now the object of their hatred was removed?
He wondered if he would see ‘Cesca again. Doubted it. Was partially sorry, but then, he did not need her, for he had his Tiola back.
~ Jesamiah? ~
~ Yes sweetheart? ~
~ Are you alright? ~
~ Not really. ~
~ Will you come and get me? I am waiting for you at la Sorenta. ~
~ Do you doubt that I would not? ~
She sent him the feeling of a loving embrace and her lips touching his. No, she did not doubt it.
There were many dead floating in the water. Two Spanish ships had gone down; men had drowned, men had been blown to pieces by an explosion of gunpowder. Some of the bodies were not whole, some had horrendous burns. Gunpowder was not a kindly stuff. Jesamiah vaguely searched the dead, hoping to find what remained of del Gardo. A movement caught his eye. He frowned, peered over the side, saw a man feebly trying to swim. Recognised the bastard’s arrogant face; watched him struggling, watched him trying to reach for a piece of wood to use as a float. Why did the fool not give up and die? Jesamiah looked away, pretended he had not seen.
Tiola would ask. She would want to know what had happened to Stefan. He would tell her he had seen the bastard’s dead body and then all this would be over. No, he could not do that, Tiola always knew when he lied. How could he be honest about it? He is dead, sweetheart, I watched him drown.
Jesamiah swore and ordered the men to alter course. He leant over the side and made a grab for van Overstratten’s hand.
“Stefan, take hold! Come on man, you are alive, we have survived. Make an effort!”
Close to complete exhaustion, the Dutchman looked up and saw Jesamiah Acorne.
“Donder der op naar de hell!”
Jesamiah did not understand what it meant, but he could roughly guess its meaning.
“There was no indigo,” Jesamiah said. “Jennings used both of us. We have both been played for fools.” He leant further out, made a grab for Stefan’s coat. Missed. A little bit more… a little more.
Was that movement in the mud-churned water behind Stefan? Debris floated everywhere, several uprooted trees, trunks had already bumped against the gig’s hull. A log was floating towards Stefan. Perhaps he would be better to grab at that?
Jesamiah cried out, urgently reached out as far as he could. “Come to me! Kick hard man! Come on! Come on!”
That was no log! It had eyes and teeth and jaws, and its home among the mangrove swamps had been destroyed, making it angry.
Jesamiah touched Stefan’s fingers, strained forward, caught his wrist, clung on. Gasping with relief he hauled, Stefan’s grip curling into his own. Rue was beside him, also leaning down, reaching out.
“I have you!” Jesamiah cried, “I have you!”
And then Stefan shook his head and stared up into Jesamiah’s eyes. “Jij wint piraat. Zorg goed voor haar,” he said, repeating it in English as, deliberately, he let go.
The muddied water churned into a sudden, brief, flurry of white foam and red blood as the swamp crocodile closed its jaws around Stefan and took him under.
The words, you win pirate. Take care of her, echoed in Jesamiah’s head, and stupidly, incongruously, he sat there in the water at the bottom of the gig, and wept.
Forty One
As the storm abated and the sea calmed, Tiola had spoken to Tethys.
~ Why do you pursue Jesamiah? Why do you try to take him from me? ~
~ Because I have only daughters and I want a son! Because he is mine! He was born in the sea and I want him to stay with me, to be mine! ~
Tiola had thrown back her head and laughed, not unkindly, but amused. ~ But he has always been yours, Tethys! You do not have to take him to where he will become nothing more than bones and rotting flesh to keep him. Always it will be his ship and the sea that is important to Jesamiah, always he will answer and come to you when you call, not to me. He loves me, but he is a part of you. He is of the sea. He always will be. But if you take him now, he will die and the light and the life that is his will be gone forever. ~
Tethys was silent as she listened and she mulled the words in the shifting tides of her mind.
~ Do you want him as a corpse, my Lady of the Sea? Or do you want his laughter and his joy, his strength and his beauty? ~ Tiola paused. Waited for an answer. It was a long time in coming. ~ Where the sea is trapped upon the shore, there is no movement, ~ Tiola added. ~ There is no tide, there is no surf, there are no waves. Just old, stagnant water that dries to nothing more than salt. Do you prefer that pool as your realm or do you prefer the wide freedom of the glorious ocean? Would you prefer the dead bones of a man or the vibrancy of his life? ~
Tethys was crooning, almost crying, the sound that of the waves upon the shore.
~ Jessh.. a..miah. Jessh… a…miah. ~
~ I say again Tethys, he always has been yours. He always will be. He loves you. He cannot exist without the sea. ~
And at last, realising the truth of it, Tethys subsided into the depth of her realm, and was content, for he was, indeed, hers. As the Witch Woman said, he always had been. Always would be.
And always, for Tethys, wa
s a very, very long time.
Forty Two
Thursday Evening
Jesamiah slept for almost two days. He awoke once and cried out in misery, but Tiola was there, beside him, her arms around him, her voice crooning and comforting, hushing him back to sleep. Over and over she repeated that it was alright, that everything was alright. He buried his head in her lap and wept, and murmured that it was not.
“‘Cesca told me the truth,” he admitted through his tears. “All those years when I was a child I endured the humiliations and the pain and the fear. I need not have done. I should not have done.”
Tiola, kissed him, held him tight and close, said nothing, let him talk. Let him release the hurt that was eating into him.
Jesamiah looked up at her, tiredness etched into his bereaved face. “My father,” he said, “had only one son. He gave the other his name out of honour for the woman, but the child was not his son. He had no right to the name Mereno. Had no right to be there in Virginia. Had no right to anything.”
“Oh Jesamiah, Jesamiah!” Tiola’s heart was breaking along with his.
“I suffered all that for nothing. Phillipe was not my brother.” His breath shuddered as he finally acknowledged the truth and confessed it to the woman he adored. “Del Gardo fathered him through an act of rape. My father gave his mother refuge, a home and a name, but he was my father. Not Phillipe’s. My father gave him everything that should have been mine. Even his love. Why? Why?” Jesamiah’s distress was consuming him, all those years of pain and fear running in a blind panic of returning memories.
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