by Jenny Barden
When they rose and dressed, and kissed, and moved to look outside where the birds were beginning to sing in the still black sky, she once again found the place on the sill where Rob had scratched his one-time name, then she asked for Kit’s knife, and scratched through ‘Little’, and beside it wrote ‘Doonan’. Kit smiled and inscribed his own name too, and so did she, not ‘Emme Fifield’, or ‘Emme Murimuth’, or even ‘Emmelyne Seymour, Duchess of Somerset’, never that, but the woman she was now and would be forever, the woman she was always meant to be: ‘Emme Doonan’.
14
Burning
‘… There we espied towards the north end of the Island the light of a great fire through the woods, to the which we presently rowed: when we came right over against it, we let fall our grapnel near the shore, and sounded with a trumpet a call, and afterwards many familiar English tunes of songs, and called to them friendly; but we had no answer, we therefore landed at day-break, and coming to the fire, we found the grass and sundry rotten trees burning about the place …’
—From the entry for 17th August from John White’s Narrative of his 1590 Voyage to Virginia describing his return to Roanoke
‘Are you ready?’
Kit squatted down beside Emme, looking through the upper gun port in the palisade above the roofs of the storehouses around the fort. His gaze swept over the wall of tree trunks which stretched from the cliff top southwest in a crooked curving line, beyond the belt of ground cleared of trees that had been reduced to huge logs and dragged together to form the star-pointed ramparts, to the dark woods that rose at its edge and disappeared into the haze where Wanchese’s warriors would be lying in wait. He was sure of it. He did not need to hear or see them. The first hint of dawn was brightening the sky, and he looked over the dormant forest imagining the men like fleas in the pelt of a beast that could spring into life at any moment. He drew back and scanned the dirt platform where Emme sat by the bronze falconet, taking in the heap of one pound shot for the cannon, ramrod and wadding, powder barrel and scoop, reamer and the linstock for firing that she held like a spear, shaft down beside her, the slow match smouldering at its tip.
‘You know what to do?’
‘Yes,’ she said quietly, appearing dwarfed by both munitions and defences: a slight, soft woman in the midst of weaponry that could butcher a whole company of men, clad like a soldier in brigandine and helmet.
‘You must bring the match to the touch hole slowly,’ he said. ‘Then you must wait for the smoke that will tell you the priming powder had taken hold. After it catches, stand back smartly and cover your ears. Don’t get behind the gun. Don’t bend over the touch hole or the blast will burn your face. Don’t bring your match to the touch until you hear the other guns firing. There will be a delay between ignition and discharge; you must expect that.’
‘I understand,’ she said.
He didn’t doubt it. She was quick-witted and stout-hearted and he knew he could depend on her. He should leave her to check on the others, but leaving was hard. This might be the last time he saw her. Just as he’d come to know her, they had to part. She was his Emme whom he adored almost more than he could bear, so rare a lady he didn’t know how he could have been favoured by the love she had shown him. She was like a comet passing Earth: a wonder to admire and expect to lose in a stream of fading light, except that last night he’d possessed her fully, and the treasure of her body had been his as a gift. Now all the shying away she’d previously displayed he could properly understand, because of the hurt that had been done to her by that earl he’d like to run through. No chance of that now, no reason and no need. Emme was his wife and she’d never be another’s.
He turned his head to kiss her, and thank God he could do that without her pulling from him. There might not be another chance.
She put her arms around his chest, plate armour and all.
‘God bless you, husband,’ she murmured.
‘God bless you, wife.’
That had to be their farewell. He turned to go before resolution failed him and he stayed to die by her side, but then defeat would be inevitable and, if he put his plan into place, at least she would have a possibility of escape, however small. He turned from her, and started to bound down the dirt slope; then he gave her one last instruction over his shoulder.
‘Don’t try and load the gun to fire again.’
If she answered, he didn’t hear her. He had to trust her not to attempt such a thing. He had told her to leave for the pinnace as soon as the firing began, and she had said that she would. She must get across quickly in the tender once the savages attacked. One shot, then go: that was what she had agreed to do. He paced around the strong-house to the place where the great nine-foot saker pointed out from the cliff top over the sound. There was Lacy in the shadows, busy recharging the gun, loading one of the five-pound balls into the muzzle, ramming and wading it home. He’d ask Lacy to make sure Emme left.
Lacy moved to the breech of the gun and took hold of the linstock left propped against the strong-house wall. The gun overlooked the water through a gap in the palisade, and, from that vantage, Kit could see the pinnace lying below to the east, and the clear expanse of the sound above which the morning star twinkled in an indigo sky. Near the horizon, over a band of grey cloud, the blue was beginning to lighten. Nothing moved but the rippling breeze and a flock of seabirds rising and wheeling, dropping back further away to settle again in pale streaks. The scent of pines and saltwater was in the breeze, and something sweet like the aromatic spicebushes that grew to the southwest, and from all this Kit sensed the way the wind was blowing. Under the canvas that screened the gun overhead, Lacy’s face was barely visible, but Kit caught the gleam of his eyes when he spoke.
‘Nothing to report, Master Doonan.’
‘Good. Keep firing to the west without haste. When you hear the rest of us in salvo, get Mistress Emme to the pinnace.’
‘Aye, sir.’
‘Give us five minutes to join you, no longer. Don’t wait after that. You must leave for Croatoan.’
‘We will. God speed you.’
He clapped Lacy’s shoulder and strode back. As he left the closed palisade, he heard the boom of the saker firing again, and the much quieter splash far off as the shot hit the water. He picked up the ladder he had used to scale the inner defences, and carried it with him as he negotiated the barricades between the houses, following routes he knew well, doubling back and circuiting through the maze of partially concealed pathways.
The bastion he reached first was the position to the east manned by Rob. It was guarded by a fowler behind one of the projections in the wall of tree trunks. The gun was an old iron breech loader, about eight feet in length but narrow in bore, mounted on a stock with two wheels, firing stone shot covered in lead. It couldn’t fire far with any accuracy, but it could be reloaded fast. Kit cast his eye over the spare chamber, ready charged, that lay near the rear of the stock by a small pyramid of round shot. He gave a nod of approval and clapped the boy’s shoulders.
‘All set?’
‘Yes, father.’
It felt good to be called that. He patted Rob’s back.
‘Don’t fire until you hear the other guns.’
‘I’ll wait.’
Rob nodded and straightened his back. He stood with his smouldering linstock, looking every inch the battle-ready soldier, helmeted and armed, his chest and back protected by a steel cuirass. His son seemed to have grown on the voyage, no longer a boy but a man. Pray God, Rob would live to talk about this day in years to come. Pray he’d die quickly if he didn’t see the day out.
Kit looked through a gap between the tree trunks that served as a crude gun port at the bastion’s point. He peered along the long barrel ringed with wrought iron hoops, and saw the forest beginning to flood with colour. Dark greens lightened to purples as gold rays streamed from below the rim of the sky. Rob would be firing straight at the sun, but he didn’t need to aim, only ignite the primer
. The gun was pointing point blank. Its two-inch shot would rip through foliage and shatter on impact with anything solid, tree or man. After that …
‘Once you’ve fired the gun then you must leave.’
‘Not without you,’ Rob answered resolutely.
‘With or without me.’ Kit pointed to the ladder which he’d left by the outer wall and his voice hardened. ‘Use that to get over the palisade; then make for the pinnace with Mistress Emme.’
He spoke again as he left. There was no more time for reasoning with him. ‘I’m relying on you to do that.’
He raced to the next bastion, past all the weapons that had been left ready to hand: pikes and bills; longbows and boxes of arrows; crossbows with their strings winched back; quivers full of fire bolts specially prepared by Lacy, swollen behind their arrow heads, their shafts wrapped with gauze packed with a mixture of nitre, sulphur and charcoal. There were a few loaded calivers, as many as they had left, and low braziers of smoking coals, well away from the gunpowder kegs. The position was unmanned but another fowler lay ready, its powder chamber locked in place, loaded and primed. More weapons were stacked at the foot of the wall: an axe and another crossbow, fully cocked; fire bolts, arrows and a longbow. He moved on and found Tom Humphrey with their third fowler; the fourth guarded the closed entrance gate.
‘Ready?’
‘Yes.’
‘God be with you. Fire at my command then get behind the palisade. Use that to climb over.’ He pointed to a ladder lying nearby.
The lad started to speak, but Kit left before he could hear him. Something was happening. A noise rose from the forest that was more than just the dawn chorus. There were other sounds mixed in, bird calls he could not place and a persistent soft rustling.
He rushed past a base gun at a crouch and reached Jack Tydway in the bastion furthest west just as the sun flared orange over the tops of the trees. Kit took one look at the falconet by which Tydway stood ready then tipped back his head. A sound passed over him like the whoosh of the wind gusting through leaves.
‘Take cover!’
He knew what it was before he saw the arrows raining down.
‘Fire!’ he yelled, roaring out the command as he ducked back to the nearest gun, snatching up a linstock left smouldering a few paces away. He held the match to the touch hole while bobbing down near the wall. There was a fizz as the primer caught, and louder noises as the reed arrows struck, clanging against metal, thudding into earth and wood, all mixed in with other sounds: the ululation of countless voices and a deep rumbling vibration. He saw the blast before he heard it, the gun kicked back in billowing smoke, the tree trunks shivered releasing clouds of dust, and the ground shook as if in a thunderstorm, sending shock waves through his feet. Another blast followed, and another in quick succession; then his ears succumbed to the pain of the noise, and all he heard was ringing, and all he saw beyond the gun was smoke filling the clearing, and traces of flame in the wood, and the shadow forms of savages running. Scores of them streamed towards him through the haze before the glare of the sun, their bodies almost naked or made strange by wicker armour. His nose filled with the stench of sulphur and his eyes watered, stinging, and he knew that most of the guns had fired but that the charge of the savages had barely been checked.
‘Back!’ He ran round behind the bastions, past Tom and Rob, calling out to them. ‘Get back now!’
He snatched up one of the crossbows and a quiver, lighting a fire bolt by the nearest brazier, putting it in place on the stock, tight against the nut, and taking aim near the gate through the port for the unfired fowler. The bastion was still clear of the worst of the smoke. Only drifting wisps interfered with his vision, and the savages running forwards to hurl themselves at the wall, springing one upon another, scrabbling to get over. Shots rang out and a man screamed nearby, but he must not look, only concentrate on the forest beyond the belt of cleared ground, and the foremost trees at the outer edge. Some were already ablaze; others were smouldering, blown to stumps by explosions. He took aim at a pine that remained intact and sighted on the black ring of pitch around its trunk, and the pitch-covered powder keg that he’d tied near its base. He let out his breath and pulled the crossbow trigger. The string twanged in release and the bolt sped away, trailing a straight line of fire for about fifty paces. Seconds later, the trunk burst into a crown of yellow flame.
He moved to the gun, set a match to the cannon’s touch hole, waited for ignition, and ran to the next position. The blast came as he reached the bastion where Rob had been only minutes earlier. The boy was gone but something moved: a savage by the gun, bent over a pool of blood. Kit sprang forwards as the man wheeled round. The warrior had picked up an English axe that he swung to strike in a flash of steel. All Kit could do was charge, using his helmet like a ram to knock the man off his feet. The warrior crumpled sideways and Kit drew his sword. The reverberation of gunfire shuddered through them, earth and wall. One thrust and the man was dispatched; a twist, and his blade was free. Another blast rocked the defences, and the smell of burning sap hung bittersweet in the air. The light through the gun port was tinged the orange of flickering flames. He could hear the forest roaring.
‘Get to the fort! Get away!’
He hoped no one would be left to listen who could understand; the others should be making for the pinnace by now. Most of the incendiaries he’d set at the edge of the trees were well ablaze in a ring of flame. He reached the bastion facing south and saw raging fire beyond the clearing, but men were still scaling the wall.
He grabbed another bolt and set it alight, took aim over the last unfired gun at one of the few pines intact at the edge of the wood. He put his finger near the trigger, released the lock, prepared to fire, then turned as a shadow fell over him, the shadow of a man like a carrion bird settling. The warrior leapt from the rampart, armoured front and back, the wicker of his breastplate forming wings over his shoulders. Kit shot him on impulse, impaling him through the chest, turning his armour into a torch. He gritted his teeth against the man’s screaming and used a linstock to fire the gun. The shot brought down the tree.
A shout made him turn again.
‘Kit!’
Someone was calling him.
‘Here!’
He looked along the walkway curving round behind the wall and saw Jack Tydway staggering towards him, stumbling around the body of a savage through clouds of gun-smoke. Across his shoulders was one of their own, head hanging down, the shaft of an arrow sticking out from his neck.
Not Rob, let it not be Rob.
‘It’s Tom,’ Jack gasped.
Savages were rushing up behind him, whooping and swinging cudgels heavy enough to brain a man at a stroke. Kit darted past to bring them down, using his pistol then his sword. They were dealt with quickly, but others followed in their wake, creeping round from the west by the tree trunks.
‘Hurry,’ Kit urged, though he could tell Jack was moving as fast as he could. His clothes were soaked with Tom’s blood.
‘Is anyone left that way?’
‘No,’ Jack grunted.
‘Rob?’
‘Haven’t seen him.’
Kit felt a surge of relief, but only for an instant. More savages were closing, warriors from the first wave before the fire took hold, men who’d got over the wall.
He grabbed at weapons as he passed, used them and threw them down. There was no chance to reload. He shot a warrior climbing over the wall, sending his blood spraying in an arc. Two more were felled with bow and arrow. He hurled an axe, shot more fire bolts, threw a brazier and struck with a caliver that he wielded like a club. In the narrow passageway through the barricades he covered Jack’s back with his sword. But the savages were too many, and they followed him inside the labyrinth, despite the barrels, crates and anything else he could drag across his tracks. His friends would be done for if they got any closer. Kit slowed and stood his ground.
‘Carry on, Jack. Get Tom to the pinnace.’
‘No matter. Go!’ He shouted again at the top of his voice as he crouched behind an overturned table and loaded one last shot. ‘Go!’
This was where he would die. He’d done what he could and his strength was waning. He’d give Jack a few more minutes. When the next savage ran into view, he fired his pistol and saw the man’s legs crumple. Another warrior appeared, and he drew his sword, preparing to lunge. But there were others behind, too many for one swordsman. He said a quiet goodbye to Emme; then he stood, arms wide.
‘Come on!’
A shot rang out, and two of the savages fell heavily, mid charge. At the point of leaping towards him, the first man was knocked back as if by an invisible fist, with a force that struck him in the middle of the chest. In falling he took down the man behind, a man who lay writhing, splattered with the blood of his comrade and with his own blood pouring from a hole under his collar bone. The shot had been fired from the side. Kit looked across and saw the helmet of a caliverman crouched behind a pile of furniture heaped between two houses. The chase slowed to a crawl. The nearest savage turned and fled.
‘Who’s there?’ Kit called out as he began to edge back. There might be a chance to reach the fort after all. Had Lacy come down to help him? But surely Lacy wouldn’t have left Emme. He looked from the savages at a standstill back to the caliverman who was loping towards him, bent low, carrying a firearm, lithe as a panther. It was Rob, ashen-faced where he was not black with gunpowder. He held his caliver out to Kit with a hand that slightly shook.
‘It’s loaded,’ Rob said. ‘I took two from the wall.’
Kit flashed the boy a smile and grasped the weapon firmly. He cocked the piece with his match and levelled it at the place where the savages had sought cover.
‘When I fire we run.’
The boy nodded mutely.