While he climbed he had not seen Levasseur when the pistols missed. Was this his escape? Had he run from him?
A ringing report at his ear and he ducked, the shot spitting stone into his hair where his face had been.
He crouched and spun. Levasseur was on the ledge behind, with another pistol set, and for a blink Devlin avowed the colossal image of a pirate.
Pistols and apostles holstered across the chest. An eye-patch, a scar running beneath and to his lip. A snake-like form wrapped in cannon-smoke and clothes that could have been a hundred years old and cut for other men.
A pirate.
And for a moment, just a moment, Devlin felt his sword heavy. Too heavy.
Then the pistol cracked and he could see the ball and flame, his eye attached to it as it blurred over the pool and the heads of his men looking up at him, Peter Sam’s last of all, and then he watched his left shoulder slam away from him.
He had never been shot at from the front before. On that day last year with Trouin it had been a ball to his back, a larger bore. From across the cave, from old powder, this was like a schoolboy’s shove. Still, a spark went off in his brain, his heart in his ears and against his ribs as his body shocked.
He fell back, his legs failing him.
But the sword held.
One hand stretched to the sand but the fist with the steel in it was white and declared his signature across the chasm, to that pirate form ruling its stage.
Devlin was far from done.
He stumbled down the shale path, holding the steel before him as the terrible pirate, larger now, pulled again.
Words.
There were hollered words following the shot but Devlin could not hear them over the breaking and splash of rock. He saw Hugh Harris’s head and boots rolling onto the ledge before him.
One ally.
Devlin’s wounded arm pulsed as he moved to Hugh, his shirt arm just blood, and he watched another shot fly towards him like an arrow.
The stone falling drowned the ball and Devlin breathed again. He saw the rocks smash into the pool among his cursing men. He saw Hugh’s back running wet, coming to stand, and Levasseur saw it also.
‘Nice eye-patch,’ Hugh said to Levasseur and unhooked his hatchet from his belt. ‘I lost my pistols,’ he rolled the hatchet in his palm. ‘You be dead for that.’
Levasseur pulled his head back and looked down his substantial beak.
‘English?’ A French scowl.
Hugh shook his head.
‘Pirate,’ he said and skulked forwards.
‘Dead,’ said Levasseur and fired into Hugh’s body with a snap of his wrist.
‘
No
!’ Devlin roared and was on Hugh before he fell, his sword out to Levasseur across them both, defending pointlessly against lead. His men remained lost in the water and shouted up at what they had seen.
Levasseur’s palms rested on new pistols. He paused to pull. Gave a captain a moment with his lesser man.
Devlin held Hugh with his shattered shoulder, dropped his dagger beside him.
‘Hugh?’
Hugh Harris pulled the back of Devlin’s waistcoat, dragged himself up.
‘Just me belt, Cap’n,’ he grunted. ‘Good. Italian. Like your boots.’ Devlin looked down to the new stud decorating the six-inch-wide leather.
‘But fuck, that hurt!’ he hissed. ‘And the fucking cave’s falling in!’ He passed his hatchet into good hands. ‘I’ll be up in a minute, Pat.’ His gut denied and he went back down.
Devlin let him to the ground, stood over him. Faced Levasseur.
The hatchet dangled, loop already about his wrist, pitted sword in the other. The same Welsh steel he had faced René Trouin with. More a shield than a blade. Worn with worth. Earned. His clothes dripped like sand in a glass, wet as the dead below.
Levasseur pulled iron and lead against steel. And the steel came on to the pistol mouths. As all battles commence.
The lead. The steel. Both metals of the earth and shaped by fire and men for one purpose: the mettle of men. Strength of muscle and sinew, command of nerve and will.
‘
Traitor
!’ Levasseur cried. It was the first time Devlin had heard his voice, but the word seemed familiar.
‘I am
Levasseur
! This is
my
place!’ He stepped back to the shade of his chamber.
Devlin came on.
‘Your cave is falling. Done for by your own cannon. Come. Leave with me.’
‘You come for my gold, traitor!’ The pistols sat cocked in both his hands, yet the man coming on was not afraid. This the gravy of his days.
‘My men are here,’ Devlin announced behind his blade. ‘We’ll take what you have. The priest’s cross. I’ll spare you. Lay down.’
‘
Spare
me
?’ They were within a dozen feet of each other, a killing ground. And Levasseur fired, threw his pistols and pulled steel before waiting for the shots’ end.
Devlin stood the pistol fire and heard the whistle as it passed. He still moved, and that was good enough, and through the gunsmoke steel finally met steel.
Levasseur’s good eye widened, his mouth white with spittle, and they ran the swords’ lengths to their hilts, fists almost to the floor.
Levasseur gritted his teeth as he felt the hone of the arm against his.
‘Who are you, Monsieur? Before you die.’
Devlin pushed him back.
‘Devlin. Did O’Neill not say? And this sword beat Trouin.’
Levasseur walked his quarter.
‘They sent Trouin after me,
pirate
! He did not find.’
‘I beat him and found you. You should measure that.’ And Devlin took his quarter also.
They circled once, and that brought Devlin to see the glistening from the chamber, the stone throne, the gold cross gleaming upon it. And Levasseur saw the diverted glance and dove at his new enemy, a traitor like them all.
Below, the men were pelted by the hail of rock. They ducked under the water in time to miss the largest shards but with every stone they knew the cave was nearing its end, becoming mountain again, eroding aeons of nature’s work. Hugh had climbed so why not they? They crawled and clawed their way up.
Peter Sam still clung to the upturned boat. Back, toward the cave mouth, he could see the new boats coming and shouted to the others. His brothers were safe now. Above he could hear the sounds of battle that came down like hammer on anvil even over the commotion of falling stone.
The combatants were out of sight but in his mind he could see every swipe and clash, and the muscles of his arms flinched at the familiar sounds. He could do nothing to help his captain. To help his friend. He waited for the final sound to come. But he had no doubt who would prevail.
Devlin beat Levasseur back for a pause of words.
‘This is madness. We’ll all be dead. Put down,
Capitaine
. Come out with me now.’
Levasseur howled and swung. The forte of Devlin’s blade sparked against the Frenchman’s. He had fought René Trouin and after that every sword felt slow. His blade had grown past the butcher’s boy of his youth.
‘You will fall,’ he said – he promised – his sword up and beside his head. Grace given.
‘
You
will fall,’ Levasseur cried. ‘Fall in
my kingdom
!’
He hacked as if Devlin were only a tree, and the pirate let the blows come on to sword and axe as if from the wooden sword of an enraged child. He parried easily, only turning his wrist. He had tussled whores harder. He pushed Levasseur away each time with the boarding-axe. Spared his head.
Devlin had the lead in his shoulder, and the true wound from the god Trouin still biting at his back, but Levasseur was no match. He knew that now. His pain was just payment for the skill he had gained.
A pirate stood before him, the man who had stolen the greatest haul on the sea. And Devlin was his master. He had practised harder with his men on Sundays. He was already counting his gold.
He let the blade come once more and turned it effortlessly to the stone and held it there with his own blade like a vice.
He put his Cordova boot to it, snapped it like a dead branch and kicked the poor steel to the pool in the same movement. His only concern was that his men would avoid its plunge.
He stepped back, turned the axe in his hand, let Levasseur marvel at the stump of blade in his fist and fall to his knees. The eye patch quivered as the brow moved in surprise.
‘The words you are looking for,’ Devlin said, ‘are “
Dommage, Capitaine
.”’
He pricked Levasseur’s bandoleer with his sword, made sure the pirate could feel the pressure behind the quillions.
Levasseur looked up along the blade to the cold face.
‘We are of the same age, Monsieur. Young enough . . . old enough . . . to have seen the war. No doubt you became a pirate . . . for the same . . . as did I.’
‘This life chose me,’ Devlin said. He took away the sword and put out his hand, the hatchet hanging. ‘Come. I’ll get you out of here. For another day.’
Levasseur took the palm.
‘You say “chose”, Monsieur,’ he grimaced. ‘That is the difference.’ His grip shifted fast to pull the wrist to the ground, his broken sword against Devlin’s throat.
‘Nothing
chose
me, dog!’ The eye-patch quivered again. ‘I am
this
!’
He pushed forward as Devlin’s ebony dagger hissed between them and embedded itself in the leather eye patch.
Levasseur fell back in a scream, balled up in pain at Devlin’s feet.
Devlin turned to Hugh Harris holding his belly, grinning for one wink.
‘You couldn’t have hit his good eye then, Hugh?’ Devlin put his sword in his belt, checked his hand to his throat.
‘I was aiming for his neck, Pat.’
Hugh stood and joined him. He put his boot to Levasseur’s chest and pulled the dagger free without a grimace at the sucking sound that came with it and passed it back to Devlin. Levasseur stopped writhing and waited for his end.
Hugh whistled at the sight of the gold cross.
‘Holy—’
‘Holy is right,’ Devlin said. ‘The priest’s Cross of Fire.’
Hugh sprang to it, to lay both hands on the cold metal.
Levasseur rolled up on his side to watch Hugh try to pull the cross from its throne.
The fight had gone from him, tears of blood coursed from under the eye-patch. The good eye was dry.
‘It is mine,’ he said. He clawed at the air near the gold.
Hugh grunted with the effort. ‘It won’t move, Pat! Help me.’
Devlin’s feet began to quake. The dust and shale were now falling like a mist, sifting down his back into his shirt and boots.
‘Leave it, Hugh! We have to go! The roof is falling!’
‘We can’t leave it, Pat!’ Hugh bellowed back and pulled harder. ‘It weighs a tonne!’
Levasseur sank, his claw now a fist.
‘More . . . It weighs more . . .’ and his eye swivelled to Devlin.
Devlin looked away, ran to Hugh, pulled him free.
‘Hugh,’ he dragged Hugh’s neck to look at the ground, at the carpet of gold and jewels. ‘If you fill your pockets you’ll drown. We’ll get out and come back.’
He twisted Hugh’s head to the hole opposite.