image [https://i.imgur.com/15eGPa6.jpg]

image [https://i.imgur.com/DqimdvY.jpg]

Jack Ketch – The hangman. To “dance with Jack Ketch” means to hang.

image [https://i.imgur.com/fCAKQh0.jpeg]

WOODES ROGERS STOOD on a parapet facing south, into the harbour. He faced the Long Night with a Bourgogne wine in his left hand, and in his right hand he held a writ from the Governor of Port Royal, upon direct orders of King George himself, To Bring upon the city of Port Royal both Order and Obedience to the Crown, and to make Pyrates, and all Pyratical Activities, and all Those associating with Pyratical Activities, immediately and exclusively Forbidden upon both Shores and Seas. Any Person disobeying this Order shall be Hanged by the neck until Dead.

Yes, that’s sort of the point, he thought chuckling to himself.

A cold easterly wind followed him as he strode along the wall of Fort Carlisle, past the cannons that were currently unmanned but nevertheless pointed outwards, as though anticipating the next attack. Rogers enjoyed these short walks in the morning, when most people were asleep and the world seemed like it belonged exclusively to him. It was always quiet this early. Never more quiet than now. To bring upon the city of Port Royal both order and obedience, he thought. Woodes rather felt the obedience part was aimed at him, as well as the pirates that had infected these streets.

That thought followed him until he came to the window into his own quarters. He sipped his wine and gazed out at sea. Gloomy skies of remitting gray were backlit by small punctuations of lightning. A book called The Byzantine Histories & Essays by Procopius sat on a wrought-iron table, and he thumbed through the passages he’d bookmarked. Rogers had been an assiduous reader of late, especially on matters of history.

Books on history were few and far between on Port Royal, as there were no schools or colleges—each family saw to their own children’s education—but fortunately he’d brought quite a collection over himself, as had the priest Olaf, who had a few tomes on naturalism. There were a few books that had been confiscated for having been contaminated by some wood-eating beetles, and together he and Olaf had gathered historical texts that may very well account for the Long Night. The account by Byzantine historian Procopius told of the year 536 A.D., when “the sun gave forth its light without brightness, like the moon, this whole year.”

Procopius’s words bore even more ill omen further down: “During this year, men were free neither from war nor pestilence nor any other thing leading to death.”

Thunder rolled across the harbour, drowning out the snoring of the whore in his bed somewhere behind him. He went inside and kicked her out, and she stumbled out into the hall, still half drunk, gathering her puddle of clothes on the way. He laughed watching her ass jiggle as she scurried down the hall, and the guards gave her little pinches as she went.

“Have at her, boys,” he said. And the guards thanked him and went chasing after her.

He listened to her screams down the hall as he got himself ready in front of the mirror. His servant James had his clothes all laid out, and after he dressed himself that same servant returned to take a brush to his jacket and vest. “Perhaps a shave today, sir?”

“No, thank you, James,” said Rogers, running his hands over his two-day scruff. “I’m starting to think it rather makes me look rugged, like one of the locals, don’t you?”

“As you say, sir.”

“Start us a fire, would you? These Long Nights are cold.”

“Yes, sir.” James was already about his work when a strong gust came through the window and he had to shutter it.

Rogers looked at the dresser where he had laid the governor’s writ. Beside it was the letter from home. Jessica had written him that their daughter Elana had died of plague. The letter itself seemed damp, perhaps stained by her tears as she wrote it. Rogers took the letter over to the fireplace and tossed it into the flames—those matters all felt a Universe away, so much like the ash they became. “What order of business today, James, besides the usual?”

“You have a meeting with the Clement brothers, if you’ll recall, sir.”

“Oh, yes. What is it they wanted?” He snapped his fingers remembering. “The slave contract, that’s right. And what was it they brought up in regards?”

“The Asiento de Negros, sir.”

“Of course!” he laughed, fluffing out his cuffs and checking his cufflinks. “They want to model us after the damn Spaniards. Well, Trenton is the cleverer of the two brothers, a cunning brute but savvy when it comes to his trade.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I wonder how these slavers will operate in these Long Nights, under strange moons and even stranger tides. Will they adapt as we have? I believe will have shown the world by now that Port Royal is a prime example of keeping your heads when the world appears to be falling apart. Isn’t this a famous thing now?” he laughed, glancing himself in the mirror again and checking his collar. “Isn’t this a famous thing, all the world falling apart and it should be Port Royal of all cities that has kept its sanity!”

“Yes, sir,” said James, brushing out the captain’s coat.

“I hear the Colonies nearly burned to the ground, so many people setting fires to try and bring back the sun! Damned fools.”

“I heard the same, sir.”

“I’m sure you heard more. Well, don’t keep me in suspense, James, my dear man, tell me what gossip from the city? What are they saying down in the Fish Market?”

“There is much talk about the crops failing, sir. People are worried about food stores that may not last them till spring, and that when spring comes the crops may not have enough sunlight to grow.”

“Well they have every reason to fear that.”

“Yes, sir. The fishermen are having a good time of it. With crops failing people are relying on fish to keep food on their tables.”

“But how long can that last?” Rogers said. “There are seasons for certain fish, too. And learned men say that the sun also has influence on sea life. So what happens to them when the sun doesn’t return? Have any of them thought of that?”

“These are dangerous times, sir.”

Rogers glanced out the window at the stubbornly dark sky. “This damned firmament business,” he said, as if to encompass all his concerns. He sighed. “What else from those gossiping hens in the Fist Market?”

“That you and the Devil’s Son were dash cunning to have staved off the attacks by the Spaniards, sir.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And do they credit Captain Vhingfrith with the victory or myself?” he asked cautiously. “Be honest, James, I wish to know the truth, none of that fluffery of yours to spare my feelings.”

James was behind Captain Rogers, brushing his coat, but Rogers caught James’s wince in the mirror. “They credit you both equally, sir.”

“Come now, surely one name was mentioned more than most.”

“They—there was talk from the Lively’s crew. They are most proud to have served Captain Vhingfrith when he scouted out the two galleons in total darkness. That is a great tale, you have to admit, sir.”

Yes, Rogers thought begrudgingly. That is a great tale, indeed.

Benjamin Vhingfrith’s glimmering cat’s-eye was now widely famous, as was its ability to see through the Long Night. While Rogers and Vhingfrith had sailed out together during a glorious sunrise, and had chased the two Spanish naos around and around Jamaica for two sunny weeks, another Long Night had suddenly befallen them, and only a small, distant, pink-and-white moon had lit that darkness. The Lively and the Duke had circled the island for days after, still hunting the two Spanish ships but unable to light any lanterns or candles out of fear that the Spaniards would spot them. And the Spaniards couldn’t light a flame, either, or they risked being seen. So they hunted one another in darkness, both blind as a bat.

But that’s where the cat’s-eye had come into play. One night while sailing close to one another, Vhingfrith had hailed the Duke by shouting over to them, and the Duke and the Lively had come close enough to kiss. When Vhingfrith came aboard, he pulled Rogers down into his ward-room, along with all their senior officers, and there he told them, “I can see them.”

“Who?” Rogers had asked.

“Who do you think, Captain Rogers?” the Devil’s Son said smirking. He winked his cat’s-eye. “Both naos. They don’t see us, of course, but they are at broad-reach of us and if we act now, we may intercept them within the hour.” He gestured out the window at dark clouds piling in the east. “That alien moon is small and provides no real light, and even now it’s ensconced behind cloud. If we sail that direction, they will not see our two silhouettes against the horizon.”

“You can actually see them?” Rogers whispered, as if he unconsciously believed the Spaniards could somehow hear hiim. “From this distance, you can see them, Benjamin?”

“As clearly as I see you now, Woodes.”

There were smiles all around the room, even from Rogers’s own people. They were smiling eagerly and if he did not want to lose face in front of them then he had to pretend that this did not bother him. But it did. It ought not, but somehow it did irk him that Benjamin was able to provide this tactical advantage when he himself had not been able to so much as find a hint of the two enemy galleons. “All right, Captain. Assuming we can sail away from them unseen, where to next?”

Benjamin had pointed to the charts on Rogers’s desk. “This is us here, coming round the South Lance. That’s Coolidge Bay, which I’m sure you all know well. Pirates usually huddled there when it was too dangerous for them to moor at Port Royal, but ever since the Cataclysm they have steered clear of it.”

Rogers nodded, seeing where this was going. “The winds are changing—my man on the watch noticed it, and my man in the maintop, as well. You figure hide in the bay, and wait for them to come round again? Then we reel in all sails?”

Vhingfrith nodded. “We wait for them to pass again, and hope this Long Night holds. I know, I know, strange for a man to pray that the Long Night persists, but just now it is an advantage.”

“Only because we have you at our side, Devil’s Son,” one of the men laughed. Others agreed with grunts and chuckles.

Rogers misliked that, but he let it go. “That’s it, then. We hide in Coolidge Bay and wait for the naos to pass. Upon Captain Vhingfrith’s signal we let all sails fly and come up behind them and chase them around the Hook and blast their rudders to flinders.”

“Aye!” the men all agreed heartily.

A cold breeze blew one of the shutters open and the flames in the fireplace danced. While James went over to lock the shutter down, Rogers thought about that night attack, and how very close they had come to smashing both naos. One of them apparently had a captain and crew clever enough to pull evasive maneuvers that allowed them to escape with minimal damage, but the ship had been forced to retreat far out to sea, and was separated from its partner. The Lively and the Duke had isolated and chased the other one down, hammering it for almost an hour, nearly cornering it, until at last a favourable wind granted them escape at the last moment. Both ships were bigger and had more sails, and so flew faster than their pursuers. But the attack was successful, it had caused the two ships to become lost in the Long Night and now they would never find one another again unless they used light signals, which would only attract the Lively and the Duke again.

They pulled this same trick just a week later against one of the naos, and again Vhingfrith’s cat’s-eye led them right up to her arse and blasted it. The ship again let all sails fly and outran them both. A few more times they harassed both ships before they could get anywhere near Jamaica, which Rogers had to admit made him smile when he thought how frustrated the Spanish captains must’ve been.

They must have wondered how in the bloody hell we were seeing them. But it was Vhingfrith’s phenomenal eye that had been the key, the only method to track the enemy in total darkness and keep them from reaching Jamaica’s shores.

“What are they saying about how we routed the Spaniards?” he asked presently.

“They say your tactics were right, sir,” said James, returning with his brush to attend the captain’s coat. “Everyone knows the story; the Admiralty has made sure to spread it everywhere. They say you have a keen tactical mind, and would have to possess great cunning in order to pull off that ambush around the Hook.”

“Uh-huh. And what of the Devil’s Son and his crew?”

James hesitated.

“James?”

“They just say that Captain Vhingfrith proved himself aright, is all, sir. The lads in The Golden Goose may have sung a song or two.”

“A song? About Vhingfrith?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Sing me a verse.”

James swallowed. “I—wasn’t there to hear the songs, sir.”

“What were their names?”

“The men singing?”

“No, James, the name of the songs.”

“Oh. Well, one was called, erm…I forget, but it did have one verse I heard someone say…they called Vhingfrith and his crew the Pirates o’ the Long Night.”

“Pirates?” Rogers laughed, spinning to face his servant. “Captain Vhingfrith and his crew are not pirates. For God’s sakes, they have letters of marque. They’re privateers, not pirates, any fool ought to know the difference.” He laughed again.

“Yes, sir. I think it was only because the name sounded clever. You know how people are.”

“I do,” Rogers said, turning to glance at himself once more in the mirror. “I do, indeed.”

He dismissed James, and before Rogers went to his meeting he looked out at the gray clouds, lit so strangely without sunlight. He walked over to his bookshelf and removed the other book he and the priest Olaf had discovered in the cache of books.

Around the same time Procopius wrote his account about the eighteen-month darkness, a Roman politician named Cassiodorus had a slave write down this account: “This year has been uncommonly dark. We marvel to see no shadows of our bodies at noon. The sun sometimes appears blue, not like our sun at all, and the moon has lost all its luster and sometimes does not even appear to be there. And now seasons seem to be all jumbled up together.”

Rogers read that account again, forefinger touching his lips. This has happened before. Historical accounts revealed mysterious instances of these occurrences, each one a little bit different. He closed the book and put it back, even more convinced he had to mobilize the island’s resources. Fast.

With that in mind he spun and walked briskly out the door.

____

There was a solemn yet occasionally jubilant mood around Port Royal these days. The people all seemed to have gotten used to the Long Night coming and going, and even the absence of the proper Moon and how the strangeness of the heavens sometimes made birds fall out of the sky. Poor things must be quite confused. Rogers had noticed people getting back to work, though, even as some of the grass and even crops continued to wither and die out across the island. They relied more on the sea than ever, fishing boats becoming more popular than they would have had any right to be, bringing food into the island, where cattle and vegetables were insufficient.

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There were plenty of food stores, lots of salted pork to last a season, and people throughout Port Royal had at least been wise enough in past years to pickle fruits and vegetables and keep them for a rainy day. Well, if this isn’t a rainy day, I shouldn’t like to see it, Rogers thought as he rounded Queen Street and headed towards Lime Street.

The streets were lit at all hours of a Long Night—the lamplighters were on a constant work schedule now. People often walked with torches or candles. Sometimes there was enough light shining through the clouds (from an unknown source) that the world around them looked grey instead of dark. As now, the gray skies made it only look as if there were storm clouds—it was only when those clouds parted that one saw the stars and the distant pinpoint of the alien moon. So the clouds themselves were providing an unnatural light.

A stubborn, overburdened mule was standing in the street, holding up wagons of fish brought up from the docks. The Sunday bells were ringing from the Old Church, and people were rushing along the mud-caked sidewalks to get there. People were surviving and adapting to this strange new order, even Rogers himself was not so afraid as he had been during that first incursion of the Beasts. It seems humanity can make up its mind to survive just about everything. He’d once heard a geologist say that thousands of years ago there had been an enormous volcano in Indonesia, and that some learned men believed its last eruption could have well buried much of the Earth in soot and ash, and that the skies and sun could have been blotted out by smoke for years, which would have brought on famine, which would have meant people dying by the millions the world over, which, he postulated, would also mean mass cannibalism. “At least until the trouble passed,” the geologist had said.

It had only been a theory but Rogers wondered if he and everyone else might be about to witness a terrible event of equal or greater magnitude. No, he decided. Men are much cleverer now, much more sophisticated than the Egyptians or the Romans or anyone else who would’ve been around back then. We are more ingenious, he thought as he passed beneath a small viaduct. We are prepared to survive better than our savage ancestors. There won’t be cannibalism.

He passed a gathering of people waiting to see three men do a dance with Jack Ketch. The pirates all stood up on the platform with hands tied behind their backs. They were each allowed to say their last words. Rogers only heard one young fellow, maybe eighteen years old, say, “—and someone please send a letter to my mum and da, tell ’em I died bravely. Please make somethin’ up, tell ’em I fought for England—”

If you wanted them to think you fought for England why did you not join the bloody navy and fight for England? Rogers chuckled to himself.

He arrived at the coffee-house just as a bit of rain began to fall. He stepped into the protection of the outdoor gazebo and nodded to the Clement brothers, Trenton and Thorton. Trenton, the eldest, was a huge barrel-chested man who dressed in a black dress suit, his pant legs muddied from all the walking must do in Royal. Thorton, the quiet, younger brother with the palsied hand only smiled at Rogers’s approach.

“Gentlemen,” Rogers said, shaking hands with Trenton. “How are we this morning?”

“Is it?” Trenton said. “Morning, I mean?”

Rogers laughed as he pulled out a chair to have a sit. “The heavens may not be in order, my friends, but gentlemen such as ourselves ought to be.” He took his timepiece from his breast pocket and checked it. “My timepiece says it’s almost eleven o’clock so by God that’s what I’ll believe till Lucky George tells me otherwise.”

They all laughed and ordered coffees. After commenting on the phenomenon (which it seemed everyone must do now, comment on the firmament business, or the Cataclysm or whatever, before getting on with business), Rogers and Trenton lit pipes and eased back into negotiation postures. “So,” Woodes said, “am I to understand you two have come to your senses or am I to go back to the governor and console him when he finds out the Clement brothers are going back on their word?”

Thorton looked worried, a nearby flickering lamp cast his long, awkward face into half shadow.

Trenton smiled broadly. “You present us only two options that attempt to corner us already, Captain! And here I thought we were friends, and the night—er, morning—has just started.”

“What is your position, sir? Out with it.” That was always the start of any good negotiation, his father had told him ages ago. Ask this simple question, “What is your position, sir?” And let them talk. Let them make the first mistake. The advice had never failed him, Rogers was a master at negotiating and getting what he wanted out of any deal.

“You know our position, Captain Rogers, it hasn’t changed. We’re slave traders, we deal in men. And we want the same opportunity the New World promises everyone else, only we want it here, in the Caribbean. And why not? This far away from England the usual rules do not apply. These are different times, exigent circumstances, which, while putting great strain on the people of these islands, also opens opportunity up for me like my brother and I. We only want to seize on the opportunity first. And we know that you want the same.”

“I tell you what I want, Trenton. I want to put an end to all this bickering about slaves and preferential sales to nobles in the Caribbean. The Admiralty Office is most upset. If the people of Jamaica and Havana require slaves, especially at this hour, they should have them.”

“I’ve not made any decree that says my people will only sale to nobles—”

“No,” said Rogers, taking a draft from his pipe, “but what you have done is made the cost of a single slave so prohibitively expensive that only nobles can afford them.”

“Price goes up when supply goes down, Captain. You of all people should know this, you’re an investor in the trade, same as the rest of us. You know what’s happened to the slave trade since the firmament fucked everything up.”

Rogers sighed heavily and smoke billowed out of him like dragon’s breath. “But if you bring the cost so high that no one can afford them, then what will the small plantation owners do? There is much work to be done just now, and when the sun does come back out there is going to be a mad rush to plough and sow. And, if God is good and the Long Night stays away long enough this time and the crops do come in, we will need men who can quickly pick the cotton in those fields. That means slaves aplenty. Slaves enough for everyone.” He gestured north, vaguely indicating all the plantations of Jamaica. “Do we understand each other?”

“It depends. Have you reviewed my previous letters? I need not remind you that my brother and I require an answer.”

Rogers snorted. “You refer to your arguments that we ought to acquiesce to some monopoly contract, such as the Asiento de Negros, in order to, eh, how did you put—I want to do the words justice, you are so eloquent—to ‘take a better example from the Spanish and how they aver strongly and correctly to mitigate loss of profits and loss of supply in the African slave trade by opening up contracts to smaller investors.’ A verbose way of saying you want to repeat what the East India Company was done.”

Trenton Clement smiled. “And why not, sir?”

“You forget something.”

“What’s that?”

“That we already have an East India Company and they work just fine. And the Royal African Company is owned by the Crown itself, and that Company oversees all taxation on the slave trade, so I doubt very much they are looking for more competition at this. And besides, their auditors are savage, they make sure every silver coin gets divvied so a percentage goes to the Crown—”

“You pontificating bastard,” said Thorton, suddenly speaking for the first time. Rogers looked at him, and the skinny, awkward young man glared back. “We happen to know that you indulge in slave trade here in the Caribbean, and that it never sees one single coin of that going up to the Crown.”

“Thorton?” said Trenton. “Easy now—”

“So spare me your loyalties to those two—”

“Thorton!” Trenton hissed.

“It’s fine, Trenton, it’s fine. What is your position, Thornton? Explain it to me.”

Put on the spot, it looked as though Thornton might wither, but he swallowed and faced Rogers and said, “My position, sir, is that this all a stalling tactic. My position, sir, is that you are not so much concerned with fair slave prices as you are your own cut. My position, sir, is that this is all a charade, with you as its chief charlatan—”

“That’s enough, Thornton!” said Trenton. Chastened, the younger brother went silent. “Forgive my brother, Captain. In our youth our parents loved him most, and spared him the rod. You know how it is.”

“Afraid I don’t, sir,” Rogers said. “I am an only child. And as an only child I quickly learned that when I’m outnumbered the only person I can fall back on are the greater powers: God, Mother, and Father. Only now as an adult with them both dead, that has changed somewhat.”

“A man without family or friends is a lonely man, Captain, especially in a place like this.”

“You think I am in need of friends, Mr. Clement?”

Trenton’s smile said he understood at once what this whole meeting was about. “I think you are, sir. And I could be that friend. If you would only review my excerpts from the Asientos de Negros.”

Rogers leaned back in his seat, chewing lightly on his pipe. He looked out to the docks, lit up like a festival with all those lanterns, their light rippling in the water.

He had to consider this carefully. The Asiento de Negros was a monopoly contract between the Spanish Crown and various merchants, and had outlined how the slave trade was to be conducted, with careful steps taken to ensure which African colonies could and could not be raided and what sorts of slaves could and could not be taken. The Spanish had rarely conducted the trade itself, instead contracting foreign merchants—typically the Portuguese, French, and even the British—to do all the raiding for them. What the Clement brothers were proposing was creating a similar pact, only locally, between their company and Port Royal’s leadership.

A slave trade that cut out the Crown entirely. And covertly.

The Clement brothers had the ships, they could very well do it, but it would circumvent a lot of paperwork and it would have to be so secretly done that the Crown never got a whiff. Because the unstated goal, of course, was for them to not have to pay a penny up to the Crown. Clement Brothers Trade Company would be a direct injection into the vein of the slave trade. A new kind of pirate, but made legal—If I can get them the right kind of contracts signed by the Admiralty Board.

And Rogers was in a unique position to arrange it all. All of the Caribbean was in upheaval, but there was key trade to be made here as a halfway point between Britain and the New World. Governor Hamilton had his hands tied with a myriad of political rivals for his position, and the eyes of the Admiralty Office were looking in so many different directions that they had left daily defences and trade disputes up to Woodes Rogers, a privateer with a reputation for fighting pirates. Their many distractions left a gap, through which Rogers might insert his own ambitions.

“Tell you what,” Rogers said. “Bring the price down on all slaves sold locally—say ten percent—and pay five percent of your total earnings up to me directly, and then I will see if I can’t speak to the Admiralty about helping you on.”

Trenton seemed to sense a trap. “And the Admiralty will not report this to the Crown?”

“Not if they are also given a taste of the profits, once your new business venture is up and running.”

Suddenly Thorton snarled, “That’s triple-dipping! Quadruple! The more of you officious types get a cut, the less profit for us. What’s in it for us—”

“Mushrooms,” Rogers said. “Upon my word, I nearly forgot the mushrooms.”

“Mushrooms?”

“As part of our arrangement, you and all your ships will go to St. Lucia Island each and every time you make a trip from Africa back into the Caribbean—”

“Why on earth would we do—”

“If you would be quiet a moment, Thorton,” spat the wiser of the two brothers, “perhaps you will learn. Pray continue, Captain Rogers. My apologies.”

“Not at all. As I was saying, you will make your way through St. Lucia Island and meet up with agents of mine I have planted there, men who are learning all they can about the mushroom farms there. They are to confiscate certain components to those farms and bring some of the mushroom spores and such to help certain mushrooms grow here in Jamaica.”

Trenton shrugged. “I suppose we could make that happen, sir. Shouldn’t be any trouble.”

But Thorton couldn’t keep his mouth shut about it. “Why mushrooms?”

“Thorton!”

Rogers smiled politely. “I’ve heard you’re a whip-smart man, Thorton. I would have thought it all obvious by now.”

“Thought what obvious?”

“My dear fellow, do I really have to spell it out?” Rogers sighed. “What is the only thing that grows in darkness? What sort of lifeform does not require sunlight, or even like it?”

It seemed to slowly dawn on them.

“Crops are failing all over, gentlemen. The Crown has a plan to survive this firmament phenomenon, for as long as it lasts. But if we are to endure we must do so together. Can I count on you to help us in this new endeavour?”

“I believe we can make this work,” said Trenton shrugging. “St. Lucia. As you say. It will be done, Captain Rogers. No problem at all. Except…the matter of Tortuga…”

“Tortuga?”

“Yes. The French control it now, and that is a problem.”

“How so?” Rogers asked, taking another draft of his pipe.

“Well, you see, Captain Rogers, my brother and I have half our slave ships on loan from a handful of French noblemen. Investors, you might say. And we have to pass through there regularly, to appease their minds and let them know we are not damaging their ships or short-changing them.”

“I see.”

“In order for our arrangement to work, we must pass through Tortuga at least twice a year. Which means, of course, when I pass through there, my ships will be inspected by the bloody French.”

“Why is that a problem? You’re friendly enough with the French, as I recall?”

“Yes, sir, but slaves tend to go missing in Tortuga and other French ports. Officers taking their fair cut. To make this all worth it—that is, to make it so that I can afford to cut the cost of my slaves and pay you your three percent—”

“Five percent,” Rogers reminded him with a smile.

“Five percent, forgive me. In order for me to afford all of this, I need to ensure my slaves will not become ‘procured’ in Tortuga.”

“Let me handle the damned French, gentlemen. The lieutenant-general owes me a favour.”

Trenton seemed impressed. “You know René Duguay-Troulin?”

“As it happens, I do. As well as his whole slave-trading outfit.”

“Upon my word, sir, you certainly keep handsome company.”

“The handsomest. And I will travel to Tortuga myself very soon to visit René, to ensure you need never have fear of your slaves being ‘procured’ at port. Do we have deal? A drop in the cost of slaves ten percent, and five percent of all sales sent up to me?”

“Long as you can clear through the French ports—”

“I can.”

“Well, then,” Trenton said. He held out his hand and Rogers shook it and they all rose to their feet. “Thank you for time, Captain. Oh, and, well done on that maneuver at Coolidge Bay. Well done, indeed, sir.”

“Thank you. Have a good morning, gentlemen.”

As soon as they were gone, Rogers turned his pipe upside-down and emptied out the dottle, then replaced the pipe in his coat. That was a fine, fine bit of business, and a good way to start the morning. He winced, checked his timepiece to see that it was, in fact, still morning.

Now I just need to find a way of getting into Tortuga without getting killed. The price was still on his head, he assumed, for all he had done to French privateers a decade before. And one privateer in particular.

____

The Old Church was quiet but for Father Olaf’s words. The man truly knew his Scripture and no mistake, and could hold an audience in rapt attention for an hour or more. Naturally, the topics of his sermons tended towards the Long Night and the firmament, even if they were not mentioned directly. A part in Ecclesiastes about how coming together as a community in strife, a piece of Corinthians (for just as the body is one yet has many parts, and all the parts, though many, form one body, so it is with Christ), and other such glimpses into what Scripture had to say about coming together in hard times.

Woodes Rogers alone in the back pew, looking over the heads of the flock, occasionally glancing down at the book he’d brought with him. It was a book by a captain named Edmondson, who collected stories from various religions during his journeys throughout Asia in the 13th century. There was a single account in there that vexed him, and which Father Olaf had brought to his attention—the account of a Christian monk living in Mongolia during the 8th century claiming to have met the Legion, the demonic armies of Satan. The text said the Legion came during a “long darkness” and that they “swum up out of the sea looking like pigs at first, but pigs whose skins had been removed.”

According to Edmondson’s account, the monk had believed these to be the same pigs that Christ had banished into the sea, when he performed his exorcism and removed demons from a man and drove them into a herd of swine and forced them into the sea to drown themselves. Rogers didn’t care about that part, he only cared about this phenomenon of prolonged darkness, and how it sounded much like what was going on right now.

All throughout history, it seemed, there were records of unexplained Long Nights, and, increasingly, Rogers found it passing strange that no one had put all these accounts together in a single compendium.

“No one seems to have noticed the pattern,” he told Father Olaf after the service was over and all of his flock had filed out of the church. Rogers stood with Olaf amid the pews, the only light provided by candles around the room. “I cannot fathom why these events have never been commented on by any scholars.”

Olaf lifted a candle and went around the room lighting others. “It is possible some learned men knew,” he said. “It is also possible that they found themselves limited in their ability to spread the knowledge.”

“How so? The Church and universities are everywhere, and have been for centuries.”

“Yes, but…well, let us take the lesson of Martin Luther. He had his disagreements with the Church, did he not? And though he agreed that the Office of the Papacy was in fact the conduit of God on Earth, he felt the Church had lost its way. This was enough to get him accused of heresy, and he would have been executed, had it not been for his distribution of his theses.”

Rogers winced. “Remind me, how did that go?”

“Well,” said Olaf, leaning back to crack his back, “Martin Luther had something no other rebel before him ever had—the printing press. That allowed him to spread his ‘rebellious’ speech like no other man before. Even the Pope became powerless to contain Luther’s words. They spread too far, too fast for the Church to stop. Like a wildfire, you might say. Thus the entire Lutheran movement was born.”

Rogers tilted his head. “But knowledge of the firmament has already spread far and wide. How can no one else make the connection to these past events?” He gestured to the book in his hands.

“We are far out here in the Caribbean, Captain,” Olaf chuckled. “Perhaps learned men have made this connection, but they are far away, and being shouted over by powerful men in England and elsewhere.”

But Rogers still could not believe it. “It just seems strange, that you and I should see the Pattern when no one else can.”

Olaf shrugged. “To be honest, Captain, Martin Luther was not an entirely unique man, either. He wasn’t especially wealthy, nor any sort of polymath genius, nor was he even the first man to speak as rebelliously as he did. But he gathered the mood of others, and wrote some of their thoughts down, sprinkled in his own, preached them, and made editorial decisions based on the reactions of others. Then he spread those refined thoughts through printing press. Others did the heavy lifting before him, but he was the first to communicate broadly the Church’s problems.”

“What are you saying? That while you and I are not the first to put these pieces together, we might be the ones to spread the truth of this Pattern?”

Olaf shrugged. “Perhaps, Captain. I would advise you to pray on this.”

“I will, Father.” Rogers stuck out his hand and they shook. “And I hope that I may recruit you to help spread this, as well. Perhaps it will calm people down to know that this has all happened before, and that humanity has survived it many times.”

Olaf smiled, and said, “Perhaps it will, Captain.”

“I only wonder, Father, about this monk who Captain Edmondson mentions. He says that monk claimed to have had an audience with the Legion, to have spoken directly to the leader himself over tea—over tea, he says, like he was a normal man! The monk claimed the Leader tried to negotiate with the monk for the surrender of all men’s souls. A most strange tale.”

“Yes, a most strange tale, indeed. Every priest has heard it, and almost all have dismissed it as lunacy. Others don’t, however.”

Rogers looked out at the window, out at the Long Night. He shivered just imagining such a confrontation. “I wonder, what should a man do if faced with such a moment?”

Father Olaf sighed heavily, and appeared to ruminate at length. At last he said, “I should hope that any man faced with the Legion would be prepared to hold his own fears in check, keep his courage, remember God’s divine love, and look the Enemy dead in his eyes and negotiate fairly for his own soul.”

Rogers thanked him and left, feeling a certain weight had not been so much lifted, as shifted on his shoulders.

As he made his way to the Fish Market, Rogers crossed in front of the hangman’s platform. The crowd had dispersed, the three pirates were all still swinging lightly from the noose. By Rogers’s own orders such pirates would remain up for two days, as a reminder to others. He stopped when he saw the young lad who he’d heard speaking, and stood in front of him. “Why the bloody fuck did you not just fight for England, lad?” The lad’s two eyes stared dazedly out at nothing.

Rogers glanced up at the sunless sky, at the gray, backlit clouds, and thought about Procopius and Cassiodorus’s two separate accounts. This has happened before.

He turned his back to the hanged men and walked on to his next meeting.