A Calculus of Angels Read online

  He blinked—had he been asleep on his feet? They were mounting the steps of a large building. Teach’s fist made explosions on the heavy wooden door.

  The portal swung open, and heat flooded out like a summer wind, so delicious to his exposed skin that he nearly moaned in ecstasy. Privation strengthened one, to a certain point—but beyond that, it only weakened you. He was very weak right now, and pleasure was far more unnerving than pain.

  He entered with Teach and his party, and terrible silence came in with them.

  “Merciful God,” someone muttered. “It’s Blackbeard.”

  A number of men sitting at a large table came slowly to their feet. To Red Shoes, they were diverse only in the way they dressed. Three were clad in austere black with only a bit of white lace at their throats to brighten them. Others wore brighter clothing—notably the four red-coated soldiers who cast dithering glances at muskets leaning against the wall. Five more at the table were arrayed quite splendidly, at least by European standards, complete with the strange mounds of false hair that so many of them affected. It was one of these—a corpulent fellow with ruddy cheeks—who stabbed a finger toward Teach.

  “What gall you manifest by presenting yourself in this place, pirate. I will have your head posted in the harbor.”

  Teach grinned broadly and placed his hands on his hips. “That is no fashion in which to address a fellow governor, Mister Felton,” he proclaimed, his voice booming in the hall.

  The other man—Governor Felton, Red Shoes presumed—reddened further. “You are beyond all insolence, Edward Teach. Do you think there is one man in this room—or alive on the face of this Earth—who believes that because you have moved your campaign of terror from the high seas to the statehouse of Carolina you have any legal status except that of a loathsome and hunted criminal? Do not mock us. If you have come here with sword and pistol to bend us to your will, then have done with it or stand to do your worst. If not, get thee hence. This council is of the gravest possible nature and touches upon the fate of us all. We cannot countenance theatrics.”

  “Then perhaps you should cease performing them,” Teach grunted. Red Shoes thought he detected a hint of strain in the pirate’s voice, as if the effort to remain amiable were paining his throat. “Who have you invited to this council? The other governors, I see, every man jack of them as helpless as a kitten. Can they provide you with what you need? You know that they cannot. I see a small coven of ministers—the good Cotton Mather, I presume, and his progeny? But I am sure that they have brayed—ah, pardon, me—prayed long and loud for what I have come to give you. Now, I admit that the Crown has not yet given me a paper allowing that I govern my colony—”

  “Never shall it!” sputtered the scarlet-faced Felton.

  Teach paused. When he spoke again his voice carried a palpable danger. “That may be, and when any of you gentlemen think to deprive me of what I have won and the order I have brought from chaos in the South, then I welcome your efforts. But until such time as His Majesty across the ocean sees fit to back the paper currency of your opinions with a more solid standard, I will keep my place and claim my due. Is there any of you who has ought than bones in his head and understands I have come to do you a favor?”

  “And what might that favor be?” The dark-clad man Teach had addressed as “Cotton Mather” asked quietly. His pendulous face and bulging eyes should have made him seem ridiculous, and yet Red Shoes sensed authority in him, strength. And perhaps—something more, something that teased at the edge of his vision in a familiar way. When he blinked, however, the something vanished.

  He was tired.

  “I know well the purpose of this council,” Teach explained to the preacher. “For two years, no word has come from England, no ship, no aetherschreiber communication. Likewise none from Holland, from Spain, from France. Nor have any ships you sent come back. Nor do you have spare ships left to send, not when you must watch for the prowling French corsairs north—’Tis true?”

  The roomful of men had no answer. They gazed sullenly back at Edward Teach. He surveyed them all with satisfaction. “Nor can you build more than a handful, not with this witchy cold and the Indians gone wild amongst the trees you might use for masts.”

  “We have ships!” another of the splendidly dressed men claimed, at last returning his lips to the pipe that had smoldered unsmoked since the pirates had made their entrance.

  “Oh, indeed, one small sloop and a frigate that has seen far better days. But ’tis all apparent now that whatever has befallen Albion is an eater of ships and men, an unknown thing, and ’twill require men-o’-war to go and return, to discover the truth of our long isolation.”

  “And why should you care about that, Blackbeard?” Felton asked, picking an imaginary hair from his velvet coat. “As you say, you have benefited by our isolated state. Why would you want our enterprise to succeed?”

  Teach trembled perceptibly as he answered, the muscles of his great shoulders bunching beneath his coat. “I will say this once, Lord Governor, and I will ne’er repeat myself save to write it in your blood. Whatever else Edward Teach might be, he is an Englishman. There is evil blood between myself and his German majesty, King George, and there was wrong done me which I have returned fivefold. But I love my country, and I fear what may have befallen her.”

  “Beside all that,” Mather quietly added, “if you were to aid us in restoring our link with the sovereign, what benefits might not befall you? A pardon, perhaps?”

  Teach shrugged. “I can’t say that would displease me, but it is nevertheless a risk to my neck, is it not? And if I risk that, then you gentlemen should be willing to risk my aid. I offer you not one ship, but four ships o’ the line with forty cannon on each, the men to crew them, and my personal service as admiral.”

  “A pirate in command of His Majesty’s ships? Preposterous!” Felton exclaimed. But his eyes were those of a small dog backing away from a larger one.

  “Well, good sirs,” remarked a fellow in a blue coat, “the choice now comes to a devil or a Frenchman. Which more frightens you?”

  All eyes turned toward the speaker. He had a strong face, careworn about the eyes, and a round chin that stuck out a bit. He was perhaps in his fortieth summer. By his silver gorget and plumed hat, Red Shoes took him to be the selfsame Frenchman he spoke of.

  “Monsieur Bienville,” Felton said in a heavily taxed tone, “surely you can understand our position. The last we heard from England or Europe, our countries were at war, and now the raids on our coast from your brethren in the north occur almost daily.”

  Red Shoes shook his head to clear it. Bienville? He looked more closely, and the recognition came. He had seen this man perhaps five times as a boy, come to the village of Chickasaway to parley with his uncle and the other leaders. He and his companions had been the first of the white people Red Shoes had ever seen.

  The Frenchman cleared his throat. “I name you governor, Sir Felton, because your king has made you one. Will you do me the same courtesy, please?”

  Felton blushed and nodded briskly. “My apologies, Governor Bienville.”

  “Thank you, sir. As to the matter you justly raise, I cannot speak for the men of New France and Acadia, Governor, save to say that if winters are hard here, they are most assuredly harder in those latitudes; and men made desperate by cold and hunger will do awful things. I have had little communication with them, and I believe that the government has fallen into the hands of ruffians—something the English colonies surely understand.” At this last he boldly rested his gaze upon Blackbeard, who shrugged.

  “And yet, as governor of Louisiana, have I not ceased all aggressions in Florida and the West, and concluded an armistice? Gentlemen, we all of us must discover what has become of the world. Are we truly alone? If so, we must know of it. We must prepare ourselves, and we must ally. For I tell you that without our mother countries, we are all of us at the mercy of a thousand evils. None of us can imagine what happened across that gre
at ocean sea. Some say they saw lights in the heavens, a red glow like sunset. Your eastern harbors were flooded, and many ships at sea were never seen again. Even our miraculous aetherschreibers have been of no use. And yet we have some rumors—of fire falling from the heavens, of forty days of darkness. I know for a fact that Paris was in flames almost two years ago. Have the devils been let loose on Earth? What man knows the truth? If there is one, let him speak it. Here is the truth that I know: Each of us alone has sent ships, and each of us alone has failed. My harbors were untouched by flooding, but I had fewer ships to begin with. The great naval actions of the Flanders War were elsewhere, as you all know, and thus were the ships of France and Spain. Now I offer you what I have left, asking only that I act as co-commander of the expedition. I give you my word as a gentleman that our armistice will hold, no matter what the case, until our ships are safe back here. Even the Sun King himself could not cause me to break this vow. I will fight against my own French brothers, if need be. My word of honor, sirs, something this pirate cannot give you.”

  An uncomfortable silence followed the Frenchman’s words, and then one of the men with Teach stepped forward. Like the soldiers, he wore a red British coat. He was perhaps forty, his faced tanned and hard.

  “It is understandable that you do not accept the word of Edward Teach, but perhaps you will accept mine.”

  “And who, sir, are you?” the governor inquired.

  “I am Captain Thomas Nairne. I believe Mr. Teach is sincere, and I will stay at his left hand to insure the interests of the Crown.”

  “That is surely not sufficient, sir,” Felton complained. “Any man can don a red coat and call himself a captain, and any captain can turn pirate, for that matter.”

  “Nevertheless,” Nairne persisted, “I urge you to consider my opinion. Like you, I do not consider the position Mr. Teach has taken in South Carolina to be a lawful one, but someone had to establish order there. He is not an unpopular ruler, though you may not credit it.”

  “I will not strike a devil’s bargain,” Felton insisted.

  Bienville shrugged. “Then perhaps Mr. Teach and I can come to an agreement on our own.”

  “Is that a threat?” Felton snapped.

  “It is not. It is an option. I would see the shores of France again, sir, and know what has become of my king.”

  “Right well said, sir,” Teach added. “What use have we of these popinjay do-nothings when we have the ships?”

  Mather crooked a finger at Teach. “He needs us,” the black-clad minister asserted, his voice as confident as an iron tower. “Or he would not have come. He wants the sanction of the Crown insofar as you governors can give it.”

  “Out of the question,” Felton said, but a man in a cinnamon coat plucked at his sleeve.

  “Not so quickly, sir,” he said softly. “There is much here to consider.” His rather lean face was puckered into a frown beneath a curling white wig. “Who is this Indian? Is he with you, Mr. Teach?”

  “No, indeed. He represents the Choctaw.”

  “Is this true?” the man asked. “We did invite representatives from your people, but we have had ill luck with Indians of late.”

  Red Shoes cleared his throat. “I am Red Shoes of the Six-towns people of the Choctaw nation. I have a paper summoning me to this meeting.”

  “I wrote that paper,” Cotton Mather said. “I invited your chief.”

  “I am his nephew. My uncle and the rest of our party were slain by the Shawano while traveling here.”

  “Yet you came on alone.”

  “I did.”

  “You speak well for an Indian.”

  “I have been taught English. I have learned to read and write and do figures. I know something of history.”

  “And what do you offer us? More ships?”

  “No, of course not. I only offer myself, and later my words to my people.”

  “Why should we value those?”

  “My people are split in the matter of the white people. Many think it is time for us to be rid of you.”

  Though his words were quiet, they had the effect of a thunderbolt. Good.

  “Of all the insolent …” Felton began.

  “Are you such a one, boy?” Mather asked.

  “No. The British and the French have many things we desire, and we have many friends among them. I see no virtue in a war that might end as badly for my people as for yours. You invited my uncle, the chief, to this meeting. That was good, because it shows us that you care—or worry—about what we think. It also admits your desperation. Some of you know the trouble that waits among the Choctaw and our allies. You would have us at least remain quiet until you learn what has caused these strange changes in the world. We would know that, too. My word: Until I am dead or return, my people will not wage an unprovoked war.”

  “How do your people know that you are alive?”

  Red Shoes smiled. “Through a certain science, they know. When I die, they will know that, too.”

  “And if you should die?”

  “That will depend on many things, and I cannot speak of a situation that might exist when I am dead. I am the eyes and ears of my people. They know what I know.”

  “Fantasy!” Felton asserted. But he believed. They all did. This time the pause stretched long, and there was some whispering at the table before the governor looked up, bleak-eyed. “We will discuss this matter,” he said weakly. “Rooms have been arranged for you gentlemen at a nearby inn.”

  “Don’t think too long,” Teach growled, and then, as if to offset the threat, he bowed clumsily.

  Back on the street, the man named Thomas Nairne approached him. “Chim achukma” he said.

  “Achukma” Red Shoes answered. Continuing in Choctaw, “You speak my language.”

  “Indeed. What do you think of what you heard today?”

  “I think they will accept Governor Bienville’s offer, and the Blackbeard’s, too. I think we will all sail across the Pale Water.”

  Nairne switched back to English. “A fair assessment, I think. How is it that you speak English so well? I have always known the Choctaw to be solidly in the French camp.”

  “We are in the Choctaw camp. Years ago, my uncle saw we should send someone to learn English ways. I was sent to Charles Town for five years.”

  Nairne nodded. “I’m sorry to hear the rest died. I knew your uncle, I believe—I was an agent among your people some years ago—and I mourn his passing.”

  “He died well.” Red Shoes felt a constriction in his throat and swallowed.

  “Tell me,” Nairne asked lightly, perhaps to keep the names of the dead from being spoken, “do you really want to sail across the sea?”

  Red Shoes nodded wearily but grinned. “As I said, I know something of history. I know of Columbus, and how he discovered this New World. It amuses me to think of discovering the old one.”

  Nairne chuckled, and they went to the inn together.

  Part One

  EVENING WOLVES

  The Evening Wolves will be much abroad, when we are near the Evening of the World.

  —Cotton Mather,

  Wonders of the Invisible World, 1693

  1.

  Der Lehrling

  Distracted as he was, the sudden pounding at the door captured all of Benjamin Franklin’s attention. Sticking his head above the bedsheets, he stared for an instant at the source of the noise, completely at a loss.

  “Katarina!” A man’s voice shouted, profundo, followed by ever more violent thuds.

  The appropriate reaction occurred to Ben, and he swiftly disentangled himself from milky limbs with as much enthusiasm as he had earlier entangled in them.

  “It’s my father!” Katarina whispered.

  “Oh, only your father,” Ben hissed back, reaching frantically for his breeches. “Ask him to come back later, then, will you?” He tumbled out of the bed and began struggling into the breeches, wondering where the rest of his clothing and his haversack
had gone to.

  “Katarina!” her father roared again. “Open the door. I know you have a man in there!”

  “I don’t think he will listen to me,” Katarina replied.

  Diving for his shirt, Ben yet allowed himself an admiring glance at tousled honey hair, half obscuring a softly rounded face still rosy from exertion. “Well, should I introduce myself?” Ben asked, yanking his shirt over his head and starting toward where his waistcoat lay crumpled in the corner. He made a mental note to learn to undress more neatly, even when passion ruled.

  “I wouldn’t. He has a pistol.”

  “A pistol?”

  “Well, he has a commission in the army.”

  “What? You didn’t think this worth mentioning?”

  “I wasn’t thinking much about my father just now. Besides, I thought he would be gone all day.”

  “Quite understandable. This window opens?”

  “Yes.” She sat up in the bed, allowing the sheets to drop away from her upper body, and despite himself, Ben grinned. The floor-length mirror behind Katarina grinned back at him from a face still rounded by the last traces of boyhood and haloed by thoroughly mussed chestnut locks. “Sorry to leave in such a rush,” he apologized, pleased at how smooth his German had become.

  “Don’t forget you promised to show me the palace.”

  “I shan’t, never fear. Expect my letter.”

  He bent to kiss her and heard a key suddenly grating in the lock.

  The kiss turned into a quick nip on the lips. “Remember me,” he said, grabbing his haversack and rushing to the window, flinging it recklessly open.

  “Don’t think ill of me!” she called from behind him. “I don’t do this all the time. But I know more than I showed you.…”

  Ben was no longer listening, concentrating as he was on gripping the windowsill, looking down at his feet superimposed over cobblestones two stories below. He did not hesitate, for at seventeen his body was long and strong, near six feet, and he was confident of his athletic ability—at least, more confident than he was of his capacity to withstand a pistol shot.