The Emerald Storm

by William Dietrich

  “A battle standard?”

  “It’s the new flag of Haiti. Do you see what it is missing?”

  I glanced, but shook my head. “I’m poor with riddles.”

  “It’s sewn from the French tricolor, but I had the white removed.”

  “Ah.”

  “I hate whites, white man. I hate mulattos, the arrogant gens de couleur who fought us and pretended they are our betters because of the lightness of their skin.” His eyes darted at some of the followers he had just insulted. “I hate the French, I hate the Spanish, I hate the British, and I hate the Americans. I and my slave brothers have been whipped and hanged by white-skins for two hundred years. I have flayed and burned and stabbed and strangled a thousand in return, with my very own hands. What do you think of that?”

  This wasn’t going well. Despite my battles, everyone seems more belligerent than me. I cleared my throat. “I do not want to be number one thousand and one.”

  There was dead silence, and I feared I’d said the wrong thing, immediately hoping for a quick shooting over a slow roasting. Then Dessalines abruptly barked a laugh, Jubal guffawed in relief, and the other rebel officers joined, too. Laughter rippled around the encampment as my joke was repeated, women shrieking with the men. I smiled hesitantly.

  It’s always flattering to be the center of attention.

  Dessalines put his hand up, and everyone instantly went silent again. “Then you will earn your keep, as every other soldier does in my army. Are you my soldier now, Ethan Gage?”

  When drafted, it’s wisest to make the best of things. “I certainly hope so. I want to liberate Cap-François.” I tried to make my nervous smile broader, straighten my shoulders, raise my chin, and otherwise mimic martial traits. “I support blacks, and admire what you’ve accomplished.”

  “And maybe I’ll let a white man help us finish, should he prove useful.”

  Here was my chance. “I can help you defeat the French fortifications.”

  He raised his brow. “How?”

  “But if I do that, there’s something you must do for me as well.” My experience with tyrants is that they admire a bit of cheek, so I mustered what courage I had. Bonaparte responded to my cockiness, and Sidney Smith, too.

  “You dare bargain with me?” Dessalines glowered like a thunderhead. The whites of his eyes had a faint yellowish cast, and the pale underside of his fingers tapped the hilt of his sword with the rattle of drumsticks. But my bet was that he was acting, too.

  “I’m in pursuit of an ancient secret,” I proclaimed, forcing my voice louder. “It’s possible that your people, and only your people, can help me. If I find it, we can share it, and it’s so fabulous you can build your new nation with it. I’m the key. You’ll be greater than Spartacus, greater than Washington, greater than Bonaparte.”

  “I want to be an emperor.”

  “And I can help make you one.” I could do no such thing, of course, but what happened after we found the treasure of Montezuma was immaterial to me. I needed to find the loot to bargain for Astiza and Harry, and this brilliant megalomaniac was the path to it. “However, this isn’t a secret to share with an entire army, and not something your military officers need know.” I glanced about me at his entourage of killers. “I’ll help with the attack on Cap-François; I have a plan to breach their defense. But before I do so, I need to meet those hungars and mambos, priests and priestesses, who know the most about your gods and legends. I need to learn what they know.” Astiza had taught me the titles, and I missed her desperately. She gets a better reception than I do among strangers, and notices details I miss.

  “Be careful of our voodoo, white man. It has power that even we can’t control.”

  “I don’t need power. Just legends. Then I can help you.”

  “He bargains with nothing,” muttered the tall black, Cristophe. Dessalines glanced at him with respect.

  In any card game, there’s a time to throw all in. “I need to meet with Cecile Fatiman,” I declared.

  “Cecile?” asked Dessalines. “How do you know that name?”

  “She’s a famous priestess, Jubal tells me.”

  “A mambo, yes.”

  “A mambo from the very beginning of the revolt in Boukman Wood.”

  “She’s our wisest, said to be more than one hundred years old.”

  “That’s who I need. She foresaw my coming. And my wife learned that Cecile is led by the voodoo spirit Ezili Danto.” There was a murmur in the crowd at mention of these names. “I need to meet with Mambo Cecile, tap her witchcraft, and solve your problems and mine at the same time.”

  “But what of the French defenses?”

  “After I meet Cecile I’ll be ready to help you surprise them.”

  Chapter 26

  Dessalines said he’d consult with his officers about my request and, encouragingly, ordered Jubal and me to have something to eat. My big companion was even hungrier than me. We were led to an elegantly carved table, chipped and stained since it had been dragged from some mansion into the encampment in the wood. There we were fed pig, goat, yams, and fried plantain, our water purified with liberated rum. I’ve seldom eaten a meal more delicious, but then Franklin said hunger makes the best dish.

  We were served by a striking young black woman whom Jubal called cherie and slapped on the bottom with cheerful familiarity. When I looked questioning, he introduced her.

  “This is Juliet, my newest wife.”

  “Wife!”

  She shoved him. “I no wife to you! You get a priest or a hangar if you want a wife! You get me some money, or a home.”

  “Common-law wife.” He winked. “When we win, we make a home.”

  “And the love you told me about?” I asked.

  “Long time ago.” He threw down a rib bone and picked up another. “This American is famous, girl. He knows about lightning.”

  “Pah.” She looked me up and down. “He wouldn’t last half a day cutting cane.”

  “No white man can.”

  “What is he good for, then?”

  “He’s going to find us all treasure, and then I can buy you that house.”

  “Pah. You just proud to have a white man. He be dead of the fevers by Christmas.” She gave me a spoonful of mashed yam. “Be careful, Jubal. He keep you in trouble.”

  I relaxed on the theory that they wouldn’t waste food on a man they were about to hang. Then I realized they might fatten a man they were about to eat, and glanced about anxiously for a big boiling pot or roasting spit. I didn’t really believe rumors that the rebels were cannibals, but who knew what their relatives had done in Africa? Fanciful books were popular about that continent, because the less authors know about a place the more they can invent. Everything I’d read about blacks had been written by whites, and it was the most lurid and sensational pamphlets that sold smartest in Paris.

  I’d expected the slave army to be a ragged group of bandits and cutthroats, but that wasn’t at all what I found. Many of the men were in captured European uniforms and, at various points in the war, had benefited from European military drill. Many had the gazellelike grace I envied, an easy athleticism, but they also exhibited discipline. They were organized into quite competent regiments, with stern officers and regular practice. They had dozens of pieces of artillery captured or bought, and most had possession of a good musket, bayonet, and cane knife. There was a cavalry bivouac nearby with a thousand good horses, and the total size of the rebel force, Jubal confided, exceeded fifteen thousand. The blacks had been fighting the French longer than Washington fought the British during our Revolutionary War, and perseverance is the secret of success. They had the confidence that comes from many victories, and the cunning that comes from springing clever traps.

  More than just disease was defeating the French.

  As I sipped fermented juices and calculated my own plans, I realized that if I were to get any credit for their victory I’d have to scramble to get ahead of these natural warriors
. They’d win anyway, but I had to convince them that some of it was due to me, so they’d help me fetch the treasure. That is, if it even existed at all.

  Finally full, I leaned back against a tree as the shadows lengthened and brooded, my thoughts turning to Astiza. I knew it had been a mistake to allow my wife to be a spy, but then she hadn’t given me a whole lot of choice in the matter. She was independent as the devil. Yet why had she gone off with Leon Martel? Had he recognized her after all? Could she not resist asking about Harry? Had she struck a devil’s bargain, choosing expedient alliance with Martel and sure reunion with Horus over dubious partnership with me? And what was the Frenchman’s game? Was he tired of taking care of a little boy, or was he upping the ante? How could I make his greed a partner in my own cause? My head ached, my muscles were sore, my skin bitten, and soon I was asleep.

  I was jostled awake near midnight. The camp slept, but some officers and sergeants wound through on various missions, sentries stood, and lanterns shone where Dessalines’s throne was. Perhaps the generals were still awake; Napoleon’s habit of sleeplessness might be universal among the bloodthirsty. It was Antoine who’d shaken me. When Jubal came awake, too, he laid a hand on my comrade. “Not you. The American. Alone.”

  I got up clumsily in the dark, disoriented. “What is it?” I still feared execution as a white man.

  “What you asked for. Be quiet, and follow.” He led me through the rebel camp and sleeping soldiers without a misstep, even though I could hardly see a thing. He murmured words to the men standing guard, and we came out of the woods and hiked into the cane fields. There was starlight enough to follow the dirt lanes, but I noticed the moon was waning. November would soon have dark nights, an optimum time for a surprise attack. Occasionally I’d hear a distant gunshot, that habitual popping from armies close to each other.

  We walked south and east, farther from Cap-François, the ground sloping downward and getting muddier against my bare feet. More trees, and then the humid, rotting, overhanging architecture of a swamp. It was utterly dark, but I could smell stagnant water and guessed we were somewhere near the river again. Mist curled, moss hung like ragged curtains from the limbs, and my guide, who’d not spoken another word, took a lantern down from a tree and lit it. The ground had become treacherous, and this time our circuitous route threaded from island to island, with occasional wades through short stretches of black swamp water. I kept an eye out for caimans and water snakes, and started at the sight of several logs and limbs. Antoine smiled when I did so, his teeth a flash in the night.

  There was the familiar chorus of frogs and night insects, but it began to falter before another sound. Through the darkness came faint drumming in time with my own heart. Thump, thump, thump. It kept pace with the tempo of our walk, an echo to the mystery of life itself. Was this the way to Cecile Fatiman? We walked in the drums’ direction, the sound getting deeper, felt as much as heard. The rhythm was ominous.

  “Where are we going?”

  Animal eyes gleamed from the jungle, watching us slip past.

  On and on, deeper and deeper. The sound of the drums grew. I shivered, despite the warm humid air clamped like a blanket.

  Abruptly, my guide stopped. “Here.” He handed me the horn lantern. “Go on yourself now.”

  “What? Wait!” I glanced to where he gestured. Darkness. Was this a trap?

  I turned to ask Antoine to stay. He’d disappeared.

  Frogs played their noisy chorus. Insects whined in my ears. Overlain on this music was the rumbling of drums. The solitude was daunting.

  Except I wasn’t alone. There was a figure ahead in the mist, I now realized, waiting for me.

  I raised the lantern. This new companion looked slight, poised more than planted, meaning more likely a woman than a man. Cecile? Her figure seemed too young, so maybe just a guide. I stepped off toward this new apparition.

  She waited until I came near and then without a word led me deeper into the swamp, elusive before I could make out her features. The water we threaded past was opaque, still as a well. Roots climbed out of mud like frozen snakes. The dank smell was as heavy as the blood of birth.

  Yes, it was a woman, her grace over uneven ground uncanny and her speed outstripping mine. Her hood topped a loose shift of pale cotton, and while it initially made her shapeless I now saw the swing of shoulder and hip. There was something about the flow of her, natural like mist, water, clouds, the curl of a wave, that convinced me she must not just be beautiful, but beautiful in some ethereal, unworldly, impossibly perfect way. I hurried to catch up to confirm this magic, and yet she seemed to float effortlessly ahead of me, receding like a rainbow. I knew that if she left me, I’d be utterly lost.

  She pulled me like filings to a magnet.

  Now I was sure I was hearing the pounding of drums from deep within the swamp. I was going, I guessed, to some kind of religious or political ceremony, similar perhaps to the one in Boukman Wood that had initiated this revolution. Lightly this woodland sprite led me toward the noise, slowing if I needed to catch up, floating out of reach if I came too near. I was sweating with excitement and apprehension. Who was she?

  What you seek, suddenly echoed in my brain.

  We came to a clearing, a small barren island of damp ground in a swampy wilderness. In the middle was a small hut of thatch and sticks from which a single candle glowed. My guide stopped at the far edge of this isle. She pointed at the dim hut. Clearly I was to enter. Would she follow? But no, she dissolved into shadow, and I felt intense disappointment. I was left to enter on my own.

  Hesitantly I stepped forward, set aside my lantern, and stooped, poking my head into the hut as nervously as if putting it under the guillotine blade.

  The structure was as primitive as my mental picture of Africa, its dome a weave of fronds and rushes. The floor was dirt. The candle burned on a small altar just one foot high, covered with a red-checkered cloth so I couldn’t see whether it was made of wood or rock. A goblet in the middle of this tabernacle held what appeared to be clear water, and four smooth river stones held down the cloth at the corners. On one side of the goblet was a human skull, and on the other a scattering of flowers. There was also a little heap of seashells.

  Well, it was exotic, but there was actually nothing more ominous about this collection than the display in a Masonic Lodge. Certainly I didn’t feel the kind of religious menace I’d experienced with the Egyptian Rite.

  “The symbol for Ezili Danto is the red-checkered heart.”

  I looked into the hut’s shadows. Against the opposite wall floated the illuminated face of an aged crone, her skin leather-colored in the candlelight. Her age was not evident in the creasing of her face—in fact, her countenance seemed remarkably smooth, if mottled—but her long years were betrayed in the wispiness of her gray hair and eyes sunk like stones in dough, their depths holding wisdom that comes only from time and hard experience. Her parted lips showed the tip of her tongue, as if testing the air for scent like a serpent. This, I guessed, was Cecile Fatiman, the famed mambo of revolution.

  “I’m something of a student of religious symbolism. My wife more so. And the flowers?”

  “Ezili’s. She is flower herself.”

  “The water?”

  “Purity of life. The stones anchor the four directions.” Cecile’s voice signified approval; she liked my curiosity.

  “And the shells?”

  “Cast to divine the future. To see your coming, Ethan Gage.”

  I crouched in the entrance, not certain what I was supposed to do.

  “You didn’t bring your sorceress wife with you,” she continued in her husky French. It was half reprimand and half question. “The shells talked of her as well.”

  “She was taken from me by an evil Frenchman.”

  “And now you come to us, the white who needs the blacks.”

  “Yes. I’m seeking information to win back my son as well. The same information can help you.”

  “You
mean my people.”

  “The revolutionaries of Haiti. You are Cecile, yes?”

  “But of course. Sit.” She gestured to a spot near the entry. The hut was no bigger than a small tent. I crowded in and crossed my legs. Sitting, my head almost brushed the rush dome. The candle was red as blood, the wax melting down the edges of the altar like rivulets of lava.

  “Can you help me?” I asked.

  “Perhaps the loa can help you. You know what loa are?”

  “Gods, or spirits.”

  “They speak to believers.”

  “Then I will try to believe. I’m not as good at it as my wife.”

  “The loa speak through the power that animates all true religions. Do you know what that power is, seeker?”

  “Faith?”

  “Love.”

  The hardest thing to earn, and give. I was silent.

  “Only love has the power to ward off evil. Without it, we are damned. Now. Drink this.” She handed me a wooden bowl filled with cool liquid that smelled rancid. “It will help you listen and see.”

  “What is it?”

  “Wisdom, white man. Drink.”

  I sipped, confirming its bitterness. I hesitated.

  “Do you think wisdom should be sweet?” she asked.

  What you seek. I shrugged and downed it all, almost gagging. What choice did I have? There was no point in poisoning me; they could kill me in a thousand simpler ways. They might drug me, but for what? So I swallowed, gasping, its taste of bitter vines, cobwebs, and grave liners.

  I grimaced and handed the bowl back.

  She laughed softly. Half her teeth were gone.

  “Are you really more than a hundred years old?” I asked, fighting back bile.

  “A slave has no name of her own, a slave has no birth of her own. A slave just is. So I count my age from what I remember the French say went on in the world as I grew. Yes, I see more and remember more than anyone. I go back a century, maybe more.” She laughed softly again.

  My stomach lurched, and settled. I began to feel drunk, but in a very odd way. My body tingled, not unpleasantly but unnaturally, and the candlelight oscillated. Yes, drugs. I would see loa, all right. Was that the intention?