Bring It Close

by Helen Hollick

  Teach waited a moment. There was a man slumped over the tiller, another, blood covered, draped over the binnacle box. Bodies were scattered around, two had been decapitated, severed limbs had streamed blood everywhere. It was a charnel house. He grinned.

  “We’ve knocked ‘em on the ‘ead, m’dears!” he cried, and stepped across into the Jane with most of his men: his boatswain Garratt Gibbens, Phillip Morton, Thomas Gates and Red Rufus, among them.

  Save for the flurries of wind and the cry of gulls overhead, it was eerily quiet. Teach walked towards the nearest scuttle, poking at bodies with his foot as he passed. He had found time during that first flight after cutting his anchor cable to dress in his usual imposing manner: two pistols hung from his baldric tied on by ribbons – there had been others, but fired, they had been discarded. Twined into his beard and hair, slow match fuses were burning and smoking. With his grimed face, tall stature and bulging eyes, he looked a fearsome sight as he strode across the Jane’s bloodied deck, although it was only his own men who saw him. And Maynard; peeping through the crook of his arm covering his face. Another yard…One more…And Maynard sprang upward. Yelling like a wild man, his pistol raised, he aimed, fired, point blank at Teach.

  Teach already had a pistol in his hand – loosed a shot as Maynard’s bullet thudded into his shoulder. It was enough to knock his aim askew and his bullet flew wide, but not enough to kill him. He barely felt its impact. At the same instant, Jesamiah moved, fast, away from where he had been slumped over the tiller, and adding his roar to Maynard’s frantic yelling, urged the men of the Jane to come up from below, to attack.

  The men, many already bloodied and wounded, appeared from the scuttles, weapons raised, screaming and chanting a war cry of “Death to the bastards!” All was noise and chaos; pistols popping, blade ringing against blade, shouts, grunts, cries.

  Jesamiah met with Gibbens. Both of them had pistols that had been fired in the frenzied rush – Jesamiah’s had taken down one of Teach’s men; Gibbens’ shot had gone wide of the mark – they had their cutlasses out, met, parried, broke apart, met again. Jesamiah’s foot slipped on blood on the deck, he went down on his backside. Gibbens moved in for the kill but Nat Crocker was there, behind them. He was using his pistol as a club; brought the butt down on Gibbens’ head. There was an audible crack, the pirate fell, unconscious. Another man – Nat turned, used his feet, his elbows, anything, to fight, to defend himself. Jesamiah came upon Red Rufus, someone else with whom he had a score to settle. Jesamiah’s cutlass swung upward; Rufus tried to parry with his own, but he was not as fast, not as agile. The cutlass – a killing weapon, heavy, lethal. His belly slit open, Red Rufus lay dead.

  Skylark ducked under an axe that was scything downward, brought his dagger up and plunged it into his opponent’s groin – but Skylark fell also, his face contorted in a grimace of agony, a bullet lodged in his thigh.

  Maynard could not believe his bad luck. He had shot Teach at close range but the man stood there and fought on like a fury! In disbelief he saw another bullet slam into Teach, going clean through his side. The big man stumbled, but that was all. It was as if he could feel nothing, as if he had no blood inside him to shed. No earthly life to lose. Was he truly protected by the Devil?

  Enraged, more than a little afraid, Maynard raised his cutlass and attacked. Teach merely laughed and stepped aside. The blade came down and shattered in half, broken on impact with his cartridge box, the edge tearing across Maynard’s hand, cutting the knuckles open to the bone. With the back of his hand Edward Teach delivered a blow to Maynard’s face and contemptuously swept him aside. He turned with a leer of triumph to face Jesamiah. He had another loaded pistol raised, was aiming straight at Jesamiah’s heart.

  And Time stopped.

  This was the place. The place where the land became the sea and sea became the land. Where one was not the other and all was not as it seemed.

  Charles Mereno stood between Blackbeard and Jesamiah, he too had a pistol raised, was pointing it at Edward Teach. The bigger man with the black hair and the bushed beard slowly lowered his weapon, the hint of a questioning frown wrinkling his forehead. After all these years of taunting, was Charles St Croix Mereno to finally find his balls and turn against him?

  Not taking his attention off Teach, Charles spoke to Jesamiah. “I wanted to make it up to you,” he said sorrowfully, “but you would not let me. You would not listen to what I wanted to tell you about Phillipe.”

  “And I did not – do not – want to know about him now.”

  Teach looked from the ghost of the father to the living son. Derision spread across his face. “’Ee weren’t thy brother, Acorne. Thy father ‘ere had no doin’ with plantin’ ‘is seed in the whore who birthed that boy. Any one of a dozen men could’ve sired ‘im. Did thee know that?”

  “He knows,” Mereno said. “I told him on the night that poor young wretch you took as wife was used so ill.”

  Teach cackled, a sound drenched in madness. “An’ did ‘ee tell ‘im I were one o’ them dozen men?”

  “I did. I told him Phillipe was your son.”

  Teach laughed again, a great cheer of mirth. “I ‘ave sons an’ brats all o’er tha place. In ev’ry port I doos reckon. Bain’t acknowledged a one of em, an’ I bain’t as startin’ t’do so now.” He hoiked spittle into his mouth and spat the saliva to the deck. “There again, fer many a reason I bain’t happy with thee, Acorne.” He raised his pistol, pointed it at Jesamiah’s head and cocked the hammer home. “Thee ‘as turned traitor t’me and my men. I casn’t be havin’ that, now cas’n I?”

  He pressed the trigger. It clicked. Nothing happened.

  Charles stared with hatred and loathing at Teach, a smile that was more of a sneer touching the corner of his lips. “You are losing your touch, Edward. That pistol is not loaded. You have already fired it.”

  With a grunt of annoyance, Teach threw the weapon at him.

  Jesamiah shivered, felt suddenly frightened. There had been no clatter as it had fallen, harmless, to the wooden deck. There was no sound at all, only their own three voices. Everything was still. It was like looking at a frozen tableau – the scene could have been a painting, one of the pictures Skylark created. Nothing moved. Not the clouds, the gulls, the sea, the tattered sails. The men, in various poses, stood like carved statues. Even the blood on the motionless deck was not running or dripping. This was unreal! A dream maybe? One of Tiola’s spells? He wondered if he had been wounded or killed and he was looking as a dead man on those who were alive. But if that was so, as Teach was moving then he was dead with him, and he did not want to be in the same place as that misbegotten whoreson. And Tiola was somewhere below with the wounded. Surely, she would not have let him die here, alone?

  “Jesamiah?” Charles said, his anguish returning, so sad, into his voice, “why did you not let me explain?” He lowered his pistol, slowly twisted round to face Jesamiah.

  “Evil is here, son; to counter it I have to do what I have to do. But I so want to say I am sorry. So want to say I love you and that I did what I did, will do what I do, out of love for you. I got things wrong, I made mistakes.” He faltered; steadied his nerve. “I would that you could forgive me, though I do not deserve it. Because of my stupidity I was not a good father, but never, never doubt that I loved you, Jesamiah. With all my heart, I have always loved you, my dearest son.”

  What could Jesamiah say? What could he answer? His childhood had been a misery because his father had never protected him. But he had got through it, he had survived, and perversely it had made him a better person because he was determined not to be like Phillipe, or like his father.

  “I wanted you to listen,” Charles repeated, a harder note coming in his words. “I wanted to tell you why, but the sand has run through the hour glass, and Time will wait no longer.” He raised the pistol, but not at Teach. He was aiming at Jesamiah.

  Jesamiah stood very still; as immobile as the men frozen in Time. He did not
look at the gun, only at his father’s saddened eyes. He was a dead shot, Charles Mereno. At this close range he would not miss once he pulled that trigger. It would be quick, instant: a better death than hanging.

  “I no longer have questions about the past, Papa, nor care about the answers. You are dead, you are gone. Phillipe is dead. Neither of you can hurt me any more.” He half smiled; flicked a glance at the pistol. “At least, I thought you could not. Why kill me? What have I done? It’s him, Teach, who has evil in his heart. Not me.”

  With infinite sadness Charles answered, “Please find it in your heart to forgive me. Edward Teach traded his soul with the Devil to become a midshipman aboard my ship. Unless the Dark is chased from him he cannot be killed. But you can, and for my peace, for yours, I have to do this. I am so sorry. So sorry.”

  Charles cocked the hammer home, pulled the trigger, and fired at Jesamiah as the last grain of sand dripped through the hourglass, and Time became right and jolted back into its solemn, measured, tread.

  Fifty Four

  Tiola was coming up through the scuttle. The men fighting for their lives were not aware that a small area of the deck had warped into a different dimension where time had ceased. Below, caring as best she could for the wounded and the dying, she had sensed the unbalanced shift and fled up the ladder, coming too late, just too late, to save Jesamiah. She ran, heedless of the fight going on around her as suspended Time became right again, and the gun in Charles Mereno’s hand fired. Jesamiah was falling. His head struck the tiller and blood spread beneath him, pooling on the deck.

  Here it was, her nightmare dream. The one word tore from her as a single, long, gut-wrenching cry of grief. “Jes…a…mi…ah!”

  She threw herself over him, covering his body with her own, her tears falling like a burst of summer rain, her arms going around him, trying to make him sit up, trying to make him come alive. Trying to keep him warm and with her.

  She heard the snigger: the humourless giggle of the Malevolents behind her.

  ~ He is dead, Witch Woman! He is dead! And you are not so clever as to bring the dead back to life, are you? We have won! We have him! ~ The giggling shrieked in a cacophony of macabre hilarity.

  Tiola stared up at Teach, her dark eyes a depth of impenetrable black as he stepped forward, his last pistol aimed at Jesamiah’s head.

  His ugly, satisfied smile was repellent. “Let us make sure ‘e be dead, eh?”

  In a blur of movement that no human could have made, Tiola was standing astride the man she loved beyond her own life. Head erect, her fingers linked together at her waist, her eyes turning into pools of a glistening blackness that sparked with flecks of gold and silver. As the balance shifted into flux, energy crackled from her body and a great mass of power built and built behind her, swelling and expanding. She stood there, the Old One of Light with her gift of Craft, magnificent and omnipotent.

  Slowly, very slowly, she brought her arms out and up, palms upper-most, forming a great circle of power in the air; a circle of bright, white fire trailing where her hands passed, building and building in density. The Circle of Light. At the zenith above her head her fingers touched and joined. The Power invoked; the Circle complete.

  Her voice was potent in its commanding chant:

  Light enclose the Circle,

  All to fill the Air;

  Coursing through the deep Earth,

  Within the Fire flare.

  Light upon the Water

  The River and the Sea,

  Spirit become the Circle

  Protecting him and me.

  Power to my Circle,

  Power to my Might

  Power to my Ageless Craft

  Dark shall fear my Light!

  The sky had turned black, the rage of the Dark Energy appearing like storm clouds banking overhead. Thunder split the sky, the rage of the Malevolence unleashed. The only light was Tiola’s circle, the white fire that burned but gave no heat.

  “You cannot harm me!” she cried to the swelling rage of Darkness. “I have formed the Circle and it cannot be broken!”

  The Dark expanded in the sky, thicker, denser, boiling and swirling in its anger, but held at bay by the burning circle, came no closer.

  Tiola turned her head slightly with a mixture of contempt and hatred towards the loathsome reptile that was Edward Teach. But for all her disdain, she also held compassion. The Dark had used him, had sent the Malevolents to feed on his vile greed and arrogance. To gorge and bloat and consume, leaving behind nothing of the man, only the sinister control of the Darkness of Evil.

  “I cannot kill you for it is forbidden,” she said, “but I can and I will drive out the Dark and those it sends to devour! I can and I will drive out the false promises of its minions, those which claim to protect and keep Death cowering in the shadows. I can and I will defeat the evil of the Dark that threatens those I love and cherish!”

  The Darkness above and around roared its fury and howled its rage, a sound like the cannons of a battalion firing a sweeping broadside. But it was impotent against her.

  “I can and I will destroy this Malevolence of the Dark!” And Tiola hurled the Circle of Light from her, thrusting it away with both hands. With all the strength she possessed she cast it, not at the broiling clouds of the Dark, but direct at Edward Teach.

  He flung up his arms, screeched in fear, warding the blaze of Light off, trying to stop its terrible force from touching his face, his body, his hands. He staggered backwards, tripped, half fell, breath gasping in his lungs as the blaze tore into and through him. The Dark fled and the canker that had inhabited Teach fled with it, racing across the sky as a hare bolts from the hounds. The Circle of Light flared once, and vanished. The sun shone again and the equilibrium of Life and Death returned to its course of balanced stability.

  Teach was on one knee. He had dropped his pistol. Desperate, he reached for it, his fingers scrabbling to close around the butt, to lift the weapon, cock it, aim. Maynard was trying to rise to his feet also, his head was spinning from the blow Teach had dealt him, blood trickling from a gash across his eyebrow. Men were fighting hand to hand. Kicking, punching and biting. Not much sound now, except for the thud and thump of blows and the groans of the wounded and the dying; the cry of gulls wheeling overhead, the sound of a wind hurrying, belatedly, across the marshes.

  Blood was soaking through Teach’s clothing, matting his beard and hair; the fuses entwined there had sputtered out. He pushed himself up, stood swaying, his vision blurring, dazed, bewildered and disorientated. This was not how it was meant to be. He could not die. He had been promised, promised that Death would not come for him. But Death stood there, bold and brazen before him.

  “I have come for you, Edward,” Charles Mereno said, bending to pick up Jesamiah’s cutlass and to step in front of Teach. “I did a great wrong when I was a young man. Because of lust I got a woman with child and I spurned her plea for help. They said she was a Dark Witch and that she had conjured the Devil to protect her son.”

  He stood before Teach, the cutlass blade pressing into the pirate’s throat through the matted blood-soaked beard.

  “And that child became a monster who found me, his father, and deliberately set out to make my life and the lives of others a misery of despair. I knew, when first I saw you, Edward Teach, that you were my son.”

  Charles glanced at Tiola who was kneeling beside Jesamiah, cradling him, her tears spilling, her power gone, faded. “I had to raise Phillipe as my own; it was my duty to do so. I knew, to my shame, that he was my grandson. I tried to deny it, to ignore him. Out of cowardice, hid away and did nothing to stop the wickedness. But now at last I will find peace by ending what I so selfishly began. I must destroy the son I so foolishly and carelessly created.”

  He drew the cutlass back and struck, slicing the blade through flesh, sinew and bone, severing the head of his firstborn, illegitimate son, Edward Teach, with the one blow.

  Fifty Five

  The af
termath of battle was a mess. The sea around where the two sloops, Adventure and Jane, drifted was tainted red by the blood draining through the scuppers. More than half the men were killed; most of the others wounded. Among the dead, Nat Crocker and Sandy Banks. Wounded, badly but not mortally, Isiah Roberts, Joe Meadows – Skylark, and Crawford. Finch, though he had fought as fiercely as the next man, had not a scratch on him.

  No one knew who had killed Blackbeard. The fighting had been confusing and intense; there had been so much smoke that for a while it had seemed as if the very sky had turned black, split only by a blast of flame from cannon fire. That the Jane carried no cannon, and none aboard the Adventure had been loaded, were facts that no one, except Tiola, realised or understood.

  They found twenty cutlass slashes on Blackbeard’s body, with five gunshot wounds, and although they marvelled at his great strength at attempting to cheat death, none felt sorry for him as they tossed his corpse over the side without word or prayer for his passing. The tide was on the turn and his remains swept in and out, bumping against the side of the Jane as if seeking its severed head, which Maynard had hung as a trophy from the bowsprit.

  Those pirates who survived were locked, defeated and broken, in the hold. All of them were wounded. They would be taken to Williamsburg, tried and hanged without mercy.

  Before the tide fell too low and dusk encroached, the Jane and the Ranger, with the Adventure as a Prize, limped away from the Ocracoke towards Pilot Point on the Pamlico River, leaving the corpses of those pirates who had died to the fish and crabs to devour. Their own dead would receive honoured burial.