A Radical Act of Free Magic by H. G. Parry

Author:H. G. Parry [PARRY, H.G.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2021-07-20T00:00:00+00:00

That evening, Toussaint rode to the headquarters of General Jean Baptiste Brunet. He dismounted and went inside. The two of them talked, cordial and reserved, and then Brunet retired from the room and a party of grenadiers entered. They were magicians, but in the end magic wasn’t needed. Toussaint’s men put up very little resistance, and he put up none at all. They came for his family soon after.

Toussaint was taken to Le Cap and transferred at last to the ship that would take him to France. The last of the army of the dead, as he had predicted, were being recalled as the ship readied itself for departure. There was an edge of superstitious fear among the crew, as though they had a wild shadow on board.

“You cannot hold Toussaint far enough from the ocean or put him in a prison that is too strong,” Leclerc wrote to Napoléon. It was widely accepted that Toussaint had no magic now, that whatever powers had allowed him to bring storms against the British fleet and rally the island itself against them had deserted him. And yet nobody quite believed that he was only human either.

Toussaint was the only calm one on deck. He greeted the captain coolly, but politely.

“In overthrowing me,” he said, just before they took him below, “you have cut down in Saint-Domingue only the trunk of the tree of liberty. It will grow back from the roots, because they are deep and numerous.”

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