There's been a murder in Nassau. Apparently Flint might be alive and invites men to return to the fold the next day, at the beach east of the bay. Max can only be expected to do so much to prevent it. Eleanor has an idea and shows Rogers Abigail's letter. Rogers realizes how much Charles Vane is a part of Eleanor's story. But he keeps a dark secret for himself - how long he himself has been a part of her story already. The Fates are playing a cruel game.

Chapter 18 - The Fates

Rogers woke at the insistent rapping on the door and a man crying, "Sir! Sir!" at the other side of the door.

He came out of a daze and realized they fell asleep as they lay. A sleeping Eleanor was still wrapped around him. Gently, Rogers moved and kissed her forehead, whispering, "Eleanor, wake up. Something is amiss."

"Hmm." Eleanor fluttered her eyes and rolled on her back. "What?" she mumbled as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes.

Rogers swung his legs out of bed, rose and grabbed his silk men's robe hanging from a peg. He pulled it on, knotted the sash and laid his finger on his lips to Eleanor, as she sat up and stretched her arm with a yawn. The candles of his chandeliers were burning low. They must have slept about three hours at least and Rogers supposed it must have been the dead of night.

The rapping on the door became louder. Rogers walked into the office, closing the bedroom door behind him. "Yes! I'm up." He approached his office doors just as they were opened by Lieutenant Perkins. "What is it?" Rogers said, not hiding his annoyance.

"Mr. Dufresne was murdered, my lord, at the tavern."

"Oh, for the love of God!" Rogers cursed. He remembered the silent, angry looking quartermaster of Captain Hornigold as a loyal man. Not really a troublemaker, but of the lonely type. "Did they arrest the murderer?"

Lieutenant Perkins shook his head. "No, he was gone already when the regulars arrived. He is identifiable by having only one leg, though. " Then he said in a lower voice. "He took the ledger of names of men who signed a pardon."

"The ledger?" Rogers nodded at Lieutenant Perkins. "I will be down shortly. You can wait downstairs for me, lieutenant."

"Should I wake Miss Guthrie as well?"

For a moment Rogers was speechless. "Euhm, no." He shook his head. "That won't be necessary, lieutenant." Rogers followed Perkin's eyes and just like the lieutenant he noticed the petticoat sprawled onto the floor, the chandeliers that had been left burning instead of being doused. And to make matters worse, Eleanor stumbled about in his sealed bedroom. Lieutenant Perkins stared at Rogers for a moment, while Rogers raised his eyebrows as a challenge to the lieutenant.

Perkins gave him a curt nod. "Sir," and retreated.

With a sigh, Rogers picked Eleanor's clothes up and carried them into the bedroom, where he was welcomed by the glorious sight of Eleanor in her shift rolling up the last of her stockings.

She looked up at him. "What happened?"

"A troubling murder." He handed Eleanor her clothes, turning his eyes away. "If we thought to keep our affair private, then that hope has just been blown out of the water. Lieutenant Perkins figured out."

Eleanor took her clothes from him, and put on her stay. "I didn't expect we could." She stood before him, turned around, and lifted her hair for him to help her tighten the laces. "Your men gossip about us already."

Surprised that Eleanor could be this unaffected by it, Rogers said, "It is not my reputation that is on the line." He pulled at her laces that she knotted at the front quickly. "It is worse for the woman. In London, I could brag about it, but you would be shunned by society."

Eleanor turned around, looked into his eyes and stroked his cheek. "We're not in London," she whispered. "This is Nassau. Besides, you said you didn't care what your men or my people thought of me." She reached for her petticoat and stepped into it. "I poured some water in the basin and used some to wash."

Rogers walked to the basin. "Not as my advisor, but –"

"What do you think people will tolerate more?" Eleanor buttoned her mantua. "That you take advice from Eleanor Guthrie, convict, pirate and a woman? Or that you have an affair with her? My reputation is ruined anyway. You said so yourself, remember."

Rogers remembered he had made some vague allusion to her credibility when he hired her. "That was meant as a jest, Eleanor." He splashed water into his face and chest.

She held out his shirt for him. "I know. But I am speaking in earnest."

Rogers slipped his arms and head through the shirt, while helped him with his cufflinks. He cupped her chin and looked down into her eyes. "Eleanor, are you telling me you came to me tonight, because of what people might think of me for listening to you?"

"Is that how it felt to you earlier?" she whispered while blushing.

He lifted his eyebrows. No, that certainly was not how it felt. "That's not an answer."

"No," she said silently. Eleanor turned her head away. "I came for you, because I knew you would think it inappropriate to come to my room." She could not explain it any better, dared not, yet. Despite the fact that they had made love a few hours before, she was not comfortable at explaining her feelings. When Max warned her how the gossip might force Rogers to set her aside, there had been a primal panic of losing him, as well as hope that if his men saw Rogers being drawn to her, he might actually answer her strong feelings. Of course, she knew Max's intention had been to warn her against getting too involved. It only impressed Eleanor with the inevitability of it instead, that they might just as well give in to their feelings, and self-denial would be worse. "What about this murder?" she asked to change the subject.

Rogers tugged his shirt in his trousers. "Mr. Dufresne was murdered at Max's."

She looked around for her shoes, and remembered they must be in the neighboring office. "Mr. Dufresne made a lot of enemies, ever since he challenged Flint for the captaincy of the Walrus."

"Do you know a one-legged man that might be his enemy?" Rogers asked as he tied and adjusted his muslin cravat.

"No." She noticed his waistcoat and justaucorps hanging across his office chair and took them to him. "None alive anyway." Rogers shrugged into his waistcoat, and Eleanor came to stand before him to help him with the many buttons. "Flint's crew member Randall had one leg, after it needed to be amputated when he got trapped beneath the Walrus during careening. But they're dead." Eleanor looked up into his face gazing down on her. Rogers eyed her with a hint of a grin. Then she noticed several locks of his hair had gotten in disarray.

"What?" Rogers asked with a frown.

"Some hair got pulled loose."

He grinned, reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ears. "Yours too." That actually made her blush.

Major Rollins escorted them to the tavern. "Lieutenant Perkins only gave me a general picture," said Rogers. "How exactly was Mr. Dufresne murdered? What happened?" Major Rollins looked at Eleanor and then whispered his answer to Rogers.

Rogers inhaled deeply. "Major, please relay Miss Guthrie what you just told me. She might stomach the description better than I do."

"Mr. Dufresne's skull was smashed in with a blunt object, M'am." And before Eleanor could ask which blunt object, he added, "Witness accounts say the murderer stamped him with his peg several times on the head, after he fell on the floor."

"And nobody tried to stop him?" she asked. Though Eleanor would not miss Mr. Dufresne, nor was she personally perturbed by the account itself, it disturbed her that such a violent murder belonging to the era of the pirate republic was even possible in the new Nassau. The only time anyone was murdered in her tavern when Eleanor still owned it was when Ned Low sawed his quartermaster's head off and then decapitated her loyal Mr. O' Malley.

"There was a gang of them that held other men down, while the murderer committed his foul deed."

They arrived at the tavern, just as Mr. Dufresne's body was carried out, wrapped in sail. Eleanor rushed towards Max, lifting her skirts as she stepped casually across the pool of blood on the floor. "You all right?"

"I was not here," Max said acrid. Eleanor remembered how but nine days ago Max had prided herself on having no enemies and only strong friends, better able to preserve the peace than Eleanor ever could. And yet, a man like Ned Low had visited and murdered a man in Max's tavern tonight, and Max took it as a personal affront.

Rogers stared at the pool of blood. "Who did this?" he said darkly.

"They say it was John Silver."

That cocky young man with sparkling eyes and angelic curls who is no more than an untrustworthy nuisance? Eleanor did not even know Silver had lost his leg. She remembered the jesting Silver as he was when had been chained in her office once. Eleanor had disliked him for all the trouble he had caused Max when he first arrived in Nassau. But she would never have believed him of all men to be capable of such a deed.

"They say he speaks for Captain Flint."

Flint lives? Wide-eyed, Eleanor gaped back at Max. "Someone saw him alive?"

"No one saw him," Max said disgusted. "Only his agents, including one claiming to be John Silver."

"Was it him?"

Captain Hornigold had joined them. "No one who was here knew him well enough to identify him, other than Mr. Dufresne. But though the identity was in question, the message they left behind was clear. They claim Flint will be returning tomorrow, east of the bay, to take on recruits."

"Well," whispered Rogers. "If Flint is alive," he said looking at Hornigold and Max. "If he arrives at that beach, I can't have him finding two hundred men waiting there for him." He glanced at the blood near his feet. " I can't have him finding ten men there. The image of any men leaving this place to join him would unsettle the street."

"I'll station men on the beach to –"

"No, no, no, no," Rogers dismissed Hornigold's notion, shaking his head categorically.

"I'll oversee it myself!" Hornigold assured in a loud voice.

"And if Flint doesn't appear?" Rogers argued. "What does that suggest? That I, too, am so weak as to fear a ghost?" His voice and face were stern. "No, I prefer there be no one there to meet him because no one wants to be there to meet him." He glanced at Max. "Can you help see to that?" Rogers had never alluded to Max's position as brothel madam in public or to Max before, but he made no bones about asking her to use her position in that regard now.

Max sighed and nodded. "Yes." She lifted her skirts, came down the platform's stairs, crossed the puddle of blood and left the tavern.

Eleanor sighed. "Max may be able to help matters, but she won't be able to stop all of them from going down there."

"No, I don't imagine she can," Rogers said cynically as he watched Max leave out the door.

"But there may be a way that you can prevent the rest of them, without looking like we're trying to prevent anything."

Rogers looked at her with a hint of a smile. "You have an idea."

"What if you were to go east of the bay and hold a parlay with Flint?" She took a step closer, minding not to get blood on her shoes. "Any man who would want to join Flint will have to wait with you -."

"And suffer my judgment," he finished for her.

Eleanor lifted her eyebrows. "Well, you can be severe."

He chuckled at this. "I like it. They will stay away from the beach out of shame. Clever."

"But you can do more than that," she pressed. "Instead of Flint recruiting men from Nassau, you can recruit him."

Hornigold had been listening in the shadows . "Flint and his whole crew rejected the pardons I offered."

In a soft, low voice, she said, "And how likely was it that Flint would have accepted your pardons, Captain Hornigold, while threatened with force, and by you?"

The captain squinted at Eleanor, turned towards Rogers and sputtered, "I-I offered them sincerely, my lord."

Rogers lifted his hand at Hornigold in acknowledgement. "I believe you, captain, but Miss Guthrie has a point. You and Flint have a history, involving alliances one moment and rivalry the next." He turned on his heel towards Eleanor. "Flint has no history with me whatsoever. He doesn't know me, nor my aim for Nassau. Meeting him, face to face, might make him see reason." Rogers indicated Eleanor to walk with him, and she fell in step with him. He took her aside where nobody could overhear, but Hornigold watched them both from afar. "Now, I backed your proposal there, but the captain also has a valid point - Flint and his crew preferred to risk death by sailing into a ship-killer over accepting pardons. That does not sound like the action of a reasonable man at all, especially in light of the crimes he committed in the colonies." Rogers pursed his lips. "Do you truly believe that Flint might see reason?"

"Yes."

Rogers sighed. "I very much doubt you believe this without having a specific reason for it." She started to open her mouth, but he said darkly, "And don't tell me it's because he wants to farm sugarcane. Eleanor, what do you know about Flint that nobody else does?"

Eleanor looked at her feet. "I know who Flint really is and why he became a pirate."

Rogers pressed his lips together in dismay. "You've been holding back on me."

"Not on purpose, no!" Eleanor said. "If Hornigold had not claimed Flint was dead, I would have told you sooner. But since all involved were supposedly dead, I felt it was of little consequence, except to drag up an old London scandal."

"I'm not pleased, Eleanor," Rogers said. "I decide whether something is of little consequence or not. Not you."

Eleanor flinched. "When Max mentioned Flint's name in relation to this, I intended to tell you all I know," she tried to explain. "If he is alive, you should know." She looked around at the regulars, Hornigold and his men. "But not here. In private. I have to show you something - a letter."

Rogers' stern eyes studied her. He pursed his lips and then sighed. "Let's go then."

Briskly, they returned to the mansion in silence. One moment she pledges her utter loyalty to me, then plays the housewife, and she was still keeping vital knowledge from me. And yet, he could not stay angry with her. What am I going to do? Put her on the Gloucestershire? Hours after making love to her? No, he was mostly angry with himself, getting himself well and good in a pickle with her. He had been prepared for all her female wiles when he lifted her out of her prison cell. He had been warned about her by Hornigold, Chamberlain, Captain Hume, the judge and herself. What he had not been prepared for was to fall in love with the diamond-in-the-rough Eleanor, the one who tried to shed her past, but still would make mistakes. And damn himself for wanting to get her as quick as possible for himself in private again. She managed to make him feel every range of emotion of the rainbow in a matter of hours. On top of that, he fumed over the murder. He was annoyed with Hornigold's failure to actually ensure that Flint was either dead, captured or an ally more than a month ago.

He dismissed their escort upon arrival, while Eleanor climbed the stairs to her apartments. "You won't be needed further." Rogers raced after her. But when he stood before her closed door and heard her rummage, he deliberated whether to enter or not, feeling foolish for loitering in front of a woman's door. But it was how he was raised. He never entered Sarah's room without being invited. All very English. This is stupid, he told himself. He grabbed the door handle, turned it.

Just then, Eleanor emerged, startled by his presence at her door. She waved the letter in her hand and closed the door, denying him a peek inside. "I have it!"

He opened the envelope and pulled the letter out, while they walked through the servant passage to his own apartments. It was written in a female hand and signed by Abigail Ashe, daughter of the late Lord Peter Ashe of Charleston. By the time Eleanor opened the doors for him into the office, he dropped the letter and turned to face her. "She says you saved her." He waved the paper in the air. "Do you realize that you would not even have been convicted to hang if you used this? One of the few illustrious survivors of the Charleston massacre personally vouched for you. Any judge would have gone for leniency."

"And where would I be then?" she whispered.

Flabbergasted, he gaped at her. "I still would have approached you to help me in ousting piracy from Nassau."

"The day you came to my cell, I thought you were death in human form to fetch me for Wapping." She said even in a lower voice. "And I did not care." She took a deep breath. "Then it turned out you were gifting me life." She met his eyes. "And I did not care." Finally, she murmured, "But now I do."

Rogers' features became still and some of the color of his face had drained. She had not been talking about a location, but a voyage of the soul. The letter was the first real window into the circumstances that led to the death of Richard Guthrie. In Rogers' mind, Eleanor's action when she saved Abigail Ashe from Vane was the purest, least selfish thing she may have done in her life, and he doubted most men would have had the brevity to do what she had done. And instead of gaining recognition she had lost everything for it - her father, her business, her freedom. And one of the main culprits behind it all, off-stage, had been him, when he reached out to Governor Tailer of the Province of Massachusetts Bay to help him bring down the fencing empire of Richard Guthrie.

After Rogers guaranteed Richard's father and Governor Tailer of Boston that England supported the idea of pardons, they agreed to send the HMS Scarborough to the Bahamas with the particular order to extract Richard Guthrie from Harbour Island and bring him to England. Instead of the father, Captain Hume delivered the daughter. Beggars could not be choosers, and Rogers decided to make do with the pirate that fate had given him, without her ever knowing she was a pawn in a political game and a judiciary theatre from the very beginning aimed at not giving her much of a choice if she wished to live. Rogers had not counted on falling in love with her though, and now he was in way over his ears. He was also convinced that in Eleanor he had found the actual jewel for all his plans. But Rogers was not keen on Eleanor realizing how much strings he had pulled to be where he was now, and how exactly she ended up caught in his net. The huge responsibility Eleanor piled on his shoulders to be her hero seemed unbearable then. We're all villains in Nassau, Rackham had said. Well at least I'm no Charles Vane, he shushed his conscious.

Slowly, he folded the letter and tapped it pensively in his hands. Her reluctance to disclose anything of this to the court, or to him, had nothing to do with Flint. It had all to do with Charles Vane and the murder of her father. Rogers knew he ought to dig further and ask her what actually happened, with Abigail, with Vane and her father, since it would clear up a lot of the mystery and might actually be of vital importance in his own relationship with her. He now saw the source of darkness inside Eleanor and it frightened him, for her. And yet, how could he demand her to share it with him, when he was unwilling to share his own darkness with her. He held out the letter for Eleanor to take back. "I see no mention of Flint in this personal correspondence."

Confused, Eleanor opened her mouth and closed it again. With trepidation, she had watched him, waited for him to inquire after Vane, pondering how much she would tell him, how to word it all. But he only asked after Flint. She blinked and took the letter back with trembling fingers. "A-Abigail does reference Flint, by his true name." When Rogers did not interrupt her, she said. "Flint is a pseudonym. His real name is Lieutenant James McGraw, a former naval officer who acted as a liaison between the Admiralty and the son of the Earl Alfred Hamilton, Lord Thomas Hamilton. Thomas Hamilton formed a proposal on how to deal with the Pirate Republic of Nassau. Lord Hamilton's wife, Lady Hamilton, lived here in the interior by her maiden name, as Mrs. Barlow."

Rogers walked to his cabinet against the wall and poured himself a glass of wine. Leaning on the cabinet, he stared at the painted wall in front of him, picked up the glass, downed it and poured more wine into it. "Thomas Hamilton was the first to introduce the idea of pardons," he whispered. Instead of the chair behind his desk, he moved aside one of the other chairs in front of it and flopped down into it. He pushed the other chair with his boot, indicating her to be seated in that one. "That was the London scandal you alluded to? That Thomas's best friend committed suicide after he went mad with grief over his best friend having a liaison with his beloved wife."

"Yes."

"Now you are saying they lived here, on the island, and McGraw is Captain Flint, most notorious and formidable pirate of the West Indies."

"Yes."

Rogers put his hand before his mouth, rubbing his stubble. "I never personally knew Lord Thomas, but my father-in-law, Ser Whetsone, was part of the admiralty at the time. Years later, in London, my friend Defoe and others discussed his proposal for Whitehall. There were a lot of various rumors about McGraw, Lady Hamilton and Thomas, but what was always very clear is that it was used to destroy the proposal and Thomas Hamilton with it. Lady Hamilton was notoriously known for having various affairs and Lord Thomas seemed to tolerate them. He would not have gone mad with grief over the last one. But his own father, one of the Lord Proprietors of Carolina, could not bear any further shame to his name in the form of treasonous pardons." He reached for her hand and took it gently in his. "This whole endeavor of mine would not exist without Thomas Hamilton, would not have been possible without him. Explain to me how you happened to save Abigail Ashe and what Flint has to do with it."

And so, Eleanor told him about Ned Low and how that maniac threatened to kill her and take over the island, while he held an unknown, valuable prize in his possession. She explained that when Ned Low challenged even Charles, the latter had killed Ned Low and took his prize who turned out to be the daughter of the governor of Carolina and intended to have a ransom for it. She clarified how Flint bombarded the fort to get Charles Vane out, how Lady Hamilton offered the solution to settle the feud. If Flint could deliver Abigail back to her father in Charleston, a reconciliation between Nassau and England could be negotiated, since Lord Peter Ashe had been their former friend and ally regarding the pardon proposal in Whitehall.

"Flint would have allowed Charles to remain in the fort in return for Abigail, but Charles demanded the Man O War for it. He rather had Abigail die in the gunning of the fort or hand her to his crew to be manhandled and was dead set against a reconciliation." Roger's hand holding hers gave her a warm feeling, reassured her, as she delved into the memory of risking everything by going down into those dark, damp cells. "I used a ruse to get inside the fort and acquire the keys, and then stole down into her cell with a letter from Lady Hamilton to convince her to trust me." She described her final meeting with Charles and his threats, and her choice to turn her back on him and run with Abigail. "I left him there to be killed by his own men," she whispered. "Instead he led his men to capture my father on his way to Mr. Underhill at the interior."

It was not hard for Rogers to figure out what ruse Eleanor must have used to get access to the fort's keys. She had fucked Charles to make him betray Teach eight years ago and she had fucked Charles to betray him personally. Worse, it was now hopelessly clear to him that the relationship she had with Charles in the past was more twisted and monstrous than he could have fathomed. Evidently, Eleanor felt torn over Charles in two opposite directions - guilt over her betrayal to him, and yet hating him. There can be no hatred without having loved first, Rogers thought. Or at the very least a love for the illusion one holds of the other. Hatred was born out of the crumbling of that illusion. It had been so between Sarah and himself. It must have been similar between Vane and Eleanor. Except, Vane had done something so violent, so damaging that could never be undone that Rogers feared it would leave a permanent mark on Eleanor. She was tied to Vane by hatred. She could never remember her father, without remembering fucking her father's murderer. The thought made Rogers livid. Vane might have left Nassau for good in physical form, but he was somehow inside Eleanor, in the hatred she felt for him, in the most horrifying memories. And Rogers wished him gone from there. Unwittingly, he had let go of her hand.

Eleanor had watched Rogers in silence as he leaned with his elbow on the desk, his chin resting on his knuckles, and looked out into the darkness of the night. He seemed oblivious to her presence. His jaw flexed with anger and his eyes only reflected harshness. He's angry over Charles, she believed. How I fucked him, used him for my own ends and left him to be slain by his own crew. Whatever he believed of me but a few hours ago, he can only be disillusioned by it now. Eleanor rose and whispered, "I think I should go."

Ever the gentleman, Rogers rose too. As she turned her back on him to move for the door, he took a giant stride and rested his hand on her hips, tugging the fabric of her dress. "Stay," he murmured.

(Rogers makes the Black Sails story since 1x01: I implied implied that Rogers was an off-screen character pulling the strings from the very beginning. The show certainly allows for it:

- S1: Richard Guthrie bribed the Proprietors for years to make him governor when English rule returned. The attempt to arrest him makes clear the Proprietors back someone else by then./ Captain Hume mentions "rumors in England", and yet his home port to dock is Boston. He follows the command of the chief-in-command in Boston, who has to work with the governor of Boston. For years the English Navy left Nassau alone. Suddenly a HMS goes to Royal Harbour to arrest Richard, and is keen on catching Flint. / Richard's painting of beheaded John the Baptist is shown several times. John prepares the way for the "savior". Hume prepares the way for Rogers./ Bryson (a Boston Guthrie man) claims he avoided speaking with Hume docked in front of Richard's home. But these men know each other and both sailed from Boston but several days apart. Bryson is quick enough to send a messenger to Hume before he leaves with the Andromache. The Bryson scenes can be re-watched as him having foreknowledge but testing Richard and Eleanor, to spy for Hume. He also takes Miranda's letter alone, proving a pardon for Flint is an actual option.

S2: Hume is still keen on catching Flint (the naval strategist), but not Charles Vane or Hornigold in his fort? After Richard's death he's ok with Eleanor, who is immediately sent to London. Why go through all that trouble for months, only to put a pirate on trial in London to hang them, which could have been done in any colony. Clearly Hume was on a mission of extraction with economical and military implications since S1./ As Governor of Charleston, Ashe would know Rogers' plans and his wish to get Flint. He must lure Flint to London. Is it likely that he wanted to avoid London and Rogers from finding out what a mess he made of it and prevent Flint from blabbing to Rogers about Ashe having played a double role in the past?

S3: Mr. Scott reminds Madi they should know at all times who the villain is, that the villain "makes" the story, and Madi begins to read Rogers' book. If Rogers did send Hume to extract Richard and Flint from the island, then yes he "made" the story since 1x01.

Rogers' historical tactics: he wished to subdue Madagascar, not Nassau. Rogers tested and proved pardon plans could work with Madagascar in 1713. He had local pirates extracted from the place, released them back onto Madagascar and gathered a long list of pirates petitioning for clemency. However, the East Indy Company preferred Madagascar pirates over a Madagascar Company (monopoly reasons). So, Rogers set his eye on Nassau instead - same tactics, different location. Show seemed to have dropped the historical Madagascar effort for Rogers and have him subdue Nassau earlier. Thomas Hamilton then becomes the fictional character that did Rogers' historical Madagascar groundwork but directly applied to Nassau.

Cupid & Psyche: Cupid pulls the strings of Psyche's fate unbeknowest to her and others. All that time, nobody truly knows that Cupid is behind it all, not even Psyche. It's all a set-up and instigated by him in secret, just like Rogers does here.)